Eden

EDEN

By Gregory Hoffman

Eden

Copyright 2010 by Gregory Hoffman

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form.

Cover design and art by Ronnell Porter

Check out Ronnel’s other cover designs at www.wix.com/ronnelldporter/design

License Notes

This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.  This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people.  If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person.  If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy.  Thank you for respecting and supporting the hard work of this author.

Author’s Note: This book is a work of fiction.  Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.  Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental…

although it would be freaking cool if it wasn’t…

Dedicated to:

My wife, Mihoko

May she always be beside me, to inspire me

Everything I do, I do for her

Gregory Hoffman is an American now living in Japan. Check out his humorous blog explaining the “little differences” between the two cultures.

http://little-differences-in-japan.blogspot.jp/

Other books by Gregory Hoffman

The Abnorms

1

If you are reading this manuscript something must have happened to me; I would never, knowingly, allow these secrets to be revealed. Not because they would endanger my life, it is far too late for me to worry about that, but because they would endanger the life of the only girl I have ever loved.

Hopefully, by writing all of this down, I can try to make some sense out of all the crazy things that have occurred since I had first met Eden. Many of the things revealed in this chronicle may sound unbelievable, but rest assured that everything documented in this account is true.

First let me start out by introducing myself; my name is Thomas Atwell and my account begins just before the start of my junior year in high school. I was not what you would call popular in school, but I did have a small group of close knit-friends. I was just your average sixteen year old boy, growing up in the small town of East Harbor, a suburb in New Jersey.

I can’t explain where they came up with the name of East Harbor, since no place in the small town could boast ownership of the fabled harbor from whence the town had gotten its name. There weren’t even sufficient water ways that would require the construction of a harbor, yet somehow in the distant past, someone had decided that East Harbor was the perfect name for our otherwise harbor-less town, and it was here that my tale begins…

It was a sunny mid-afternoon in early September when she first entered my life. Her arrival was announced by the roar of a diesel engine. Disturbed by the loud noise, I peered out of my bedroom window to the vacant house next door, just in time to see the burly driver and his helper climb down from the large moving van that had just parked at the curb. My curiosity turned to shock when I saw the young, thin girl hop from the back seat of the truck’s cab.

She appeared to be about my age and my height, but that’s where all our similarities ended. She was beautiful. She had long black hair and moved with a graceful stride borne of confidence. From my vantage point, she looked to be vaguely Asian, but I couldn’t be sure. The other strange thing was that I couldn’t locate her parents. Other than furniture and boxes, the van seemed to have only conveyed the two movers and the girl.

I wasn’t sure how long I stood there, entranced by her beauty, but I soon realized that the girl had stopped moving up the lawn and just stood there, her head upturned, looking straight up at me. She must have noticed my shock because a bright smile crossed her face. It wasn’t a sultry smile or an evil grin; it was a warm, innocent smile that seemed to say ‘hi neighbor’ and it was beautiful. I quickly ducked back from the window, both embarrassed and elated.

If I had been a bold and confident youth, I would have hurried downstairs and across the yard to introduce myself to the Asian beauty next door; but in reality I was neither and as a result, I stayed in my house, sprawled across my bedroom floor.

For the first time in my life I tried to console myself with the knowledge that school would be starting in a few days. Surely, we will be attending the same school; East Harbor High was the only public high school in the area. It would be easier to introduce myself there. Just as I was beginning to feel better, my cell phone rang, startling me back to reality.

Snatching up the phone off my bed, the caller was identified at Matt.  Flipping it open, I said, “What’s up?”

“What are you doing?” Matt asked.

“Nothing,” I said quickly. I realized at once that I didn’t want to tell Matt anything about the beauty next door.

Matthew Long had been my friend long before high school; as far back as I could remember, in fact, but Matt wasn’t as shy as I was and I was afraid that if I told him about the girl, he would come over and sweep her off her feet. Thinking back, there was about as much a chance as me winning the lottery as there was of Matt Long sweeping anyone off their feet.

Matt was a big guy, he wasn’t fat, but he wasn’t defined like a body builder either; he was just big and solid. He would have made an excellent football player, if he was interested in sports, but the closest he got to playing football was the most recent John Madden video game. He was a nice guy, though, with a heart of gold. He wouldn’t try anything with the new girl if he knew how I felt about her, but that was the problem; how did I feel about her? Even I couldn’t, honestly, answer that question.

“You want to go to the mall?” Matt asked.

“Not really,” I told him, “we’ve gone to the mall like every day.” It wasn’t the fact that we went to the mall everyday, the truth was, I wanted to sit and brood over the girl some more.

“Alright,” Matt answered, “but if you change your mind, Kyle and I will be there.”

Kyle Lafferty was another one of my friends from high school. I hadn’t known him as long as I knew Matt, but it was close. Kyle was the owner of the previously mentioned John Madden video games, and just about any other video game you could imagine; Kyle was a tech-fiend. If there was a new electronic gadget, Kyle was likely to have it, take it apart and make it even better than it had been. I wasn’t worried about him stealing the girl away from me, he was even more shy than I was, and even if he hadn’t been, like most tech-fiends, he didn’t pay much attention to his physical appearance.

There was a fourth member of our quartet, and his name was Dwight Drakeford or Drake as we called him, but unfortunately, he spent the summers with his father in Florida. He should be returning home tonight and we had already all made plans to meet up with him first thing tomorrow morning. Drake would be my toughest competition. He liked to think that he was a ladies’ man, and if I didn’t make my move soon; he would be the one that would, most likely, steal her away from me.

“Ok,” I said and terminated the call.

After placing the cell phone back down on my desk, I went to the window, but the yard was empty except for the moving men bringing furniture into the house; the girl was nowhere to be seen. Disappointed, I went back to watching the TV show that I had been watching before.

I, periodically, looked out the window in hopes of catching another glimpse of my beautiful neighbor, but to no avail. Suddenly, my heart jumped as I glanced out to see a figure approaching my house; but my hopes were immediately dashed when I recognized the figure to be ‘Sir Strolls-a-Lot.’

Sir Strolls, as we called him for short, was an old black man who lived at the end of my block. He could often be found strolling up and down my street, stopping only to shake his fist and yell at us young-uns, accusing us of things we have never done, nor had even thought of doing.

Sir Strolls paused at the curb in front of my new neighbor’s house, maybe trying to see if it contained any new young-uns for him to yell at in the future. Finally, after a few moments, he moved on with a strange look on his face, maybe secretly disappointed in not detecting any new kids to hassle.

That night after my mom got home from work, I was trying to find the right time to bring up the subject of our new neighbors next door in the hopes that, she had heard something about them. During dinner, I finally found my chance.

“Hey, Mom,” I began, “do you know who moved in next door?”

She looked up in surprise, “You mean someone bought the old Logan place?”

Suffering disappointment for the second time that day, I didn’t answer.

“What are they like?” she asked.

“I didn’t see the owners,” I informed her, “only their daughter.”

“Oh,” she smiled, at once recognizing my agonized expression, “what’s her name?”

“I don’t know,” I confessed, “I didn’t talk to her.”

My mom knew how shy I was, especially around girls; even more so around attractive girls.

“Well, then,” she announced, rising from her chair, “let’s go over and welcome them to the neighborhood.”

Horrified, I tried to stop her, “Shouldn’t we wait for Dad?” I tried, reasoning with her, “We don’t know anything about these people, they could be dangerous.”

“Come on,” she reassured me, winking, “if their daughter is that cute, how dangerous could they be?”

“Don’t go, Mom,” I pleaded, horrified at the thought of my mom saying something embarrassing to that girl.

“If you’re worried about my safety,” she said, “come with me and protect me.”

In spite of my protests, my mom went out the back door and walked around to the front of our neighbor’s house, dragging me in tow. The last thing in the world I wanted to do was show up on the doorstep of this beautiful girl’s home with my mom. My contemplation was shattered by the most fearful noise I had ever heard, my mom knocking on the door.

I was just about to drag my mom from the steps and back home when the front door swung open. Standing before me, framed in the golden light from the entry hall, stood the beautiful girl from this afternoon.

Even though she was almost the same height as me, her petite frame made her seem somewhat smaller, more vulnerable. Her skin was porcelain white, in sharp contrast to her long, straight jet black hair. Her heart-shaped face was beautiful just as I had remembered from earlier that afternoon. Her brilliant, almond-shaped eyes were a deep and sensual emerald. She looked Asian, but something more, something I couldn’t place my finger on. I tried to speak, to say hello, or anything; but nothing would come out of my mouth.

“Hi,” my mom said, extending a hand, “My name is Pam Atwell and this is my son, we live next door. We just stopped by to welcome you to the neighborhood.”

“Hi,” the girl said in a musical voice that matched the beauty of her appearance, “My name is Eden, Eden Sinclair.”

She extended her hand to my mother and then to me. I stood there, frozen for a second, unsure of how to proceed. My mom silently kicked my foot and I regained my composure.

“My name is Thomas,” I finally managed, “I live next door.”

“I know,” she giggled, the sound rang like music in my ears, “I saw you this afternoon.”

My mom looked at me, as if to say, I thought you didn’t meet her yet, but I ignored her, instead I shook Eden’s hand. Her hands were warm and soft, like nothing I had ever felt before. I wanted to stand like that forever, with her hand in mine. Reluctantly though, I released it and my hand dropped back to my side, feeling cold and lifeless.

“Are your parents at home, Eden?” my mom asked, “I’d like to meet them and introduce myself.”

“I’m sorry,” Eden explained, my heart seemed to ache at the thought of her sorrow, “My parents won’t be here for a few days yet, they are away on business right now. They travel a lot, unfortunately.”

“Oh, well if you need anything at all,” my mom offered, much to my delight, “please feel free to come on over.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Atwell,” she said beaming a smile that lighted the doorstep like an afternoon sun, “I sure will.”

When she turned that sunny smile in my direction, I thought I would swoon under its effect. I must have stood there, dumbfounded, after Eden closed the front door because soon my mother was nudging me off the doorstep and back across the yard.

“She sure is cute,” my mom whispered to me as we entered our yard. I nodded my head in agreement; although, cute was inadequate to describe her beauty.

“I think she is Asian,” my mom continued, “or at least a mix. Those green eyes were breath-taking.” Again I nodded my head in mute agreement.

My mother laughed, “Could you please say something?”

“So,” I squeaked, in a voice barely recognizable as my own, “do you think I made a good impression?”

My mother laughed again, “Of course you did. I’m surprised she had enough self control to keep from flinging herself into your arms.”

Even though I could detect the mocking tone in my mother’s voice, the thought of Eden flinging herself into my arms, nevertheless sent shivers of delight down my spine. As we entered the house, I could foresee endless hours of fantasy playing through my mind tonight before sleep would finally claimed me.