All Comments on 'Accidental Hero Ch. 09-12'

Thanks!

Very nice story. Thanks for sharing.

Wish he could have found a way go learn about Karen and symphony just as old friends and family should

Another winner for you! Enjoyed this!

Really liked it! This story could really keep going though.

If you write it I will read and enjoy it. Five stars doesn't do justice to the quality and development of this tale. I agree with a previous comment it could go on until old and grey and I believe it would be enjoyable till the end.

Thanks!

I enjoyed most of the story, but didn't like how willing he was to get back with Shelly after she broke his heart for so stupid a reasoning, seems like it was nothing more than her being insecure.

It should have made him a tad more wary and less trusting over her, because what might she do if she becomes insecure in other circumstances?

Better to move on than return to the past, it didn't seem like he tried very hard to do so, it's far from impossible to find dates that like the same things as him, especially at university.

Excellent. Could go another chapter or two and bring back Sym and Karen for the wedding as friends.

However, I agree with Ib-says that Shelly dumped him in a careless and cruel manner. She seemed to do well enough for 4 years without him. He should have requested another therapist. Still, (sigh) I suppose that the new and improved (and mature) version is so much more stable and ready to get married. (Mild sarcasm, there) But honestly, couldn't he find one more girl who fit his criteria? Only 3 in the entire northwest quadrant of North America? I liked it enough for a 5 star rating, even with those warts at the end. Thanks for writing. JPR

I felt the end of the story was a logical conclusion and the final end of the tale.

Great Story - nuf sed.

The ending was lame.

The girl he should have got back with was Kelsey.

Apart from that good story.

4*

and it's hello, how are you, want to get married?

No Way!

If he's going to get back together with someone how about this alternative:

Bud suggests he get a Masters in Management, focused on government.

Kelsey gets a scholarship to the local uni for post grad Masters

They meet in classes, date for 2 years, marry, he runs for and is elected Mayor, 2 kids, picket fence, happily ever after.

A shame it didn't end with him meeting and falling in love with Kelsey.

Shelly just dumped him out of the blue with a pretty poor reasoning.

I really don't see why he would be so willing to attempt dating her again.

In his shoes I would have had a bit of trouble trusting Shelly, there would always be that lingering worry.

Once bitten, twice shy.

It really bugged me that he didn't try to seriously move on, instead wasting four years without a real relationship.

I doubt Shelly has been doing the same.

I thought it would be Kelsey also. Could have had a real strange twist at the end . Good story though. REALLY like not being pissed off at the end.

bloody neat reading.

thankyou

I don't understand the comments telling the author how to write his story.

I enjoyed the story being set in Canada.

We all may know someone like this. In the right place at the right time and does the right thing. Very good story with a great cast of characters.

I liked it for several reasons, the main one, I think, being that it doesn’t have any of the mean-spiritedness that you see so often in stories here. Don’t get me wrong, I still enjoy “Loving Wives” stories very much but a change of pace can be a good thing. I have to admit, I thought early on he would end up getting back with his first girlfriend, the one he saved from being run down by the car during the baseball game. But hey, nothing wrong with Michele, she certainly seemed like a winner, particularly after she matured a little. All in all, a very good story.

The whole story was excellent, and made me want to believe in second chances.

Thanks for the great writing. Happy Endings are the best.

Liked it that it didn't get the predictable ending. Liked it that people are just people in this one. I understood that Shelly broke up with him under the circumstances when she did; it was better to do the hard thing and break up then staying in a relationship where you feel suffocated and strangled. That would have become a very bitter one sided relationship. This way she learned to overcome her inner struggles and insecurities, there was never any dishonesty or maliciousness in the break-up, she needed to figure herself out. Lucky for her he hadn't given up on her. Usually it's males that need to mature. Nice twist.

the breakup seemed to be more of a plot device than a natural outcome of the relationship, and their reuniting was a bit rushed.

I agree with some who suggested getting Kelsey back in the picture, but to do it right would have added 50% more length to the story, (not a negative, but it would be a lot of work to do it justice.)

I can certainly relate to Ian's propensity to being an accidental hero. It's happened to me several times in my life. I worked at a fast food place when I was in high school in the late '60's, early '70's. It was on the SW corner of an intersection on the main street of my hometown. The main street was four lanes, but the cross street was a small two lane residential street.

Across that residential street, on the NW corner was a Texaco service station. Just north of it was a small, older Dodge dealership. Nothing like today's dealerships, and much smaller than either the Ford, Chevrolet or GMC dealers in town.

One weekend morning, maybe 5 minutes before opening, I had just dumped the first batch of french fries into a metal pan, located under several heat lamps. The day shift 'waitress', Lois, was salting the fries, and shaking the pans to distribute the salt.

I paused to stand beside Lois, and chat a minute, which allowed me a view out of the window, looking north at the Texaco. Before I had a chance to say anything, a Dodge station wagon pulled away from the gas pump, and took the pump with it. The hose was still in the car, and it pulled the pump right off it's base.

This would have been 1970, maybe '71, and before automatic shutoff valves were integrated into pump designs, precisely for the reason we were witnessing. With an auto shutoff, if a pump is toppled, the valve closes the pump's supply pipe.

Without an automatic shutoff valve, when a pump is pulled over, or run into, and knocked over, (those uniquitous 6" concrete filled guard posts did NOT exist back then, so hitting a pump would be easy.), and there is any spark, the supply pipe ignites, and the heat of the gas turns it into a mini oil well fire.

As the Dodge pulled the pump over, there WAS a spark, and everything happened so fast, before Lois could even gasp at the instant ignition of the gas, the flame was the height of a person.

I don't know what I said to her, but I immediately headed for the back door, which opened on the north side of our building, looking right at the Texaco.

There was a small table the manager would work at, but there there was really no room for a chair. He was sitting at the desk, as I rounded the corner at full speed. I grabbed the small fire extinguisher by the desk as I barreled past him, yelling, "The Texaco's on fire, call the fire dept.", as I blasted out the door.

As I reached full stride, and got to the street, the flames were reaching to the roof of the island, easily 15' high. I was not thinking, I was acting. My immediate thought when I saw the pump get pulled over, and the fire start was, 'That fucking tank is gonna explode and we're all gonna die.'

I raced across the street, ran right up to the plume of fire, stuck the nozzle of the extinguisher into it, and pulled the trigger. To my amazement, it just killed the fire. It was almost anti-climatic, it was so easy to put it out.

As the fire died, I was standing in just the right position where I could see the Fire Chief's red sedan come flying into the station from Main Street. I didn't have to move my body, or head to see the car, or the fire truck just behind it.

I grew up with the son of the Chief, from 7th grade on, and knew the Chief, as well. He'd been a summer baseball coach of mine. (My hometown was only 7,000 people, and I think I knew 6,000 of them. LOL Well, maybe only 4,500...)

As the shocks settled on the Chief's red Chevy, he was already out of the door, and heading in my direction. I had stepped over the pump supply pipe, and started walking to meet him, as soon as I got over the shock of putting out the fire so easily.

(I have never really thought about Chief Wolfe's POV as he arrived until just now. There was about 100' between the Texaco, and the back wall of the Dodge dealership that was a graveled area wear they parked used cars. He could have easily witnessed me run up to the fire and douse it. I never talked to him about what he saw, so I'll never know.)

Chief Wolfe was a huge man. Not fat, huge, but proportionally huge. He could put a baseball in his palm, close his hand, and you could not see the ball. I remember that from when I was a kid.

In my first career, I was an athletic trainer at a Pac 8 college, (Pac 10, today), and in pro football and pro baseball for 13 years, total. I also consulted with the Portland NBA team for a couple of years. I never met anyone as physically big as Chief Wolfe. He stood 6' 10"-6' 11", if I recall correctly.

Chief Wolfe was also the kindest, most soft spoken, and gentle man I've ever known, (when my friend, Ron, his youngest son, effed up, though, his 'loud' voice would make an effin' Grizzly pause, and reconsider whatever they were doing. LOL). He was working with one of the pitchers on our summer team, and a ball he threw got past the 2nd string catcher, (I was the starting catcher.), and hit me on the forearm, AFTER bouncing off the grass. The seams of the baseball left a precision blood bruise on my arm.

He was so apologetic, concerned, and careful as he checked it out, and iced it for me, it was almost embarassing. Hell, I was a catcher. I regularly got beat up by baseballs, bats, and cleats. (It did hurt like bejesus, though.)

I walked up to the Chief, looked up at him and said, 'Glad you showed up, but I got it covered.' Adding, 'I gotta get back to work, see you later.' I turned and walked off. He never said a word, just stood there looking down at me, then back up at the empty space where the pump had been. Over and over.

I headed back to the Arctic Circle, and saw my manager, standing a half- dozen steps out of the back door, and Lois standing in the doorway. As I got within ten feet of my boss, he yelled, "Are you out of your fucking mind? You could've been killed!"

As I walked past him, I said, 'We're gonna need a new fire extinguisher, this one is empty. I imagine Chief Wolfe will refill it, free, since I did their job for them.'

I walked up to Lois, (we had a 'love-hate' relationship, at best.), she moved aside, held the screen door for me, as I entered the back door, and set the extinguisher on the floor by the manager's table.

i washed my hands at the sink, and went back to my work area, and continued with the remainder of my opening duties.

I never felt any adrenaline let down, or nerves. The manager, who I was good friends with, after 3 years of working for him, gave me some more, 'are you nuts' dialogue, along with some general, 'I don't believe what I saw, or you did.'

But, years later, what I found was most interesting about the while thing was I never heard a single word from anyone about it. Nothing from Chief Wolfe, or anyone else. In a small town, where NOTHING happens, you would have thought, it would have been a big deal: '17 Year Old Burger Flipper Puts Gas Station Blaze'.

It was like everyone witnessing it took it in stride, just like I did. Well, except my manager. LOL

No doubt, though, it was a singular unique experience... In a life of many unique experiences.

I later found out the Dodge wagon was driven by the wife of the owner of the Dodge dealership. She was used to signing for gas and driving away. It just so happened, my friend who was working that day, had her sign BEFORE he'd taken the nozzle out of the tank.

She was oblivious, dragging the pump out of the station, onto Main Street, and back into the front of the dealership, where someone finally stopped her, after seeing the gas pump being drug like a kid's pull toy. LOL

Also, after my shift was over, I went over to talk to my friend who worked at the Texaco. We looked up at the tall awning over the pumps, and could see slight burn marks in the white paint.

About 15 years later, I was back in town, during an off season and started an auto repair business with an old friend. We ended up buying that Texaco station from someone who had disassembled it. We planned on using it as a paint spray booth.

As we were loading and hauling the building pieces to our shop, I remembered the day Mrs Muncie ripped the pump off it's mountings, and told my partner the story. We got to looking, found the awning pieces, and the black fire marks were still there.

Our partnership failed, as they frequently do, but we are still friends. He now lives a couple miles out of town. The service bay portion of the station is erected on his property, and the awning pieces are in a pile beside it. I imagine the fire marks are still there, as well. LOL

GeoD

Great story line, I only question is, was Shelly alone whole time she was apart from Ian, if she was then why did she not try to reconnect. The story should have detailed what she was doing during the time she was apart from Ian. I was glad to see the happily ever after in the end All in all it was still well written and great content. 5 stars

Enjoyed it immensely.

This story was a gem. The character "Soup" was well developed. In your next story try and spend mre detail about the other really interesting character Sympathy.

A great read!

Once I started reading, I didn't want to stop!

Great story! 5 stars

Thanks