Sometimes the most interesting situations present themselves in the most unexpected places.
I’d been driving along the coast highway for several hours, just drifting. I hadn’t seen any other traffic for miles, just a few cars parked by the beach access a few miles back. I used the parking area to stop, stretch and explore a bit. The turn off wasn’t too far from the nearest town; maybe a half an hour or so to the south, and secluded. The beach was a good walk from the parking area, down a trail cut through a strand of pines, then another distance around scattered driftwood and thick brush. I was the only person on the beach, with a few surfers about a mile down the coastline. A few minutes walk along the beach and I found a nice, rocky little cove, tucked away. It was a perfect, private place to relax and have some fun.
I decided to file the spot away in my head, and head into town for a bite to eat.
I was so distracted after finding the cove, I almost missed the for sale sign on the opposite side of the highway. Deciding to put lunch off a few more minutes, I pulled a quick u-turn across the divider and drove back.
Lord knows how long it ago the realty had put up the sign. I could barely make out a faded phone number and the name of the realty selling the property. Right next to the sign was a driveway, overgrown and neglected, that angled up through the hill.
Maybe I had time to explore a little more.
A few minutes later, the drive opened into a small parking lot, full of potholes and weeds, with a large old A frame style building stuck into a clump of trees set at it’s edge, just above the freeway, facing out over the ocean.
Another for sale sign was driven into the flower beds at the front of the building, with a small plastic box attached to the post, half full of mildewed paper flyers. I pulled a flyer from the box and walked around the front, reading. A photo of smiling Clem Jones, the real estate agent, stared out at me from the front of ... Læs hele novellen
