Ch 2     Ch 3    

Chapter 1

Sandy Lockhart leaned back against the belt holding her to the telephone pole, climbing spikes firmly planted into the thick wood and arched her back to ease the ache in her shoulders. It was the end of another gorgeous day and she’d just finished repairing the connection between the telephone line leading from Etta Garber’s house to the pole out back. She took off her cap, ran her hand through her short blond hair, then replaced it. Her shoulders were feeling the strain of the work, so she rotated one, then the other, arched her back against the climbing belt and stretched her well-tanned arms back, pulling the thin material of her summer work shirt taut over her breasts. A carload of teen-age boys passed by out front, heads stuck out of their car windows, whistling and catcalling. Sandy ignored them. She was used to it by now.

It was that in-between season in Pinesville. Technically almost Fall, but still deceptively warm. Nestled in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, Pinesville, with a population just a little over 8000, was considered by most of its residents as an ideal place to live. Not too cold in the winter and not insufferably hot in the summer like other towns further south. Small enough to be cozy, but just large enough now, with its growing industries, increasing jobs and innovative new programs in the schools, to be a vibrant community.

The excitement of the summer’s Pinecone Festival and the weddings of two of the town’s favorite couples had passed. Now, the town was readying itself for the change of seasons. Fall was heralded by the changing colors, the sharp shrill of the coach’s whistle punctuating football practice at the high school, the crisp air in the evenings and the rustle of winds through the ever-present pines that had given the town its name.

After closing up the connection box and sealing it, Sandy leaned back against the belt again and relished the view. Fluffy white clouds drifted leisurely across an azure blue sky. Beneath her, late blooming mums meandered along the shrubs like a fallen rainbow. Etta’s house was one of the oldest in town, with a high, peaked roof and dormer windows set into its two-story frame. Since it sat on the edge of Pinesville referred to as the ‘The Hill’, Sandy could easily see down the grassy slope into the thick pine groves and fields. Inspired, she dug her old Nikon out of her work backpack, where she carried it whenever possible, and snapped a few photos. Pictures taken from the top of a telephone pole usually created an unusual perspective, one not accessible to most photographers. Over her years as a shutterbug, she probably had taken hundreds of pictures in and around town, but each one was a new experience, a new way of seeing the beauty that surrounded her. Each picture also reminded her of how much she’d come to love the town that had become her home.

She had only a few shots left in the camera, so she went ahead and finished off the roll. That meant she could develop them tonight after work. She shot mostly in black and white, printing her favorites and displaying them in simple frames she made herself, using a miter saw and corner clamps she’d bought in a garage sale. Making frames certainly helped keep the cost of her photography hobby down. Although she enjoyed people shots, landscapes were her favorite subject and this roll was filled with a number of potentially good photographs. Usually she preferred the starkness of black and white photography, but on days like today, she wished she had a way to develop color film as well. As if to underline her thoughts, a Cardinal landed on the line near her, cocked its head, eyed her and took off.

Tucking her camera back into the pack, she noticed Will Beamer, off in the distance, walking out to his garden. Hoe in hand, he was probably planning to do some weeding in his collard patch. The collards should be ready for picking soon. All of the other vegetables, save a few hardy tomato plants and some melons, had been picked and frozen or canned already, just like in the other smaller gardens all over town. Sandy found her mouth watering as she watched Will using his hoe to weed his garden. The better farmers and gardeners had worked mulch and manure into the soil, slowly turning it into the rich black earth needed to nurture good crops.

Will inevitably turned up every October at her back door with an armload of fresh collards and stayed long enough for a cup of coffee before going on his way. In his early eighties, he’d lived in Pinesville forever and was always ready to share stories about the town and the people of its earlier years, tossing in a few secrets about some of the town’s finest and best, with a chuckle every now and then. Sandy hoped she would be that spry and quickwitted at his age.

It was already late September, but still warm enough in Pinesville for summer clothes although there was a chill in the air not far to the north. Sandy would probably be able to wear her short-sleeved uniform shirt for another few weeks. When it got cooler, she would have to break out the long sleeved shirts and jackets. The heavier clothes were a lot more cumbersome to work in, especially in a climbing rig at the top of a pole.

She’d been with the Pinesville Telephone Company since she was eighteen—ten years now—and was as happy doing her job as the day she started. At the beginning, she worked inside, answering phones. While she could have continued doing office work, she soon saw that linesman made a lot more money than office help and, to her, looked like a lot more fun. When a lineman’s job opened up, she immediately applied.

Nobody took her application seriously and some of the other linesmen laughed at her behind her back. She knew people around town thought she was strange to even consider such a job–a job that, prior to her application, had been an exclusively male world …at least in Pinesville and the surrounding communities. Women had been doing this sort of work in larger metropolitan areas for years now, but in small towns the idea of what were proper jobs for men and women were still relatively rigid. When her boss tried to stonewall her, she politely but forcefully reminded him that, given the equal opportunity laws, he couldn’t turn her away unless she couldn’t do the job.

All new linemen applicants had to attend the company’s training school for six weeks before they were assigned to working crews. If they couldn’t cut the mustard, they were out. Sandy had heard that most of the men joked that she would never survive the school and especially the physical requirements of climbing poles, let alone working at the top of a pole held on by a strap and climbing spikes. Some even had wagers going they thought she didn’t know about. She made sure she did it all at least as well as her male classmates. In fact, to their chagrin, she did far better than most.

At first, a lot of people resented her success doing a ‘man’s job’. Over time however, she earned the grudging acceptance and respect of her fellow employees and then, surprisingly, most of the town’s women. It helped that she was damn good at her job. Slowly, her supervisors recognized her skills too. They saw she had people skills as well as her as technical abilities, and regularly promoted her until she held her present position as crew leader. Her crew accepted her as ‘one of the guys’ and she was secretly proud of that.

Early each morning, unless the weather was really bad, she pedaled her bike, first to Sandrines for breakfast and then to work. Sandrines was a local restaurant at the edge of town where mostly blue-collar workers gathered to form their car pools. The owner allowed workers who weren’t driving to park their cars in the large parking lot behind the place. It was good business because many of them parked and came in for breakfast, even if it was nothing more than a sweet roll and coffee before they rode off to work. Sandrines was also where the group of older men and retirees, affectionately referred to as the ‘Breakfast Club’, met to discuss town politics or pass on the latest jokes.

After she finished her coffee and roll, Sandy would bike on to the telephone company’s garage, where she changed from her riding shorts and tee shirt into her work uniform. After picking up her day’s assignments and a crew, if necessary, she signed out a company truck and headed for the first job on her list.

Tall and lean, with her blond hair short and tousled, she could have been just a pretty face behind a desk and probably would have made a good living at any inside job she chose. Certainly she was attractive enough to grace any desk she might have occupied but desk jobs weren’t for her. She liked working with her hands and she liked working outside. She also liked the solitude this job gave her most of the time.

It wasn’t that she was a recluse. She got her kicks bantering back and forth with the guys she worked with and others who hung around at Sandrines. She also liked her time alone and had come to cherish it.

When she first moved to Pinesville, the single men in town came on to her in droves, but Sandy never responded to any of their attempts to take her out. She made it clear she wasn’t interested in any of them … sometime rather forcefully. Eventually a few people, especially those men she’d turned down, started to believe she was a man hater, or­– even worse in a small town since nobody had ever seen her with a date, gay. She had to smile to herself. If anything, she was anti-romance. She’d been there, done that and once was enough. Why count on a man who could throw you away as easily as a gum wrapper when he was through with you? She’d settled into the role of a single woman just fine and she liked it. No man around to bug you or hurt you. She’d had enough of that already to last a lifetime.

Etta Gerber pulled into her driveway just as Sandy was closing the back of her truck. “Got your problem fixed, Etta,” Sandy called out to her. “Your phone should be fine now.”

“Thanks, hon.” Etta walked over to Sandy’s truck. In her early forties, short and prematurely graying, Etta taught math at the Pinesville high school. “By the way, I made some brownies last night. Want some for dessert tonight?” she asked.

Sandy started to decline, but knew Etta would be hurt. She prided herself on those darn brownies. Since Sandy’s ‘supper’ usually consisted on picking out a TV dinner and zapping it in the microwave, food wasn’t a big deal for her.

Etta dashed into the house and was back in less than a minute with a couple of brownies in aluminum foil and pressed them into Sandy’s hand. “Hey, didn’t you grow up in Stoneyburg?” she asked her, as an afterthought.

Sandy hesitated. “I lived In Stoneyburg until I finished high school. That’s when I came to Pinesville to live with Aunt Beth and Susan for a while and ended up staying. What makes you ask?” Sandy gave her a curious look. Nobody had asked her about her hometown since her aunt died and Susan moved to Florida several years ago. She was surprised that Etta even remembered the name of the place. It wasn’t a subject Sandy discussed.

“We have a new counselor at the school,” Etta said, fiddling absent-mindedly with her pearls. “About time we got one, the way students can be these days. Anyway, she’s from Stoneyburg. It rang a bell. Then it came to me. I thought I vaguely recalled that’s where you came from. Her name’s Carol, but for the life of me, I can’t call her last name to mind right now.”

Sandy felt her stomach tighten. Carol was a fairly common name. Growing up in Stoneyburg, she’d known several Carol’s. She’d left secrets there that she didn’t particularly want spread around Pinesville. Since the two towns were practically across the state from each other, she’d always hoped her past would remain that way—past and secret.

There was one Carol she remembered well. Carol Axton had been her friend and confidant from first grade on. When her ‘trouble’ started, she’d withdrawn into herself and all but shut Carol out. To her credit, Carol had never stopped trying to help. In retrospect, Sandy could see how much it took for Carol to hang onto a friendship with someone who suddenly avoided her at every turn. It made her appreciate Carol even more, though she hadn’t stayed in touch after she left. Sandy just wanted to put the memories behind her.

It would be too much to ask that the Carol who just moved here was Carol Axton. If so, Sandy didn’t think she’d have to worry. There were a couple of other Carol’s that she would worry about, though. As her mind clicked over the possibilities, she wanted to ask Etta how old the ‘Carol from Stoneyburg’ was and what she looked like, but something inside of her was afraid of the answer. ‘Better to just leave it slide than show any interest,’ Sandy told herself. She’d find out soon enough.

“Well, I’m scheduled to start installing the phone lines for the new computer classrooms at the school on Monday,” Sandy told Etta. “Maybe I’ll see her then. Thanks for the brownies.” She hopped into the driver’s seat and drove off.

While she was driving the truck back to the company garage to turn it in for the night, Sandy’s mind returned to the job on Monday. She’d been assigned to install the phone company connection lines for the new computer labs along with Luke Sexton, the local computer whiz, and set up the LAN wiring for the entire system. When they were finished, the high school would have all of their computers tied together and have a few of them connected to the Internet. Pinesville High School was, at long last, going to have a Computer Science program under the supervision of the new computer teacher, Jim Brisco. It was a plum job mainly because it was a challenging one. Sandy had to run cable not only for the computer labs but for the library as well. She’d been looking forward to it, except for having to work with Luke Sexton, a loner with a reputation of having little patience and a sharp tongue. Sandy smiled to herself. She also had a reputation of being a loner with little patience and a sharp tongue. Maybe that was why, the few times their paths had crossed, Luke had intrigued her. As she visualized him in her mind’s eye, she couldn’t help but wonder if he, too, had secrets from his life before Pinesville that he didn’t want to share. She quickly tried to put him from her mind, but his image remained. He was an attractive man and, though she was loathe to admit it, a sexy one too. Sometimes she had almost felt the heat radiating from his body the few times she’d been near him. But she’d ignored him so far so there was no reason she couldn’t continue.

Thoughts of ‘Carol from Stoneyburg’ returned and she started to consider ways she could figure out who the woman was. She wanted to keep a low profile until she could see her first. Once she knew which Carol it was, she would know if she had to figure out how to handle the possibility of her past coming back to haunt her, something that didn’t enthuse her. She parked the truck in the company lot, turned in her keys, changed into her riding clothes and biked home.

As soon as she stepped inside her house, she stuck a TV dinner into the microwave, then ran down the basement steps to her darkroom. When she’d bought the house three years ago, one of the first things she did was build a small, light-sealed room with its own running water and sink on a work counter for developing film. Unloading her camera, she set the film cartridge on the counter to warm to room temperature before developing it. She wanted to devote at least part of her evening to processing the film and maybe getting a few prints done to get her mind off Monday. By the time she’d laid out her developing chemicals, the microwave timer went off so she ran back upstairs to eat.

The rubbery pieces of turkey and green beans disappeared in less than five minutes and she had to admit that she was glad she’d accepted Etta’s brownies. They were delicious. The one time a year she actually prepared a decent meal was when Will brought over the collard greens. Those were too good to resist.

After a quick shower and change into comfortable jeans and a fresh tee shirt, she sat down at her ancient computer. To her delight, she discovered an e-mail from her cousin Susan in Florida. Susan was the only relative she cared about anymore. She’d lost touch with her other cousins and remaining aunts and uncles years ago and that was just fine with her. If her cowardly high school boyfriend hadn’t seen fit to tell her story all over town, lying about his part in the whole thing, things would have just blown over and nobody would’ve been the wiser. As it turned out, her parents and half of her ‘good fundamentalist relatives’ had turned against her and the other half spent their time trying to save her. All Sandy wanted to do was forget. She still couldn’t believe she’d ever been that stupid.

When she finally left Stoneyburg after high school, Aunt Beth and Susan had taken her in, no questions asked and loved her. Aunt Beth died several years ago and now Susan was the only one who really knew the details of the problems the appearance of someone from her hometown might create. Sandy clicked on Susan’s e-mail address and typed: Hope you check your e-mail. Need to talk to you if possible. Will try at eight o’clock. If you aren’t there, don’t worry. Sandy was entitled to free long distance calls through her work, so she’d insisted earlier that she be the one to call Susan unless Susan had an emergency and needed to call her.

Sandy looked at her watch. She had almost an hour before eight, so she went back to her dark room, picked up the film cartridge, then pulled her bottle of developer and the film developing canister can forward on the table. With the door closed and lights out, she struck the film cartridge on its end and broke it open, pulled the reel out and unwound the film. Next was the tricky part—threading the film onto the spiral developing reel without getting it jammed or missing the slot. When she had it all on, she pulled the tape off and popped the reel in the developing canister. She remembering the first time she tried doing that in the dark. What a mess! Like most difficult things, it took practice to get it right.

Once the film was in the developing canister, she poured in the developer, capped it, turned on the light and started her stopwatch. After rolling the can carefully to distribute the fluid for the prescribed time, she poured out the developer and filled the can with water. The film washed, she added fixer. Since the fixer took about two minutes, she reset her stopwatch and took the can upstairs with her so she could continue to agitate it while she checked to see if Susan had, by chance, been near her computer and received her message. She had. Looking for you at eight this evening, the message said. Sandy breathed a sigh of relief.

 When her stopwatch told her the fixer had done its work, she ran back downstairs, dumped out the fixer solution and ran water into the developing canister. When the film was washed clean, she opened it, pulled the film off the developing reel, clipped one end to an overhead string and clipped a weight to the other end to let gravity keep it stretched out while it dried. Though wet, Sandy could see that the newly developed images looked pretty good. The ones she had taken from Etta’s telephone pole looked especially good. The lighting was just right and the pines looked like little soldiers guarding the grassy field.

A lot of people found developing film to be tedious or boring. Sandy found the precision it required relaxing. Liking things to be done precisely was probably another reason she was so good at her job. She was willing to spend hours working with intricate wiring problems and fittings to get the job done right when many of her co-workers threw up their hands in frustration.

Sandy looked at her watch again. Still half an hour to go before the telephone call. She climbed back up the stairs, picked up the remains of her TV dinner and tossed it into the trash. Then she sat down at her old computer again.

For some time she’d been thinking about replacing it. While the computer she was using was good enough for e-mail and writing letters, she really wanted a machine with enough power to edit photographs. From what she’d been reading, with some of the less expensive graphics programs, she’d be able to branch out into color photography and still be in control of how the photograph turned out. Digital photography was the wave of the future and she wanted to learn more. Sandy figured she almost had enough money saved to buy a medium priced computer within the next several months, but the real problem was which one was the best buy for her money. She clicked onto Google and searched the internet for information about a couple of name brands again. She’d started a pro’s and con’s list on a tablet beside the computer last week, but, so far, it was proving to be more confusing than informative. Every company claimed theirs was the best. Since she was going to be working with Luke Sexton next week, maybe she could talk to him about computers. His reputation wasn’t one that encouraged idle chitchat, but the word was he knew computers.

Luke was a relative newcomer to Pinesville, having moved there a bit over a year ago. With more and more people using computers in their homes, not to mention all of the computers in the new industries, Luke’s golden touch at solving even the most perplexing problems had made his one-man business an instant success. At least six-foot-four to her five-foot-seven, with thick black hair and smoldering dark eyes, Luke looked like he walked into Pinesville straight out of a cabin in the woods. Actually, she’d heard he’d last worked in Charlotte. Rumor was that he’d had more than one altercation with his boss before storming out and setting up his own shop in Pinesville. Sandy often saw him out speed walking when she biked to Sandrines in the morning. He lived in a small apartment above his shop a block from town center. Despite wearing a prosthesis on his right leg, his gait was sure and strong. Whenever she saw him, she felt that heat rise again and she no longer knew if it was from him or from inside of her. Having those old feelings surface again surprised her. To try and clear them from her mind, she just pedaled her bike faster.

As far as she knew, Luke never talked about his leg, but town gossip had it that he was a Vet and had lost it in Desert Storm. She had no clue how anybody found out how he lost it, but one could scarcely keep a secret in a town where one person’s business too often become everybody’s business. Another reason she was concerned about someone from Stoneyburg showing up.

She was so busy thinking about the computer, Luke, and the stranger from her hometown that it was eight before she realized it. She picked up the phone and punched the quick dial button for her cousin's phone.

Susan picked up before the first ring had finished. “What’s up Cuz?” she said.

Sandy got right to the point. “I just found out that someone from Stoneyburg has been hired as a counselor at the high school.” She went on to relate what Edna Gerber had told her. “I don’t know any more about it but if she knows me, I may have problems here.”

“You don’t have any idea at all who she is?” Susan asked.

“Nope. Just the first name.” Sandy replied.

“Try not to worry too much yet,” Susan replied. “I suspect most people have forgotten all about what happened considering it’s been more than a dozen years since that bastard got you pregnant and spread it all over town. You miscarried before you started to show. Remember? When a kid didn’t appear, they didn’t have much to talk about. Most people figured he was just bragging about something that didn’t happen.”

“I’ve found people have a long memory for gossip like that,” Sandy said. “Besides, Tommy’s family had influence and he was a popular guy. I’m sure a lot of people believed him and just thought I got rid of it.”

 “Well, even if they do remember and even if some people did believe him, there’s no reason for this person to want to blab it all over Pinesville. After all, if she’s a counselor, she’s not going to get very far if she starts off by spreading stories like that all over town right off the bat.”

“I wish I could believe you, but people are people—even counselors. I’ve got a good life here and if these people learn that I was dumb enough to get knocked up, especially by a jackass like Tommy Hilger, my reputation won’t be worth a plugged nickel.”

“So you made a mistake. So have most people. Big deal. All teenagers are bone-headed. That includes both of us. You know what mom used to say—‘teenagers suffer from SFB’. You weren’t any exception.” Susan chuckled. “In case you don’t remember, ‘SFB’ is ‘Shit For Brains’.” She paused. “Seriously, Cuz, people who know and care for you will take stories like that with a grain of salt. And for those who don’t know you or have a bone to pick, why should you give a damn about what they think?”

 “Thanks,” she told her. “It may sound trite, but I needed to hear that. I know you’re right.” Despite her words and the comfort talking to her cousin always gave her, she still felt that knot of fear in her belly.

 “Yes. I am right. But you’ve got to know it as well. You’ve got to stop worrying about this,” Susan said. “I know you are. I know you pretty darn well.”

“Yeah, you do.” Sandy laughed. “I don’t know what I’d do without you, Suze. You’re the only person I can really talk to about these things. About any important things. There’s just one person here in town I’ve ever trusted enough to tell about my teenage years and I know he would never say anything. And before you ask, he’s just a friend. In fact, he got married this month. One of a kind, that one.”

“Hey, if you run into anybody else like that who’s still unfettered and you don’t grab him for yourself, send him this way,” Susan said.

“No fear of me grabbing anybody,” she said, but a flash of Luke’s face shot across her mind. “Hey, I thought you were dating somebody you really liked.”

“I was. For a year. He told me last week that he needed his space. Code for wanting to play the field. Right?” Susan’s tone was light, but Sandy could hear the hurt in her voice.

“That’s why I swore off of romance,” Sandy said. “As I told my friend, Dan– been there, done that,” and, after a long pause, a quiet, “Never again.”

“Don’t be so sure, Sandy.” Susan said. “There’s gotta be somebody special out there for both of us. I know it doesn’t seem like it, but I haven’t given up hope yet.”

“There may be somebody there for you, Suze, but not me. I’m not looking. Just thinking about those last couple of years in Stoneyburg ties my guts in a knot. But as usual, you’ve made me feel better. One of these days, maybe I’ll be able to give you something back. After all, you and your mom took me in when I had no place to go. I’ll never forget that.”

“Good Lord, Sandy,” Susan replied. “Are you back on that kick? Mom and I didn’t ‘take you in’. You were family and a friend to boot. Mom loved you like a daughter. I love you like a sister. Seems like you never really realized that. Don’t you think it’s about time you did?”

Sandy felt tears well up in her eyes. “Dammit, Suze. You’re going to make me cry. I don’t cry.”

“That’s nonsense. Getting things out is good for the soul. But don’t worry. I won’t tell anybody you cried and sully your tough girl reputation.” She laughed.

Sandy laughed along with her. “Okay, okay. You made your point. I appreciate it. Now that I’ve bent your ear, how’s the job going in the land of the newly wed and nearly dead?”

“Pretty good, actually. I’ve picked up a couple more clients and so far, they like my investment advice. Mr. Jensen, the Boss, says he’s quite impressed. He even said I’m the best investment counselor he’s had in 25 years. In a year or two, when he retires, I’ll probably strike out on my own. Mr. Jensen says he’d be more than willing to help me any way he can. Could be that I’ll inherit some of his clients. We’ll see. How about the phone company? Still like climbing those poles?”

Sandy filled her in on the upcoming job at the school.” I figure it’ll take at least the first part of the week to string all the wire and get it connected. up. Haven’t done much with computer systems yet so I’m pretty excited about it. At least it’s different,” she finished. “The only problem is that I’ll be working part of the time with the town Sphinx. His name’s Luke Sexton and he’s the local computer guru. He has the reputation of being a bit of a loner and a bit touchy, but supposedly knows his stuff. We’ll see how it goes.”

“Ah, to be a fly on the wall, “ Susan laughed. “Twin prickly pears in the same room? He just might just turn out to be the man of your dreams.”

“More likely my nightmares,” Sandy smiled. Changing the subject, she said, “So, tell me the latest on this hurricane that’s headed your way. All I’ve heard is that they’re still expecting it to skirt the east of the Florida coast.”

“That’s the prediction I hear, too. I’m all stocked with food, water and batteries for the season, anyway. Don’t worry. I’ll be fine.”

“Well, I’ll keep up with it on my end and you keep me posted, too, okay?”

“Okay,” Susan told her. “Now, like I said, stop worrying. Both about this ‘Carol from Stoneyburg’ and the storm.”

“Okay, boss,” Sandy laughed. “And thanks again.

“No charge, Cuz. My pleasure. Let me know how the computer installation goes. I sure wish we’d have had those things when I was high school. Would have made learning lots of things I do now easier.”

After they hung up, Sandy walked out into her back yard. The moon was already rising on the horizon and she could hear the sounds of her new neighbors’ voices drifting out of their open window. She turned around and looked back at her house. The oak tree she’d planted when she moved in had doubled in size–maybe more. The shrubs were thriving all around the perimeter of the house too. Her house might be small, but it was hers and it was beginning to feel more and more like home. A real home.

 As she stared up into the sky, a wave of anxiety washed over her and suddenly she was sixteen again. Pregnant and ashamed. A misfit in a town that scorned her, with a family that turned against her, her heart broken by a boy who whispered words of love and future marriage into her ears night after night only to tell everybody in town she was a slut. She closed her eyes and fought to get back to the present.

It was hard to imagine back then that she would have all of this now. She lived in a place she loved, had work she loved and a life she felt good about. She wasn’t going to let anybody wreck that. Not someone from Stoneyburg. Not anybody. After a long time she walked inside and began developing her photos, but the ache for that innocent sixteen-year-old she once was continued to throb inside her off and on into the night.

 

 

 

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Chapter 2

 

Sandy woke up out of a nightmare early Monday morning, covered with sweat. She’d been falling into a bottomless black hole, screaming for help, but nobody came. It was the same nightmare she’d had regularly, for almost two years after what happened with Tommy. Not just the pregnancy — it was his gut-wrenching betrayal and the reactions of the people she thought cared for her that tore her apart. After she left Stoneyburg and moved in with Aunt Beth and Susan, the nightmares gradually started to go away, returning only when she was under a lot of stress. And now Stoneyburg had come back to haunt her again.

She sat up in bed and tugged her sweaty nightshirt off over her head. Outside the window, the dawn sun was just beginning to layer the sky with pink. A lone car, its tires hissing on the dewy pavement as it passed faded away and then the street was quiet again.

Sandy’s bedroom was in front of the house, facing east. She’d chosen that room because she liked to wake to the sunrise. Her bedroom, with its off-white walls and simple décor suited her. Her meager wardrobe fit easily into the room’s mid-sized closet and the pine chifforobe against the south wall. A blue and green cloth rug with an Indian design woven through it covered much of the hardwood floor. She’d lucked out and found the rug and the chifforobe at a rummage sale the same year she moved into her house. After a through cleaning, both looked like new, though the chifforobe required a good coat of wax. Her framed photos of the woods and hills around Pinesville topped off the room. Enough to give it a homey feeling without clutter. A house filled with frills wasn’t for her.

The rest of the house was simply decorated, too. A smaller spare bedroom was in the rear corner of the house, with the bathroom in-between. Both bedrooms, the bathroom and the door to the basement stairs opened into a eight by twelve space that served as a den but was really more like a wide hallway. Her computer sat on a desk in the corner, which she also used for paying bills. A comfortable recliner that she’d inherited from Aunt Beth faced a television set, at an angle, on the southwest wall. The door to the kitchen as well as to the front living room on the north side of the house also opened into the den area.

The larger living room along the front of the house held a sofa–also inherited from Aunt Beth–and two overstuffed chairs from the thrift shop. The kitchen off her work area was a bright room with two huge windows, containing a sturdy oak table that had been left there by the last residents. Sandy had refinished and kept it, even though it was large enough to serve five or six people. She seriously doubted she’d ever have to serve that many people at one time. She’d painted all the walls off-white and hung more of her developed prints from around Pinesville all throughout the house. Two more brightly colored rugs topped off the wood floors in her living room and the tiny den.

Sandy sat on the edge of her bed for a minute, watching the sky change and letting her head clear. Finally, she stood up, slid her feet into her bedroom slippers and padded into the bathroom. When the water temperature felt right to her fingertips, she stepped into the shower, letting the water play over her head and body.

Unbidden, thoughts of Tommy came to mind again. If he’d been the boy she thought he was, they could very well be married now with one or two kids underfoot. She’d dated him during her freshman and sophomore year of high school. Three years older than she was, to her naive freshman eyes, he’d seemed sophisticated and handsome. As the starting halfback on the football team, he had plenty of attention from upper class girls, but he chose her. She came to crave the kind of affection he gave her, affection she’d never received from anyone. Her parents were cold, to put it mildly, and her father had a heavy hand with the strap—said he’d been strapped as a youngster and it kept him on the right path. All to often, the multiple bruises across her back and bottom showed that he intended to do the same for her.

Tommy was a welcome respite from home.  He hugged and kissed her whenever he got the chance. At the time, it was like Christmas come at last after years of doing without. He called her his ‘little doll’. With her long blonde hair and huge blue eyes, she probably looked like one then.

Soon after they started dating, he’d wanted more. He’d told her she could prove how much she loved him by having sex with him. When she said she was afraid, he’d shut her out for a week, saying she didn’t really love him. Being isolated from the only person she thought really cared was too much to bear, so she gave in.

At first, she was terrified. After all, there were so many confusing stories about sex floating around, not to mention sexually transmitted diseases. She still wasn’t totally sure how a person got them. They sure didn’t teach her anything about sex at home or at school except that it was a sin. The only person she could ask about it was Tommy and he told her she had nothing to worry about. Like an Alice in Wonderland, she believed him. Lord, she was stupid.

After the first few times that they made love, she found, to her surprise, that she enjoyed it. Looked forward to it, in fact. The pleasure of being held and the sex, itself, took her mind off her problems at home.

Tommy didn’t always have condoms with him, but said he wanted her so badly he couldn’t wait. By that time, she believed he was as much in love with her as she was with him and, after a time or two, stopped objecting. He always assured her that it took more than once to get pregnant and not to worry about it. She certainly wasn’t going to ask anybody else if what he said was true. Besides, he talked about marriage and the home they’d have one day. She knew if she got pregnant, he’d take care of her. He was her hero, the Prince Charming she’d always dreamed about on those nights when her father had been especially ugly with his fists or the strap.

Tommy quit school suddenly right after football season that first year they dated, despite being a senior, and got a job at the local hardware store. School was for the birds, he’d told her. He said he wanted to get out there where he could earn ‘real money’. Working, not school, was the way to do that.

She tried to talk him into finishing school or, after he quit, at least getting a GED. She might have been naive about some things, but she knew an ordinary person didn’t get far without an education and a diploma. There were notable exceptions, but even through her rose colored glasses, Sandy knew Tommy was no Einstein. He was lucky to scrape by with a C minus average. When she told him she was pregnant, over a year later, he got furious. Instead of taking her into his arms and assuring her that they would go ahead and get married, he said it was all her fault. He shouted that he didn’t want to get tied down with some dumb little broad who didn’t know enough to take care of herself. She was the last thing he needed to drag him down just when his own life was just beginning.

For her, the Tommy she thought she knew had disappeared into thin air and a monster took his place. She was stunned. No more hugs. No kisses. Just threats that she better not name him as the father. To make things worse, Tommy spread the word all over town that she was knocked up and it wasn’t his. When her parents found out, her father strapped her until she could hardly stand let alone walk, while her mother watched, arms folded across her chest. Both threatened to throw her out of the house. Shortly after the beating and before her parents could make good on their threats to throw her into the street, she miscarried. Aunts and uncles from her crazy family arrived to pray night after night for her sin-ridden soul. They said God was punishing her and her unborn child. If it hadn’t been for visits by Aunt Beth and Susan during those years, as well as the years she was growing up, she doubted she would have been able to make it out of the place with her sanity intact.

Most townspeople were willing to believe the story Tommy was spreading. When she miscarried and didn’t show, as she’d told Susan last night, they just figured she had gone some place to get rid of it. Nobody seemed to question Tommy’s story. At school, the boys smirked at her and the girls whispered and giggled behind her back. Many of the adults made comments she could easily overhear whenever she went downtown. “Finally getting her comeuppance” some of the older girls said—the ones who’d been jealous when Tommy chose her over them. The one notable exception was Carol Axton, the classmate who’d been her friend since before they started first grade.

From that time until she finished high school, the punishments got worse. The strap came out more and more often and she wasn’t allowed out of the house except for school and her part-time job at Abner’s Drug Store and Soda Fountain where she worked after school and on Saturdays. Her body twinged with pain now, just thinking about it.

After turning over her salary for her room and board as her parents insisted, Sandy worked overtime whenever she could, telling her folks that keeping her job depended on working the extra hours. She also kept the tips she got on those days she worked the small sandwich/soft drink counter, a remnant of the older drugstore days that Abner liked to keep going. Other times she was in charge of finding items for customers and restocking the shelves. She could usually count on one or both or her parents driving past the store to peek in and check that she was where she said she would be.

Above and beyond what she gave to her parents for room and board, she squirreled away almost every other nickel she made into her secret nest egg—what she called her “traveling fund”. Fortunately, her boss, Abner Wright, was a kind man. He knew what was going on, both with Tommy and at home. He despised Tommy and had told Sandy as much. He didn’t much like her mother or father either. Her parents had earned Abner’s contempt years before though they didn’t know it. They told a good friend of Abner’s that he was going straight to hell because he opened his drug store on Sunday afternoons. Abner was a good Christian, but he never forgot what they said.

Abner had seen the strap marks and bruises on her arms when she wore a short sleeved blouse to work after one of the beatings. He threatened to report her folks to the police. Sandy begged him not to since it would only cause more problems in the long run. Her father had a couple of connections with the police department through their church and it was doubtful they’d take her word over his. Reluctantly, Abner let it pass, but told her if he ever met her dad in a dark alley he couldn’t be responsible for what he might do.

 The only reason her folks let her work for Abner, Sandy felt sure, was that he offered the highest wages in town for part-timers with no experience and all of that money went into their pockets—or so they thought. Abner didn’t tell her folks about the extra money she was earning. He was one of the few adults in Stoneyburg who treated her decently and she was grateful.

Sandy promised herself that she would leave town as soon as she earned her high school diploma. Despite her increasingly abusive home life, she worked hard, earned good grades and graduated three months after her eighteenth birthday. One thing her parents and Tommy had succeeded in teaching her was how to survive. She promised herself never again to be caught in such a helpless situation.

Stoneyburg was smaller than Pinesville so it was harder to avoid unpleasant people. Before she left, she saw Tommy float from one menial job to another during her last year there. She knew he still told stories about her behind her back. She ignored him and the other boys who asked her out.  Before the miscarriage, Tommy had told most of the town that she was an ‘easy lay’ and a slut. It was his way of making extra sure he wouldn’t be held responsible as the father. She wasn’t about to add fodder to the rumors by going out with any other boys, even if her parents would have allowed it.

Like many boys who were reasonably good at, but not super at sports in high school, Sandy eventually realized that Tommy had reached his peak during his junior and senior years. At the time, she would have married him no matter what her parents might have said. Now, over a decade later, she realized what a close call she’d had. With no decent academic background, skills, or ambition, she couldn’t imagine how he would have been able make a living, let alone contribute to raising a family. She was eternally grateful she’d escaped the whole situation. Sometimes blessings came in painful guises.

Forcing her mind back to the present, she soaped up and rinsed, turned off the shower and toweled herself dry. Half an hour later, she was on her bike, heading for Sandrines. After all, what happened was in the past and she needed to take Susan’s advice and stop worrying about it, something easier said than done. There was one good thing about it all being in the past. She never had to see Tommy Hilger’s face again.

She always enjoyed her ride to Sandrines. It relaxed her to weave through the back streets past homes fronted by pines, maples and other large trees. The maple leaves already were tinged in red and yellow, indicating that Fall was making its way slowly into the Carolinas. Most of the homes in Pinesville dated back over fifty years. Some went as far back as a century or more. Wooden houses. Brick ones. Wide front porches and dormer windows on many. High peaked roofs, like the one on Edna Ferber’s house. She’d felt at home from the moment she moved there.

The house she enjoyed biking past most was owned by the town eccentric, Mrs. Beasley, roughly judged to be in her early eighties, though nobody could say for sure. Mr. Beasley had made his money in overseas investments before his untimely death from a heart attack at least thirty years ago. The word was that Mrs. Beasley had withdrawn every penny from the bank the day the estate was settled. Nobody had a clue about what she did with the money. Since she didn’t drive and never had, she couldn’t have taken it out of town. She rarely left her property. A distant relative drove over from out of town twice a month to run errands and bring in groceries. Some speculated that the money was all in a trunk buried in her back yard, amongst the scarecrows and clanging pans hanging from the tree limbs. Others thought it was all stuffed into her mattress.

Sandy didn’t have the slightest interest in where Mrs. Beasley hid her money. She was simply fascinated by the house. It was a large wooden home built in a Victorian style with odd-shaped windows, a huge porch and turrets rising from the roof in the most unusual places. Make it a bit smaller and it was the kind of house she could imagine living in, if she had the money. Sandy never saw Mrs. Beasley in the mornings, but did see the elderly lady most afternoons on her way home out puttering with her flowers, trimming bushes or weeding with her hoe. Sandy always waved and called out a greeting, but, in all these years, Mrs. Beasley had never used her name. If she spoke at all, she simply nodded and said, ‘Hello, Bicycle Girl’, with an expressionless face. Whenever Sandy saw her struggling with something she stopped to help if she had the time. That usually brought a “Thank you, Bicycle Girl” from the old woman, but not always.

Sandrines was located at the edge of town, near the bypass and on the road leading to Carters, the county seat. It took her less than twenty minutes to bike there. Only the last half-mile was on the main road. With sparse traffic and wide shoulders however, she felt almost as safe biking there as on the more sheltered neighborhood streets.

Sandrines was named after a great-uncle's place in the north, still considered Yankeeland to the locals. The uncle had ‘defected’ to the north in the '30s during the great depression to find work. He opened the original Sandrines someplace in Illinois, but no off-ramp on the new interstate had forced it to close. His grandson returned to Pinesville and opened the present Sandrines in the middle ‘60s and it had been open continuously ever since. It still was one of the most popular breakfast and eating places in town, despite a Hardys and a McDonalds opening over on the bypass. The interior was simple, as was the food. They served their breakfast menu from covered dishes laid out on a long buffet. You could get anything from a snack to a full breakfast and get it fast.

When Sandy first heard the story she’d had to smile about “Yankeeland”. It might be well over a century and a half since the Civil War, but Southerners still kept their traditions and pride. Sherman’s embedded cannon shells probably would never be removed from the courthouse in Columbia, South Carolina. It wasn’t so long ago that it had taken a legal battle to prevent the Confederate flag from being raised daily under the Stars and Stripes on that same building.

She finally pulled into Sandrines’ parking lot and leaned her bike against the pale green concrete block wall. Inside, she walked up to the counter, picked up her usual sweet roll and coffee and paid Gale, who was manning the cash register today. Gale had worked there since Sandy had lived in Pinesville. They chatted for a few minutes, as usual, while Gale totaled up Sandy’s tab.

Sweet roll and coffee in hand, she spied the telephone company boys at their usual table. She was surprised to see Luke Sexton at a corner table, scribbling into a small notebook. He rarely had his breakfast here. If anything, he seemed even more reclusive than she was. She thought about going over to talk to him for a few minutes about the day’s job. It might give them a jump-start. She started over towards his table. As she got closer, she noticed goosebumps forming on her arms. She couldn’t help but notice what an attractive man he was, even at this time of day when most people were holding their eyelids open with toothpicks. He radiated an animal sensuality.

When he turned his head to glance up at her with an amused expression on his face, she stopped dead in her tracks, her toes practically curling beneath her. It was the first time she could remember looking directly at him, eye to eye.

 ‘What are you thinking, Lockhart’, she told herself, heart racing. All she needed was to start getting friendly with the only man who’d given her hormones the slightest nudge since she’d moved to Pinesville. She stopped, turned on her heels and headed in the other direction to join her crew. They were used to her. The single ones didn’t hit on her. Not anymore, at least. Most important, they were safe.

Breakfast went quickly with the usual bantering back and forth and complaints here and there about the workload for the day. Fred Selzer, one of the guys who frequently was assigned to her work crew, took a gulp of coffee and said, “I hear you’re going to be working with the quiet man this week.” He nodded over in Luke’s direction. “That guy never hangs out with anybody. Think he knows how to talk?”

 Henry Adams, another one of the crew, rolled his eyes. “You two ought to get along real good! Like oil and water. Bet this’ll be the quietest job you’ve ever been on,” he said. Most of the table roared.

“Thanks, guys.” Sandy retorted, in an exaggerated drawl. “Ah really appreciate you’all’s deep concern for my well bein’. There’s nothin’ wrong with quiet. He cain’t be any harder to work with than a bunch of turkeys like you’all”.

Several flapped their arms, roaring with laughter. “Turkeys,” Fred howled. “That’s a low blow.”

 “So? What did you expect? Accolades?” Sandy took a bite of her roll.

“Can you spell that?” Fred said.

 “Buy a dictionary.” Sandy replied, “That is if you know what one is. Is this the kind of nonsense what I can expect from you guys the whole time I’m working on the school job?” she asked.

“Could be”, Fred answered, “unless we can think of something else to lay on you. No pun intended of course.”

Sandy shook her head. “I’ve gotta find a new table.”

“What about the computer genius’ table?” Ted Jensen laughed. “We saw you heading that way before you came over here. Hey guys, maybe Sandy’s gonna find herself a man at last. Think so?”

“Could be. Stranger things have happened,” Henry added.

“Believe me, boys, he ain’t my style,” Sandy said, dryly. “Now try to work hard these next few days since I won’t be around to check up on you.”

 “I’m already helping out, Fred said. “I’ve got a pillow stashed in the truck so Ed here can nap on the way to his jobs instead of hiding out at lunch hour to sleep. He’s getting too much of that gal over at Carters at night.”

The guys all laughed. Ed gave them a sleepy look. “Hey, I can’t help it if I’m so sweet she won’t let me go home,” he said.

“Sweet?” Ted hooted. “Yeah, right. Just like a pot of honey and you’re the bear!”

“Well, considering the way this conversation is going, I’m out of here,” Sandy said. She swallowed the last of her coffee and stood up.

“We’ll all miss you terribly,” Fred said. “Nobody to pick on.”

Most of the town referred to Fred, Ted and Ed as the Three Mousketeers, both because of their rhyming names, and because Ed’s parents had brought them all back Mickey Mouse ears after a family trip to Disneyland when Ed was seven. They wore those ears till they were ragged. The three of them had been friends since Kindergarten. They had a good time cutting up, but all three were great guys in Sandy’s estimation. In fact, she had a crew of great guys. Not that she’d admit it out loud to any of them.

“I’d say you’re doing a pretty good job picking on Ed,” Sandy said. She put down her empty coffee cup and walked away from the table. On her way to the door, she took a sideways glance at Luke again, caught his eye and quickly looked away.

Darn. He’d caught her looking at him a second time. Involuntarily, her heart thudded again.

As she walked towards the door, to her dismay, she heard the Breakfast Club speculating on where Hurricane Darlene was going to hit the Florida coast. The Breakfast Club consisted of a group of retired men, some widowed and some married, who came to Sandrines regularly for breakfast, to pass the time and gab about town news. She stopped to ask a couple of questions. She hadn’t looked at the news this morning so she didn’t know it had unexpectedly veered west instead of following its initial projected path to the northeast, which would have avoided Florida’s Atlantic coast altogether. Now she wished she hadn’t been so obsessed with her own problems when she talked to Susan last night and had asked more questions.  At least Susan was prepared, or so she said. But could anyone really prepare for a hurricane, Sandy thought to herself as she was walking through the door. She would make it a point to listen to the weather station when she could during the day and give Susan another call tonight.

Outside, she hopped on her bike and cycled to the company garage, changed clothes, picked up a company truck and drove to the school parking lot. Luke pulled into the school lot right behind her a couple of minutes after eight. They’d arranged to meet with Jim Brisco at eight-fifteen to briefly run over the plans one last time and make sure the installation went just like he wanted.

Sandy glanced up and down the hall as they walked silently side by side to Jim’s office. The first classes of the day had just started and nobody was in sight except for somebody pinning an announcement on the bulletin board outside the principal’s office. Sandy had no idea where the new counselor’s office was located, but she planned to find out as soon as possible so she could avoid that area until she got a good look at just who the school had hired.

For a fleeting moment, she imagined herself in a dark wig and dark glasses, skulking around like those women in detective novels she occasionally read. But then she had to giggle at herself. Somehow detective novel ploys didn’t apply to real life plans very well. Maybe just pulling down her cap low over her eyes would hide her blonde hair and serve to make her features less obvious for the time being.

Jim was waiting for them in his office. He was a nice looking man with a pleasant smile. Sandy sensed he would make a good teacher. He had an easygoing humorous personality that students generally liked. A few minutes into the discussion, it became clear that nothing of substance in the plans had been changed. The number of phone lines and the their distribution into fixed phones or those to be connected to the school’s server were as specified on the drawings.

 Today, Sandy would run the main trunk line into the school and connect twisted pairs of wires to the distribution panel. Later she would work directly with Luke and help install the switch and router lines from the server to the various workstation machines.

 Eventually, the computer science program was to have twenty-four computers in the main classroom and four more in the library. Later, more computers would be added in the middle school. So far, only a main server and eight computer stations for the high school classroom had been purchased. Jim had also ordered an overhead computer projector and hanger for the classroom, but it hadn’t been delivered.

Sandy and Luke had been hired to install the wiring and plug-ins for all the machines on hand and set up the server connection boxes in each computer station for all the rest. Then, as new machines were acquired, connecting the server connection boxes and the workstations would be all that was needed to bring the new machines on line.

 Luke’s job included checking out the eight computers on hand and connecting them to the main server through the junction boxes.  Once the LAN was up and running, Jim Brisco would install the programs to be used for basic teaching on the server and workstations and individualize the programs for student use. Before the system was connected to the outside world, Jim and Luke would make sure everything was protected with firewalls and up-to-date anti-virus programs.

Before the meeting ended, they discussed briefly the arrangement Luke had already made with Jim—that Luke would be free to leave the job should an emergency come up in his business. That still was no problem with Jim. He wanted the job done right and wanted Luke to do it, he told him, so he was willing to work with that arrangement. Fifteen minutes later, they agreed that everything was clear, strategy-wise, and the meeting ended.

When they walked back to their trucks to gather up what they would need to get started, Luke stopped alongside Sandy’s truck. “Need any help carrying your gear?”

“I carry it myself every other day of the week. Why would I suddenly need help now?” Sandy snapped. She didn’t know why she was being so short with him. Part of it was her nervousness about still wondering who Carol would turn out to be and part was the way he was looking at her … almost as if he was undressing her with his eyes.

But that was silly. In the year he’d been living there she didn’t remember them exchanging more than a few brief words here and there in passing. As far as she knew, he didn’t know she existed. She turned her back on him and busied herself finding the key to open the side cargo door on her truck. She could feel his eyes still burning into her back.

 He didn’t say anything for a minute. “They said you were a hard case, Sugarplum,” he finally said. “I won’t insult you by offering to help again.”

She knew he had been trying to be nice, but now that she was up close and personal with him, so to speak, the vague feelings that she’d felt earlier when she saw him from a distance speed walking or over in the corner at Sandrines had suddenly felt overwhelming. She hadn’t been turned on like this by a man since she was a naive teenager and she already knew where those kinds of feelings could lead. Well, she’d sat on them for over ten years. Surely she could continue to do it. All her protective instincts kicked in. Hands on her hips, she turned to face him. “For the record, Sexton, my name is Lockhart, not ‘Sugarplum’,” she retorted. “And why have you been talking to people about me?”

“Simple, Sugarplum,” he said. “Somebody sends a pretty face to work with me, I want to know if she can do the job or if she’s part of this feminist affirmative action deal everybody’s been so hot about now-days.” The corner of his mouth turned up, his eyes twinkling. He’d recovered from his initial surprise and now was clearly enjoying baiting her.

“Listen up, Mister Sexton. If my boss felt I could...how did you put it…‘do the job’,” Sandy said, “why would you question it? The telephone company doesn’t send a dummy out on a job like this just to make an affirmative action point.”

He raised both hands in mock innocence. “Hey, I like to know who I’m working with. Don’t get your knickers in a twist. I’m pretty choosy about who I work with.”

“The state of my knickers is none of your business, smart guy,” Sandy snapped again, “and I’m willing to bet I’m choosier about who I work with than you are.” She could see that working with this man might be more difficult than she’d originally imagined. The irksome thing was that he seemed to be enjoying the whole interchange immensely.

“I heard that about you,” he grinned. “Being choosy, that is,” he said. “Not just at work. From what I hear, you’ve turned down every guy in town who had the audacity to ask you out. What's the matter? Too good for them?”

“Well, for a virtual recluse, you certainly seem to have a lot of information about me. Or misinformation, I might say. Besides, what does any of that have to do with the job?”

“I may not hang out with the boys at Sandrines and laugh at their jokes, but I’m a pretty good listener,” he said. “I hear more than you might think. The poop on you, so far, is you’re pretty good at the job—something I intend to find out for myself—and that you keep to yourself a lot, despite all that tomfoolery at Sandrines. I sure hope the first part’s true. I really don’t give a rat’s ass about your social life.”

Sandy looked him up and down. “Okay, then hear this because I’m only gonna say it once. I’m good at what I do and I don’t give a hoot in hell about what you think about my social life or my work. I don’t have to please you. I only have to please my supervisor and myself. Now that that’s clear, we both have work to do. Let’s cut the crap and get started!”

“I was just fixing to suggest that, Sugarplum,” he said, then casually turned and strolled towards his truck.”

“Don’t call me…” Sandy began, then stopped. Over the years she’d learned how to get the upper hand with just about every man who’d pulled this kind of crapola on her, but she found herself flushed and tongue-tied with Luke Sexton and it ticked her off royally.

“Sugarplum, indeed!” she grumbled to herself as she unlocked her truck. When she finally glanced over her shoulder, work pack loaded and lines coiled for the morning’s work, he’d already gathered his things and had gone inside. Well, they were off to a great start, all right.

 

 

 

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Chapter 3

 

At the end of their first day’s work at the school, Luke walked into his shop to check the messages on his answering machine before going upstairs to his apartment to eat. Looking around the place, he once again marveled that he’d been able to rent this spot. Money had been tight when he moved to Pinesville to set up his computer business. As it turned out, his landlord, Earl Johnson, was happy to get a tiny additional rent for the upstairs space above the shop. Garret might be a better description of it than apartment. With its small living area, complete with fold-down Murphy bed, easy chair, one-person sized kitchen and bath to the side, nobody had rented it in years. Earl had walled off half of it and used it for storage for years.  Even though the remaining part was small, it appealed to Luke the moment he saw it. He didn’t own much and didn’t need much space. Besides, the place reminded him of camping, something he still liked to do whenever he could get away.

His shop was larger, encompassing the whole downstairs of the small building.  It was located four blocks from town center on Pine Street, the main drag.  He had a front area where he could display blown-up photographs and specs of some of the computers he’d built and a counter for sales.  It was separated from the back shop area by a six-foot high partition.  Double doors out the back onto an alleyway allowed easy access for shipping and receiving materials and parts, as well as parking space for his camping van and work truck.  He had plenty of space inside for parts storage as well as a large shop area.  The big bench allowed him to have several computers laid out in  various stages of building or repair.  He didn’t stock commercially made machines although he would order them for an insistent customer. Mostly, he sold computers he built for his customers to the specifications they ordered.  He made it a point to spend time discussing exactly what the customer needed rather than simply selling them something with a lot of unnecessary bells and whistles they’d never use.

One thing he’d learned working for others in the computer sales and repair business; knowledge about computers and technical competence led to customer satisfaction and were the keys to success.  He made sure he serviced what he sold.  Increasingly, he was asked to service computers and computer systems he hadn’t sold, which he knew would lead to further sales.

He’d carried his appointment book upstairs that morning and had forgotten to take it with him.  Tomorrow, he would be sure to have it on hand in case he had to return any calls while he was on the school job. He’d made sure the arrangement with Jim Brisco allowed him to work his regular people into time slots as he deemed necessary.  If a business was in trouble, it was important for him to be able to schedule a service call the same day whenever possible. Businesses couldn’t and wouldn’t wait days for their techs to find a convenient time to handle their emergencies.

At two o’clock, when he’d last checked his messages with his cell phone, nothing was pressing except for one call and it could wait until tomorrow morning. That call was scheduled for right after lunch tomorrow. He figured he’d be far enough along with his part of the job at the high school to leave Sandy with enough work to do until he got back.  His bigger customers knew that he’d be tied up for several days on the school job but he’d assured them that he would be available if they needed him.

As he climbed the back stairs, he realized how much his leg ached from the extra crawling around under desks and counters all day installing the hidden power and data cables for the computer lab workstations.  He looked forward to slipping off of his prosthesis and massaging his stump.  A long hot shower on the stainless chair he’d bought for that purpose would go a long way to easing the aching, too.

He’d finally come to uneasy terms with losing his right leg below the knee but it had taken a long time. Now, if some idiot threw a word like gimp or crip at him, he just laughed along with them. Usually, the laughter bugged them more than getting mad. He’d learned to cope with the amputated leg, but not a day passed that he didn’t wish he had both legs again.

Damn wars! Why didn’t they send the wise-ass politicians to fight instead of kids filled with dreams? Kids who went to war thought they were invincible and figured they’d survive intact, get out and get a good job, marry and raise a family.  He’d believed it. He’d bought the so-called American dream.  Kids marched off to the middle east all army “rah rah rah”, only to see their friends die in a ditch or have their hopes, limbs and, sometimes, lives taken by one well-aimed bullet or bomb. 

He’d lost the last of his own illusions the day his leg had been blown off. Lost a lot of dreams about what his life was going to be like, too. Growing up and attending school in Boca Raton, Florida, he’d been sure he could do anything he set out to do. School came easy so he had plenty of time to indulge in the many water activities that Florida offered.  Traditional sports, such as football or basketball just didn’t appeal to him.  On those few occasions when there were a few waves, he borrowed an old board from a neighbor and tried his hand at surfing.  He enjoyed swimming and snorkeling, too. He’d hoped one day to travel someplace and try to find that perfect wave or dive a gorgeous reef, not the smaller bland ones typical of his area of Florida. He also wanted a challenging career even though he hadn’t decided on what it would be yet. 

All through High School, at least two or three girls were always hanging around him, flirting. The feeling was heady, but, for the most part, they bored him with their talk about what shade of lipstick was better or whether they were too fat.  His sex drive was as strong as the next guy’s, though, so, vapid or not, it was hard to resist getting involved with a few of them.  Especially when those gals showed up at the beach wearing what amounted to three strategically placed swatches of cloth held in place with strings.  During his senior year, he finally fell for Joella, a sweet brunette who was both attractive and smart. They both realized they were too young to get too serious, but they talked about getting married when he got out of the service anyway. 

After he got hurt, it took him the better part of a year to heal from the primary wound to his leg and the surgeries that followed.  He threw himself into the rehab to learn how to walk again with the prosthesis the Army provided.  Rehab was tough—tougher than he thought it would be. The pain—the healing—the setbacks. Learning to walk like a baby again. Falling down over and over, just to get back up and start all over.  It was the hardest thing he’d ever had to do. By then, he’d lost most of his adolescent dreams. The boy he used to be was long gone.

Once he got back to the states, the Army offered him training in computers during his rehabilitation and he took it.  If for nothing else, it gave him something to do besides feel sorry for himself.  When he tried to reclaim some semblance of his old life with Joella, she took one look at his missing leg and broke off their relationship. Oh, not in so many words and not immediately. That would have been kinder—to end it completely and finally.  Instead, she took the tack that “we need to take more time” and “marriage is a really big step”, which only dragged out the hurt. 

Joella took that big step less than a year later, marrying another guy from their town who wasn’t missing any limbs. He supposed he couldn’t blame her.  She was still young, whereas he’d grown up fast in the service.  Seeing friends and comrades shot down and blown apart aged you fast.  But, even though they were light years apart, Joella’s leaving still came as a blow. The only good thing about her dumping him and marrying someone else was that it made him throw himself even harder into his rehab and computer classes where he found his niche and made him even more determined to show that he was as good as anybody else.

It paid off.  When he finished, his limp was barely noticeable and he was stronger than he ever had been in his life. He ended up graduating at the top of his computer class.  Wryly, he quipped that he figured he traded a leg for his computer knowledge. 

Women, though, were another story. Mostly, he avoided them during his rehabilitation. He just wasn’t ready to lay his heart on the line again.  Once in a while, he talked to one of the women who hung out at the bars near the base but, as he found out fast, those women weren’t really interested in guys with disabilities on their way out of the service.  They were after the men with promising military careers, men who could take them around the world, bring in a nice paycheck and play stud besides. In addition, there were always women who were willing to provide a man company for a price. Practitioners of the world’s oldest profession were always available around military bases, trying to make a fast buck. He avoided them.

After he was discharged, he bought a conversion van with part of his disability check, modified it for sleeping and traveled the country for over a year, sleeping outdoors when he could and in the van when the weather didn’t cooperate. He spent a lot of time in the woods and mountains of Colorado, Vermont and North Carolina, but fell in love with the Carolinas.

It was hard to say what was special about the Carolinas. Most mountains made his heart stop with their beauty, but he liked the green rolling hills that covered most of the state. He found he liked the food, too, and the slower pace of life in the South, compared to most other places. It didn’t hurt that the bitter cold months were shorter. He especially enjoyed his time on the Appalachian Trail and in and among the small camping areas near Boone and Black Mountains. The area was the kind of place he wanted to call home.  Compared to South Florida where he’d grown up, it was a different world, especially now that the influx of people brought even more crowding and traffic to the Sunshine State.

One day, while finishing up a fried trout in a secluded camp east of Ashville, it hit him that he couldn’t run from his memories and problems for the rest of his life.  In addition, his funds were finally running low so he applied for and got a job in a computer store in Charlotte. It was close enough to the mountains that he could get away nearly any weekend he chose, except, of course, in the dead of winter.

 After about a year in Charlotte, he met a woman he liked and who seemed to like him, but the first time they made love, he could see the thinly veiled horror in her eyes when he took off his prosthesis. The counselors in rehab had warned him about the possibility of those sort of of reactions, but it still hurt.  While he saw her around a few times after that, he didn’t ask her out again. He figured he would spare them both any further discomfort. She never asked him about the change in their relationship either, confirming that he’d been right. 

It took a while before he dated again, but, even then, it seemed that many women went too far in insisting that his missing leg didn’t matter when he could see in their eyes that it did when they finally made it to bed. After another woman he was beginning to really like reacted negatively when she finally saw his leg without the prosthesis, he decided he’d had enough.  He didn’t want to be defined by a body part, or lack thereof, so he mostly withdrew from the dating scene.  Oh, he occasionally took a woman out for dinner or to the movies, but avoided extended dating or bed, except for those times his sex drive got so high he was willing to deal with the risk of rejection again. He’d been emotionally smacked too many times to go down the road to a serious relationship again.

Sometimes, when he let his defenses down, he still wondered if there was a woman who’d be right for him.  While he knew he couldn’t blame all his failed relationships on his leg, he also knew it was a big factor.  He knew he was guilty of anticipating and seeing rejection, whether there or not, in almost every woman he’d met since Joella. Sometimes he felt like a porcupine with all of its spines splayed out for protection.  Spines, grown over a long time for self-protection, weren’t easy to shed.

Now, to his immense frustration, he found himself attracted to someone again.  Had been from the first day he’d seen her riding her bike to work.  He’d asked about her casually and found out she didn’t date and seemingly had no interest in doing so.  He’d heard, too, that she had a short fuse with ignorant remarks and a way with words that could stop grown men in their tracks. He’d found that out for himself, yesterday. Her spitfire mouth might be a problem, but he liked the independent spirit and attitude behind it.  From what he could gather from those who knew her, she was well-respected in town and sharp as a tack.  For sure, she was attractive as hell even though, most of the time, she wore those bulky uniform pants and shirts, or jeans.  He couldn’t help but wonder what she would look like dressed in a way that would show off her figure.  When he daydreamed about her, and he seemed to be doing a lot of that lately, that was how he saw her–showing the figure he’d only glimpsed in her riding shorts.

Good thing for him that he seemed to appeal to her about as much as a dead skunk or he could see himself getting into real trouble with this one. One thing was for sure.  Thinking about her let him know he hadn’t completely given up the idea of having a relationship with a woman again. He closed his eyes and imagined unbuttoning her blouse, sliding it down her arms, looking down into those huge blue eyes, then…

‘Calm down, Luke,’ he told himself. ‘It’s not gonna happen so stop thinking about it’.  It didn’t work.  Sandy had already taken root in his mind.

Maybe he’d better start taking cold showers if he was going to survive being around her here in Pinesville. And yes, he felt settled here and planned to stay. People let you be yourself.  His buddy, Jake, had given him a good tip about moving to the town. Business was good and the countryside around the town was almost as pretty as being up in the mountains themselves. Ten minutes, tops, and you could be on an abandoned sloping road, surrounded by huge groves of pines. Enough pines peppered the town to give a person the feel of nesting inside the woods, too, especially as one got further out from town center.

He’d been so lost in his thoughts, he suddenly realized he hadn’t checked his answering machine yet. He hurried back downstairs. Five more messages. Two were routine and could wait until morning. Three were from Sadie Lowry, a married lady around Luke’s age, who was active in a lot of clubs around town. She was also the Methodist Church secretary and all three messages said it was an ‘emergency’. He rolled his eyes.

With Sadie, it was always an emergency. She had the uncanny knack of regularly messing up her laptop.  If she was a complete ditz, he would blow her off, but Sadie worked hard and tried to help everyone.  He called to ask about the problem and as usual, she told him she absolutely had to get a church’s newsletter printed and copied by tomorrow and it was gone.  With Sadie, it was always something she absolutely had to get out.  But in her defense, Sadie was always working to get something done for others.  She was also a regular customer who’d sent a number of new customers his way and was willing to pay him extra for emergencies.  He told her to bring it over and he’d look at it. 

Starving, he ran back upstairs again, made himself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, cast a longing look at the chicken and fresh vegetables he’d planned to cook in his wok tonight and was waiting downstairs when her minivan pulled up.

Sadie walked through the door with her usual sheepish grin and handed Luke her computer in its carrying case.  Luke unzipped the case and took out the laptop, the power supply and the extra mouse he’d given her.  After connecting everything up, he booted it and asked her about the problem.

“I worked all day yesterday and about three hours today on setting up the newsletter, saved it and went to lunch.  When I came back about two thirty, it was gone,” Sadie told him, wringing her hands. “I don’t know what happened.  I have to get it printed and copied tomorrow so the Ladies of the Church group can stuff envelopes tomorrow morning at ten.  You’ve got to find it!”

Luke opened up her Documents folder and glanced over the items there.  “What time did you last see it?” he asked, praying she hadn’t hit the delete key by mistake.

“Well, I took about an hour for lunch, so I guess it must have been between one and one-thirty,” she replied.  “I’m sure I saved it, because I remember hitting the ‘save’ button.”

Luke knew that Sadie saved all her work in the Documents folder since it was the default for her word processor.  At least she didn’t try to fool around with the defaults.  If she had, her problems could become even worse.

He examined the files saved there by date and time and then clicked on the one listed at one twenty-three that afternoon.  It had a strange name, but he figured it was worth a shot.  Sure enough, Sadie’s newsletter popped up.

“Thank the Lord. How on earth did you do that?” Sadie said, astonishment and relief written all over her face.

“Somehow, you saved it under the wrong name. Here, I’ll rename it as a ‘newsletter’ on this date so you can find it.”  He also wrote the name of the file on a blank mail label, stuck it to the top of the laptop.  “The file name is on this label too,” he said as he zipped everything up in the carrying case and handed it back to her.

Sadie thanked him effusively and asked what she owed him, but Luke waved his hand and said, “It’s on the house, Sadie.  Besides, it only took a minute”.  He didn’t say that the only problem was that Sadie simply didn’t pay enough attention to what she was doing.  There was no sense in telling her something she already knew and seemed unable to do much about.

Watching her walk out to her car and drive away, Luke fantasized about how Sandy would look in the kind of outfit Sadie wore tonight.  She was dressed in a soft blue skirt, with a darker blue blouse and low heels in a matching blue color.  While the blouse was a bit on the frilly side for Sandy, it suited Sadie.  She wore just enough make-up to set off her eyes and brighten her lips.

In that outfit, minus the frills, Sandy would be a knockout, with that blue matching the color of her eyes.  Hell, clad in a lineman’s work shirt and pants she already was a knockout as far as he was concerned. He felt his body heat up just thinking about her.  He sensed she’d fight tooth and nail to keep from dressing that way though.  Somehow, he knew that Sandy dressed to hide her figure and femininity rather than show it.  He couldn’t help but wonder why.

Luke brought himself back to the real world. How on earth was he letting himself fantasize about such an impossible woman?  He had better things to do than dwell on a woman whose main purpose in life seemed to be to avoid contact with men and, if today was an indication, most certainly with him.  With the only emergency call answered and the problem successfully resolved, Luke walked over to his computer and turned it on. 

He regularly communicated with seven other vets he’d gone through rehab or computer school with.  A couple of them still had some problems with their injuries.  Clearly, some had adapted more easily than others.  He saw that two had written, so he clicked on the first e-mail.  It was from Jake Riddle, who was one of his classmates at the military’s computer school. 

How’d the job at the school install go today, buddy? it said.  If you need any help, things are a little slow around here so I’ve got some extra time on my hands.

Jake usually fielded his emergency calls when Luke was out of town or gone for a long weekend or on vacation.  Luke returned the favor last year when Jake took off a couple of weeks to visit his parents and sister in Boseman, Montana. Like Luke, Jake’s high school girlfriend had dumped him only two months after he’d enlisted and left town.  When Jake had a little too much to drink, he would start singing “Dear John”, an old Ferlin Husky tune dating back to the early ‘50s, except that he would substitute Jake for John.  It took him a long time to get over being dumped, too.  Recently, Jake had started seeing a woman in Carters, the county seat, about twenty minutes away, and it seemed serious. Luke had met her a few times and she seemed to really be fond of Jake.  It gave him a good feeling to know there were still some good women out there who could love a man for who he was.

Luke typed out a reply to Jake, filling him in on the job and telling him he would call him if needed.  He hesitated, then added, A phone company gal who works as a head linesman is helping with connecting up and routing the cables.  Yep, she climbs poles and everything, but she’s a looker. Seems to know what she is doing, too.  Interesting gal. He exhaled deeply. This was the first time he’d mentioned Sandy—or any woman in Pinesville—to Jake. That was a big step. He didn’t say that he’d known that calling her ‘Sugarplum’ would get under her skin … and it had. If he couldn’t control his own feelings for her, he figured he could drive her away by making her furious at him. In the past, he’d called it his ‘flippancy tactic’. From the looks of what happened yesterday, it’d worked really well. Maybe too well.

After another deep breath, Luke pulled up the note from a vet in California.  Hank had been in an especially gruesome firefight that killed most of his buddies. As a result, he had a history of nightmares and periodic anxiety attacks.  His note said he was having nightmares again.  Luke asked how his sessions with the shrink and support group were going and encouraged him to keep at it.

Once his e-mail correspondence was finished, Luke found images of Sandy flowing through his mind again.  ‘Stop it, you damn fool,’ he said to himself.

He pulled down his Murphy bed and stretched out, intending to close his eyes for a few moments before his shower and calling his aunt in Florida to make sure she was prepared for Hurricane Darlene.  Having grown up in Florida, he knew what a hurricane could do.  The next thing he knew, it was morning and he was waking from a dream about making love with Sandy.

Damn. The woman was everywhere! He took a quick shower, dried his stump carefully and changed the sock for a dry one.  He’d learned a long time ago that if you didn’t take care of the stump and the socket, there was hell to pay in pain and reduced mobility. Once dressed, he strapped the leg back on, made some business phone calls and headed out.  He would call his Aunt Claire on his cell phone.  For the first time in years, he found he was looking forward to seeing a woman more than his work.

He drove to Sandrines for a bite to eat. He could’ve eaten breakfast at home as usual, but he knew it was likely Sandy and her crew would be there.  Besides, she usually rode her bike and wore biking shorts and he wasn’t averse to starting his day by seeing a good pair of legs. 

Sandy’s bike wasn’t there when he parked in the lot, but he went on in, ordered an egg sandwich and coffee and sat at the corner table again.  His stump ached a little, like it usually did in the morning. He’d missed his morning walk, as well.  Usually, as the day progressed and his stump conformed snugly down into the socket, the ache went away.  Well, most of the time it did, but he’d slept with it on last night and when he didn’t let the skin dry overnight, it sometimes gave him problems.  He’d find out as the day wore on.

The Breakfast Club table was near his.  The retirees were talking about Hurricane Darlene now bearing down fast on the South Florida coast.  It had made a turn west after tearing up the Bahamas and was due to make landfall somewhere in the South Florida area within the next twenty-four to thirty-six hours.  After Florida’s last couple of hurricane seasons, not to mention the destruction of New Orleans in the Gulf, nobody wanted to hear the word hurricane again. Luke had been keeping his eye on Darlene since it formed out in the Atlantic off Africa over a week ago.  Originally, it was predicted to stay in the Atlantic, but he knew that big storms like Darlene could turn anytime and go in a different direction.  He’d called his Aunt Claire in Boca a couple of nights earlier and was eager to talk to her again when he got back into his van.  Aunt Claire had practically raised him and now he felt protective of her.  Maybe overly so. He usually kept an eye on any storms that developed and called regularly just to make sure she was all right. A neighbor who used to help her clean up after the storms had moved away last April.  Luke had already tried to persuade her to take leave from work and fly up to Pinesville for the season, but she’d refused. She reminded him she had a job and besides, she could take care of herself.  He had to smile. Her stubbornness reminded him a little of Sandy.

Just then, Sandy strolled in. This time though, she didn’t look at him or start over in his direction.  She just picked up her usual sweet roll and coffee and went straight to her work crew’s table.  He figured he must have really pissed her off yesterday.  Maybe more than he thought.  Ironically, that thought didn’t please him.

After about fifteen minutes of raucous laughter at the telephone crew table, Sandy jumped up and left, but Luke got to the school before her.  Of course he knew that she had to bike to the company garage, change clothes and pick up her truck first.

 He had crawled behind a counter in the computer room when he heard her finally walk in. He already knew the first part of her work today involved threading some of the hook-up lines down into this room. Busy checking, adjusting and dressing the cables to the gang of machines on top of the counter, he didn’t bother to make his presence known. If she could ignore him at Sandrines, he could let her wonder where the hell he was, too.  She was dragging something around in the room that sounded like a stepladder and generally making a clatter, so she didn’t seem to hear him.  After a few minutes, he’d forced himself to focus on his work and forgot about her. Or so he tried to convince himself.  Unsuccessfully, if he was honest with himself. The room was filled with her presence.

 

 

© 2007, Copyright Michael G. Patrick, All rights reserved.