by Kevin Lucia
“He didn’t have the heart to go on,” she finished for me. I glanced at her, surprised, because she sounded angry. Like she was taking it personally. “No offense,” she added, “but that's bullshit.”
I shrugged. “No offense taken. Mom and I don't exactly fight, but we don't really see eye to eye, either. She wasn't thrilled I got the basketball scholarship, believe it or not. She thinks I'm gonna grow these crazy dreams of playing pro ball someday.”
Michelle smiled, her—anger? —fading. “Little does she know, it's far worse. Her son's grown crazy dreams about being a writer someday.”
“Yeah. That would go over wonderfully, I'm sure.”
She cuffed my shoulder. “Hey now. No self-pity. No offense to your mother, but you're not gonna let her kill your dream, like she did your Dad's.”
I rubbed my shoulder and pretended to wince (but not completely; she had put some unexpected oomph behind her swing). “She didn't kill his dreams, really. More like starved them.”
“Whatever.” She waggled a finger in my face, scowl-grinning. “You're not going to let her do it to you. Understand?”
I chuckled, holding my hands up in surrender. “Sure. Whatever you say. Just don't hit me again.”
“Depends. Promise you won't give up? You'll keep writing, and you'll make sure to marry someone who nurtures your dreams instead of starving them?”
I stared at her for a moment - —lost in those green eyes - —marveling at her mature self-possession, intrigued by her sense of the world beyond herself. None of her rant had been a veiled suggestion she was the one to feed my dreams. It hadn't been a flirty gesture to win me over. She was genuinely adamant I keep writing.
Which of course only made me fall for her even harder.
I nodded, smiling in wonderment. “Yeah. I won't give up. Promise. First novel gets published; I'll dedicate it to you.”
She waved. “Naw. Dedicate it to whomever helps get you through it.” Her small smile crept back. She glanced at me sidelong. “However, a hat-tip at the end of your acknowledgments will do nicely.”
I laughed, shaking my head. “You got it.”
A moment of quiet followed, against the backdrop of other people talking and a boom box playing, ironically, “You Want It” by FAITH NO MORE. There was no awkwardness. It was a comfortable quiet, the kind usually existing between those who are so intimate they feel no pressure to fill the silence with chatter. Like many other things, I've only ever experienced this with one other woman besides Michelle: my wife, Abby.
After a few more minutes of this wandering around and chatting, she placed a hand on my shoulder, (which made my heart beat triple-time) and said, “Hey. Wanna see something cool? You ever explore the woods on the other side of the road?”
I peered at her, curious. “No. Why?”
She gripped my shoulder, eyes alive, excited. “It's...well, I'll be honest. It’s kinda eerie. But kinda cool, and definitely not boring. You game?”
I remember feeling a little unsure for the first time since meeting Michelle. Part of it was the break in routine. Everyone visited Old Webb because of Old Webb. I'd never heard of anyone exploring the woods around it, or across the street. But also...
A special knowing glinted in Michelle's eyes.
As if she had access to secrets I'd never understand.
My journey through adolescence into adulthood was one of constant discovery. I learned many things growing up that completely altered my view of the world. I wasn't sure what Michelle wanted to show me in the woods across the street, but while most of me was intrigued, a smaller part of me felt...
Anxious?
Apprehensive?
Afraid?
To this day I'm grateful I repressed that cold feeling in my stomach, plastered on a brave smile and said, “Sure. I'm game.” Perhaps it was only a small moment in the face of life's panorama, but like so many other small moments...
It changed everything.
* * *
Luckily I'd brought a flashlight with me so we had light to leave by. Which was good, because I might've had a hard time walking without one, as excited and nervous as I was. Rationally, I knew it was unlikely Michelle was leading me across the road with amorous intentions. However, I was a nineteen year old guy, so part of me couldn't help but feel hopeful.
Another part of me - —a much smaller one, but no less vocal - —truly felt some anxiety. No one had ever mentioned anything worthwhile seeing across the road from Old Webb. Which begged the question: was Michelle leading me across the road because she had something to show me, or had she lied, and was leading me somewhere for something...else?
I suppose it’s obvious I hadn't seen many slasher flicks as a high school student. If so, I might've been a little more suspicious of a girl I hardly knew leading me out into the night in a secluded part of the county to “show me something really cool.” Especially when she took my flashlight, saying, “I know where we're going, so this'll be easier.”
Regardless, most of my unease faded as her free hand took mine, the simple contact of flesh against flesh soothing. We walked across Old Webb's moon-glimmering parking lot, our feet scuffing the cracked asphalt in the night's silence. At the time I didn't have the vocabulary to adequately describe the scene. If pressed, I probably would've offered something like “really pretty in an unreal sort of way.”
From my vantage point today, (though my perspective is obviously tinged by nostalgia), I remember the dreamlike image of the yellow stripes running down Route 7, glowing under a full moon. Everything was cast with the faintest luminescence: the trees, the road, and the star-strewn sky. The deep quiet of the Adirondacks swelled around us and pressed in, dampening the faint strains of “November Rain” drifting from Old Webb behind us.
If pressed today?
Ethereal would be the word.
We stopped at the road’s shoulder. Michelle shined my flashlight on a darker patch of woods on the opposite side. “See that,” she whispered. “it leads to an access road. Most people miss it, because the trail-head is so overgrown.”
I squinted. Sure enough, she was right: I could see a gap in the foliage. Looked like any “official” Adirondack trail-head you'd see in the Adirondacks, but without the blue, gold-edged sign telling you the trail's destination. “What's back there?”
“You'll see. Do you know what the land here was used for before Old Webb came along?” I shook my head, but I'm not sure she saw me, because she continued without a beat. “Believe it or not, it was a Bible camp. When the Town of Webb bought it in 1930, it built around the camp's dormitory and expanded it into Old Webb Elementary.”
We crossed the road, our sneakers whispering against asphalt. Most of my anxiety had given away to intrigue. I don't care how old any guy is; exploring abandoned places always holds a special allure. “How do you know all this?”
I glanced at her, my breath nearly taken away. In the night, lit by the backwash of the flashlight, Michelle appeared to be otherworldly. Like a beautiful nymph from faerie realms.
Of course, that's more rose-tinged nostalgia for you. Back then, I probably thought to myself: “Wow. She's hot.”
She offered her knowing smile. “I haf my vays,” she whispered mischievously in an awful Euro-trash accent. I snorted, and she chuckled along with me.
On the other side of the road we ducked under low-hanging tree branches and past brush into a surprisingly clear, rutted path winding up into the forest. Clearly, at one time, vehicles of some kind - —if only tractors - —had driven up this road.
“This used to be a big part of daily life at the old Bible camp,” Michelle whispered as we picked our way carefully up the old access road, the flashlight's splotch of white bobbing along the path before us. “It wasn't owned by the Bible camp, but the owner worked with the camp. After the Town bought the camp and built Old Webb, the owner of this plot worked with the school, offering special after-school riding sessions, weekend training, offering its premises for
4-H meetings for many years before the administrators decided to eliminate 'non-essential extra-curricular' programs and activities in the wake of educational ‘'reform.’' Y'know what the worst part was? The owner of this place offered her continuing services for free but was still turned down because at the time, Old Webb's administrators were hot in pursuit of state funding through mandated, 'approved' curriculum and educational planning.”
“Riding sessions? 4-H meetings?”
“Yep.” We rounded a corner. She panned the flashlight back and forth across a clearing. “Check it out.”
I'm not sure how many times in my teenage years I was actually rendered 'speechless,' but I can safely say I was that night. The access road opened into an old clearing inexorably being reclaimed by the surrounding woods and waist-high brush. An abandoned but oddly preserved cabin sat far back to our left.
In the middle of the clearing, the barest remnants of fencing could be discerned in the brush, and if you had a good imagination, you could fill in the blanks and trace the fencing around a small pasture. Back in the far right corner leaned what might've once been old horse-stables for maybe four or five horses (Corey's younger sister took lessons at Pleasant Hill, so I recognized the stables easily enough.)
“A horse ranch,” I whispered. “Those are stables back there.”
Michelle nodded, smiling. “Yep. Imagine this entire pasture picked clean and countless footpaths and trails for rides through the woods, and you'd have Shady Acres Horse Stables.”
I glanced at her, raising an eyebrow. “Shady Acres, huh? Not exactly original.”
She shrugged, sweeping my flashlight back and forth. “But it was right. Which is sometimes better than being original.”
We passed the next few minutes in silence, making our way toward a section of fencing still standing upright. Any nervousness or anxiety I'd felt had faded in the face of a wondrous kind of...well, exultation; I guess you could call it. I was struck nearly dumb by the sight. It sounds contrived, but it was as if the moon had specifically chosen to shine down into the clearing, casting everything in its pale white glow, making everything ghostly, insubstantial. I firmly believed if I dared blink, everything would vanish.
We made our way toward a surviving section of old fencing. I gripped it, tested my weight against it, finding it surprisingly sturdy. I folded my arms on the top rung and leaned against it, gazing at a weed-filled, moon-fired pasture that had once played home to horses and their young riders.
(This, of course, is the part of the story you’ve probably been waiting for this whole time.) Michelle sighed, leaned against me, slipping her arm around my waist, resting her head in the crook of my neck and shoulder.
I could feel the pulse of her breathing against my ribs. Her soft breath caressed my skin. A part of me soared inside. Remarkably, however, I mostly felt calm. At peace. Yeah, I was basically cuddling with an attractive girl out in the middle of the dark woods, but I don't remember consciously thinking anything. Nothing like, “Now's your chance, kiss her quick!” I was there with her, at that moment, which was more than enough.
After several minutes of a bliss that would go unmatched until I met Abby a decade later, Michelle whispered against my neck, “I'm not slamming your Mom. Honest, I'm not. But you're not going to let her beat you. . Are you?”
“No,” I answered immediately, full of sudden, surprising conviction. “I'll find a way to keep writing. Dad never talks much about his own writing, but if he knew I was writing, too...I think he'd want me to keep it up.”
She snuggled closer. I slipped my arm around her waist, pulling her tightly against me. “Good,” she whispered, her warm breath sending chills across my skin. “When you give up something you love, when you stop fighting...you lose something, inside. And you're always haunted by it. Trust me.”
“How do you know?”
She shrugged. I couldn't see her face, but I knew she was smiling her small little smile. “I just do.”
We stood there for a while, holding each other silently, trying to preserve the moment in moonlit amber.
* * *
Eventually the night's creeping chill overwhelmed our moment and we made our way back down the access path to Route 7. As we drew closer to the road, leaving abandoned Shady Acres behind; our conversation grew more mundane, rooted in everyday things. Though I don't remember telling her about the Gus Maker tournament the last time we talked, she asked how we fared and I told her. We chuckled about bad officiating and the unpredictable bounces a basketball sometimes takes. She proved remarkably knowledgeable on the subject, asking if I was excited about playing college basketball the following year at Webb Community College. I offered ambivalent answers, wondering (perhaps for the first time) how invested I was in basketball, anymore.
We crossed the road. Slipped back into Old Webb and ended the evening as we had before: chatting about nothing and everything. Corey finally found us, said he and the guys were heading out. Seeing as how they were my ride, and Michelle had made no mention of giving me one, I reluctantly gave in.
Michelle walked me to Corey’s car, where we exchanged a far too causal “see you around,” as if we’d just spent the night chatting about school gossip, rather than discussing my writing dreams. There was no goodbye kiss (not with the guys there), or even a hug, just a small squeeze of her hand and her knowing smile.
We drove off and I looked back, saw her watching us. As we rounded the bend, she turned and re-entered Old Webb, where I knew from past experience the party would continue for several more hours. I never once thought she was going back into Old Webb searching for another guy to hang on, though my friends joked (with no malice) about it. For the rest of the ride home, I was convinced she'd come tonight specifically to see me, and what she'd shown me in the ruins of Shady Acres - —whatever it was she had shown me – —had been for me, in particular.
To this day I still wish I'd made a greater effort to get her phone number. If she’d given it to me – —if she’d had one to give me it might've cleared up quite a few questions.
Because I never saw Michelle Titchner ever again.
* * *
The following week, I felt...different. That’s the only way I have of describing it. Following an urge I barely understood but had to obey, I called Corey and told him I was taking the week off from basketball. Told him I wanted to rest for a few days. I didn't know what was going on inside my head, but in retrospect, I think I now know: a part of me, hidden deep inside, had given up basketball.
Not completely, of course. And not immediately. I'd play for two more years at Webb Community. I'd enjoy it, and I would play well. But the week after seeing Michelle Titchner for the last time, something inside knew the time had come for basketball to fade, that the time had come for something else to take its place.
Back then I didn't think anything so concrete. I just knew I didn't want to play basketball for a while, maybe even a whole week. I wanted to write. So every day after my chores I borrowed the car and drove to Bassler Memorial Library where I hid at a table in the back and began my first halting attempts at writing this story, in this blue notebook. Of course, there were a few things I didn't know then, until Gary McNamara called me up the Saturday morning at the end of that week.
* * *
“Hey. You busy?”
I cradled the phone between my ear and shoulder, scooped a spoonful of cereal in my mouth, chewed, swallowed and said, “Not really. Was thinking of fishing later, maybe. Depends on how hot it’s supposed to be. What's up?”
“Can you swing by Old Webb?”
Something in his voice sent a mild shiver down my spine. A catch in his breath, maybe. Something in his tone. Of course, I'd spent the entire week trying to put into words this strange, weird thing between me and a girl I'd only met twice, and now here Gary was, asking me to meet him at the only place I'd ever seen this girl, but during the day. It occurred to me as an afterthought that I'd not wandered around Old Webb during the day
since I was twelve or thirteen.
I slowly placed my bowl of cereal onto the counter, shifted the phone to my other ear, staring at nothing out the kitchen window, into our backyard. “Sure. Was thinking of fishing near there, anyway.”
“Cool. See you in a bit.”
“Right.”
I hung the phone back up on the wall. Stood and stared out the kitchen window for several more minutes. Gary and I had always been okay friends, but we'd never done much on our own. Just him calling me was weird; and him wanting to meet me at Old Webb during the day, alone was even weirder.
The feeling that had floated around me all week, a feeling of change, intensified. For the first in my life I felt unsure of what lay ahead. I realized with a mild sense of shock I enjoyed that uncertainty, which also frightened me a little, too.
* * *
I pulled behind Old Webb and parked next to Gary's beat-up Isuzu pickup truck. He was waiting for me by the rear entrance, flashlight in hand. I parked, shut my Ford Escort off and got out, offering Gary a puzzled smile. “So what's up? We're kind of old for ‘'come see the cool gross thing I found,’’ aren't we?”
Gary smiled a little, but I could see it in his eyes. Something lingered there, a nervous energy seemingly all out of proportion with the situation. Also, his smile was brief, tight at the corners, like he was trying to smile and show how cool he was, show he wasn't...
Afraid.
I folded my arms, something strange and unbalanced - —like I was sitting in the front car of a roller coaster teetering over the edge of its first drop - —stirring in my stomach. It shocked me a little, again, to find the sensation not entirely unpleasant.
“Gary. Dude. What's going on?”