Joey (AA/CC teen) [WIP]

[greywolf]

Deputy Johnson put the phone down, trying to decide just how much he hated Special Agent Thomas of the FBI.

There was always a little jurisdictional friction when the feds got involved, but this went far beyond that. Thomas was an SOB, Johnson decided. No, he wasn’t. Johnson liked dogs, he wouldn’t insult female dogs throughout the world. Thomas was human, but as arrogant and obnoxious a human as he’s ever met.

They had the kid’s dental records for identification, for crying out loud. The tacky way that Thomas had asked the scared parents, “Oh, you are going to need to give us permission to get your son’s medical records to identify the body,” had gotten a quick signature from a glaring father, but only at the price of sending the kid’s mother into tears. Identify the friggin’ body. Damn, what an ass Thomas was. Thomas had whined and complained since he’d come to Roswell. The town was too small, the desert was too hot, the food was too bad, the hotel sucked.

An East Coast guy from the big city, he’d obviously considered his posting to the El Paso regional office to be a punishment tour, and a case in little old Roswell had brought him to what he obviously thought was the end of the earth. And he spared no effort in voicing those opinions, voicing them to people who’d grown up in Roswell and stayed because they liked it here.

So four hours ago, he’d ordered, not asked, but ORDERED Johnson to go get the kids x-rays for the forensics file. Luckily one of the other deputies had gotten permission from the kids parents. Johnson could just picture Thomas waltzing up to them and saying, “Oh, we need the neck and body x-rays on your son, IN CASE HE’S BEEN DECAPITATED AND WE CAN’T FIND THE HEAD.” Instead, the local deputy had handled it with tact and discretion. Unfortunately it hadn’t done much good and Johnson had just wasted part of the morning and most of the afternoon trying to find those x-rays. He and two radiology techs had turned the department upside down. They hadn’t found them. Were they misfiled in the one of the tens of thousands of other film jackets in storage? Were they lost? Stolen? Nobody seemed to know and nobody seemed to be able to find them. Worse yet, the computer digital imaging system didn’t have the files to reprint them, apparently lost when the emergency generator had activated suddenly this morning. A computer glitch of some kind.

Agent Thomas had been livid, screaming about the incompetency of people in the hospital, local law enforcement clearly meaning Johnson, and everything else. So his sum total reward for a day of hard work had just been the ass-chewing he’d gotten over the phone from that arrogant FBI twerp.

What a lousy week this has been, and it’s only Monday.

[greywolf]

The dirt bike stopped in the arroyo two miles from Andrew’s house, and the engine was suddenly silent.

After a day spent touring the untracked New Mexican desert, the two teenagers had returned to the pod chamber, rolled up the sleeping bags and done the other mundane chores of camp housekeeping. As Andrew had donned his borrowed riding leathers, borrowed without her dad’s permission he recalled, he had looked around the pod chamber. This was a place of new beginnings, and it would always be special to him. When Joey had touched the rock the door had sealed behind them, leaving some bags of trash, his gurney and respirator, and some other odds and ends of medical equipment safely inside to be disposed of at some future date.

The night ride through the open desert had been bittersweet, both of them knowing that it meant parting, but knowing that it had to be done. His parents suffering needed to be ended and the questions of the police and perhaps even the press would have to be faced, as best he could face them.

It was funny how he could sense Joey’s thoughts. They had really only been a couple for two days, but Andrew could sense that she was also uneasy, unsure of when they might actually get to see one another again, and sad at their parting.

He took off the pack and handed it to her, first reaching inside it to get the hospital gown. “Property of Roswell Memorial Hospital”, he said laughingly. “Like anyone would want to steal something that doesn’t even reliably hide your butt.”

That broke the somber mood of the moment as Joey smiled and raised one eyebrow. “But it’s such a nice butt…,” she said.

He moved off into the darkness and shed his borrowed clothes, returning to the bike with as much dignity as the gown would allow, and helping her stuff the rest into the backpack.

Both teenagers approached each other somewhat uneasily. They were both very new at this.

The thoughts sprang into Joey’s mind. She’d not showered for almost four days, and been camped out most of that time. She had not been out of these clothes since Friday night. She’d spent the day riding through the dusty desert, hot and sweaty. She had probably consumed most of a bottle of Tabasco sauce since the last time she’d brushed her teeth.

Drew’s thoughts were very similar. He hadn’t showered since Friday morning, and he’d played almost three quarters of tackle football since then, let alone the various pokes, proddings, and medical equipment he’d been attached to. He’d been camping out pretty much the whole weekend, and been riding through the dusty desert all day. Although he could usually go a day without needing to shave, it had now been nearly four. He hadn’t seen a toothbrush since Friday morning. He was wearing this stupid hospital gown.

Individually, both teenagers had come to the same conclusion. This would be a gentle hug, a quick kiss on the lips, and a promise of more to come, even if that future was months away.

As his lips touched hers, it came to Joey that it might be three months before they touched one another again. Three months. They had been a couple for less than three days. How unfair was it that fate would take him away from her for so long, so soon, after she had wanted him for all these years?

As her lips touched his, Drew realized that it might be three months before they touched one another again. Three months. They had been a couple for less than three days. How unfair was it that fate would take her away from him for so long, so soon, after he had wanted her for all these years?

There was no one to observe the two teenagers in the arroyo that night. If there were, they would have observed them come together in a tentative hug, and as their lips gently touched their bodies seemed suddenly to almost flow together, each clinging to the other as their passion surged through the connection. After several minutes they slowly parted, both appearing a little dazed by the encounter. He smiled and blushed, she blushed and giggled.

She gave him a quick kiss on the cheek and said, “I’d better go, while I’ve still got the willpower to do it. I’m in enough trouble with my folks already.” Moments later he was watching as the dirt bike receded into the distance.

When it was gone he turned and headed toward the lights of the town. Time for him too, to face the music.

[greywolf]

‘Or maybe not,’ he thought after he punched the combination into the garage door keypad, and watched the door open to an open stall.
While dad’s commuter car was in its stall, the “family car” was gone. And as he entered the house from the garage, it was apparent that both of his parents were gone as well. It was after 11:00 PM. Both he and Joey had underestimated the time it would take him to walk the two miles. Barefoot and nearly freezing in the thin hospital gown, it had taken well over an hour for him to cover the two miles. By the time his feet were cold enough that he could not feel the rough shards of rock of the arroyo, the cold night in the high desert had left him shivering and uncoordinated, continuing to slow his progress. Stumbling into a prickly pear patch hadn’t helped either. Now, looking around the empty house he came to a quick conclusion. While it had been vitally important to his cover story that he return to the house with his hospital robe without any borrowed clothing, there was now absolutely no reason he couldn’t get his own clothes, and take off the now tattered gown. Better yet, he could warm up quickly in the shower, before getting into his own warmer clothes.

Roger and Barbara Douglas came in to the house from the garage. They had been to the shift change at the sheriff’s office to get the latest information about the search for their son. Unfortunately, there was no real news at all. It was almost as if the injured young man had fallen off the face of the earth.

Roger was at least glad that Barbara seemed to be holding up better. He’d really thought she was going to lose it the previous night. The long sleep she’d had last night had certainly helped her. She was still concerned of course, and had been deeply disappointed that there was no news at all tonight, but she seemed to at least have hope since this morning, rather than the deep despair of the previous day.

They climbed the stairs and turned toward the master bedroom. As they started walking down the hall, Roger heard running water in the back upstairs bathroom. He turned back, wondering if there was a plumbing problem, or perhaps a bad flapper-valve on the toilet. As he turned to check on the problem, his wife followed along.

As he opened the door, two surprises greeted Roger Douglas. The first was that the light was on in the bathroom. The second was when he noted, to his great surprise, the shower was on, with a figure barely visible through the shower curtain. Surprised to find an intruder, and surprised even more to find an intruder taking a shower in his house, he turned and whispered to his wife, “Go call 911 and tell them we have an intruder.” His wife didn’t move, but continued to stare at a spot on the floor, her eyes wide, and a gasp of surprise coming from her lips. He looked down to see a tattered piece of material. It was darkened by dust but not so dark that the lettering could not be clearly read, “Property of Roswell Memorial Hospital”.

Luxuriating in the spray of warm water, Drew heard a gasp just outside of the shower curtain. He pulled the curtain back enough to look out at the bathroom. “Mom! Dad! Hey, let me get dried off and get some clothes on…”

[greywolf]

It was 4 AM and as he followed his wife back to bed, Roger Douglas felt like he was starring in an episode of the Twilight Zone.

It had started when Drew had wrapped a towel around himself and stepped from the shower, giving both of his parents a long wet hug. Before either Roger or Barbara had recovered their senses, Andrew had taken his robe from the hook on the back of the bathroom door and put it on saying, “Let’s go get some hot cocoa, I’m still freezing,” as he lead them back down the stairs.

When he had stopped in the kitchen his parents stared at him in disbelief, wanting to hug him, but afraid of the damage it might do to his injured neck. Roger had recovered first, “Lay down carefully son. I’m going to call 911 and get an ambulance to take you back to the hospital so they can check you over.” And at that point, thought Roger Douglas, he’d taken the second step into the Twilight Zone.

Andrew Douglas looked at his parents and said, “I’m not going back to the hospital to get checked.”

Roger Douglas had long worried about his son being shy, almost painfully shy. He made friends through his sports activities, but he was too introverted, to unassertive in social situations. His one attempt over a year previously to ask a girl to a dance had required him to spend weeks building up his courage, and her rejection had left him depressed for further weeks. School dances had since come and gone, and he had never repeated the attempt, either with that girl or any other.

But when Andrew said he was not going back to the hospital, there was no mistaking what he meant. This was not a kid arguing with his parents about going back to the hospital. He was not appealing with them to not take him back to the hospital. It was not even an act of adolescent rebellion, showing his independence by contradicting the wishes of his parents that he return to the hospital. When he had made the statement it was clear that he believed he was stating a fact. This was not an opinion, it wasn’t a request, it wasn’t even a non-negotiable demand. It was as if he were to say, the area of a circle is pi times r squared, the first president of the US was George Washington and, oh yeah, Drew Douglas is not going back to the hospital. The way he stated it clearly excluded even debate of the subject. The issue was a non-starter. Any statement that included Drew going back to the hospital was simply false.

Roger and Barbara had looked at each other in wonder, and then his mother looked at her son and said, “But Andrew, you need to be checked over.” He had responded, “I’m fine, Mom. Look. No pain, no problems,” and proceeded to flex and extend his neck, to turn it from right to left and back, to lean it to left and right. Remembering the x-rays, this simple action had managed to paralyze both parents with fright, wondering what damage these movements were doing within his neck.

And when his mother asked the next question, the topic moved on, although Roger still wasn’t sure exactly how that happened. He wasn’t sure if it was the demonstration of neck movements or the manner of Andrew’s assertion that he wasn’t going back to the hospital, but it seemed like a door just closed on the topic. Indeed, Andrew WASN’T going back to the hospital.

Barbara’s questions were logical ones, “What happened to you? Where were you? Who did this, and did they hurt you?”

Throughout his life, Roger believed, Andrew had never lied to his parents. Sure, he’d had the invisible friends of childhood, but he’d never really LIED to them. Perhaps that was why he lied so poorly when he answered his mother’s questions. Certainly Roger could not disprove those answers, as his son told a story of awakening in the desert alone, feeling OK, and wandering for a couple of days until he could find his way home. But the furtive looks Andrew gave as he told his story, the lack of eye contact with his parents as he talked, the way in which he seemed to carefully choose his words, all told Roger Douglas that his son was lying to his parents or at least knew far more than he was telling.

Roger wasn’t really sure if his wife had picked up on these things or not. For Barbara, having her son back had seemed enough, without worrying about the details, and having him well was a miracle, too wonderful to be analyzed critically.

And so somehow, not only had Andrew not gone back to the hospital, but his parents had not even really confronted him about his alibi for the time he had been abducted, Roger realized. It had changed by the time the police arrived twenty minutes later, and that change was in its own way amazing too. As the sheriff’s deputies questioned him, it appeared that Andrew’s skills at prevarication had improved markedly. Perhaps it was the twenty-minutes practice on his parents, perhaps it was that Andrew felt less guilt lying to strangers, but by the second telling the cues were largely gone, the story came easily to his lips, the eye contact was there.

The answers he gave were no more helpful, but he projected an image of really wanting the police to catch whoever had done this, and wanting to help them however he could. Had Roger not seen the earlier performance, the second one would have been convincing…almost.

But the truly remarkable incident was the third telling of the story, when the obnoxious FBI Special Agent had arrived, criticizing Andrew immediately for having destroyed forensic evidence by taking a shower, and demanding that he be taken immediately to the hospital to be examined, and to have forensic specialists document his every cut and scrape.

Roger had again said, “I’m not going to the hospital,” with the same tone, quietly stating what he regarded as an obvious fact. The Special Agent had chosen to interpret this as a challenge, and had immediately closed to within twelve inches of Andrew’s face, screaming at him about federal crimes, and penalties that Andrew could face for obstructing justice.

The intimidation had anything other than the desired effect. His son had actually smiled at the man. “So you are trying to tell me that if I don’t do what you want, you are going to charge me with kidnapping myself?” he’d asked. The Agent had gone livid, as several of the deputies had openly laughed.

Before the agent could compose himself enough to say another word, Andrew, shy unassertive Andrew, had halved the distance between himself and the Agent, stared in his eyes momentarily and said, “I’ve had a long and tiring weekend. It’s late, and I’m going to bed now. When you get a warrant, come back and see me.” He had then turned to the sheriff’s deputies, and said a polite goodnight, kissed his mother and hugged his father, and gone up the stairs, ignoring the rantings that had come from the Special Agent.

Ultimately, the man had left, spouting threats of warrants and charges of impeding an investigation. The deputies had filled out some paperwork, and asked them to bring Andrew to the department to talk to them further once he had rested, and then Roger and his wife had climbed the stairs and gone into Andrew’s room, to find him asleep.

They talked for awhile, unsure of exactly what had happened that day, looked back in on their son, and finally went to bed themselves.

Three times they had awakened during the night, and three times they had gone into his room, to convince themselves that this was real, that he was really there, that he was safe. Three times they had seen their son sleeping peacefully, a broad smile on his face, as if he were having a beautiful dream.

As he looked up at the ceiling of his bedroom, Roger Douglas pondered the mystery. When his son had first refused to go to the hospital he had feared that the abductors had done something to the boy, something that had hurt him or shamed him, something that Andrew had feared others might discover. But that clearly wasn’t the case. Andrew looked healthy, except for a few scratches. His neck clearly did not bother him, perhaps the greatest mystery. Maybe the doctor could have made an error but Roger certainly didn’t know how. He’d seen his son struggle to move his feet, struggle to move his arms, both without success as they treated him in the Emergency Room. And it had clearly been an abduction. The two ambulance attendants certainly hadn’t duct-taped each other to the fence posts.

But he’d come back from his abduction healthy and, to Douglas it appeared, happy. And his son somehow seemed more complete, not just more assertive and more confident, but more fulfilled, as if he had somehow discovered whatever had been missing in his life.

His son had come back not just well, but….whole. He hoped that someday Andrew would find it in himself to trust him, to tell him the real story behind this amazing weekend. But until then, sometimes it’s just best to take your victories and move on he thought, as he drifted off to sleep.

Barbara Douglas listened to the gentle snoring of her husband beside her as he finally drifted off to sleep. After all these years, she found the snoring…reassuring.

Her fears were finally departing. Everything was going to be alright. She thought back to the last visit to their sons room, and remembered his face, asleep, but smiling happily. The same expression, she realized, that Andrew had worn in the dream she had when the young girl had shown him to her. The young girl who had said that Andrew was safe, that he was well, and that he was…loved.

She had felt that love wash over her as the girl had said those words, felt her deep love for Andrew and for her too, because she was a part of Andrew. She’d seen a sparkle of possessiveness in those blue eyes, when they had looked at Andrew. The dream-girl’s love for Andrew had seemed no less than hers, although not at all maternal.

Maybe there was someone out there like that for Andrew, and maybe someday he would find her and share his life with her. Barbara hoped so. But that was for the future. Tonight was a time for contentment and joy. Barbara listened to the snores of her husband as they lulled her gently to sleep.

[greywolf]

As Joey shimmered and departed from his dream, Andrew stood along the beach alone.

Ten weeks wasn’t a life sentence, but he looked forward to the day he could actually be with her again in the real world. So far, things were going well, better than either expected. He had told her about his confrontation with his parents and the police, she had told him about being grounded for ten weeks. He walked back to the beach chair and as he looked at it he smiled.

He had really been unprepared for their first dreamwalk, he hadn’t really believed it would work. His fantasy of a sunbathing Joey in a skimpy white string bikini had obviously embarrassed her when she’d come into his dream. Her seeing it had certainly embarrassed him.

He really didn’t think about her that way, he had told himself. But that was a lie, and he knew it. He thought about her that way a lot. She had always been incredibly attractive to him, incredibly..desirable.

But the point was, he didn’t think about her just that way. He really loved Joey, the real Joey, not just her superficial beauty, but the person underneath.

He had been dreading their second dreamwalk even more than talking to the police, wanting to convince her that she was important to him as a person, not just a hot body in a string bikini. He had practiced his speech several times and had made sure that it was an empty beach of white sands he was watching as he heard her walk up behind him from the dunes. As her shadow fell across his face, he had looked up and seen her beautiful blue eyes and he had sighed as his vision expanded to take in her golden curls, and…the white string bikini.

As she had approached him she had felt very self conscious.
This was more like something her Aunt Izzie would do than something Joey would normally do, but somehow it was different with Andrew. She was more comfortable with Andrew than she’d ever been with anyone, even her own parents. He somehow completed her.

As he had looked up at her his eyes seemed full of love. As he had seen the bikini, his eyes had gone wide and his mouth gaped. Remembering that moment Joey smiled and said to herself, ‘That went well.’

[greywolf]

Deputy Johnson was having his best day in weeks.

First of all, there had been the late night phone call from the Douglas’s. Not only was their son home, but apparently the docs had made some sort of mistake, because he was not only back, but back in good shape. Andrew Douglas had been clearly confused, maybe by the drugs they’d given him to sedate him for the transport. Unfortunately, he probably wasn’t going to be much help in finding the perpetrators, but with recovery of the kid unharmed, recovery of the ambulance in good shape, the crime had now come down to some sort of assault on two ambulances attendants, except neither could remember the assault, someone duct taping them to a couple of fence posts without doing them any actual harm. While technically an assault and battery, Deputy Johnson had seen worse hazing done by college fraternities, or police academies he thought, as he remembered one cold night he’d been doused with ice water and locked out of the trainee barracks.

Somebody had apparently put 70 miles on the ambulance, joyriding in it. But the sum total of the monetary loss was really the respirator, the gurney, and the neck immobilization stuff they’d had on the kid.

But what had really made his week start off well, was seeing that young kid stand up to Special Agent Thomas. Deputy Johnson figured he was one of about five people who’d wanted to see that arrogant so and so put in his place all weekend. They’d swallowed their pride in the interest of what their Sheriff called ‘inter-agency cooperation,’ but if ever anybody needed to be told off, it was that FBI guy.

When the confrontation came from a 16 year-old kid who’d stood there like he was ready to go toe to toe with the Agent, it had been priceless. Seeing Thomas rant and rave last night when the federal judge had refused his request for a search warrant to compel an examination was great.

Unfortunately Thomas had ordered the deputies working on the case to arrange for a local judge to get the order, and had bristled when they indicated they doubted that a local judge would grant the order either. He had told them in no uncertain terms that they were to set up the meeting with a judge, and he’d do the convincing.

Johnson and the other three deputies working the case had been trying to decide what to do over some coffee and donuts in the bakery that morning when Sheriff Valenti, now long retired from the force had dropped by for some coffee and a maple bar or two. He listened to their grousing about the FBI agent and, with an evil grin on his face, asked them why they didn’t set up an appointment for the man with Superior Court Judge Bean.

Raymond Bean was 72 years old, and had been a local justice of the peace for about 45 of those years. He’d been born in Shubert, New Mexico a small town not too far from Roswell. That is, a town that was small, even by Roswell standards.

He was a local character and always had been. It was rumored that he was a direct descendant of the legendary Judge Roy Bean, the law west of the Pecos. That was probably a lie, but if you’d ever seen him in his court, you’d find it easy to believe.

The fact that he was currently a Superior Court judge was really just a fluke. He had been appointed to the position by the governor two weeks ago to fill out the last three months of the term of a judge the governor had nominated to the state Supreme Court, and it really sort of made sense. To avoid the cost of an expensive special election, for a term that would only last for 90 days, it had been agreed to appoint Raymond Bean, to restrict his caseload to the reasonably simple cases, and to let the two individuals actually running for the office to compete equally in the next general election in November, with neither having the inside track as an incumbent.

After Valenti had made the suggestion, the deputies had looked at each other, first with broad grins, finally with outright laughter, as one had called on his cell phone to request an appointment for the FBI agent with the judge.

As Deputy Johnson followed the gray General Accounting Office leased car down the highway, he looked at the two other deputies in the car. They were all trying real hard, but unsuccessfully, to keep from laughing. When all three had finally managed to stop, someone would make eye contact with one of his fellow officers, guffaw, and start all three of them off again.

The meeting had been priceless. The Agent had explained about the incompetence of the small town physicians, the incompetence of the small town ambulance personnel, the incompetence of the small town radiologist, and x-ray technicians, and the arrogance of that small town 16 year-old kid to the Superior Court Justice who had been born and raised in Shubert, population 72 and described by even the Roswell locals as an incorporated filling station. Shubert had let him rant for awhile, and as he wore down finally addressed the Special Agent.

“Be that as it may,” said the old desert rat, “you haven’t explained to me why you believe that this kid, who you admit was sedated, restrained, and by some accounts paralyzed, somehow kidnapped himself. Now you’ve done a lot of talking, city-boy, but you haven’t answered that."

The hearing had deteriorated rather quickly after that, with Agent Thomas glaring at the deputies as they struggled to keep straight faces.

When Thomas had started ranting about small-town deputies and their incompetence, Raymond Bean had seemed amused, but shortly after a statement by Thomas that had included the phrase, ‘incompetent senile old fart small town justice of the peace,' Bean had declared Thomas in contempt of court and sentenced him to 90 days in the county jail, instructing the deputies to immediately remove the firearm from Thomas and to handcuff him.

By this time even Thomas realized he had gone too far, and apologized. Bean was unmoved. Thomas had requested that the sentence be suspended until he could discuss the issue with the federal attorney. Bean said no dice. As the prospect of actually being incarcerated in a (small-town) jail by the (small-town) deputies started to seem very real to the Agent, he asked if there couldn’t somehow be some sort of a plea-bargain, “in the interest of interagency cooperation.”

Bean had given him 45 minutes to get to his hotel, pick up his belongings, and be AT the county line. As the gray GAO sedan passed the county line, it pulled over to the side of the road. Johnson and the other three deputies exited the car and were smiling as they went up to Taylor and handed him his unloaded service pistol, and an envelope containing the bullets from the clip.

After a brief but spirited exchange of unpleasantries, three laughing deputies got back into their prowler and headed back for Roswell. One exceedingly angry FBI Special Agent returned to El Paso where he wrote a report questioning whether any kidnapping had ever actually occurred, and decrying the incompetence of small town medical, law enforcement, and judicial personnel.

The scathing report was actually never read by anyone, although an OCR scanner recorded the keywords used in it for future retrieval. Apparently, however, no researcher ever was interested in those particular keywords. It was held in the active files for 30 years and then transferred to the records repository in Missouri where it was held for an additional 20 years. It was subsequently shredded, giving up its cellulose to be recycled into several soft drink cups eventually utilized by a McDonald’s in Kansas City.




Three weeks after the departure of Agent Thomas, the Roswell Sheriff’s department received an email instructing them to go to an arroyo several miles out of town. There they found, in good condition, an ambulance gurney, a portable respirator, and an assortment of cervical fixation devices that were identified as being those taken from a Roswell EMT ambulance almost a month earlier. The email account had been opened only minutes before the message had been sent, on a website offering free email service.

The address of the sender was steamboatwillie@hotmail.com. No subsequent messages were ever sent from that account. The registration for the email account indicated it had been set up by a Mr. M. Mouse, who had listed his address as 1313 S. Harbor Boulevard, Anaheim, CA 92802.

Believing this to likely be a fake name and address, Deputy Johnson never bothered to contact the Anaheim Police Department, but the Sheriff’s department IT experts had tracked down the IP address to a coffeeshop in Roswell that provided free Wi-Fi service to its patrons. Once the IT experts determined this was accessible not only by those patrons in the building, but even by people in the parking lot and adjacent buildings, it had been decided that further investigation was probably not a reasonable use of police manpower.

As Deputy Johnson finished the report closing the case he thought to himself, sometimes you just take your victories and move on.

[greywolf]

Roger Douglas was relieved at the result of Andrew’s medical exam, but felt guilty that the boy had been convinced to undergo the exam under false pretenses. Andrew had not played another football game his sophomore year. He had received his letter in football at a football team dinner the preceding week. He had started two games, and played a total of seven quarters before his injury. That was enough, under the rules of the conference, to qualify him for the award of a letter. Oh, he’d tried to play in Roswell’s subsequent games, but the team physician would not allow it unless he were cleared by an orthopedic surgeon and he still adamantly refused to consider returning to either the hospital or to the only two orthopedic surgeons in Roswell, the physicians who had treated him after his accident. Eventually he had negotiated a deal with the team doctor allowing him to return to the team his junior year, but only if fully cleared by another certified orthopedist.

Andrew himself had found a sports medicine/orthopedic specialist in Albuquerque who had agreed to see him. Roger had worked with his insurance company to get approval for the consultation, knowing full well that Barbara had already decided that Andrew would never again wear a football jersey regardless of the outcome of the exam and that without her approval, he wouldn’t give permission either.

He had taken the Tuesday off from work to take his son all the way to Albuquerque, pulling him out of school for the long journey north. The results had been good. Andrew was totally cleared by the specialist.

As he looked at the new x-rays that showed no evidence of any fractures he remembered from the night of the injury, Roger shook his head in wonder. Would anyone ever really know what had happened that weekend? Would Andrew ever tell? Andrew had become superficially more social after his accident, and his story had gotten more polished with each telling. He had little difficulty now talking easily with people who asked about that night, convincing most that the doctors had simply misdiagnosed him and that whoever had decided to take a joyride in an ambulance had simply dumped him out in the desert.

In fact, the report from the doctor in Albuquerque would probably make that even easier in the future, Roger decided. Although he knew that his son was continuing to hide the facts of what he had experienced, Roger still felt guilty as Andrew discussed his plans for next year’s football season, happy in the belief that he would be allowed back on the team.

In small towns in the sparsely settled Southwest, high school sports are an integral part of the social life of the whole town. Townspeople, even those without children of their own, would often turn out to cheer the team on, even for the minor sports. And the local radio station would often give play by play.

It was late Tuesday afternoon. For the last hour they had been listening to a high school girl’s basketball game, as they continued south to Roswell. The opposing girls team had won the state title the previous year, and had most of that championship team back. The Roswell team had done well the previous year, but it had lost four starters to graduation, as well as several other players.

Roswell was not expected to even be competitive today according to the announcer, and his words had proven prophetic for the first half. At the second half, however, Roswell had changed point guards, playing a young freshman. In a wide open running game, Roswell had managed to close the gap between their score and that of their opponent, and as they entered the city limits the game had gone into overtime as a brilliant pass by the young point guard had set up an easy score by a Roswell Forward.

When Andrew asked his father if they could stop at the school to see the overtime play, Roger almost said no. Then he looked at the clock and realized that Barbara would still be at the hairdressers for another 45 minutes. They had agreed over the phone to meet at a nearby pizza parlor to celebrate the results of the exam and, Roger suspected, for Barbara to tell her son that regardless of the normal exam, his football days were over.

Realizing there was no urgency, and feeling guilty about deceiving his son, Roger drove to the West Roswell High parking lot and went with his son into the gymnasium.

[greywolf]

The Clovis coach had told her team to slow the game down in the overtime, after seeing their sizable lead melt away late in the game as her team had tried unsuccessfully to run with the Roswell team. They had been hurt badly by the speed and passing skill of the young blonde freshman that Roswell had put in at point guard early in the second half.

The new strategy had proven effective in the overtime period as the taller and more experienced Clovis team had slowed the pace of scoring by holding the ball patiently, using their height advantage, and avoiding some of the mistakes that Roswell had converted into fast break opportunities earlier. They had gotten an early lead and maintained a margin of 2 to 4 points throughout most of the overtime period. With 30 seconds left to go, they had a two point lead over the Roswell girls and possession of the ball. She gave the signal for them to stall, to force the Roswell girls to come to them, force them to foul for possession.

As the Clovis girls brought the ball slowly down the court, Joey’s eyes flickered to the Roswell coach and saw her give the sign and she passed it to her fellow guard. As the girl with the ball came across center court Joey dropped off the other Clovis guard and joined in a double team on the Clovis player. They pressed her hard, hoping to get her to step back across the center stripe, waving their hands furiously to try to deny her a passing lane to the girl Joey had just been covering. Desperately the girl tried to pass the ball to a Clovis forward who had broken away from the Roswell girl covering her. Joey leaped out at the ball, almost missing it, but deflecting it enough to go off the hands of the Clovis forward. The ball was suddenly up for grabs and it was the Roswell center who managed to pull it in, immediately calling their last time out.

Roger Douglas was amazed at the intensity with which his son followed the game. His son liked most all team sports but basketball probably was his least favorite. And he had always liked playing on a team, far more than just watching it. How strange, Roger thought, that his son was getting this excited as an observer to a basketball game, a girl’s basketball game at that.

She hadn’t spotted him yet, but Joey knew he was in the crowd. It was strange, really. They hadn’t ever touched one another since that weekend. In fact, in her entire life she’d actually only had a few conversations with him prior to that weekend and one of those was turning down his invitation to the dance. Their sole real time as a couple had consisted of that incredible 70 hours when they had actually kissed exactly five times. The memories of those kisses still warmed her though, as she thought back 10 weeks.

They had met in the dream orb almost nightly. They walked along the dream beach, held hands, sometimes kissed in the moonlight with the waves lapping on the shore. It was nice, but hardly as nice as really being with him. But even this had brought them closer and she now could feel his presence whenever he was near at school. Even more surprising, he could feel hers.

Her mom and dad could do that, she knew, as well as her aunts and uncles. But only after they had been couples for some time, not when they’d first met. It was like when the connection had formed the first time he’d caressed her, almost on its own. It was so natural, so easy to be with him, even in the dream orb. Not today though, she thought.

Today was her day of liberation. She knew if she’d worked on her father she could have gotten her grounding reduced, probably to only a week or two. But she hadn’t done it because to her it really hadn’t mattered. She knew she would still have to keep away from Drew for the whole ten weeks anyway. What was the sense of not being grounded when you still couldn’t do what you wanted to do. It had been touching really, to see her father hinting at her, almost begging her to ask him to reduce her sentence. Of course, that may have been due to the Ramirez twins giving him such a hard time about grounding her for ten whole weeks. Aunt Isabel and the girls had come over for dinner once before they’d gone back to Boston. The twins had really given her dad a tongue lashing about Joey’s grounding.

Aunt Izzie had privately told her that she had liked Drew, that she thought he was a very nice young man. Joey suspected that she’d egged on her own daughters to give her dad a hard time. Aunt Izzie was a hopeless romantic. Joey’s mom had told her about it when she was ten, but still couldn’t believe Aunt Izzie had actually married Uncle Jesse without even telling him about the “Czechoslovakian business, “ as mom called it. There had been a twinkle in her eye as Aunt Izzie had hugged her niece goodbye, looked meaningfully at her father, and then told her, “Goodbye Jean Valjean. If Inspector Javert there ever lets you out of prison, come visit us in Boston.”

Finally her eyes found him in the crowd. He was standing with his father near the entrance to the gym, over by their offensive basket. As she turned to listen to her coach Joey thought to herself, ‘It’s funny, but knowing he’s here watching me doesn’t make me nervous.’ The whole gym seemed more comfortable, just because he was near.

As Roswell in-bounded in back court, the Clovis defense was set. As Joey passed the centerline the Clovis point guard picked her up defensively. Taller but less agile than Joey, her defender stayed close enough to deny her a shot, but not so close as to let the smaller player drive past her. Time was on the side of Clovis, and every second the clock ticked off brought them that much closer to victory. Suddenly the other Roswell guard broke away from the basket, surprising her defender. A blind pass by Joey went into her hands. As the Clovis point guard watched the sudden pass she was distracted for only a fraction of a second, but that was enough. Joey broke past her without the ball and then took it back in mid-stride as the Roswell guard sent the ball to her on a bounce pass under the outstretched arms of her defender who was just a fraction late getting back to cover her.

Drew loved watching Joey play basketball. Of course, he admitted to himself, he’d love watching her brush her teeth too. He’d sensed her presence even before he’d stepped through the door into the gym. After 6 weeks of this happening he knew he would, but he still marveled at how he felt just being near her. He’d struggled to change the date of his appointment once he’d noticed that it fell on this, Joey’s day of liberation, but it hadn’t worked. He’d really wanted to see the whole game, but he’d heard most of it on the radio and would be here for the end of it.

He looked out on the court at her. Her golden curls were matted down with perspiration, even her jersey clinging to her. ‘That's my Joey,’ he thought, ‘she never did things halfway’. ‘MY Joey’, he thought again to himself. ‘ That sounded so good.’ And it was true, he knew. He was only complete when he was with her, and she was only complete when she was with him. That’s just the way it was.

As Joey brought the ball down the court the crowd was screaming wildly. They’d seen an incredible comeback, Drew had listened to most of it. Could Joey do it one more time, tie the score and send the game into a second overtime? Suddenly she passed off and as she broke for the basket her hands took the ball back without her breaking stride. One Clovis forward stood between her and an easy lay up and the large girl moved to block, her hands held high.

Drew smiled then, because he knew what was coming. The eye fake, the hip fake, the fake shot, drawing the large forward into the air as Joey switched the ball in her hands and pirouetted to put up a reverse lay up, as the forward continued into her in an obvious shooting foul. The ball didn’t swish, but instead rolled around inside the hoop once, drawing the crowd to its feet before settling through the net to tie the score, just as the buzzer sounded. The Clovis forward, a starter on the team that had won the state championship the previous year looked crestfallen. I feel your pain, thought Drew with a smile.

The crowd went wild as Clovis called their last time out, hoping to “ice” Joey, to make the inexperienced freshman so nervous she’d miss the free throw. Andrew shook his head. His Joey didn’t get rattled easily. He was standing there looking into her eyes and she looked back and smiled at him briefly as she stepped to the free throw line. The referee bounced the ball to her. The Clovis crowd screamed as she started the shot, the Roswell stands deathly quiet. She took the shot……nothing but net…..Roswell wins.

Joey had felt no pressure as she had stepped to the line. He was near. He was with her. That’s all that really mattered. The game had to be finished for them to be together. The ball was going in the basket she decided. No, she wouldn’t cheat and use her powers, but she was determined that they’d waited long enough. Her grounding was done, and it was a time for them, not a time to play a second overtime period. She looked again into his eyes as she stepped to the line. She was given the ball. She concentrated hard, and took the shot.

When the ball went in her teammates on the floor mobbed her, squealing with delight. Her teammates on the bench ran to the celebration, as part of the Roswell crowd also surged forward to congratulate the team on their win. She joined in the celebration, but her thoughts were really elsewhere. She could sense him coming closer though, and turned toward the net to see him walking, still 5 or 6 feet away, coming toward her.

Roger watched the end of a hard well played basketball game, and saw the Roswell players celebrating around the young girl who had made the last point, the winning point. To his surprise, Andrew moved out onto the court toward the celebrating players, his eyes on the young blonde point guard. She was celebrating joyously with her teammates, hugging them and being hugged by them. As Andrew neared her, it almost seemed as if she heard or sensed his approach and turned toward him.

Roger watched in surprise as the young girl took two quick steps and leaped into his sons arms, pulling him forward into a kiss in the midst of the celebrating crowd.

He almost laughed, waiting for his shy son to pull away in embarrassment from the kiss and the embrace. He waited long seconds……more long seconds and with growing amazement even more. Several Roswell basketball players watching the two started giggling, and the girls coach was watching with growing concern and a total lack of amusement.

Finally the Roswell center standing nearby had said, in a stage whisper, “Guerin, Douglas…..get a room for Pete’s sake.”

The two teenagers had broken, both blushing furiously while the girl’s teammates all laughed, but they still continued to hold hands as the celebration rolled on.

Roger leaned against the wall, feeling his brain attempt to reboot itself several times, totally bewildered by what he had seen.

His shy son apparently had a girlfriend, who most certainly was not shy. Apparently his shy son wasn’t particularly shy anymore either, at least when it came to this young lady. How had this happened? When had this happened?

His mind was still reeling, trying to encompass this new reality when his son led the young lady over to him.

[greywolf]

“Dad, this is Joey Guerin,” Drew told his father.

“I’m pleased to meet you,” responded a befuddled Roger Douglas, his voice coming out somewhat mechanically.

“Would you mind if Joey came to the pizza parlor with us?”

The young lady looked at Roger and said, “Oh, that’s OK. I don’t want to butt in on a family night out.” She was smiling up at him but continuing to grip Andrew’s hand.

“It’s just pizza but we’d be glad to have you there,” said Roger. “Andrew had to be in Albuquerque today, so we weren’t sure when we’d get back. His mother will meet us there in a half-hour. Please feel free to join us.”

She looked back into the bleachers where a middle aged woman with the same blonde hair as Joey and a taller man with dark hair were coming down toward her. Even from this distance it appeared to Roger that the man was staring at Andrew, who now had his arm around the waist of the young girl.

“I’ll need to check with my folks and hit the showers,” she said. “I think it’ll probably be OK though.”

She went over to her folks, pulling Andrew along in trail. After a brief discussion, they all came back to Roger Douglas. The woman introduced herself as Maria, and her husband as Michael. Maria was smiling and cordial, glad to meet the parent of one of Joey’s friends. Michael was courteous, but kept eye contact on Andrew who had now removed his hand from the waist of the young girl, and was contenting himself with merely holding her hand. It was easy for Roger to tell that Joey’s dad was still trying to do a reboot from the embrace and kiss at the game’s end too. Roger could almost feel his pain, and certainly understood his bewilderment.

Finally Joey had hugged her mom and dad and headed for the showers. Maria indicated that it had been a pleasure to meet the two of them, and maybe they could get together again some time. Michael was courteous, but appeared somewhat numb. Roger could understand. Michael said goodbye to Roger and Andrew and repeated his wife’s comments about getting together in the future, although Roger thought privately the man would probably be just as happy if he never saw Andrew again, at least not around his daughter.

Barbara Douglas was already sitting in a booth when her son and husband arrived at the pizza parlor. She had been pleased that Andrew had gotten a clean bill of health from the specialist, but was dreading the upcoming confrontation with Andrew over playing football.

The memory of that Friday night was burned indelibly in her mind, and in the next 24 hours she had thought she was losing her mind. She’d recovered quite well she thought, encouraged by that strange dream. But not enough to take the risk of going through that again, or even the nightmares she knew would haunt her if she even saw her son in a football uniform again. This evening might wind up being unpleasant, but not nearly as unpleasant as those dreams would be. She’d get through it, she decided. If she could get through that weekend 10 weeks ago, she could get through anything.

As they walked in she noticed that Roger was looking at his son with a somewhat curious expression. As they joined her Roger turned and said, “We’ll be having a guest for dinner, a friend of Andrew’s.”

They already knew what they wanted, it was always the same. Andrew and his father would split a large meat-lovers special. Barbara would have a small plain cheese. As Andrew left to put their order in at the counter he said, “I’ll get Joey a medium size pineapple and Canadian bacon.”

Barbara turned to her spouse, noticing his continuing odd expression. “Who is Joey and how did Andrew meet him?” she asked. Roger shook his head in apparent bewilderment. “Joey is not a he, Joey is a she. Our son has a girlfriend, and I have no idea how it happened.”

“Well that’s great,” said Barbara, hoping this new news might somehow cushion the shock when Andrew was told he couldn’t play football.
“Andrew is such a shy kid. It’s good that he can finally feel comfortable enough to be friends with a girl.”

As he looked at the eyes of his spouse of 20 years, Roger saw in his minds eye a rerun of the scene that had occurred in the free throw lane at game’s end, the words of Joey’s teammate echoing in his mind, 'Guerin, Douglas…..get a room…'

He looked at his spouse, a strange expression on his face as he mumbled, “Comfortable? Well, yes, I suppose…”

[greywolf]

“So what is her real name? “ Barbara asked her spouse. “Josephine? Joanna? Joan?”

“I’m not just sure,” he said. I met her parents at the basketball game and even they called her Joey.”

Barbara looked up to her son who had left the order counter with a tray and a stack of glasses he was now filling at the soda fountain. As she watched a young blonde girl went to his side and she watched in amazement as her son put down the tray and reached around her waist, pulling her into a quick embrace. “Joelle Guerin…” Barbara said aloud.

“Oh, you’ve met her then?”

“No, just saw her picture in Andrew’s junior high yearbook,” said Barbara, unwilling to admit that she’d spent almost two weeks a year ago almost hating this young girl for breaking her son’s heart in his first case of puppy love.

And then it happened. As Andrew motioned toward the table where his parents sat, and started in that direction, Barbara felt the hair rise on her neck as the girl watched the retreating boy. Barbara was overwhelmed with a sense of deja vu. She had seen that look on that girl once before, in a dream. Just as now, when it had come to her in the dream the look was accompanied by an overwhelming feeling of possessiveness.

As the girl came closer Barbara Douglas knew even before the girl looked up, that Joelle Guerin had the bluest eyes she had ever seen. Barbara worked at keeping a calm demeanor, and was polite as his son introduced the girl. Inside, however, Barbara was trembling.

Roger Douglas watched with wonder as his son introduced Joey to Barbara. An hour ago he had no idea that this girl existed, and certainly no idea that there existed any attachment between her and his son. But the two teenagers moved with the easy intuitive grace of a couple who had known each other for years. As they sat side by side talking to Barbara, he saw the girls right hand and his son’s left hand find one another, and then intertwine, without apparent conscious thought on the part of either teenager, certainly not with the nervousness he would have expected his son to have, introducing his first girlfriend to the parents.

His wife, on the other hand, looked as if she’d been stunned. Her eyes peered at the girl intently with a mixture of emotions he couldn’t read. Was it concern, awe, jealousy,…fear? Roger couldn’t decide. He held his own wife’s hand and pulled her near him.

“Well Joey, how long have you too been seeing each other?”

The girl looked at Roger and replied, “Well we knew each other years ago in junior soccer league and more recently in junior high, but I guess it was back in football season that we first really got to know each other.” As she finished speaking the two teenagers shared glances, and he noticed that his son had a sort of sappy grin.

“Why is it that our son has never bothered to introduce us to you?” asked Roger, looking at his son with exaggerated reproach.

Before Andrew could reply, Joey said “It’s my fault really. I got grounded by my folks for ten weeks, for breaking my 10 o’clock curfew.” I really haven’t been allowed to see him until today.”

“Ten weeks for breaking curfew? Boy, your parents must be kind of tough on you,” said Roger, almost understanding the passionate reunion now. On the other hand, he thought, if the young lady was THAT passionate, maybe her parents needed to be strict about her curfew, although in fairness, he thought, his son had been doing his own fair share there in the free throw lane as well.

“So how long did you stay out, to get them that angry?”

Joey looked at Andrew’s parents. She really didn’t want to lie to them, but it’s not really like she could tell them the story either. “I got back home a half hour before midnight,” she said truthfully, neglecting to mention that she had returned an hour and a half and three days past her curfew.

Roger tried to lighten the mood a little by joking. “You must have been to some wild teenage party to miss your curfew by 90 minutes.” The humor missed the mark badly with Andrew who looked angrily at his father.

“Actually, Dad, when her curfew expired that night she was at the hospital, trying to find out how badly I was hurt.”

As Roger sat in stunned silence, looking at his obviously angry son, Joey quickly put her hand on Andrew’s forearm and gave him the look, the junior version of the same look that Michael Guerin had been receiving from Maria for almost a quarter of a century.

“That’s not fair, Drew,” she said. “Your dad couldn’t have known that. And your parents were there that night too. You scared all of us pretty badly that night.”

Andrew looked at Joey and turned toward his father. “I’m sorry Dad, Joey is right. It’s just that I really feel bad that she was punished because of me.