My dad, whom we thought wasn’t listening, poured himself a cup of coffee in the corner of the kitchen and chimed in.
“Don’t listen to her son, we fell in love just like everyone else. Sounds to me like it was just the hormones,” he playfully answered.
“He’s lyin’ through his teeth Elliott. That man was a fool for me then, just as he is now.”
He walked out of the room smiling without a peep of disagreement. He knew she was right.
“Well, it sounds to me like it was quite a day for you. You hungry? Oh! What am I sayin’? You just ate. Well, you go to bed sweetheart and we’ll talk more tomorrow.”
She stood and kissed the top of my head, but before she left, declared, “I love you Elliott, very much. Remember the rules darlin’.” She pointed at me. “You treat her as a lady, always. You handle her with kid gloves young man, she’s precious.”
“Yes, ma’am.” I nodded.
Then she strolled down the hallway through the living room on her light feet to the master bedroom. She turned right before opening her door.
“Is she the student you were having trouble with baby?”
“She was.”
She turned with a smile and opened the door to her bedroom.
I woke an hour earlier than usual and rang Julia to let her know to anticipate me at seven-thirty, an hour before school. I knew it wouldn’t wake her mom or her dad as they would have been at work at six a.m., along with my dad. She answered and her voice impressed on me like freshly baked bread, warm and soft.
“Hello?” she said, half asleep.
“Miss Jacobs? It’s Elliott.”
“I know who it is,” she laughed.
“You may expect me at seven-thirty this morning.” I detached all formality and almost whispered the rest, “I’m calling this early because I don’t know how much time girls need to get ready and wanted to cover all my bases.”
She laughed, whether it was with me or at me I’m not sure, and agreed to be ready by seven o’clock, and told me not to be late. She had gumption and I loved that.
I showed up at her house at six fifty-five on the dot. The sun hadn’t even shown, which was my plan. My headlights shone brightly onto her home and I watched as she locked her door. I left the truck running and ran up her porch. I took her backpack from her and guided her to the other side of the truck, opened the passenger door for her and threw her bag, with mine, in the bed. When I stepped in, she was buckling her seat belt.
“Hi,” she said flirtatiously.
“Hi,” I said, trying to hide my smile.
“We have an hour and half before school starts. Whatcha’ got planned?”
“I thought we’d watch the sun rise, but I’m keeping the location a secret,” I told her.
“That’s a perfectly respectable thing to do Elliott Gray.”
“I know.”
The corners of her mouth gradually turned up as my truck chased the road. I took a backward way to throw her off but once we got close, she knew.
“Our creek,” she said. “Very clever Elliott. Since you like surprises so much, consider yourself ambushed.”
She removed a CD from a plastic case and twisted it in her fingers before popping it in.
“A gift, a small one, really. It’s a mixed CD of all my favorite songs. I made it for you after you dropped me off last night.”
When she’d said that, my throat became dry and I swallowed hard. The words sang through my head and settled softly in my heart. I really liked the idea of her thinking of me when I wasn’t around.
The only thing new in my truck was the stereo my Uncle Danny and Aunt Becky had bought me for Christmas the year before. I reminded myself that I needed to call them up later and earnestly thank them for the gift again.
Jules had drawn on the CD case an intricate illustration of an antique typewriter with a piece of parchment in its platen. On the parchment, written in tiny letters were the songs and their artists in the order that they played. Did I mention Jules is an amazing artist and painter?
The first song began to play and I slammed the truck to an abrupt stop. She grabbed the dashboard and looked over at me.
“What?” She asked.
“That’s my favorite song,” I said.
It was an obscure English band that the British had barely heard of, let alone more than one person in some random little town in West Virginia.
“It’s mine as well.”
There was no use on dwelling on it any more than that. We’d gotten used to the unusual by then. I pressed the accelerator gently so as not to startle her more than I had and when we arrived at the creek bed, we worked the quarter mile through the brush and sat on the large rock bridge we used to play a lot on as kids. I hadn’t been there in years and I didn’t remember it being so magnificent.
Smooth and soft from thousands of years worth of water carving out its intricate form, it sat as a natural bridge between both sides of the creek bank. Water trickled down the cascading hill of rocky matter underneath it and joined the main body of water several feet below. The greenest, wet moss surrounded the stone, as if someone had laid a soft blanket on the flat of it but the wind grabbed hold and blew it to the sides. The quilted moss hugged the rock tightly, foolishly trying to avoid getting wet.
Above, hovered the thickest canopy of green trees and foliage that camouflaged the sky leaving a gap just wide enough for the sun to appear. It smelled sweet and clean and earthy. Its trilling stream wept down the rock bed, tears splashing into each other, finally whirling together and funneling its way back to its tamer companion. The only other thing audible to me was the obnoxious static of my own heart beating from my chest. I painfully hoped that the beating of the water against the rocks was loud enough that my heart wouldn’t betray how vulnerable and intimidated I truly felt.
She sat close to me and stared into the water below. I ordered myself to wrap my arm around her but it laid feebly by my side.