Jack and Pops from Brandy Hollow

That tree was nothing but a seedling when first we sized up each other.

Running up to me to check my pulse.

Egads, the mouse is a man!

Nothing to be afraid of, but turquoise flints in my vocabulary.

You dared my hand to find yours and away we went.

Twice down the long hill, once down the rocks.

Stop where you see the sign for Brandy Hollow.

Well, I don’t see us going back there anytime soon.

Not for me to tell you what age prevents, but we are not a sonic boom.

Maybe if they reinvent the way of breath and oxygen.

Nickel in your pocket and that’ll be from me.

Egads, don’t go owing people money!

You had rules, rules, rules and I had saliva.

Alabaster cooking like campfires were going out of style.

Egads, don’t forget to put the fire out!

There was never a fire I couldn’t put out.

That was back when hours were made of water.

Remember when we were the only two people on earth who knew what secrets were?

Egads, don’t tell them all our secrets!

I won’t, I won’t.

The only one I want to tell is the one about our friendship.

Parsnip cuts for dinner again?

No imagination in this place.

Egads, I need a piece of liver to steady my nerves!

Something about your complexion tells me they should have fetched a doctor.

Remember the doctor we’d go see in Brandy Hollow?

Winnowed man with a checkered past?

There was always a story about everybody when we were young.

Gone are the days of mystery and discovery.

You found me shivering by the wagon after my parents hightailed it out.

There I was in burlap shorts and a shirt made out of sandpaper.

Remember your mother taking me in?

Not that you could ever forget.

There was no jealousy on your end.

Dinner served at six, that was all I needed to know.

When the time came, I was family.

You made it as simple as that.

There are no friends in Brandy Hollow.

What you find, you keep or chuck.

Kites overflowing in trash cans all over town the day after the fourth.

Happy to find a place at the table.

Egads, Jack, don’t go around making it sound like my mother was running a home for orphans.

She happened to have extra and she didn’t like waste is all.

Long nights of me on the porch hearing her tell me that my parents weren’t bad.

Doing wrong by your kids is an Appalachian tradition.

No point in holding bitters hoping they’ll turn sweet.

The stars would come out and she’d have me wish until my wells ran dry.

You’d come out with us and make some wishes too.

Only wish I had ever come true was finding a family.

Years later and all that’s left is you.

Understand that I’m not complaining, Pops.

Some people get nothing and nobody.

You got me and I got you.

Usually best friends stop dripping like a fixed faucet over time.

Egads, don’t go talking like you’re a Fannie Flagg character.

Remember telling me I was going to die first, because I was always the one running through the hollow like I was chasing after lightning?

Good eggs don’t roll fast is how the principal would say it when I’d show up with all my clothes a mess.

Some excuse you gave me to give to him about a bank robbery.

You were always stealing your best excuses from Twain.

Not that I wasn’t well-read, but you could scribble me under any writing desk.

Kick the tires on my first car and say ‘Floor it, Jack.’

Kids today think they invented speed.

Doing near a hundred on roads made up of gravel and prayer.

Remember getting pulled over by your uncle?

Egads, don’t tell them about him letting us go without a ticket!

That was a hundred years ago or more by now.

We can tell any stories we like.

Egads, some stories dry out their own ink.

Keep as many cards as you like near to your dear.

Remember the secret about our friendship.

Plans made to escape through Baton Rouge.

Egads, you may as well show them the map we drew up.

Parties were going to be had when we left Brandy Hollow.

We were the devil’s dust and the angel’s tears.

Some would speak of us the way a priest speaks of temptation.

Nobody would miss us but your mother.

Remember peaking in her room before we scurried down out our bedroom window?

We said a silent goodbye to the greatest woman known to man.

No intention of ever seeing her after that.

Then we hitchhiked all the way out to Rodger’s Cove.

Egads, you’re going to tell them the price of milk in Malaysia now.

We stopped at the bus stop (a very good place to stop).

Packed lunch unwrapped and consumed.

Drizzles of mayo and tomato pulp down our shirts.

Somebody cleared their throat.

The genesis of the secret was born out of the guttural removal of whatever it is that gets stuck in your throat.

There was no point in dreaming about escape after that.

The bigger secret would stay a secret.

That’s one I won’t even tell now.

We were the prodigal sons of Brandy Hollow.

Without a word from your mother, nor, subsequently, anybody else.

Egads, I bet she threatened them that if they said anything she would--

Didn’t ever meet anybody that wanted to cross your mother.

Remember how even when we knew we were going to be stuck, we told ourselves we’d still be stuck together?

Remember going out on that porch even earlier every night and staying out twice as long just to wish twice as much?

How about the night we saw a plane flying so low it shook the house?

Egads, I thought it would smash down through the roof and we’d get some kind of settlement money and we’d all move to the coast.

That was before the plane pulled up.

Planes just like flying low sometimes I guess.

So now I’ll get your parsnip dinner from down at the dining hall.

Looks like they’re doing lights out early tonight in case that storm pulls the power so we won’t notice and find ourselves in a stupor.

Remember how that old guy two rooms down said he heard the water was going to rise up all the way to the top of this building and we’d have to be evacuated?

Didn’t matter what he said, because I know if I’m escaping this time, I’m going all the way.

You’ll come with me, Pops.

Sorry to tell you I forgot to pack a lunch though.

Hope they have lunch where we’re going.

God, I hope it’s somewhere good.