Memory

By Willard Easley

Time travel is impossible. Jethro "Gracy" Johnson knew that without a doubt. But he invested millions of dollars in the construction of a most unique time machine - a very old house from his childhood in rural Mississippi. And he enlisted the help of a childhood friend to help him fulfill the purpose of his time machine. He needed it to go back and correct an event that had derailed a future he desired. He needed to go back in time to marry the girl he had always loved - Memory Morgen. And, in a most unique way, he accomplished the impossible. Or so it seemed.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Willard Easley
• Release date: Jun 11, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463619537

Book preview

November 8, 1963

Jethro Johnson sat nervously on the wooden seat, paying no attention to the game on the field. Throughout the entire contest, he had been rewriting in his mind the words he would say to the small girl seated away up behind his left shoulder - in the upper corner of the bleachers. He had been practicing them for days and now he felt he had them down perfectly, from the calm, casual tone of his adolescent voice to the nuance of the meanings of the words. He knew where he would be holding his hands, how he would be standing, and every response to any possible reply she may give to his greeting. He was practiced and prepared.

The people around him were cheering suddenly. Apparently, the Buhl Bulldogs had scored a go-ahead touchdown. He paid them no mind. His thoughts were on more important matters. He continued the rehearsal of his words. Suddenly the air horn signaling the end of the game sounded, causing him to jump with both excitement and anticipation of the events that were about to unfold. With renewed nervousness he stood and turned.

There she was, beginning her descent of the old, oak plank steps. Like Miss America walking down the runway to receive her crown, he thought. She would be surprised, he thought. She would be happy.

He turned toward the wide green field and lifted his leg to take the single step to the ground where he would again turn to face her and begin his soliloquy.

And his thirteen-year old, clumsy, growing foot -- uninstructed in the importance of the moment -- caught on the edge of the seat in front of him. He struggled briefly to regain his balance. It was futile. He fell -- headfirst into the hard-packed ground at the base of the stadium, arms flailing and eyes wide open to the impending catastrophe. He felt the hard, large rock dig into the soft flesh just above his left eye and he felt the dirt and grit bury itself in the exposed and tender flesh beneath the ruddy skin. In only a heartbeat he felt the warm flow of blood as it gushed into his eye and rolled down his cheeks. And he felt the quick strong clutch of someone’s arms grabbing him. Through blood-clouded eyes and a searing ache in his head he could see the figure of Memory Morgen walking past the queue of adults anxious to help him. He saw her glance briefly into his blood-soaked face. And he saw her move away.

This was the last home game of the season. There would be no next week to make the attempt again. The opportunity of a lifetime had slipped away. Life had changed and there was nothing he could do about it.

November 8, 1963

The game was nearly over but Memory Morgen had seen little of it. Absent mindedly, she had nibbled at her popcorn and sipped her soft drink as her young mind tried to block out thoughts of the inevitable future. She had succeeded only slightly because of a small crowd that had gathered on the ground below and to the left of where she sat on the top row of seats.

There, between the bleachers and the concession stand, several men and women were gathered around a man that she did not recognize. She heard one of the ladies refer to him as Mr. Meyer but the name didn’t ring a bell for her. As she watched the man stood patiently answering a barrage of questions being put to him by the men and women all wearing concerned looks on their faces. Unable to comprehend the gist of the conversation she could only discern that the voice of the man being questioned – Mr. Meyer – was deep and had an accent she had never heard before. Perhaps, she thought, he was a foreigner, but this bit of intelligence gave her no hint as to the reason for the interrogation.

Grasping at the distraction to relieve herself of her own tormented thoughts, she noticed that near the man stood a woman, her dark hair done up in a bun such as she had only seen in movies and distinctly out of place amidst the women surrounding the man that Memory took to be her husband. And, standing next to the woman, a smaller figure she could tell nothing about from her lofty seat. He stood, using the toe of his shoe to draw an endless succession of lemiscates in the dust of the ground at his feet. She could only see that he had his mother’s dark hair and was wearing glasses. Memory knew every pupil near her own age in the small Buhl school, but she had never seen this boy before. Perhaps they were from nearby Molton or Noland and had wandered to the Buhl side of the field to visit friends.

Whatever the reason, Memory was grateful for the distraction from her own thoughts and she watched and listened to the garbled conversations with the curiosity of a child watching a squirrel gathering acorns. Distracted by the proceedings and her own nervous anticipation of the game’s soon conclusion, her sandaled foot accidentally touched an abandoned waxed Dixie Cup on the seat before her. Partially filled with watery soda, the cup tumbled to the ground and splashed at the feet of the boy who, until that moment, had been engrossed in the figures he drew in the dust.

With the splash of the drink hitting the ground near his feet, the boy glanced up into the stands with a look on his face that Memory could only identify as either surprise or anger. Her lips that so often were fixed in a frozen smile now parted in dismay. As he looked up at her, she mouthed a whispered I’m sorry and, with a small shrug of her shoulders, offered him a look of sincere regret. But the expression on his face did not change as he kept his gaze fixed steadfastly on her.

Finally, having nothing more to offer, she raised her dark eyebrows in a manner that spoke What else can I do? and gave him her broadest tight-lipped smile. With that gesture his own expression softened, and he returned the smile and touched his hand to his chest, telling her without words I understand and it’s okay.

Without a spoken word they had been introduced.

The sudden loud blare of a horn signaling the end of the game snatched Memory’s attention from the scene below. Reluctantly she began her descent to the ground. Then a sudden commotion caused her to halt her progress. Someone had had an accident in front of her. Perhaps one of the older men or women trying to leave the game had tripped or, perhaps, just gotten a little dizzy and had had to sit down. Quickly, a crowd had gathered around, and Memory could hear the Oh, dear exclamations of the ladies and the snorting laughter of ridicule from the men in the group. These rapidly died away and, as Memory Morgen was able to edge closer, she could see someone with a great deal of blood streaming down his cheeks. It was a boy of about her own age, she could see, and, after she had studied the face a few moments, she recognized, behind the curtain of blood covering virtually the whole of his face, that it was a classmate named Jethro Johnson.

Like every other member of the small class she and Jethro spoke to each other when they happened to be in close proximity in class or in the hallway but Jethro was acutely shy – as was she – and he had never made an effort to take any conversation with her beyond an awkward short sentence or two.

And Memory had other reasons for not instigating or encouraging long discussions with Jethro - or any other boy in the school.

She eased further past the group surrounding Jethro, holding her blue pleated skirt away from a small pool of blood that had gathered on one of the seats. It was obvious that he was in a great deal of pain and feeling extremely embarrassed at his fall but, despite that, as she eased past the crowd, his eyes seem to follow her with a plea for recognition or acknowledgement.

What a curious thing, she thought as if he somehow blames me for his condition. Was she, somehow, to blame for so many things on this night? But as she crossed the last row of seats and began to walk down the sideline toward the cars in the dark parking lot on the hill above the football field, her mind shifted to other things. She looked down at the front of her dress, smoothing out imaginary wrinkles in the fabric. Her steps became shorter and her heart began to beat faster.

This was the tenth and final game of the season and the fifth home game for the Buhl Bulldogs. Joe Morgen had brought his daughter to the previous four and dropped her off at the gate with an admonition to be quick to return when the game was over. With that he had departed, as he had on this night, heading the car toward nearby Clay County and the liquor store that waited just across the county line. And, after the previous four games, Memory had walked up the embankment that surrounded the field to find her father waiting in the old, red Chevrolet, smelling of whiskey and hurrying her into the car. She anticipated the same on this night.

Memory’s older sister, Melody, was a senior this year and had ridden to the games with girls from her class. After the first home game, Memory had seen her only briefly and she remembered the frightened look in Melody’s eyes as she watched Memory get into the car with their father. It had puzzled Memory and she had planned to ask her what it was about later that night at home.

But then Joe Morgen had pulled the car off into the lumber yard on Firetower Road, less than a mile from their home and he had begun to speak softly to his daughter, his face so close to hers that, from that day forward the smell of whiskey would bring up one mental picture that she could never erase.

The threats had been well thought out before he spoke. He apparently had used them before on Melody, Memory had later deduced. The insinuation of repercussions if she ever revealed the events of this night were clear and, for a thirteen-year old girl in Mississippi in 1963, the words were immutable and dire.

The threats were also unnecessary.

Memory would never have spoken of this night or any of the following nights if God Himself had commanded her.

As she topped the rise and walked into the crowded parking lot, she spotted the red Chevrolet Impala at the end of a row of about twenty equally old and dusty cars and trucks. Dutifully, she walked to the passenger side and got in.

Later that night, she slid into bed beside Angel, her sleeping younger sister, knowing that sleep would once more be difficult to summon. That cool Friday night in November was just one of many for Memory Morgen. A night of shame and embarrassment that a thirteen-year-old girl lacked the ability to comprehend or manage. Perhaps this was something that other girls her age also dealt with. Perhaps it was normal. Intuitively, she knew it wasn’t. She had not mentioned the event to any one at school but she had begun to listen carefully to the older high school girls in the bathroom of Buhl Consolidated School as they exchanged stories and shared information about their changing bodies. None of them told of any rites of passage that dealt with the events transpiring in her own young life.

Occasionally, when one of the older girls mentioned unwanted advances made by one of the boys in the school, Memory would see Melody cut her eyes in her direction but say nothing. At present Memory did not understand this furtive glance. Did Melody suspect or did Melody know? Memory was too frightened of her father’s threats of punishment to venture a question of any kind. But she did know that hers was a unique experience from those shared by the other girls, so she held her council and remained quiet. Perhaps this thing would end as quickly as it had begun. Perhaps her father would soon find other means of ridding himself of whatever demon it was that seemed to torment his mind. It will be over soon, she reassured herself.

April 8, 2005

Go back! Go back!

The screams seemed futile and plaintive. The ball was soaring far over the little boy’s head and was destined for the other side of the wire mesh fence. Despite this, the boy ran with abandon toward the farthest parts of the right field of the diamond, looking back over his right shoulder and heedless of the dangers ahead.

Already, the other team had begun to pour onto the field to congratulate the runner as he crossed the plate. Already, his own teammates had begun to toss their hats and gloves into the red dust of the dugout. Still he ran but even he expected nothing to come of the effort. You see, in baseball and especially in little league and city league baseball, the right field defensive position is reserved for the worst player on the team – the one who perhaps has some batting ability but no arm strength to return the ball to the infield, or one who lacks the coordination or intuitive judgment to tell where the arch of the fly ball will take it. Right field is where you put the talentless one in the last inning, when the game is either hopelessly lost or virtually secured; where you put the last child to get a chance to play. Right field is reserved for the least athletic of those who are fortunate enough to be permitted to be a part of the team. Those less qualified than the right fielder in the game of baseball are destined to sit in the dugout and be content to be observers of the action. This nameless boy was that one – the least blessed of the blessed or, seen from the opposite perspective, the most blessed of the pitiful.

Still, he ran.

The batted ball had begun its descent. There were no thoughts of imminent glory for the nameless youth, no dreams of accolades for a job well done. He, he thought in his own mind, must be seen as only making the attempt to do what he was supposed to do, that which one more talented might have made look like just another simple catch that was expected. For now, there was only a boy and a ball in contradiction. One final time his lungs expanded to gain an extra ounce of oxygen in preparation for the leap of faith – and judgment. Then, later, the coach would pat his back and say something like Good effort while his teammates would only scowl and think that perhaps if the ball had only come their way - perhaps things would have been different. So many things move through the mind so quickly for all of us.

He leapt.

The ground fell away as though he were flying. The cheap dollar store glove extended over the top of the fence as his head encountered wire mesh. The wire gave – a little. The diamond imprint of the wire would be there for many days. The tender muscles of his neck would ache and the bruise he gained on his shoulder as he hit the fence would remind him, he was not a superhero.

But the ball fell into the open pocket of the glove and stayed there.

It stayed there.

On this day he was a superhero.

As he slid down the fence to the hard clay warning track, he heard . . . the silence. The visiting foe had stopped in mid-jubilant jump, staring at the arm of the little right fielder extending up from his prostrate form, waving ball and glove like the pennant of a victorious army. His own teammates were struggling to reshape guttural moans and unflattering opinions into shouts of shared success. For victory was not just his. It was theirs. The superhuman effort of the one had made them all champions. And, unwilling as they had been to be a part of his vain attempts, they were now clamoring to be a part of his triumph. Rushing to be a part of the celebration, each young boy fought to be one of the ones that held the nameless hero aloft and carry him off the field.

At the edge of the field, proud fathers and mothers tried valiantly to make their children stand in some sort of order for the obligatory pictures to show to family members who were not present for this auspicious occasion. And – front and center – was the hero of the day, still holding the prized ball. Finally, after everyone had taken enough snapshots, the dirty, dusty, happy boy ran to his mother, sitting in the stands just below where Gracy sat watching. And, as Gracy watched, he heard the beaming hero whisper to his mother I’m trying to stop grinning, but I just can’t!

Jethro Gracy Johnson sat in the stands, mesmerized by the scene, and he smiled with a sudden insight. Whoever this boy was, Gracy knew one thing about him – he had, for the first time in his short life, a restore point. Fifty years from now (if only the world should last that long) this young man would recall the smell of new spring grass and the taste of red dust in one moment of time. He would, perhaps, touch a small scar on his forehead where he had met that unyielding fence so long ago. And he would grin again in fond remembrance of this now present but too soon long-ago day when he had done one great thing. To Gracy, it had not mattered, only one minute ago, who won the game. He had no connection to any of these kids. But Gracy had heard the shouts from the bleachers and been captured by the words of the spectators. Captured and catapulted into thoughts and dreams that were never far from his every conscious thought. Words that he had chosen for his mantra, his creed, his obsession, and his commandment.

Go back! Go back!

But first he must go forward. Gracy stepped gently down from the bleachers, careful of that last row of seats as he unconsciously touched the indentation of the scar over his own eye and headed for his old pickup. Settling comfortably into the well broken in cushion, he turned the key in the ignition and, unconsciously, pushed a CD into the player. The first song was old and familiar. It was The Letter by the Box Tops. He turned the steering wheel and headed for his home where he would continue preparations for his great endeavor.

Restore point. Every computer has one. A date and time that you can go back to when you discover you have made a mess of things somehow with your computer files. A do over. Kids understand the basic fairness and logic of this concept. As you proceed with a task you discover that somewhere along the way you took a wrong path, reached a false conclusion or just flat out made a bad decision and, if you had the chance to go back and do over, everything would turn out better, not just for you but for everybody else, too.

Do over, a fresh start, turn over a new leaf, wipe the slate clean. Anything to have the opportunity to just take it back.

"Backward, turn backward, O time in your flight

Make me a child again – just for tonight."

Every person’s dream.

Every. Person’s. Dream.

And time itself, it seems, is agreeable to this logic - this innate desire to have a new beginning. Time cooperates by marking quite clearly the restore point each of us needs. Each of us, individually, has days that are unique only to us in that we can recall with crystal clarity what we were doing on that day. The weather. What we wore. Who was with us. Days in which our small world changes in some way that is significant to us alone and which is etched forever in the secret journals of our minds. Other events are more far reaching and impacting on a larger group of people or on humanity universally. In different countries and different cultures those points may be on different days and different years. Perhaps in 1929 it was that Black Tuesday in October when the New York Stock Exchange took a nosedive out many skyscraper windows. But the people who have a clear remembrance of that day are quickly disappearing from our lives. In the next generation it was either September 1, 1939 or December 7, 1941. After that perhaps the next point was November 22, 1963 and then - the most recent – September 11, 2001.

On all these dates those who were alive and whose history was intersected by such events remember where they were and what they were doing at a specific time on that day. They remember, perhaps, what the weather was like, the clothes they wore, who they talked to and what they talked about, the smell in the air, what they had for breakfast and their immediate train of thought at the time. These days, I am sure, were burned into their memories and can be recalled years afterwards as though it had happened only on the morning of the current day.

Two of these dates fell within the lifetimes of the people in this story. On September 11, 2001 Lawrence Cadaretta and Gracy Johnson were about fifty-one years old. Since that day life has rolled along pretty much as it had before.

But November 22, 1963 was different. It was the day before Gracy’s fourteenth birthday. He remembered that day. And he recalled a series of events that had occurred in the weeks leading up to that day. And now it was time to include Lawrence Cadaretta in those events.

November 8, 1963

Even before he opened his eyes, Jethro Johnson heard the nagging voice in the back of his head. "Time travel is absolutely impossible." He smiled and nodded to himself. Yes, it was impossible, he agreed with the ethereal voice, but I’m doing it anyway. Still he kept his eyes closed. Gradually he was feeling the warmth of the living room of the dog-trot house fading from his cheeks and hands, being replaced by the damp coolness of a long past November evening.

Just before he opened his eyes the voice spoke once more. "What if she isn’t there?" She won’t be, he told the voice, but I’ll see her anyway. It was then that he opened his eyes and his heart truly began to race. He felt in his eyes the stinging sensation of the smoke from the grills behind the bleachers as it curled through the open seating and wafted into his face. He also felt the chilly November air which carried the smoke as it brushed across his face and hands. Early November in Mississippi is usually not really cold but, compared to the November he had just departed it was cold enough. He wore a thin jacket of some sort of brown polyester material which covered a thin cotton cloth lining. It was warm enough to deflect the chill in the air, but nothing could have prevented the chill which sent a ripple up the nerves of his back, causing him to shudder more from sheer excitement than cold.

He wasn’t sure which sensations he should take in first – the aromas vying for dominance in his nostrils or the visual which confronted his eyes, free of cataracts and floaters. Maybe even the audible should take precedence: the sounds of the spectators and the teams and even the crickets and frogs of the surrounding woods. So many sensations! He should have planned more.

It was not too late, he told himself. He could still go back to November 2005, spend an hour or two with Law figuring out which way to go when he got here, and then come back and start again.

But he didn’t want to do that. Going back and forth in time on just a whim would destroy the reality he was seeking. He must stay here as though this was the only place there was. He must forget the past (or was it the future?) and drop anchor here in 1963. If this is going to be more than just a daydream or a temporary, temporal diversion he had to make 1963 his home – and go forward in time from this point. That was what he wanted.

But 2005 still had a strong grip on his sub-consciousness. He knew (for the voice kept trying to whisper it to him) that Law was out there somewhere, watching. Would Jethro’s awareness of Law’s presence fade or go away completely over time? Or would he always be aware of that world that existed outside the boundaries of his mind?

The voice interceded again, this time with a reassuring comment. "I’ll go away, it said. Like your memory of a dream you had last night – vivid on first awakening but, in the passing of the day, fading like the mist over a lake in the heat of a Mississippi sun." This whisper placated him and helped to calm his vibrating nerves. The visual, he decided, would be the most logical. It was the visual which would take center stage at least for the moment, for it was the visual that he so desperately desired – the seeing of Memory.

But first – first he would take a firmer grasp on the idea of not only where he was but when he was. With that setting of priorities he began to focus on the events transpiring before him.

It was a football game between the Buhl Bulldogs and the Molton Blue Devils. The Bulldogs wore helmets painted with a cheap gold spray paint that flaked and chipped with every solid collision between the rival teams. They wore maroon jerseys with gold numerals, solid maroon pants and high-topped cleated shoes with white socks. The Molton Blue Devils wore white helmets with a blue stripe down the center from front to back, white jerseys with blue numerals and blue pants. They wore the same style high topped, cleated shoes and white socks as their opponents.

The teams, at the moment Jethro observed them, knelt on the opposite sides of the football. Obviously, Jethro thought, one side or the other had called a time out. Slowly moving his gaze to the near sideline, he saw – Coach Gaines! And he was talking to Ray Roberts, the Bulldog quarterback! Jethro’s heart began to pound against his ribs like a piston in a race car. In his research to re-create this moment he had not paid much attention to the photographs of Coach Gaines and Ray Roberts, only to the details of the scoring and outcome of the game. But, now, here they were – in Technicolor and 3-D!

Jethro focused for long seconds on the concern registered on Coach Gaines’ face and the equally worried look exhibited by Ray Roberts as his coach rested large, gnarled hands on each of the young quarterback’s shoulders. Then Jethro turned his eyes to the north end zone where, after the whitewashed iron goalpost and before the whitewashed cinderblock old gymnasium stood a scoreboard with a large analog clock in the top center. One solitary hand registered the time remaining as somewhere between one and two minutes. There was no digital display to tell precisely and exactly how much time remained so it was left to the teams and the spectators to wait till the hand hit the spot between the large numerals 1 and 2 at the zenith of the clock face. On the left side of the clock was written in large white letters HOME, and on the right side in similar lettering was written VISITORS. Below the word HOME, hung on a metal prong, was a two-by-three-foot piece of thin metal with the number 13. Under the word VISITOR hung the number 19.

Should he turn and look back now? He decided not just yet. She was there. He was sure. After all, it was his fantasy and he was only re-creating something that had actually happened in history forty-two years ago. She was there. He needed no convincing on that point. And she would still be there for somewhere between one and two minutes more. He inhaled deeply through his nostrils and began mentally sorting the smells. First was the air. Not much different that the air he had just left in November of 2005. This was, after all, undeveloped and very rural Mississippi. No large factories or traffic congestion here to spoil the clean and crisp air as it swept through the trees, depositing whatever mild contaminants it may have picked up and, in return, receiving the fragrance of the evergreen pines and musky, fertile soil beneath them. As the November breeze pushed through the heavily wooded acres surrounding three sides of the field it picked up also the smell of the perspiring, heavy breathing football teams and their sweaty leather and plastic pads. This was the smell Jethro remembered most; the smell of toil and effort trapped beneath the heavy cotton uniforms, rising with the heat of their exertion through the open collars of the players, magnified and compressed before being released to the cool moving breeze which carried it into the bleachers that lined each side of the field.

Jethro doubted that anyone else in the stands was even aware of the smell and, if they were, they certainly attached no significance to it. They would say it smelled like a bunch of hot, sweaty boys. Jethro, like Robert Duvall in Apocalypse Now, would say it smelled like victory!

Victory! That was the cheer of the eight maroon-and-gold clad cheerleaders that stood on the edge of the field, between the bench where the reserve players sat and the hog-wire fence that ran the length of the field, separating the field of play from the bleachers and those spectators who paced nervously up and down the sidelines, shouting encouragement to the home team and subdued blasphemies to the referees.

V-I-C-T-O-R-Y! Victory, victory, that’s our cry!

Jethro smiled as the cheerleaders jumped and pirouetted on the sidelines. He recognized Barbara Ellis, Ray Roberts’ girlfriend and the head cheerleader. And there was Diane Crimm and petite, blonde Laura Macon. He went down the line whispering the names of each. They were all beautiful and vivacious and energetic – and young. Once more the voice slipped into his head, whispering, "Two will be dead within five years. One will be an alcoholic. The others – the others lived ordinary Buhl, Mississippi lives and had ordinary children and ordinary husbands and ordinary problems." Jethro willfully suppressed the voice.

He then turned his focus toward himself. He looked down at his hands, unwrinkled and with no skin cancers or liver spots. Soft and supple with the oil of youth. He clenched and relaxed his fists and saw the skin on the backs of his hands spring instantly back to its normal shape and smoothness. He saw dirt beneath his fingernails and smiled. Hygiene was so unimportant to a thirteen-year-old boy. But then he caught the distinct aroma of his father’s aftershave which he apparently had applied liberally before coming to the game (another of those things he had not remembered or researched and which, apparently, his subconscious was more than willing to supply unbeckoned). If he kept his fingers folded tightly, she might not see the fingernails, he thought, and maybe she wouldn’t be turned off by the overpowering smell of Mennen.

He looked past his hands. Smiling again, he wiggled his toes inside the black canvas Converse All-Star high topped sneakers – tennis shoes in other regions of the country, tenny shoes in a time in Mississippi that knew virtually nothing of tennis and tennis courts in these days before Nike and Air Jordan. Apparently, he had been doodling on the sides of the sneakers during class because he could see where he had scribbled with a ball point Bic pen on the round rubber logo that was steam pressed onto the side of each shoe. He moved his gaze to the faded jeans he wore, sharply pressed, starched and creased by his mother’s electric iron. Each pants leg ended in a five-inch rolled cuff which would be let out as he grew in the coming year.

His waist was slim. Not one ounce of fat. Chores and youthful energy prevented such a thing as storing calories and sugars. Every bite of food he ate went straight to muscle and movement. Beneath the brown polyester jacket, he wore a not-too-badly faded plaid shirt of a red and black checkered design which, he was sure, if he walked up and down the crowded bleachers, he would find copied on at least ten other males of various ages. There were no gloves – gloves were for sissies – and this was at a time before teenaged boys wore baseball caps anywhere but on a baseball diamond.

His inventory complete, he decided it was time. Once again, his heart beat a staccato rhythm in his chest. This was what he had come back for. This was who he had come back for.

Slowly, so as not to appear overly anxious or curious, he turned his head to the left and looked up toward the topmost seat of the bleachers, perhaps five rows behind where he sat. And there, at the very end of the topmost row of seats, in the upper left corner of the old oak-planked bleachers, sat Memory Morgen.

She was looking intently toward the field, seemingly oblivious to anyone near her, thereby allowing him ample time to take in every detail of her existence. She wore a navy-blue blouse with a skirt of wide pleats. The top had four exceptionally large white buttons arranged in a row down each side of its front, similar, Jethro thought, to the way a nineteenth century cavalry officers’ brass-buttoned uniform looked in the movies. The dress was completed by a wide lace collar and a white faux leather belt encircling her slim waist. White socks that stopped mid-calf contrasted the remains of a dark summer tan. The carefully buffed patent leather sandals matched the petite patent leather purse she clutched on her lap. On her right wrist was an emerald green plastic bracelet perhaps an inch wide and, in her hair, she wore white bows. This was the extent of her wardrobe.

But as far as Jethro was concerned, she could have been wearing a Martha White Self-Rising Flour sack and hip boots. For it wasn’t the wardrobe but the girl with which he was mesmerized. Memory Leigh Morgen had straight, raven black hair that stopped in an up-swirl between the lobes of her ears and the beginning of her shoulders. She kept it pushed behind her ears in such a way as to make the ears appear to stick out from her head in a most captivating way. But everything about her was captivating to Jethro. The same summer tan which was beginning to fade from her legs was also fading from her face, giving it a color somewhere between light brown and cream. She wore a red lipstick that was a shade or two deeper than modest and she needed no makeup for those large eyes. Even from this distance Jethro could see their green tint reflecting in the harsh lights of the football field. But it was the slight smile of a mouth that was just a little too large for her face that kept him transfixed and awed. If that mouth had been only slightly smaller or a little less noticeable, she would have been a rather ordinary looking young girl, no different than any other of the charming and attractive girls of Buhl Consolidated School. But it was this single difference, this one quirky little thing – a larger than average