Write Me a Love Story

Write Me A Love Story

by

Retta Michaels

Disclaimer:

If you are under the age of eighteen, or live in a locale which doesn't allow you to read these sorts of stories legally, then please don't. Come back when it's legal for you to do so and it will be great with us who are here legally. In fact, we'll support you and in the right circumstances help get you laid. Now, skedaddle and shut the door on your way out!

Now, for the rest of you who are supposed to be adults, act like it!

Chapter 8

That afternoon, the Sheriff gave us a call and said, "I'd like for you to come to my office, I've got two people here who need to have the hell scared out of them."

Stu looked at me and said, "Whatever happens, just stand behind me on this. I don't even know what I'll do yet, but I guarantee you one thing, when I'm done, they'll be wishing they'd never happened down that road."

We drove over to the Sheriff's office and went in. His secretary said, "Guys, he wants to speak to you out here. Just have a seat and he'll be out shortly."

We'd no sooner sat down when the Sheriff came out. He smiled and said, "Guys, I told them I was going down the hall. You guys go into my office and do whatever you want. Don't hurt 'em and don't make 'em make any messes they can't clean up."

Stu looked at the Sheriff and said in a calm voice, "Don't arrest me for what I'm about to do. I just want them to see how it feels."

The Sheriff nodded and said, "I'd do the same thing if it were someone in my family that got treated as you did."

Stu and I went to the door and Stu took a look and instantly ran in yelling, "Are you the motherfuckers?!!!"

"Huh!"

Stu grabbed the closest one up and said, "So, I hear you're the motherfucker that decided you had to drive by my house and take shots at me. Since you did it and my lover died, I'll give you a choice, you can decide if it's you that wants to die today, or if it's him. Then, I'm going to ask the other one and he's going to tell me and if your answers don't match, I'll kill you both."

Stu pulled out a pistol and put it to the guy's head.

"Stu! Where'd you get the gun!"

"I told you I had to get a gun to protect myself after these guys did what they did, so I've been saving it. Now, it's my chance to use it."

"Stu, you don't want to do this."

"Why?"

"These guys should get a trial."

"No, they didn't give Eddie a trial. They just drove by shooting and then he had a heart attack and died, now they'll find out what it's like to lose someone they love."

"They're gay Stu."

"So, Eddie was gay, and they didn't give a fuck!"

Stu had a madman's tone to his voice and his eyes were wild. If I hadn't thought he was acting, I would have been really scared. Even with him acting, I was scared because I didn't know if he was acting or not."

Stu growled into the guy's ear, "What's your answer. You, or him?"

The guy turned to Stu and said, "We didn't mean it."

"Oh, but you did. The end result is Eddie's just as dead as if you did or didn't. What's your answer?"

"Take me."

Stu dropped him into his chair and went over to the other chair. The guy raised his hand and cool as a cucumber, Stu lashed out with the butt of the gun and drilled him into his forehead. "Gonna fight punk? Let me tell you I'll drop you right where that butt found it's mark." Stu's voice lowered to a whisper, "What's your fucking answer?"

"Take me."

Stu stood back and said, "Boys, how did it feel?"

The looked at him and were clearly confused. They looked at each other and then at Stu.

I looked at them and said, "He asked a question. I can't control him when he's like this. How did it feel?"

"How'd what feel?" The one closest to me said.

Stu looked at them and said, "How'd it fucking feel to be afraid and get to choose whether your lover lived or you?"

"I'm scared man!"

"You God Damned right you're scared, just like I was scared and if I had a choice, you would have taken me. Instead you took him. For that, I'm supposed to forgive you?"

The looked at me and I shrugged, "I wouldn't forgive the day you were born, I don't know if you're supposed to answer the question or not."

The one that spoke said, "Man, we didn't mean to."

"Yes...you...did." Stu answered with finality.

"No we didn't."

"If you didn't mean to, then how the fuck did it happen for you to find yourself driving by my cabin and your gun to suddenly discharge in the direction of our heads time after time after time?"

The one that was speaking shut up.

"See, I told you you meant to. So, don't lie to me anymore."

The guy sat there and Stu said, "Here's what the good book tells me to do. It tells me to forgive and let the Lord judge you, but it also says an eye for an eye and those who smite me are supposed to be forgiven the first blow and then after the second one, I get my vengeance."

They looked at each other and Stu said, "I've been told you two found yourselves to be lovers after you did what you did. You decided to level with each other and tell each other the truth. What's the problem now is your whole family kept the secret and the Sheriff is good and pissed about it. You see, he would have arrested you, but we talked him out of it. We've got better things for you guys planned."

"What you gonna do with us?"

"Well, starting off with, we're going to become friends. You're going to learn about us and we're going to learn about us. You're going to watch our backs and we're going to watch yours. And then, we're going to decide what's going to happen. If then, we decide you guys go up for manslaughter charges, then you will. If you choose to protect other homosexuals, then you will. If you choose to be friends and be true friends, then you will. I'm not telling you what to do, but starting right now this afternoon, we're splitting you guys up and you are going with Jer and you are going with me."

The guys looked at each other and then at us and said, "Why are you taking us?"

Stu looked at them and said, "We're taking you and splitting you up because we don't trust you. If we find out you've lied to us then I can guarantee you just as soon as we get back together and compare notes, you'll go to jail. Friendship's based upon trust and if I can't trust you, then why carry it any further. We'll call the Sheriff and have you arrested."

The looked at each other and said, "How are we supposed to trust that you won't do something to us?"

Stu smiled at him and said, "Just like I was to trust you wouldn't come back and kill me after Eddie died. So, are we supposed to trust you? All we're asking you to do is go with us and be inconvenienced. Now, you can be inconvenienced for an afternoon, or you can be inconvenienced for the rest of your lives. I'll leave that up to you. Jer, let's leave the office and let these guys make up their minds because if they don't come out in five minutes, I'll have the Sheriff arrest them."

Stu and I left the office. He looked at me and shook his head. "They're some dumb asses. If I was given the opportunity to keep my butt out of jail after doing what they did, I'd attempt to save it."

"Maybe they don't understand that."

"How could it not be clearer?"

"Well, they're not trusting us. Maybe your psycho performance has them afraid to go with you."

He chuckled and said, "It wasn't much of a performance. For so long, I laid awake at night and thought of what I'd do to them if I caught them. Then, we find out who they are and I let a little of what I felt all these years come out. They should be thankful we were in the Sheriff's office." He got quiet and then said, "It's damn hard to let him go."

"Don't let him go. Let the anger go. Sometimes when you build something, you have to disturb something and then you can benefit from it. Let the anger go and let them get to know Eddie through your love of him. Show them photo albums. Let them feel how you loved him like they love each other. Let them see they'd feelt he same if someone did it to them now."

"That's a good idea. I do want to take them out individually. What I want you to do is go someplace and sit with the one. Talk with him and see what he's like as a person. If he's a piece of shit, then let the state have him. If he's a nice guy and is worthy of saving, then we'll save them. But, they're not even trying to work with us."

The Sheriff came in and said, "What are you guys doing out here?"

"They're in there deciding if they're going to come with us or you're going to arrest them." Stu shrugged.

"What!"

"Yeah, it seems they don't trust us enough to go with us. We asked one to go with Stu and the other to go with me and they balked." I guessed.

"Them idiots! One second guys, I'll have them thrown out of here."

The Sheriff went into his office and I could here him yell, "Get your asses out of my office and do what they ask. John, you go with Stu and Rhen, you go with Jer."

"Sheriff, Rhen has a roast in the oven and he's afraid he'll burn the house down. He was making it for the carry in."

"Rhen, take Jer and go home. John, you take your dumb ass with Stu and you try to convince him you're not too stupid to pull a trigger." He paused and said, "Rhen, I know it was you. John's the one who always drives. It didn't take me long to figure out who did what there."

Stu looked at me and said, "Be careful."

"Oh, He'll be the one that will wish he was careful. I'll call Em and he'll be over and crush him!"

Stu chuckled and said, "But you have Em afraid of you, so you're about even.."

"Yeah, but they don't know that."

The guys exited the Sheriff's office and the Sheriff stood behind them, "If they give you any trouble, give me a call. I'll be close by."

"Sheriff, if I have any troubles with mine, I'm calling Em. You can only arrest them, Em will have mine wishing he was only arrested."

The Sheriff chuckled and said, "Donna's waiting for a phone call. If it doesn't come, she'll be prepared to tell the family they got themselves arrested."

"O.k., I'll talk with Donna when this is all over. I do need to get things made right with her."

"No, let her stew. I know why you came to me and you did right. She knows you called her bluff and she'll know to keep her word to you from now on."

We left and Rhen walked with me. John went with Stu and got into Stu's truck. Rhen paused and said, "We're taking our truck?"

"Yeah, I didn't drive mine here, so it's either you drive or we walk."

"Where we going? I got a roast in the oven."

"We can go back to your house. All I want to do is talk and get to know you."

"You serious about that?"

"Yeah, unless you don't wanna and then I don't give a fuck if the roast burns your house down or not, you can go to jail."

"Why you guys doing this?"

"Which part?"

"Making us be friends with you."

I looked at him and said, "Rhen, are you that fucking dumb?"

"What the fuck you mean man?"

"Let's see. The choice is either be friends, or go to jail. There's nothing else that's to be decided. We're not about to leave and let you guys go along shooting at other people and hoping you don't come back and kill us. Those days are over. Instead, you got a choice to either be friends, or go to jail. Either way, we're going to have this ended and know we're not going to have to wonder if someone's going to die."

"But, what if your buddy decides to kill John?"

"Is that what you're worried about?"

"Yeah, your buddy's already asked us if we wanted to die."

"And, you didn't give him that choice. So, John going to kill Stu? Because if that's your plan dumb ass, I'll have you dead before Stu falls."

"No, I just am worried about John."

"Well, I'm worried about Stu too. Does that worry mean you love him?"

John looked at me and said, "Yes. There's no one else like him."

"I feel the same about Stu."

"But you're not the one that was with him when we did it."

"No, but I am now and I'll be the one if you try that shit again. But next time, I'll know where you live and Em will take me there."

"Em and you friends?"

"Em and I had it out earlier. He's now afraid of me. Em learned I can do things and he gets worried about real fast."

"Em's a hard assed dude. What'd you do to make him afraid of you?"

"Let's just say Em doesn't like pain."

"What!"

"Yeah, so don't fuck with me and if you do, you better be fast."

"You know kung fu?"

"Something."

"Wow, I never knew anyone that knew that."

"Well, where I come from, we have to be worried about folks driving by and taking shots at us. So, when I run through the woods, I've got to get ahead of you real fast and use my hands to knock down a tree."

"You can really do that!"

"Rhen, did I just say that?"

"Yeah."

"Then, don't fuck with me and you won't have to find out. So, tell me how you cooked the roast."

"Well, it's not hard. I use a cup of coffee and I put the roast in a crock jar. I chop up green peppers, onions, taters, and carrots. I throw in some spices and then, I let it cook down for a while until the roast is falling apart. When it comes out, it's done."

"Sounds good."

"Yeah, John likes it."

"So, that's your specialty you take to the family dinners?"

"Yeah, everyone cooks up what they cook best and it's all good...except don't eat what's in the yellow crock pot."

"I've been warned."

"Some people like it. John likes it but me, I can't cook it to ever make it taste right. If we ever get to the point I have to eat one, I'll drown it so many vegetables, I'll never have to touch the meat." He smiled.

"Tell me how you and John met."

"We were raised together. I always knew him."

"So, when did you realize you loved him?"

"Oh man, I started noticing him when we was about eight or nine. He was the best looking boy I ever knew. Then as we got older, he got better and better. Then, by the time we was out in the barn and doing things, I knew I loved him. I was afraid to tell him. So, we'd go out and do things like shooting at your buddy."

"So, what changed?"

"One night, we got drunk on some stone liquor and we started making love. I told him I loved him and he told me back. As soon as he said it, he looked at me like he was afraid he'd said the wrong thing and I told him how long I'd felt it for him. He said he felt it about that long too. So, we decided to move in together. Since then, everyone's accepted us and that's that."

"Weren't you afraid you were going to get caught for what you did?"

"Yeah, but it's like something you did bad you try to put behind you. You hope no one remembers and after a while, you learn to go on. When we heard that guy died, John and I were real scared. Everyone knew and we were afraid they'd come after us."

"I'll tell you now you ought to be glad Stu didn't find you back then. He probably would have killed you for sure."

"Yeah, that's what had us afraid today. We got the call and knew our goose was cooked but when he came in and asked us which one wanted to die, I couldn't let John down and tell him I wanted it to be John. I guess John felt the same way."

"That's the answer he wanted. He wanted to see if you loved each other. If you'd pointed at John, or if John pointed at you, you would have found out John didn't love you. Wouldn't that have killed you inside?"

"Oh man, I never thought of that. Stu's smart."

"Yeah, and the only answer you could have given was the one you did. Blessed be they that would lay their life down for a friend."

"My granny used to say that."

"And, now you know what it means."

"Wow, granny was so good."

"Speaking of that, I need to ask you a question to see if you know."

"What?"

"Who makes the massage oil that used to be sold here in town."

"That would have been granny. She made that from renderin's."

"What?"

"Renderin's."

"What's that?"

"Oh, let's see how to put it. Renderin's is made when you boil a hog, or a cow, or a chicken."

"Broth?"

"No, Broth is when you're wanting to eat it. Renderin's is when you're cooking it to get the hide off. The skin all blisters and it'll slide right off."

"So, does anyone have the recipe or know how it's made?"

"Why do you want to know?"

"Stu had some and as you can see, my face is burned. We used it and it's the best stuff I've ever felt."

"Well, I'll talk to Liza Jane and see if she has a tub of it. I know she made the last batch and before that, Louella made some. When they make it, everyone shares it. So, I'll get you a tub."

"Well, what we'd like to do is sell some at the show and that way we could be selling some of the things made locally."

He looked at me and I could see the distrust. "Why?'

"Why do we want to sell it? Or why do we want to sell locally made items?"

"Both."

"Well, the reason I want to sell it is because I know it's good. The reason I want to sell locally made things is because to many people up there on the strip sell things no one around here gets to make any money on, so I told Stu we need to start finding things like that to sell."

"Well, it's easy to make. It takes a long time though."

"Well, that's why we want to sell it. It's excellent and even if it were like a hundred dollars a tub, it'd still be better than most things on the market."

"Wow, I betcha Liza Jane would make it for a lot less than that."

"Well, how often does she cook up a hog?"

"Which time?"

"Just tell me the last time she did it and then the time before, and I'll know how often she does it."

"Oh, well the last time she did it was when the moon was new. You can't do it when the moon's dark because the hide comes off hard and the meat won't be tender. So, we only do it at that time. She makes sausages and folks love 'em."

"So the sausages are good."

"They're the best. She'll bring some tonight."

"Will she sell some sausages?"

"Yeah, she sells it to lots of people."

"What else does she sell?"

"You'll have to ask."

"Ok, It's just I don't want her to sell us a little bit of stuff. I want it to be on sale for a long time. What we're doing is we're going to be redoing the Waters and making a sort of store in it like an old time general store."

"That will be nice."

"Yeah, and that's where we want to sell these things, so if you know anyone that makes things, we'll sure be interested in selling them."

"Are you guys going to buy them from the locals and then put a big price on them?"

"No, What we're planning on doing is selling them for the locals at the Waters. We'll probably add on ten percent of whatever they charge, but that's not much. If a sausage is five dollars, then it'll be five fifty."

"That's not bad. It'll sell the things and the locals will finally get to make some money up there."

"Yeah, that's what we thought."

We pulled up to an older style farm house and he said, "Well this is where we live."

"Nice place."

"It's home."

We went in and they had it decorated up really nice. I walked around looking at all the things they had on the walls decorating their kitchen. He said, "This is the kitchen, It's my little space. I do the cooking because if I let him in here, we'd have bar-b-que everynight."

I smiled and said, "We don't do bad together in the kitchen. We're still getting used to each other, but it's nice to cook for two rather than one."

"Yeah, we're lucky because everyone took to us being together really good. At first, the men were all standoffish, but after they saw we were the same as we always were, they accepted us. It's just something we don't speak about."

"I understand. It was that way for me up home. The difference is I didn't let them sweep it under the rug. The problem with it was the guy I was with was a real loser. He mentally abused me to the point I thought I was worthless and he had everyone convinced he was the best thing ever. My mom and I still have issues over it."

"Really?"

"Yeah, she thinks he's great and I'm not because I told him he had to leave."

"So he lived at your house?"

"Yeah, when went out on our first date, he came in and just basicly moved in. It didn't give us time to get to know each other. IF I had, I would have sent him packing. Instead, I stayed with him for too long. Finally, one night he hit me and then tried to say he was trying to hit the dog. I got up and beat the tar out of him and told him he could either leave out the door or out the second floor window, but I threw all his stuff out all over the front yard."

He chuckled and said, "So how'd you come about being here?"

"My parents have a cabin right next to Stu's place. They come down several times a year. I decided after the break up I had to get away. The only place I could think where I could get some peace and solitude was there, so that's where I went. The nice thing is Stu and I met the next day and hit it off really good. He showed me the Waters and I saw all sorts of things that needed improving, so I told him what they were and it wouldn't cost much. Before we knew it, he was planning on a whole new remodel of the place."

"That place is nice. Who would have thought you could do all that with water?"

"Yeah, it's neat, isn't it!"

He pulled the roast out and uncovered the crock. He stirred it and I looked in. He said, "Take a taste."

I tasted it and said, "You used some seasonings, what are they?"

"Not much, there's a bay leaf in there and some yard onions, but other than that, I didn't use anything but a clove of garlic from the yard."

"It tastes good."

"Thanks. John likes it."

"I imagine he does."

He smiled and said, "We raise our own cow every year. This was last years. If you raise your own meat, you know what it was fed."

"We don't have the space."

"Well, we do, so if you want, we could raise it for you."

"Really!"

"Yeah, it doesn't cost much. What we do is we have that field out there and we get a bag of seed corn. What we do is we grow it and we put the ears into that corn bin ears and all. When we feed it, we take it out and a few bangs with a sledge hammer and the corns all crushed. What kernels that fall off feed the chickens."

"You raise chickens too?"

"Yeah, we don't have any now because they don't lay well in the winter. We'll be getting some more here shortly and then they feed off bugs and things in the yard. Then after a while, they start laying eggs and we use them and what we don't use, we sell. The cows, we have one out there now and then we'll get another later this Spring. We'll raise it and the one that's out there will go to slaughter this fall. It's nice to have two in rotation for the milk. I make everything with the milk from butter, to cheese, to cottage cheese."

"That hard?"

"No, the butter is easy because all we do is we take that churn and after we milk, we put it into the churn and .....well, let me show you."

We went outside and he milked the cow. He offered to show me and I tried, but I didn't get near a peep of milk. He said, "Here try this, stick out your thumb and I'll show you how it's done."

He did and as he squeezed, he pulled and the action nearly gave me a boner. He smiled and said, "Yeah, it'll improve your love life. Now, try it that way."

I sat on the one legged stool he was sitting upon and put the bucket back under the cow. I did it how he showed me and it squirted. He said, "Now, do it with both hands on two teets and you'll fill the bucket. Get yourself a nice rhythm and you'll find you can do it in no time."

I did and soon, I was filling the bucket. When the bucket was filled, he took some stuff that looked like vaseline from a cloth sack hanging on the wall and put it on the teets. "That's bag balm. It's the same as that massage oil, but it's done up with more renderin's. It's good for the cow because their teets get sore and this keeps them fresh."

We carried the bucket back inside and he poured half the milk into the churn. He said, "What you have here is pure buttermilk. We use this to make biscuits and pancakes. They fluff up better because they're made with it. Now, sit there and just turn that crank and in about fifteen or thirty minutes, you'll see the butter getting on those paddles. What the butter is, is the fats that's in the milk. What you'll have after you churn it is a lot like 2% milk you get at the stores. If you re churn, then you get skim milk where all the fats are out of it. We don't use the stuff, but some people prefer it."

"That's neat. I never knew this."

"Yeah, what this is over here is a cream seperator. What it does is it spins the milk around. The cream is heavier, so it will rise up higher on that and then it'll go down that tube. The rest is milk which we sell. The cream we use to make sour cream, cream for coffee, and then we also use it for cheeses. What I do to make cottage cheese is I put it on to cook and then put some eggs in. Some people don't use the eggs, but I like it in mine. After it cooks, and comes to a slight boil, you take some salt and mix in it and set it off overnight. The next morning, the curds are forming. What I do is I wait until later that afternoon as there will be a lot more curds. Then, I strain it out and reboil it to get more. Most people don't, but I do. Here's some of my cottage cheese."

"He set some out in a crock from the refrigerator and said, "Just dip a spoon in and try it."

I did and the taste of it was amazing. "This is way better than at the store."

"Yeah, that's because the stuff they sell at the store they put artificial things in to make it last longer and to get curds faster." He smiled and said, "What we use the whey for after the cottage cheese is made is for some of this cheese over here. It's soft and John loves it on a sandwich. It spreads like butter and has a tangier flavor."

I dipped my spoon in the cheese he showed me and tried it. The taste was like a faint American cheese. "Mmmm, that's good."

"Yeah, if you put a hamburger on it, it'll get stringy like that cheese they put on pizza."

"Mozarella."

"Yeah, it's basicly the same stuff except what they do to make that is use the whole mix without taking cottage cheese out of it. I've made it before, but I prefer this."

"You sure know a lot about all this."

"You have to living out here. We don't let things go to waste. Whatever we don't use, we trade off to get other family member's leftovers or we feed to the animals. What I do is I will get a hog and this stuff here after I seperate out the butter from the milk, I'll feed it. They love it and if you mix in some of that cracked corn in it, it will swell up the corn and they're really happy."

"I'm learning a lot from you."

"You'll learn a lot from John too. He's the one that will show you everything about hunting and the outdoor side of the house. That man can go out into a field of corn and have it all knocked down and stacked in no time at all. "

"What do you mean?"

"What we do is we use a huge scythe like this to cut the corn down. Machinery costs a lot, so we don't use it. We can cut the corn down and then strip the ears off and put those into a bin and then the stalks go into a silo all chopped up. What we use those for is animal feed. Everything eats them."

"So nothing goes to waste."

"Right."

"And John hunts?"

"Yeah, he hunts deer, turkey, and pheasant. His brothers come over and hunt squirrel, rabbit, and other things. Back in the back, we have a pond and we have catfish in it. We set out trot lines and soon enough they'll be full."

"What's a trot line?"

"You sure don't know much about bein' in the country, do you?"

"No, but I'll learn listening to you!"

"What a trot line is, is you take jugs and it doesn't matter what kind and you take a long string and you tie it so you have a jug and then you have a part that hangs down and on that will be a hook. You bait the hook with a piece of corn, and then there's another jug. It goes like that until you have enough to go clear across the pond. The jug keep the fish from sinking to the bottom. It'll fight to get the hook out of it's mouth and will finally give up. The next day, you go back and it'll be full. I'll help him pull it in, but our deal is he skins them and he takes all the cuts and feeds the chickens. What he brings in is a bunch of filets and we have those quite a bit and we freeze those."

"Man, that sounds good."

"It is, some day you guys will have to come over when we fry some up."

"That'll be good."

He looked at me and said, "You're sincere about bein' friends, aren't you?"

"Yeah, we're sincere. We want everyone to know us and we want to know you."

He said, "Good. Now, what you can do is you can put out trot lines in the lake out there and you can catch a lot of different kinds of fish."

"I wouldn't know what to do with them."

"John'll help you. He's good at that sort of thing. Me, I'll skin something and have a mess. He's got a gentler touch and he can talk a fish out of it's skin."

"That's neat."

"Yeah, now, let's take a look at that churnin' you got done there. Ooh yeah, you've got some butter on there already. Now, let it rest and let's go show you the rest of our house."

We went into the living room and it was nice. "Over there is our wood stove. My granny got that for marrying my grandpappy as a wedding present. It's served them all those years and when she died, she gave it to me. My grandpappy is John's grandpappy."

"Really!"

"Yeah, we have different grannies, but his died birthin' and then mine got together with him. I've got pictures around here of them someplace. People called her high falutin' because she got pictures taken of them, but I'm glad they did because I can now see what they looked like. Here they are."

He showed me the photos and their grandpappy was a hot looking guy. He smiled and said, "Go ahead and say it, the man was nice looking, wasn't he?"

"Yeah, if I saw him today, I'd think that."

"Just wait until you see my cousin, He's a dead ringer for him and he has all the girls all over him."

"I bet he does."

"I think he's like us though."

"Oh man, he'll break some hearts."

"No, he'll probably get together with a girl."

"Why would he do that?"

"Back here, people are real set on making sure everyone does what they're supposed to do. The stink about John and I was enough I imagine we'll be the only ones in our generation. Back in the day, two guys could live together and as long as they went out courtin' and didn't do anything, they were seen as bachelors when they went home together. No one said a thing. For us to not even pretend isn't right in their eyes. To me, it seems more honest this way."

"I think so too. So, he can't find someone?"

"I imagine he can find a lot of guys because he's just that good looking, but it's not finding someone for just a one time thing that's hard. It's finding someone that is willing to do it on a regular basis and build a relationship. Folks are all set on a guy to marry someone and when he doesn't, he's not easily forgiven."

"Oh"

"Yeah, John was supposed to marry my cousin. She didn't want him because she wanted to go to Memphis and he didn't want her. So, he told her he'd help her get to Memphis. She was the first person he ever told about himself."

"And she accepted that."

"Yeah because she didn't want him either. If she's wanted him, then there would have been a big fuss."

"Who were you supposed to be with?"

"Oh, I'm not sure. There were several girls my family was keen on setting me up with, but I'd take them out and nothing sparked, so I never kept at it. After I got to the age of fifteen without getting a girl pregnant or even one set on marryin', they gave up on me."

"I bet that made you feel better."

"Yeah, but it's not an easy feelin' knowin' you let your family down either."

"Oh, yeah, I imagine it's not."

"So, with Jacob there, he's the only son and all the rest are girls. The pressure's goin' to be on him somethin' terrible to get a girl."

"Oh man, that's got to be hard on him."

"Yeah, but I'm conjurin' up a plan. How about you and Stu get him to workin' for you and then he can meet someone out of here."

"I'll talk to Stu. I don't think it'll be a problem."

"Good. It doesn't matter doing what, I just want to see he has the opportunities he can to be happy."

We continued looking at different things in their living room and he put a stick of wood on the fire in the stove. The heat radiating from it was nice.

We then went out onto the front porch and I saw they had two rocking chairs sitting side by side. To the right of one was a log used as a table and in the middle was another. In the middle of the log in between the chairs, two holes had been bored so they could put their drink glasses.

"This is where we sit in the summer time. If it gets too hot, we go indoors, but as you saw, we don't have a television. All those knicknacks in there were whittled by John. He does that while we're out here sitting and wavin' at traffic go by."

"What do you do?"

"Oh, I'm usually peelin' 'maters, or shelling peas, or snappin' green beans. We put up our own vegetables and I process those. We don't have regular jobs, so we have to make by with what we have."

"Oh, how do you pay the bills?"

"As I said, we make by. It's not hard when we trade for things and we help each other in the family."

"How about asking John to sell some of his whittled things at our store and then you can make by better."

"I doubt if he can get much for them."

"I don't know. We can try and then see. Something is better than none."

"Ok, I'll ask him, but I'm not sure if he will, or not. He doesn't like to have to do things. He does things because he wants to do them. That's why I imagine Stu and he aren't getting along as good as us."

"Stu's probably being hard right back though. You guys don't know what you did to him. He loved Eddie and you two took him away from him. If I was Stu, I'd probably be giving John a good tongue lashing every time I thought about it."

"I imagine I would too if someone had done what we did to us and I'd lost John. Well...I'd probably already hunted them down and killed them and would already be in the state pen."

"Stu didn't know where to look. He's an outsider and you know just as good as I that just as soon as he got to asking questions, everyone would have protected you two."

"Yeah, but how'd you guys find out?"

"Someone said something about something and thought we knew it already. When I asked more, I found out Donna knew and didn't tell her daddy. SO, I went to the Sheriff and he made her tell him. He's not real happy with her right now."

"Oh man, that's got to be really bugging her because she's her daddy's sunshine and she knows it."

"Why hasn't she gotten married."

"Her fella up and married someone else. He expected her to get engaged or married by the time she was thirteen and the Sheriff wasn't havin' any of that. So, it cost her a fellar. The thing about it is she really was sweet on him."

"She was sweet on Stu too."

"I could see that. The fellar and Stu are built just alike and look quite a bit alike. You need to watch her, because she's cagey."

"No, she knows not to mess with me. She lied to me and I caught her. Now, it's up to her to decide if she can be friends, or not, but if she doesn't, I won't have a thing to do with her again and every time I can, I'll tell people not to trust her word."

"What'd she lie to you about?"

"There are lies and there are lies. One is if you tell someone something which isn't true. The other is being friends with someone knowing who was responsible for their heartache and not telling them. She's been friends with him and not said one thing. Now, he knows she knew and I know she knew and although he's keen on forgiving her, I'll hold firm and bug her until she apologizes, or her reputation is ruined."

"Oh, well she needs to apologize."

"I think so too, but you know what my stance is if she doesn't. I'm not going to go around acting like it's all better when it's not."

"I don't blame you."

"So, the Sheriff's going to make a few things set straight tonight at the meeting. He feels like the whole family let him down and he's not happy about it. Even his own wife is in the doghouse over this one."

"His wife is someone who is looked up to by everyone."

"Well, everyone can protect her from them, but she wasn't honest with him. How would you feel if John kept that sort of a secret from you?"

"Oh....I'd be mad. Well, I'd probably throw his butt out of here and tell him I never wanted to see his sorry face again."

"No, you can't do that because you love him. That's where the Sheriff is. He loves her and he's got to forgive her, but she's got some serious making up to do with him."

"She'll do it. She loves him too. She took on her whole family over him."

He went back in and pulled down a huge stoneware bowl. It had a cover on it and when he took the cover off, I saw he had a mess of homemade bread in it."

"This here is my own version of honey bread. It's sweetened with honey instead of sugar. When it bakes up, we'll take some of that butter and have a nice snack."

"Oh man, that sounds good."

"It is. I make the loaves split down the middle and put the butter in the middle."

"Have you mixed the butter and the honey together and put it in the middle?"

"No, but that sounds good!"

"I had some up home like that and it was real good. Also, what they did was the took some of that sort of cheese and put it in the middle of some long sticks of bread and baked it. That was really good too."

"Oh man, I bet it was. When we twist us out some, I'll try that. If it's good, I'll make some for John like that."

"He'll like it."

"I imagine. I think it was my cookin' that kept him."

"You two work good together as a team. That's what impresses me. It's like one of you ends and the other begins."

"Yeah, and if we don't know the other has done something, it gets done twice a lot of times. It's my job to feed, and he was forever doing it after me. Finally, we made the thing up of the cup on the wall. His is to be so the cup faces out. Mine is to have the cup facing in. If he's done it, I know the cup is facing out. If I did it last, then I know it's not been done, so I go ahead and do it. It's also that way about the milking stool As you saw, I put it on that shelf with the handle facing in. If he does it, the handle faces out."

"That's good, that way you're communicating even when you're not there."

"Yeah, but there are chores he does that I don't do and there are ones I do that he doesn't. Ones that we need done that neither of us are supposed to do, we do together."

"What are those?"

"Well, I told you about the scything of the corn. He does the scything, but I am the one that takes the ears off and chops up the stalks. Then, together we carry the baskets in and put them into the bins. It's the same way when we're working in the garden. On the way out, he'll carry the shotgun and I'll carry the baskets. Then, he and I walk through together looking for snakes and I'll set out the baskets. If there's a snake, he shoots it and I carry it to the chickens."

"Oh, you have many snakes?"

"Not in the house garden, but up where the blackberries are, it almost never fails there's going to be one. I don't know why, but there is."

"I could tell you a way to stop that if you want."

"How?"

"Ok, blackberries like really acidic soil, so this won't hurt them, but what you do is you dig a trench around the patch and then you put in some rock salt. You'd think the salt would kill the plants, but you'll get the biggest, juiciest berries you ever saw and that's because the salt is acidic. What's good about it is nothing will grow in that trench and the snakes will have to crawl across it to get to the blackberries. They don't like the salt on them, so they'll stay out."

"That's a good idea. There's a salt lick down over by Louellas so we'll have to bring some home."

"A salt lick?"

"Yeah, it's a spot in the ground where the salt is. You dig it up with shovels and then take a hammer to it and then roll it with a rolling stone and it gets crushed up until it's really fine. Some people use it as it is, but what I do is I put it in water and boil it and then, pour off the impurities. What's left is white salt that's like table salt rather than it being gray."

"Oh, I never knew that."

"Yeah, for a long time everyone had to pay to dig the salt. I remember mama and daddy going over and getting a whole wagon of it for a chicken. Then, table salt got to be so easily to get and cheap, everyone stopped going to get the salt. The old lady that owned the salt lick died, so her kin' just decided to let whoever wanted it to go dig it. So that's what we do."

"That sounds like it's interesting."

"It is. John and I get it because it gives us something to do, plus we have enough of it that we can take some of the milk cans full of it over and trade the salt to get some hams. They use it to cure the hams, so it's a good trade."

"Ok, I see what you do now. So it's like a bartering system."

"Yeah, no one has money, so we trade it."

"I'm beginning to understand it more and more."

We went back in off the porch and Rhen said, "Let's twist up some bread and then bake it. I'm itchin' to try some of those ways you told me."

We went in and he took the pan and poured it out into a really big pan. He squeezed out different sizes and said, "Here, you twist out some. I did and made them really small about the size of a soft ball. Then, I took it and made it like a foot long hot dog bun. I took the cheese and put in it and then sealed back up the opening so the cheese was inside. He did the same and put some honey in one and some of the honey and butter mix in others. We then put them in to bake and I noticed he put wood shavings in a side hopper of the stove.

"You seasoning the bread?"

"No, this is a wood stove."

"Oh, I thought it was a range. It looks like a range my granny used to have."

"Yeah, it's got a wood stove over here and the heat goes out across the top and up the chimney out the back. Once you learn how to cook on it, you'd never want another. I like it because we can use chips and saw dust and a handfull added in will keep the fire going for an hour. What I do is I put some of those chips in that basket over there until it's full and that's what I start the fire with in the morning and it will keep until lunch. We keep the fire burning and the kitchen stays warm. Down here, is the ash hopper, see. And all we have to do is take that out and put it into that metal trash can. That goes over and it's used to make up soap from the renderin's."

"Ok, so you use even the ash from your stove?"

"Yeah, to a lot of people, it might be waste, but to us even things people throw out are used. The scraps from the garden are used to fertilize the garden. What we do is we have a dung pile out there that the scraps go in. Worms turn that into good fertilizer."

"Wow, I never thought of that."

"Yeah, cardboard and things like that are all used out there too. The worms will break down most everything except plastics."

"What do you do with plastics?"

"They get burned in the stove. It makes the fire hotter. That's the only thing we've found that we can do with them so far."

"Oh, well let me see what we have for waste at the Waters because I'm sure we have quite a bit you could use."

"Ok, we could come in and get them."

"No, we both have pickups and we've got trailers, so that'd be no problem. Besides, if we have to make trips over then we can see you guys and maybe we can spend some time together."

"That'd be good. I think we'd enjoy that."

"Yeah, and if you guys have time available, we could use you up at the Waters. I'm sure Stu would have places for you two to earn some extra money."

"That'd be great. I don't know what hours we'd have available, but that'd be good."

As the bed baked, Rhen began using a sort of paste in a crock to begin another batch of bread."

"What's the stuff in the crock?"

"It's starter. What I do is instead of yeast, I have that and each day I feed it a little and it keeps going good. Unless it gets too cold, it does good. In the Summer though, I have to put it outside because it will really get to going too good and will go from that little bit there to being a whole crock full. I really should put it into a bigger crock, but I use all my others for canning pickles and sauerkraut."

"You make your own?"

"Yeah, it's not hard and we like the homemade better."

"Why don't you can up extra and we can sell them. People would love them."

"Ok, I never thought of that. I'd need extra crocks."

"Where do you get those?"

"About once a year, a man comes by and has a bunch of them. He charges a lot for them, but he sure has some nice ones. If I ever had the money, I'd buy a bunch of them."

"Well, when he comes by again, you let us know and we'll get you a bunch."

He smiled and said, "You're serious, right?"

"Yeah, the way I see it if we make the investment with you, then we'll have a lot of canned items and then, we can be sure to have things to sell."

"Ok, I'll let Rhen know. I think he knows where the guy lives. He seems to know the man. If you don't mind, I'd like to go ahead and get them. You'd be amazed at all the things I could make from cheeses to extra batches of breads and canned good in them."

"Well, just let us know and we can go over there together. Maybe the guy would like to sell crocks at the store."

"Man, that'd be nice. I'm sure he'd appreciate it to. You're going to be amazed at the size of some of those crocks. He has them from the baby ones like this which are about a cup all the way to great big ones that are probably fifty gallon ones."

"Oh, I didn't know they came that big."

"Yeah, My granny had a great big one she made corn relish, pickles, and sourkraut in. I thought we'd get it, but it got a crack in it and wasn't much count. So, Liza Jane is using it for her soap making now. Once something gets used to make soap, everything that's food will taste bad from it. But, what's nice is Liza Jane made Em some soap that smells like his favorite cologne. It sure smelled nice."

"How'd she do that?"

"She took the cologne and poured some in the soap. Then, when he used it, he sure smelled good."

"Oh man, I've got a cologne collection up home that she could use and I bet that would really sell."

"Yeah, and a lot of different people have the perfume for women. I know she goes to yard sales and gets perfume bottles that have it in them and gives those to the women in the family."

"Oh man, that'd go over too."

"Yeah, she's real good at that stuff."

"How much soap does she make?"

"Soap's easy. All you need is a bunch of lard from processing either a cow or a hog and then some lye from the ashes and a bit of water and it makes up a batch of soap. What she does is she takes a window screen and she'll rub soap over it and it'll grate that soap up into soap powder for washin'. The only difference is you have to have a pot to boil some water and disolved the soap in it and then you pour it into the wash."

"That'd be neat and then your clothes would smell of the perfume."

"Yeah, I like the lilac and lavender flavored ones for the bedclothes. All that takes is cutting a bunch of lilac or lavender and boiling it. You can do it with Rose petals too. It'll release the oils in the flowers and once it's condensed down, the whole bunch will smell like whatever flower you use. She then uses that water in the making of the soap."

"You know quite a bit about it."

"Yeah, I go over and help her a lot. She's done a lot for us, so I go help her. The woman sure stays busy."

"It sounds like it."

"Well, most of the women out here stay busy like that. I think once you meet them, you'll find they will all fall all over themselves to help you. And, once they find out they can make money doing this, watch out because they'll have you full up!"

"That'll be good. I'm sure once we get a reputation for having that stuff everyone will want a bunch of it and maybe we could give out a flyer so people could order it by mail once they get back home. That way it's not a one time purchase and what will be nice about that is we'll need more help for that too."

He smiled and said, "You really think a lot about different ways to help people don't you."

"Well, I just know that once we have people knowing about all this stuff, we'll have everyone wanting it. What we'll have to do is find a way for people to have the soap bought. What I think is if we have it in ziplock bags with some labels on it, then it will go over."

He smiled and said, "We can get those at the grocery store."

"Yeah, but I think we can get big boxes of them for a lot cheaper. I know we did that for the stuff we sold at the pool supply. Some people would never use a big bottle of something, so we'd break it down and they'd be happy to buy it in one use sizes."

"That'd be nice. Then if someone wanted to wash their bed clothes in a batch of that soap, they'd not have to buy the whole bunch of it ."

"Yeah, and then they could buy their husband a batch of soap powder of his favorite cologne and she could do her laundry in hers. "

We sat down and he pulled out a crock. "Would you like a cup of tea?"

"Sure."

He poured it and it was really red. "What kind of tea is that?"

"Sassafrass. We dig the root and then use it to make up some tea."

"It's good"

"It'll thin your blood and cure what ails you. If in the Summer time you feel a bit sluggish, we'll make up some 'sang (Ginseng) tea and you'll be amazed at how you'll feel invigorated for a few weeks after that."

I never thought of that. We could sell different kinds of teas as a refreshment at the waters and if you have enough, we could sell it."

He smiled and said, "You'll have us rich with all the stuff we could sell!"

"Yeah, I think you'll find there's a lot of things you could sell yourself."

"Well don't let John know because he'll be brewin' up all sorts of his bar-b-que sauces. That man has all sorts of them. He could bar-b-que up a fish and have it tasting good if you'd let him."

"Really?!"

"Yeah, he's got a whole bunch of them. If I let him, he'd bar-b-que every day, but he lets me do the cooking."

"We ought to have him bar-b-que-ing up on the strip. I bet he'd have folks talking for miles."

"He would that. You ought to talk to him because he'd love it. Let me take you out to his pit. You'll be amazed at how he has it done up."

We went outside and went out to their barn. When we went in, we went to the back and there was a huge bar-b-que pit. It was really nice. He had it done up in brick and a real nice wide area about six foot wide and four foot deep."

"He bar-b-ques on this?"

"See those meats hanging?"

"Yeah"

"He can close that door and it'll smoke up the whole insides here and get it nice and hot. What he does is smokes a bunch of meat in here. We make up lots of sausages and hams and turkeys and smoke them. It's real good. When he's smoking them, what he'll do is he'll put a lot of different slices of meat and put it on those racks there. It makes the best jerky you've ever tasted. Here, try some. He keeps a bunch in these crocks so he can snack on them."

He pulled out a piece of meat that was about the size of a kansas city strip and handed it to me. I bit off some and the taste and flavor was intoxicating. It was maple with a hickory bite."

"Ummm, this is good."

"Yeah, all those crocks have different flavors. That one is his favorite."

"It tastes like maple and hickory."

"You're close, but you probably don't know the Black Locust tree. What he does is he lays in a layer of each of the woods and as it burns from the bottom, it will give off each of it's smokes. He soaks the wood first and as it dries, it will then become fuel for the fire. A lot of people will bring their meat to him to smoke like this. What they do is they give us a bit of it and then we don't have to hunt as much. What you're eating there is a bit of deer meat."

"It's good."

"Yeah, now, I'll tell you how we get it since you know and don't be grossed, ok?"

"Ok, no problem."

"When someone hits a deer, the Sheriff will give us a call. We'll go out and get it and then we'll process it up."

"Isn't that a bit messed up?"

"No, not really. Most of the injuries are internal. Yes, there's usually a broken leg, but if you process it quick enough, you can get it into some sausage and you don't know the difference."

"Oh, well, I wouldn't know."

He smiled. "You never processed a dear, have you."

"No, but the meat's not bad."

"The key to processing it is to get all the viscera off of it. A lot of people don't and it tastes too strong. If you take that off, the meat is just as good as beef."

"What's the viscera?"

"If you take a look at a picture of a man without his skin, you'll see white stuff all over his mucles. That's viscera. It sort of joins the muscle to the skin. You have to be careful and pull it off, but as I said, John can talk a fish out of it's skin and he can work the meat right out of it's viscera."

"It's sure good."

"Yeah, now, let's go back in and sit a spell and then you can finish churining that butter. It should hop right on those paddles now."

We went in and I could see the milk seperating. I started turning the paddle and it wasn't anytime at all the paddles were carrying a heavy coat of butter on them. He said, "Stop for a minute and I'll pull that off and then you can do it some more."

He undid the lid and pulled the whole top out with the paddles. He used his fingers to get the butter off and put it in the butter crock. There was probably a good pound of butter already gotten from the milk. He put it in again and I began turning. He said, "Turn that and it'll get the most out of it and then I'll show you how to cheat it so you get even more."

"Ok"

"I churned it and soon there was another huge glob of it on the paddles. He said, "Ok, now hold on and I'll show you how I cheat it."

He took the paddles out and said, "Go ahead and take that off and I'll do this."

He put another lid on the jar and then began shaking it back and forth. He was real hard on it and then stopped. I could see all sorts of butter particles floating around in the milk. He said, "Most people don't use that because they just churn until they can't get anymore. My mama taught me that and now, if you'll churn it for another five minutes, you'll get that and then it'll be about another half pound."

"Two and a half pounds of butter from a gallon, that's a lot."

"No, that's about average. What you can do with that there is you can use that in your coffee and I can make it into cottage cheese, but what John does is he adds in a little corn grits and he makes a mush for breakfast. It's good to feed hogs that when you feed them too. It'll put fat on a baby pig in no time."

"I bet."

He then showed me a different way of molding the butter and said, "Back in the day, they used to mold the butter. Now, it's hard to find a butter mold because they buy them up at the auctions. What I like is this bowl here. When I cool it in the refrigerator, it'll slide out and be real pretty. If you look tonight, you'll see all sorts of different molds have been used. One of my favorites is the Sheriff's wife's spun cherries."

"What?"

"Spun cherries. What you do is you take cherries and you crush them all up. Then you take ice cream mix and you make it. Then about the time it's frozen, you add in the cherries and you put it into a mold. If you don't spin it, the cherries will all settle to the bottom. So, with it spun the cherries will go to the edges and it mades a real pretty desert because all the lighter bits will then settle. When you turn it upside down, and it comes out of the mold, it's beautiful. She'll do it wil raspberries and boysenberries too. Boysenberries are my favorite."

"Mine too. I love that kind of ice cream."

He smiled and said, "We'll have to go hunting them. It takes a keen eye because the wild life love them too. What you do is you hunt them and then after you get them all, you stand back with a shotgun. Then when the deer or the turkey come to get themselves some, you go huntin'.'

"IS that legal?"

He smiled and said, "Revenuer's don't come out this way much and if there's one around, everyone's a runnin'."

I laughed and said, "I imagine."

"Yeah, in the Summer time, up here in the hills, folks still brew their water."

"Water?"

"Other folks call it 'shine, but we call it water. It's clear as water and some of it will kick you plumb out of your chair. If all the guys are headed to a certain jug, don't drink much. It'll be loaded with 'shine tonight."

"Even with the Sheriff there?"

"Yeah, even the Sheriff has some when he's off duty. It's not bad, but what it'll do to ya is it'll slip up on you and before you know it, you'll find yourself on the floor. Folk's will do that to someone new, so be careful."

"Ok, so I drink it, but just be careful."

"Yeah, but if no one's drinking a whole lot of everything, then just be careful of drinking a lot of anything because everything's got it in it."

"They'll let kids drink it too?"

"Not much. They tend to save that for the adults. One thing you'll see is when the water's a flowin' the jigs danced are a lot livelier."

"I bet."

"One that will plumb wear out a rug is Em when he's drinkin' the water. That guy will really do a huge dance."

"I bet. Now there's one for that cousin to hook up with that would get serious."

"Yeah, I've thought about him. Them two don't hang around each other much, so they probably don't know about each other. Maybe we should introduce them."

"Ok, we'll work on that. It should be nice to see Em happy."

"You seem to like him."

"Yeah, he's a nice guy once we settled our differences. I bought a trailer up there today."

"Ok, yeah those trailers are made over there by another cousin. They're real good. What we'll do is we'll take that trailer back and have him put some real springs under it. The springs he uses for normal trailers like that only hold so much. The ones he puts under family's he puts some real springs under them that hold a lot more."

"Oh, well that's neat."

"Let's check the bread. I'm anxious to try some."

"Now the one with the cheese in it, be careful because it'll be hot and burn your mouth."

"I bet. Yeah, it's about done. Hear that hollow sound when you thunk it?"

"Yeah"

"That's the way a watermelon will sound when it's ready too."

"I didn't know that."

"Yeah, you can't do that to muskmelon or honeydew. They are ripe if you can sink your finger tip in it."

"Ok"

He pulled out the bread and then glazed it with some egg whites and then the heat of them put a sheen on the tops. He said, "Let's try the cheese bread first. That's the one John's going to love."

We broke it and the cheese came oozing out. I said, "When it cools, the cheese gets more solid, but it's nice when it's warm."

"It sure tastes good, but it's hot."

He took a big sip of his tea and then said, "I'll make a few more loaves of that for tonight and then we'll take it to the shindig with us. That will be your offerin'."

"Ok, I hadn't thought about what I was going to take."

"Well, this will be good enough. I bet everyone is going to be amazed at it and it'll be all gone. The women will all be envious of you and the guys will all want the women to make them some more."

I smiled. "That'll be nice. Then everyone will have a part of us in their hearts."

"Yeah, but watch out at the next gatherin because all the women folk will want you to top it."

"I've already got a few ideas. One of them is my rotisseried chicken."

"What?"

"It's a chicken you cook on a spit. I have a recipe that makes it tender, moist, and delicious. What you do is you take equal parts of soy sauce and worchester sauce and you ease back the skin once you have a nice pocket, you pour that in there and then you add in the lemon pepper seasoning. As it bakes, the flavors soak into the meat and it's really good."

"I bet it is. I wonder if I could use lemon fennel. That's good too."

"I bet you can. It's got a peppery taste and tastes like lemons."

"We'll have to try it. How do y ou put the chicken on the spit?"

"I have a cooker. The chicken cooks upright and the juices flow down. I've not made it for Stu yet, but I know he'll love it."

"We'll have to do that some night when we're spending time together."

"Ok"

He smiled and said, "I'm really looking forward to this."

"Me too."

We heard a vehicle pull up the drive and he looked out. "Here come the guys now. Just in time for some of this bread. I better go ahead and pop the other loaves in."

He went over and began working the bread dough. I went over and helped and when the guys came in, Stu came over and gave me a hug. John went over and gave Rhen a hug too. Rhen said, "Try some of this bread. He made the idea of putting your cheese in it as it cooked. It's delicious."

He broke off a hunk and gave it to Stu and then some to John. Both tried it and as soon as they tasted it, John was really glowing on it. Stu said it was good and said, "You're a good cook hon!"

"Thanks, you ought to go out and try John's meat. He's quite a bar-b-quer."

"Really!"

"Yeah, he's got some smoked too that is awesome."

John smiled shyly and said, "It's somethin' I do."

"Well it's good."

Stu was a bit quiet and I said, "Well why don't you show him around John?"

"John got up and took Stu out to the shed."

"They've not had a good day." Rhen said.

"I could tell. Stu was really quiet."

"John's usually more talkative too. Maybe they're not used to each other as much."

"We'll have to get them used to each other."

I made up a really long rope of bread. It was about three feet long. Then, I divided it in the middle as I did before, but after I sealed it, I twisted it so it was in the form of a nice braid.

Rhen saw it and said, "You're going to have all the women envious of you."

"No, it's just decorative that way. One other thing you could do is make dinner rolls by squeezing it into small dots after doing this and they'll cook into small loaves so everyone doesn't have to tear the bread apart. It's already cooked and real crusty."

"That's good too I bet."

"Yeah, we'll try both, but this time, when you glaze the top, use some of that honey in the glaze with the egg white and you'll be amazed at the taste."

"I never thought of that."

"It coats it with a sugary taste and the eggwhite keeps it stuck to it."

"Oh man, that's going to be good."

He said, "Let's go out with them and see what we can do to help them get along better."

We went out and I heard Stu yelling. I picked up my pace and when I got inside the shed, I saw Stu with his fists clenched. "Stuart Reddington, what's going on!"

"I try to get along with him, but he wants to be an asshole."

"Stu, step outside for a minute and cool down. If you keep this up, I'll have to go out with John and you'll stay here."

Stu stepped outside and I saw pure hate upon his face.

"Stu, now I'm going to say something and you might not like it, but you've got to let it go. Beating him over the head with it isn't going to help a thing. Now, my granny said when a dog's killed a chicken, you beat it with it and it'll kill a chicken again. Sometimes, you tie it to it's neck and you let the thing rot off him. He'll hate a chicken from then on out. You're beating the dog. What are you going to do when it's time to pet him?"

"I've been bein' an ass, haven't I?"

"I don't know, have you?"

"Yeah."

"Then go make up with him and don't be surprised if he doesn't bite."

"Ok, will you go with me?"

"Yeah, but you've got to let it go. It doesn't mean you love him less, you've got to learn to open your heart and love John too. They're good people."

"You weren't the one ducking their bullets."

"And you aren't now. Is that what you want? You want to take shots at them? What does it prove? It proves you're less of a man because you profess forgiveness and then don't forgive. Well, trot yourself in there and I'll make things better."

"We stepped inside and John said, "Get out!"

"John, it's me. Now, I'm coming in and you're going to let me speak for the both of us. Ok?"

"You do anything wrong and I'll go to prison gladly after I kill both of you."

"John, there ain't no one going to prison. We're going to talk and then whether or not you two like it, you're going to be friends. If not, I'll talk to the Sheriff and I'll handcuff you two together. You'll stay that way for a fucking week!"

"Well, I bet I could shut his mouth then."

"And maybe you could, but I think I just did, so give us a chance here."

"I did. He's used every opportunity to see to it I'm going to be miserable."

"No he's not. He's going to grow up and he's going to cut that shit out. Right Stu?"

"Yeah."

"Then what we're going to do is we're going to get along and you're going to be friends so help me God because I'll take you both out."

Rhen said, "John watch him. He's got Em afraid of him!"

"Em!" John said with a look of surprise

"Yeah, he knows kung fu and can knock down trees. So you better behave."

John looked at me and said, "Ok, I'll try again."

"Good. Now, what were you showing him in here?"

"I was showing him how I smoke the meats."

"And Stu, don't you think if we had some of these for sale at the store it'd go over well?"

"Yes. Yes it would!"

"And John, don't you have lots and lots of bar-b-que sauces you make up. One even for fish?"

"Yes, I've got all sorts of varieties."

"And now, do you know where the man lives that sells the crocks."

"Yeah, he's Nate Jackson. He lives over in Hell's hollar."

"Well, Stu, you and John need to go over and take a look at those crocks and see if Nate would like to sell a bunch at the store and you need to buy these guys a bunch of crocks."

"Why?"

"Because they make the best things in the world with them and if we had a lot of that stuff up at the store for sale, they could make a nice living from them. John here knows all sorts of things and his whittlin' in there is probably good enough he could win a prize at the state fair. His knicknacks are probably going to bring top dollar at the store if he'd decide to sell some."

"Really?"

"Yeah, but you beating him over the head isn't going to do either of you any good. If you took the time to see the good in him, you'd know these things. Instead, I've learned to like him through Rhen's eyes. That man loves him like I do you. Now, how much did you tell him about me? Because I bet you Rhen could tell John a lot about you."

"Well....ummm....."

"Yeah, now aren't you proud of yourself? That's bullshit Stu and you know it and you John! What did you tell him about Rhen?"

"I couldnt' get a word in edgewise."

"Sometimes, you have to tell him to shut the hell up!"

John smiled and so did Stu. "Now, I'm going to go out of here and you two better be able to tell us something good about each other much less us guys when you come back in."

I went out the door and slammed it. Rhen looked at me and smiled. "You flew into them like his mama. I bet they both know they've been whupped."

"Well....they need it ....acting like a bunch of kids."

Rhen giggled and said, "One thing John knows about you is you've got a temper now!"

I laughed and said, "So does Stu. I've never laid into him like that before."

"Well, I bet they get along now. Both of them will be afraid not to."

I chuckled and said, "Let's get them a glass of that tea and take it out to them. They'll like that and maybe they'll loosen their tongues."

"No, let them stew a bit. I bet that was enough to make them start trying."

"I bet too. If not, then I'll have to show John how to split wood the hard way."

He laughed and said, "No, don't do that because he'll try it and hurt himself. Then, he'll get better and try it again. He's that way."

"So's Stu."

"Well, maybe they do have things in common."

"Yeah, now sometime when you two have a chance, I'd like to take you to the waters and see if you can meet Eddie."

"Huh?"

"Eddie's ghost is there. He's spoken to me and Stu saw him the last time we spoke. I bet you could see him."

"Don't tell me you're touched like my granny was."

"What do you mean?"

"She could see and talk to the dead just like you and I are talkin'. She'd sit in a chair and she'd see 'um."

"That's be neat. I don't know if I have that, but I know I've seen Eddie and there've been others there that have seen him too."

"Yeah, but take a look at all them people who didn't. Only certain ones can. You're one and I bet the more you pay attention to it, the more you'll see them."

"I don't know."

He nodded and said, "I wish my granny were alive. She'd tell you how to see them better and then you could. I do know you'll meet some in my family who will tell you about my granny, but what was interestin' was one night, she was telling people about the dead and she said someone we all knew was talking with her. We thought she was nuts and then, we got home and the next day, we heard he'd gotten hisself killed out in the woods from a fall down a sink hole."

"Oh man, how'd they find him."

"Buzzards flyin' over the area. They can smell 'em and then you follow 'em and they lead you to 'em. It's when you don't see buzzard that you have to worry because that means either they've up and ran off, or they've fallen in a cave around here."

"There many of them?"

"More than you know. Sometime in the Winter time, we'll have to go out in the woods. They're easier to see then because you can see the steam coming out of the ground. When you get there, you'll see the hole, or the entrance if they're big enough. There's tales that over there along the border of Arkansas and Missouri along the line is one that's got gold in it."

"Really?"

"Yeah, but who knows. I do know the fellar that brought out the hunk of it found it to be good, but when he went back, he couldn't find it."

"Oh man, that'd be heartbreaking, but nowadays, it'd be easier to find the spot."

"How?"

"Just go up there with a GPS locator and it'd tell you where you were. Then, all you have to do is follow those coordinates and it'd take you back."

"What's one of those?"

"You see my cell phone here?"

"Yeah"

"It's got one in it. See on the screen here. This is your coordinate for your house. IF we go out to the front porch, it'll change. Everywhere on the planet is different, and this will get you to within three feet of where it is if you go there again."

"Oh man, that'd be neat takin' huntin'. You could leave a deer out there and then go back and get help carryin' it in. Then you'd know right where it was."

"Yeah"

"I'll have to see about getting' one of those."

"They have them without the phones too. It's similar to this, but it's not got a phone."

"No, I'd want a phone. Then, if I found the gold, I'd want to call you and say, "Come to this spot. I found it!"

We laughed and I said, "You know how fast I'd have my truck out there in them woods pulling that trailer!"

"That'd be funny."

"Yeah, you'd see me comin' and I'd be knocking down trees with the truck and you'd think it was a bulldozer." We laughed and Rhen said, "Let's go take them out their tea."

When we went out, we went into the shed and the guys were laughing. "This sounds better."

"Yeah, John was telling me a story about chasin' a coon hound"

We sat in the shed and I said, "John, how much extra corn do you need to grow us a cow?"

"Oh, I don't know. It's not the corn, but the plowin'. Up here, the soil's real rocky, so it's a real chore, but a sack of corn costs about thirty dollars and you can grow a cow off'n that."

Stu said, "Really!"

"Yeah, each kernel grows into a stalk and that stalk will have three ears on it. Most people space them about eight inches apart, but a long time back, I told Rhen I had an eight incher, so he planted them that far apart and now we know we can grow corn about five inches apart."

I laughed and Rhen blushed.

Stu said, "Would you grow one for us?"

"Sure, that's no problem. Do you want the milk from it?"

Stu shrugged and said, "How much milk comes from one?"

"About four gallon a day."

"Oh, that's a lot of milk. We probably would only use a gallon a week. You could keep the rest, couldn't you?"

"Yeah, we can make all sorts of things from it."

I said, "I learned how to make butter today and that cheese in that bread is home made. He makes cottage cheese too."

Stu looked impressed and said, "We could use some butter some time too."

"Hon, if we put in coolers, we could sell a lot of that stuff. It could get them money and it'd be really good. I've learned a lot of things today and know we could get a lot of things for the store from Louella and Liza Jane. Both of them know how to make a lot of things."

John looked at me and said, "Like what?"

"The soap like she made you would go over real well and also that laundry soap and all sorts of those things."

John said, "You really mean people would buy that stuff?"

Stu said, "Yeah! What sorts of soaps do they make?"

I said, "She put some cologne in it for John and it smelled like the cologne when he bathed in it. Remember my cologne collection up home? I could bring that down for her. And she makes perfumed soap for women and then they make lilac and lavendar soap and laundry soap by rubbing it over a window screen. They also make sausages and hams. John here smokes the hams and someone else cures them from salt they dig which also could be sold."

John said, "People would buy that?"

"Yeah"

Stu said, "John, you don't know it, but all sorts of this stuff people can't get back home, so they'd buy it."

"And, what I thought of today was we could send home a price sheet with them and they could order it by mail. So, that'd be a year round income because people would like to give those things to their friends as presents."

Stu looked at me and said, "Yeah!"

"And, we could hire the guys to work at the store and John could whittle and show people how things are made. Or, he could bar-b-que. We could sell that tea there and they've got other kinds of tea we could sell too like one made from 'sang."

"What?"

"'Sang. It's something they dig up."

John said, "That stuff's all over the place."

Stu said, "It is!"

"Yeah, these hills are full of it."

Stu said, "John! You don't know how much people buy that for!"

"What do you mean?"

"A pound of it's going for like thirty dollars now!"

"Really! Man, I could go get a truck load right now."

"Man, do that and you'd be bringing in some huge money!"

"Well don't let anyone else know because I can get a whole lot of it." he said smiling. He looked at Rhen and said, "Hon, I'm going to start diggin' us a lot of 'sang and get us some money."

Rhen smiled and said, "We could get a lot of things around here like a tractor."

"Yeah and with a tractor, we could grow a lot more on this place. We could sell those vegetables in town at the farmer's market."

Rhen smiled and said, "Oh man, that'd be nice."

Stu said, "Why don't you sell the vegetables in front of the Waters. You could even sell your bread Rhen. I know people would love to buy loaves of that. It's wonderful."

Rhen looked shy and said, "It'd probably not bring much."

"About four dollars a loaf when it's home made. I know because the Amish do that up home. Their pies go for a lot too."

Rhen said, "Really!"

"Yeah, whenever the Amish sell their goods, you'd be amazed at how fast their things sell out. They come into town once a month and if you're not there that morning, it's all gone."

"Oh man, I could make a lot of them extra for that."

Stu said, "Guys, you've not known you could sell this stuff and now you do. If you don't want to sit there and sell it, I'll sell it in the store and you'll get just as much."

John said, "How do you make money off it?"

Stu said, "Tell him hon."

"Well, what we do is if something sells for a dollar, we sell it for a dollar ten and that ten goes to us. That's how we do it. So if it sells for five dollars then we sell it for five fifty."

"Oh ok, so you sell it and we get our money and you make a little off it too."

"Yeah, but the plus side of it is you don't waste your time waiting around for people to come get it and you can be doing other things. You make just as much, but we make some too."

"So this is what you're going to be doing for everyone?"

"Yeah. What I thought was the bars of soap they make, we can get a dollar each. Folks will buy it and take it home and they'll love it. The laundry soap we can sell in ziploc bags and get a dollar for that too."

Stu smiled and said, "That laundry soap will make them a lot more money because that's not a whole bar of soap in that."

"No, it's only about a quarter of a bar."

John smiled and said, "Won't Liza Jane and Louella just love that."

"Yeah, because what they sell for a bar of soap that I saw they give you guys is really about two bars."

John said, "Liza Jane also makes that one soap guys use to wash their hands with when they're working on their cars. That stuff will cut right through grease and oil."

Stu said, "Really?"

"Yeah, all she does is puts a little ground up stone in it and it scrubs it off."

"What makes it cut through the grease?"

"The lye in it."

Stu said, "Let me try some of that stuff. I want to see about doing something with it. If it works, all I'll have to do is do a demonstration once a day and you'll be amazed at how much I get out of a bar of it."

I looked at him and said, "What do you mean?"

"All we have to do hon is take a pan that's got a build up of grease on it and scrub that pan with it and if that grease comes off, then folks will buy a bar of that for about five dollars!"

"Man, I never thought of that, but you're right. People will think it's miracle stuff and what they don't know is it's lye soap. And when they get home and their friends see how good it works, they'll want some and we'll have a lot of it sold through the mail."

Stu smiled and said, "Oh man, I can't believe this hon, we'll be helping so many people and they'll be making money and we'll have a nice little mail order enterprise going for year round sales. So even when the crowds leave, we'll still have an income."

John smiled and said, "So it'd help you guys too!"

"Yeah"

He smiled really big and said, "Rhen, I'm glad we went in there today. These guys are really good."

Rhen smiled and said, "Yeah and we've got us some good friends too who support us and we can relate to."

John smiled and said, "I feel good about this." He went over and hugged Rhen and turned to Stu. "I'm sorry Stu, but I'm really happy we're friends now."

Stu went over and hugged him and said, "John, I'm glad too. Now, what Jer and I have to do is we've got to go home and get ready for this party tonight."

I went over to Stu and said, "Guys, what time are you leaving so we'll know when to leave. Then, we can get there about the same time. It'll feel better if we know someone there."

"We'll leave about four thirty. That way we get good seats and our things will be laid out far enough away from that yellow crock pot that folks will eat the stuff." Rhen said.

We laughed and then walked out of the shed.

I got in Stu's truck and we said goodbye.

-- >From My Keyboard To Your Heart Rhett

Here is a list of stories I've written and where to find them:

With Love - Nifty - Beginnings Section Rural Love - DeweyWriter.com Write Me A Love Story - DeweyWriter.com To Love Him - DeweyWriter.com Military Zone - Nifty - Military Section Evan - Nifty - Beginnings Section Jordan - Nifty - Beginnings Section

Can You Catch My Heart

Buckets of Blessings

Chains of Love

Dead Air

Prayers of Thanks

All On DeweyWriter.com or Nifty.org