J'ai pour habitude pendant que j'écris "un petit quelque chose" de marquer une légère pause lorsqu'une autre idée me vient en tête, afin de la poser sur papier pour avoir une belle trace écrite. Depuis septembre j'écris un roman, premier tome d'une trilogie du crime. Trilogie liée par son thème et ses lieux. J'ai marqué une pause pour écrire le premier chapitre du second tome écrit exclusivement en anglais (il y a aura une traduction en français par la suite), qui s'intitulera Ben Franklin - Let's talk about Lenny. Bonne lecture, et n'étant pas anglais, si j'ai commis des erreurs, ça m'aiderait beaucoup d'être corrigé. Merci pour tout le temps que vous réserverez à la lecture de ce texte.
KingsU
BEN FRANKLIN
Let's talk about Lenny
Foreword
This book hasn't searched to tarnish Benjamin Franklin's image. It's with respect I've chosen this icon among the great people. It's written with a dark style to permit, I hope, a better immersion. Anything that follows these words should be considered with precaution – the fictional foreword after it inform of some details in spite of the fictional style already present.
I wish you a good reading, by recalling you it's just a fiction.
Yoann Leroy
Fictional foreword
The Author chose an idol, symbol of the good deed and goodwill because Lenny loves Benjamin Franklin. And when Lenny loves, Author completes it. Lenny does wonderful nonsenses, and this is why you will appreciate him. But, even in his mistakes, Lenny stays clever.
You will enter in the privacy of a protagonist a little too atypical – Lenny, which we talked about him previously. Lenny loves Benjamin Franklin, because Lenny, and only Lenny, loves to give a bad name to great people, and in an indirectly same way to the USA. However, nothing happen over there – in the USA. Imagine you will be somewhere in North America – probably Canada.
You will find violences and dark style in it. You will even find horrors and different things that could be unacceptable. Sensitive readers, you're warned.
Author loves USA.
Author wishes a pleasant reading.
The Author
“At twenty years of age the will reigns; at thirty the wit; at forty the judgement.”
Benjamin Franklin
“Triad of decades:
‘Willingness’ : do things because envy pushes us. What also pushes us to become what we are by the‘good’ willingness. My ‘good’ willingness is ‘good’ because it's my willingness, and because I cannot control it.
‘Spirit’: To become present in each of them.
‘Judgement’: To fall back into vice.”
New interpretation of the Benjamin Franklin's thoughts
By Ben Franklin
FIRST PART
Lenny's Back
April 12th, 2024
Lenny Lloyd used to drive on route 62. He was travelling asphalt at the pace of his Ford for hours and hours, even in the setting Sun. Some people persist to search this magical way to unwind. If not, they break down. Lenny, He was driving.
By day or night, at dawn or dusk, he didn't care. On Tuesdays and Fridays, Lenny was driving. It was a quiet and soothing road. His own psychoanalysis to avoid the inevitable. He had been taking this road for ten years. Since then, nothing harmful came to obscure his thoughts.
Anyone. Never anyone.
Friday the twelth. Eighteen hours. Lenny was driving. On sixty second the Sun was shining. About thirty kilometers of spiritual escape was waiting for him. Loud music – Tom Waits on Friday –, He didn't barely exceed forty miles per hour. Goin' Out West echoed in the year fifty nine Mustang. Window open to smoke, in the distance the horizon snapped up his attention.
Lenny's look focused on a shadow. Disturbed by the setting Sun, It merely looked like a shaky stain. It moved heavily. Not close enough to see the real form, Lenny pressed somewhat stronger on the gas pedal. The milometer indicated fifty miles per hour. Over time and always at the pace of the Mustang, the shadow was turning into a silhouette, then the silhouette became man. In his thirties, Lenny thought when he was close to the man. Few cars – not to say neither – passed on the 62. On the way back, Lenny knew he would appear in front of him. And that wasn't the question. What preoccupied Lenny was if he should stop or if he would resist the urge when he met him again.
He passed close to the hitchhiker two minutes ago. In his mirror, the man returned to silhouette before become again a shadow.
Anyone. Never Anyone.
Fifteen minutes. The shadow was no longer. The sky which was overhanging on the sandy plains was coated by an orange color. The 62 was not ended yet. On his seat, Lenny was waddling. Tonight, He would not travel his firty kilometers of asphalt. No, surely not. A thought struck his mind: at forty the judgement.
Lenny slowed down the car before swerving on the right of the road. A thick and sandy mist appeared. Lenny turned the steering wheel in the other direction. He had a remarkable composure. The album was over. Once he had done his detour, he parked his car on the side of the road. The Mustang, a wise choice to Lenny. He approved the saying which said “Old tech, best tech”. And, he loved the good old Yank mechanic. He used to put a CD player between the car door and the seat.
“Come on Lloydi Lloyd” He said when he bent down toward the glove box. It contained a pair of scissors, some files. And, two albums. On that, dust had accumulated. He rubbed the housing. On one of two, there was a man in black, a hat in his hand – probably Tom Waits – and Mule Variations were inscribed on it. This album was been here for so long.
Lloydi Lloyd or Ben Franklin. Those were the nicknames that he gave to himself. Lloydi Lloyd came to him straight from his childhood, Ben Franklin from what he liked to do ten years ago. From what he would do again today.
The 59's Mustang stopped a few meters in front of the hitchhiker, with the warning lights on. Lenny had taken some precautions. Because Lenny hadn't felt this for a long time. If it's my jugement, so do things by preparing them as well as possible, He thought on the way back. Huh, so do things in the good way, step by step. So a decade deserved more precautions than before, and a better attention too.
Excitation but likewise a dose of anxiety intermingled in Lenny's dark thoughts who, on the surface didn't lose his nerve. His body never betrayed him. In the inside mirror, he monitored the man's approach who was reddening by the rear lamps of the car. The only things that would betray him was his hands which grasped frantically the steering wheel. Yet, Lenny oversaw everything, every detail that could go against his intentions. So, since the moment when the hitchhiker disappeared from his line of sight, Lenny released the steering wheel.
The man who didn't let his face show arrived in front of the window of the passenger's side. Leaning on the car roof as an tired old man, he knocked on the glass. Lenny had handed his right hand toward the door crank when the man's face appeared. The man had a straight face. On his facial wrinkles, Lenny perceived all the road, the hard life's uncertainties and some other things that he probably crossed. In between the hairs of his thick and worn beard, some words came out of his mouth:
“Ester. This is where you're going?” His voice was deep and serious. Closer, he seemed he was rather middle aged. Once more, Lenny leaned toward the car door and took back the CD player.
“Come in !” He said with a likeable smile.
The two men drove five kilometers without a word. Lenny began to talk:
“Lenny” he said, holding out his hand to the hitchhiker. The man hesitated an instant. Then, he took it.
“Mark”
The navy blue sky announced the beginning of the night.There were only a zest of sunshine already relayed by the moonlight. He imagined these two stars such gods who watch over us, day and night. Lenny loved this transfer. It was also during this transfer he had his old habits. Those of ten years ago.
Lenny understood the human psychology. And, to do the talking softens anxiety. Mark seemed worried. Maybe because he was with Lenny. Maybe it was nightfall. Perhaps both. Therefore he did the talking.
“Where are you from, Mark ?
- As far as the road can take me.”
A poet, Lenny said in his head.
“And where do you locate this “as far” exactly?”
Lenny felt the man hesitate, as if he was searching his words. What to say and not say to him. Finally, he opened his mouth:
“I was born in Esther. I left this town fifty years ago. Now I come back.”
I come back too, thought Lenny.
“Family or friends to contact ?
- Nobody”
Lenny had a talent for talking. He could talk for hours without committing a faux pas. It was necessary to calm and improving the atmosphere. So he improved the atmosphere.
“You like music Mark ? Lenny slowed the car a little.
- It's doesn't bore me.
- Tom Waits never annoys !” Lenny said looking at the man, once more with a smile. “I like music. It relaxes me.
After few minutes, Mark took the floor:
“I was Lucky to meet you.
- Lucky ? There is no luck when you meet someone like me.” He slowed a little more.
“Like you ?” Mark's intonation was uncertain, between interrogation and obfuscation.
“You don't speak about chance when you meet a guy who drives every Tuesday and Friday on this road.” And who NEVER meet anyone, he thought.
Lenny removed his foot from the gas pedal entirely and let it die along the side of the road.
“Is there a problem ? Mark said.
- No” Lenny said, maybe to reassure him – or not. “Wait here, I'm coming back”
A short time after these words, Lenny was already out. He had left the headlights and the engine running as before. He began to go around to the rear of the Mustang. In darkness, he took a switchblade knife out of his pocket. He stuck it along his left leg. He took a look in the car. Mark didn't move. Arriving at the right rear wheel, he knelt down and he planted his knife in the tire. The sound of the car stifled the noise of the perforation as planned. The lack of lighting had certainly not permitted Mark to realize something had happened. And, with the subtlety of the stabbing and the natural of Lenny, Mark, who had seemed anxious, would be clueless if he had looked in the rear-view mirror.
Lenny went in front of the door where Mark was. He knocked. Mark, who had not see him, startled a little. He opened the window.
“Want to help me ? Lenny Said. We have a problem.”
Mark thought an instant. He considered the man with distrust.
“What kind of problem ?
- Oh, not big.Tyre problem.”
Mark left the vehicule and followed him. Lenny wasn't frightening, he had even no personality. The kind of man with whom you have no worry.
Lenny opened the car boot, took a wrench and gave it to Mark.
“Can you do it ? Lenny said. I will detach the spare wheel.
- Ok.”
Mark is heartened, thought Lenny. He thinks that I will not be behind him when he will take care of the wheel. Lenny smiled when Mark knelt down toward the wheel. Lenny took again his switchblade knife out of his pocket, and gazed at the man. It was the moment. The restart - At forty the judgement. Yes, Lenny was a killer. And Mark was his victim.
Je vais prendre tout en considération ! Pour les majuscules, je me suis pris cette lubie de mettre des majuscules à tous les pronoms personnels: grosse erreur de ma part (sur open office, le pp "I" est automatiquement mis en majuscule. Du coups une lubie m'est venue ^^
Pour "Sun": le soleil est un nom de planète, d'où là majuscule, à mon sens j'y tenais. Peut-être que c'est une erreur en effet.
Pour les tournures de phrases très française, c'est bien là mon soucis oui :)
Pour le reste, les majuscule, la ponctuation, ce sont des erreurs que je ne devrai pas faire en effet. Pour la ponctuation du dialogue, c'est mon copier-coller qui a merdé, et j'ai dû remettre les tirets de début de dialogues, j'en ai oublié, et je suis aussi fautif par endroits.
"Lenny wasn't frightening, he had even no personality" Je veux dire: Lenny n'était pas effrayant, il n'avait même aucune personnalité.
Je vais vraiment prendre en considération chaque petit point que tu as relevé. Je corrige ça ce soir. Je te remercie!
Si j'ai le temps, je publierai ce soir le début de mon premier roman (en français).