Picket Fences and Apple Pie

Picket Fences and Apple Pie

By Thomas Blaine
(thomasblaine@yahoo.com)

The small town of Baker Falls could have been mistaken for any of a hundred, or even a thousand, small towns in the United States. Small houses waved American flags during the summer months, neatly manicured lawns kept behind white picket fences, the smell of freshly baked apple pie cooling on a windowsill, and the sound of children playing in a neighborhood park.

To my knowledge, no one in Baker Falls locked his or her doors at night. No one really needed to for Baker Falls was a safe place to live. You could always tell it was morning when the ten-year-old boy on his red bicycle rode by and tossed your newspaper on your front porch, or when the milkman in the white uniform left bottles of milk next to your door. The policeman in his flattop hat still walked a beat down the sidewalk past your house, and the fire department raced to rescue the cat stuck in your neighbor’s tree.

After school, the teenagers raced downtown to Mr. Cooper’s Malt Shop on the corner of Main and Fourth Street, there they could choose their own bananas for a banana split. Each banana had a sticker on with a price. Sometimes they were lucky and only had to pay ten cents for a banana split, other times they had to pay fifty.

At the diner just up Main, near the park on Stevens, one could order a cheeseburger and a cherry coke from a waitress in a pink apron and have it made by a grill man with a white paper cap on his head. The old men sat outside Buckley’s Barbershop and reminisced about days long past when things were better, but most of the residents of Baker Falls thought things were just fine the way they were.

Baker Falls was the kind of town that one always remembers with a sense of nostalgia, and then later tries to convince himself or herself that it really couldn’t have been that nice. But Baker Falls was just as nice as the resident’s memories made it out to be. It was the ideal of the American dream.

And that’s the way the residents liked it.

* * *

My parents died in a car crash when I was four and my sister was two. Both of us had become sick so they left us with the nanny one Sunday morning and went to church – they always went to church each and every Sunday. On the way back, their car stalled on the railroad tracks on King’s Road by the bend in the Elkwater River. I know they must have heard the train coming, but to this day I don’t know why they didn’t try to escape. Perhaps they were paralyzed with fear. Fortunately, they were killed instantly, but the wreck was one hell of a mess.

My sister and I stayed in Baker Falls and were adopted by a couple that was friends with my parents. They couldn’t have children of their own and no one objected when they asked for custody of Mary and me. Mr. and Mrs. George Anderson raised us, but we kept our last name, Knappe. Our father was born in Leipzig, Germany and immigrated to the United States following the war. He wasn’t a Nazi, just a common soldier in the Heer, the German army.

Most people don’t realize that members of the Wehrmacht, the German Armed Forces, generally weren’t permitted to become members of the Nazi Party. For all of his fascist rhetoric, Hitler was fearful of the power of the armed forces and was afraid that they would try to take the party over. My father never killed a Jew or executed anyone. He killed two French soldiers during the invasion of France, but then his leg was shattered and he spent most of the war in a German military hospital. That’s where the Allies found him when Germany was defeated.

He was allowed to immigrate to the United States in 1949 and met my mother, an army nurse who had been stationed in Europe, on the boat ride across the Atlantic. He was twenty-one and she nineteen. They fell in love at first sight and asked the Captain to marry them before the boat reached New York. The moved to Baker Falls, my mother’s hometown, and I was born in 1951, my sister in 1953. The crash occurred in 1957.

Mary and I went to elementary, junior high, and high school in Baker Falls and I graduated from BFHS in June of 1969, just as the Vietnam war was beginning to heat up but before people began to lose hope that we would win. I was ineligible for because of a bad heart I inherited from my mother. It was hard seeing my friends leave and go from the school playfields to the Vietnam battlefields. Many of them would never return. There’s a plaque in the foyer of BFHS to this day that bears the name of alumni that died or never returned from Vietnam. Fifty-seven alumni went over, thirty-two were killed, and eight became missing in action or prisoners of war.

I continued to live at home after high school but took the bus twenty miles to St. Barker’s College in the next town over. There I double-majored in political science and Russian. The government would offer good jobs to anyone fluent in Russian and who had a good understanding of international affairs. I guess serving your government, whatever government that might be, ran in the family.

* * *

During the evenings, I worked for Mr. Williams, the local real-estate agent. Baker falls was growing fast in 1969 and more people wanted to move there than we had houses for. The Chamber of Commerce voted in 1958 to not allow apartments to be built until the population of Baker Falls was two thousand. We were at fifteen hundred and were expected to meet two thousand by 1972. (It actually didn’t happen until 1974.)

My job was to show the ten or twelve houses that were available on any given day to people who walked in off the street. Some houses sold fast, others seemed to take forever. Most of the older ones were the first to be sold because they were located in "lived-in" neighborhoods. With most of the newer houses, the trees weren’t taller than the roofs yet and everything looked too new.

There was one exception to this rule, the McCormick Mansion on Sparrow’s Hill. It was the oldest house in Baker Falls and one of the largest. Built in 1892 for the local manager of the mine that the town was founded around, it was an imposing structure. It was beautiful when the Victorian-style house was new, but it had been abandoned since the war, the First World War. The one road up Sparrow’s hill was steep and winding and there were no phone or power lines.

You can imagine my surprise when someone wanted to buy the McCormick Mansion.

* * *

One August afternoon, I sat at my desk in Mr. William’s Real-estate office. The afternoon had been slow with no visitors and two phone calls, one of which was a wrong number. I sat reviewing my conjugation of Russian verbs and practicing my Cyrillic handwriting by translating descriptions of the houses into Russian. Mr. Williams kept making jokes that I was really a Communist spy sent here to sell the nice houses in Baker Falls to other Communists.

The front door swung opened and hit the metal cowbell suspended above it. I looked up from my work and saw a woman in her mid thirties wearing a green skirt and jacket with a white blouse beneath it. She had blonde hair that shoulder-length, back-combed slightly at the top, and curled out at the ends. On her feet were very tall high-heeled shoes that matched the color of her skirt and jacket.

"Can I help you?" I asked, standing up and walking to the door to greet her.

"Yea," she said in a sweet voice with a slight Southern drawl. "My name is Elaine Daniels and I’m thinking of moving here. I was wondering if you could show me what houses are available."

"Of course, Mrs. Daniels," I said, extending my hand to shake hers. "My name is John Robinson."

"It’s just Miss Daniels, John," she said. "There’s no Mr. Daniels, but you can call me Elaine."

I smiled and motioned towards a chair at my desk for Elaine to sit in.

"We have eight houses available right now, Elaine," I said, handing her the scrapbook that contained photographs and descriptions of the houses.

"That first one there just came onto the market yesterday," I said, pointing to the photo of a two-story house with green yard lined by shrubs out front. "It has three bedrooms, one and a half baths, a kitchen, living room, dining room, den, and a two-car garage out back."

"It’s nice," Elaine said, flipping to the next page. It had a photo of a large two-story brick house with a stone front porch.

"This one is a little larger than the last one," I said. "It has four bedrooms, three and a half bathrooms, kitchen pantry, dining room, living room, den, and a multi-purpose room in the basement. There’s and adjacent two-car garage."

"I don’t need anything that large," Elaine said. "It will just be me and my two cats."

In the back of my mind, I wondered why Elaine wasn’t married. She certainly wasn’t unattractive. Her slim face was covered with fair skin that didn’t have a single blemish. She wasn’t too heavy or too thin, but just at the right weight to show that she took care of her body but wasn’t obsessed about being thin.

"Oh, I don’t like this one," Elaine said after seeing the picture of the third house. It was a small, one-story bungalow with a front yard surrounded by a white fence.

"I’m not much of a picket fences person," she said. "There’s something about it that seems too, well, tamed."

She looked up at me and said with a smile, "I’m more of a wild woman. Are you wild, John?"

"That depends on what you mean by ‘wild,’ Elaine," I answered without giving any information. Elaine smiled again and moved on.

"I want something a little more out of the ordinary," she said. "Something that’s different than the other houses."

The next page in the scrapbook was the McCormick Mansion.

"Oh goodness!" Elaine gasped when she saw the old black-and-white photo. "I love it."

"That’s larger than that other house I showed you," I pointed out.

"I know, but its so unusual I couldn’t resist," Elaine said. "I’m a sucker for Victorian architecture."

"That’s the McCormick Mansion," I said, tapping the plastic cover over the picture. "I should tell you right now it will need a lot of work. It’s been abandoned since World War I. There’re no phone or power lines and the water pipes probably don’t work anymore. I’ve been in it a couple times and it’s a real mess. I highly recommend looking at one of the other houses in town, Elaine."

"Nonsense," Elaine said, waving off that suggestion with her hand. "I want to see the McCormick Mansion, John. I assume you’re allowed to show it to me."

"Yes, ma’am," I said. "But I think you’re wasting your time."

"We’ll see about that once we’re up there, John," Elaine said. "Now, will you drive or shall we take my car?"

I sighed.

"Hold on, I need to go tell Mr. Williams where we’re going," I said, standing up and reaching for my red windbreaker.

* * *

"You’re joking, John," Mr. Williams said, looking up from his book in his office. "She want’s to go where?"

"I’m not kidding, sir," I said. "Ms. Daniels wants to go have a look at the old McCormick Mansion."

"Did you tell her how bad it is?" he asked.

"Of course," I replied. "I tried to talk her out of it but she’s intent on checking it out."

"Well," Mr. Williams said, shrugging his shoulders. "If she wants to, more power to her. The keys are by the door. Let me know how it goes."

"Sure thing, sir," I said. "I’ll see you later."

I grabbed the key ring for the McCormick Mansion from the hook by the door and walked back out to Elaine.

"Are you ready?" she asked.

I nodded.

"Let’s take your car," I said. "Mine’s a mess."

* * *

We drove towards Sparrow’s Hill and up the long, winding road to the McCormick Mansion. The road hadn’t been traveled in a long time and dust and leaves covered parts of the pavement. The thin road turned directions four times before we reached the large, wrought iron gates to the property. The gates were partially hidden behind the overgrown foliage and we didn’t see them until we were right in front of them.

"Stay here," I said, opening the car door. "I need to unlock the gate."

The iron gate creaked and swayed in the wind as I reached from the padlock securing the metal chain that kept the gates locked. I opened them and Elaine drove into the gravel driveway. I closed the gates without locking them and got back into the car.

"It’s rather spooky," Elaine commented at the eerie shapes the sunlight made as it fell through the gapes in the trees and bushes that surrounded the driveway. "How long has it been since someone took care of it?"

"Almost forty years." I said. "It was abandoned in 1920 when the mine closed, but supposedly a groundskeeper kept the property tidy until World War II."

"I like those," Elaine said, pointing at a little stone pedestal with a small statue of a winged demon on it.

"There’s one on either side of the road," I pointed out. "I guess it’s to ward off evil spirits."

"I can’t wait to see the house," she said.

Almost without warning, the driveway opened up into a clearing. Before us was the three-story Victorian-style McCormick Mansion. Ivy grew unchecked over the mansion’s façade and several of the windows were broken out. The driveway formed a circle in front of the main entrance and Elaine drove around what used to be a fountain that had sculptures of tiny angels on it.

"This is it," I said as Elaine stopped the car. "It’s not too late to change your mind."

"Not on your life," Elaine said, getting out and staring up at the imposing building before us. "No that we’re here, I have to see inside."

"Okay, just be careful where you step," I said. "These floors are so old the boards are probably rotted. We don’t want to fall through or have part of the house fall on top of us."

Elaine wasn’t listening to me. She approached the front steps as if in a trance. The wood creaked beneath her feet as she ascended the stairs to the front porch. I came up behind her and unlocked the massive, solid-oak front doors.

The rusty hinges screeched and moaned as I swung one of the doors open. Inside, the air was cold and musty. It had been a rainy summer and there were probably pools of water in the basement.

"This is amazing," Elaine said, standing in the foyer. "It’s just as I imagined it."

Before us was a hallway that led to the back of the mansion, where the kitchen, pantry, and servants quarters were. To the left side of the foyer, a staircase climbed up to the second story, where it joined a balcony that looked down onto the foyer. On either side of us were small sitting rooms. The one on the right was smaller and bore the remnants of the decorations of what obviously was where the lady of the house entertained visitors. To the left was a larger room lined with bookshelves and with a large fireplace on the far wall.

"I can just see it," Elaine said in the door way to the room on our left. "There must have been couches there by the fireplace for the men to sit and talk and drink brandy. A grand piano was probably in one of the corners and sometimes the master of the house would treat his guests with a song.

"And over there," she said, turning around to look into the other room. "The lady of the house would have had tea with their wives. They would have sat here and gossiped."

"You seem to have a feel for this house," I said.

Elaine smiled. "It’s wonderful! It will need a lot of work, and it will be very expensive, but I can definitely afford to take care of it."

"Well, before you commit a small fortune to this place, shall I show you the rest of the mansion?"

"Of course," Elaine said, excited.

I noticed that she was breathing heavily and her cheeks seemed to have become more flushed.

"All of my life I’ve dreamed of a house like this," she said. She slowly climbed the stairs to the second floor and paused on the landing halfway up to look around.

"Look there," she said pointing to the peeling red wallpaper. "You can see where they hung their pictures. A picture of the husband, and one of the wife, and one of the whole family in the center.

"Tell me about the people who used to live here," she said.

"It used to be the manager of the mine here in town. He lived here with his wife and family from when the house was built in 1892 to when the mine closed in 1920. If I remember right, he lost both of his boys in World War I his wife died shortly after the mines closed."

"How sad," Elaine said. "How did she die?"

"I’m not sure," I answered. "I think she fell from one of the balconies on the back side of the house. It’s right against a cliff that looks down to Squacreek Lake. It’s a good two-hundred foot drop. But the view is really something and that’s why Julius McCormick built the mansion here."

Up on the second floor, a hallway stretched the width of the house. Elaine walked to the right as if she knew where she was going.

"What’s down this way?" I asked.

"That’s the master bedroom," I replied. "There’s also a couple other rooms, possibly one of them was a nursery at one time."

The hall terminated in large double doors with brass handles. The brass had become dull and tarnished over the years. Elaine reached for the handle and tried to open the door.

"It’s locked," she said.

"I know," I replied. "We don’t have a key for it. If you decide to buy the house, we’ll have all of the locks removed and replaced before you move in. There’s no telling who’s been able to get keys for this place in the past fifty years."

"I thought people ‘round here didn’t lock their doors," Elaine said.

"They don’t, but you can never be to careful," I said.

"Are you sure you don’t have a key?" she asked.

"Quite sure," I said. "We only have keys for the exterior doors, not the interior ones."

"I really want to see inside," Elaine said.

She pulled a bobby pin from her hair and began jimmying the lock, but without success.

"Here," I said, stepping up to the lock. I took the bobby pin and my Swiss army knife from my pocket and picked the lock.

"Informative and talented," Elaine joked when we heard the pin of the lock slide back. "Is there anything else you can do?"

"You’d be surprised," I replied. "I picked up quite a few skills during high school."

The door was reluctant to open, but both of us working together were able to get the hinges to move.

"So this is the master bedroom," Elaine said as we stepped into the room. "I’m impressed."

The two outer walls were almost entirely occupied by French windows that stretched from the floor to the ceiling. Old torn and tattered curtains hung from over the windows; they bellowed as the wind blew through the broken glass. A large canopy bed was built into the wall to our left, opposite one of the walls of windows. It too has old, dusty curtains, but most of the trapping seemed to be intact.

"Mr. McCormick left most of the furniture here," I said as Elaine walked around the bedroom to get a better look at what was there. "Over the years, most of what was left has disappeared, but this room seems to be almost untouched."

"I wonder why that is?" Elaine said. She was thinking aloud. "This place must have been beautiful when it was still lived in. It’s a crime that it is so decrepit now."

"That must be the balcony over there," I said. It’s the only one that looks out onto the lake. All the other rooms just have windows."

"I guess the owner wanted him and his wife to be the only one to really see it," Elaine said, walking over to the French doors on the back wall of the bedroom. I followed right behind her. Elaine opened the door and our breath was taken away by the stunning view.

"Oh my God!" we both gasped in unison.

Before us was a completely uninterrupted view of Squacreek Lake. The sun and fluffy clouds reflected off the lake’s smooth surface. On either side, green forest-covered hills rose and joined the foothills of the mountains. Out on the lake, sailboats moved back and forth and left V-shaped wakes behind them as they sliced through the crystal-clear mountain water. A low, stone balustrade circled the edge of the balcony three yards away from us. Part of it, along with the surrounding balcony, had fallen away, leaving a yard-wide gap.

"Look," Elaine said, pointing at the gap. "I wonder if that’s where the wife fell."

"I don’t know," I said. "But it could be."

Elaine took a step towards it, but I grabbed her arm and stopped her.

"I would get too close to the edge, Elaine." I cautioned. "We don’t know how close this balcony is to crumbling."

"Thank you," Elaine said, placing her hand on mine. "My curiosity gets the better of me if I’m not careful."

"That’s okay," I said.

Elaine left her hand on mine for a few more seconds. Her hand was warm, even though I was sure mine were cold. It was a chilly August day, which was the norm for Baker Falls.

Suddenly, there was a crashing sound from back inside the bedroom. We ran back inside and saw that the large door had blown closed.

"It must have been the wind," I said, feeling it whip around my neck and head.

Elaine shivered and crossed her arms.

"It suddenly got cold in here," she said.

"That’s the wind off the lake," I answered. "It’s always welcomed in the middle of summer and dreaded during the winter because it’s always much cooler than the rest of the air.

"No," Elaine said. "It’s not that. It’s not the wind. It feels like someone else is in here, something cold that passed near me."

I shook my head.

"Nah, your mind is just playing tricks on you," I said. "An old creepy house like this is bound to do that. But here, take my jacket."

I removed my red windbreaker and handed it to Elaine.

"Thank you," she said, putting it on.

From outside the windows, a rumbling sound came from across the lake.

"Thunder?" Elaine said, perplexed. "But it’s bright and sunny out?"

"There’s probably a storm building up on the other side of the mountains across the lake," I said. "That’s where all of the storms come from, to the north."

"Oh," Elaine said. She shivered again. "Let’s get out of here. I want to see the rest of the house."

Elaine looked spooked, but that was understandable. My first time in the McCormick mansion left me spooked too. And I’ll admit it, being in the master bedroom for the first time was rather creepy.

"Just wait until you see the greenhouse," I said, reaching for the door handle. The brass was cold and the finish flaked off in my hands, but the handle was stuck. I tried a little harder and, with a snapping sound, it came right off.

I look at Elaine and smiled. "I guess now you have one more thing to fix if you buy this house."

Elaine smiled a fake smile, but I could see she was a little worried and didn’t want to remain in the bedroom a minute longer than she had to. I tried the other door, but that handle snapped off in my hands as well.

"Now what?" Elaine asked.

"I guess now we look for an alternate exit," I said, turning my head to look at the two interior walls of the bedroom. One wall had two double doors, and the other three double and one single door.

"Let’s see where these doors lead," I said, waling over to the one closest to the window. Elaine checked the ones near here.

"It’s a closet," Elaine said. "Full of women’s clothing."

"Same here," I replied. "But this one has men’s suits in it."

The next door I tried led into another closet, but this one was empty. The second set of double doors Elaine opened concealed drawers filled with women’s personal possessions: undergarments, accessories, and jewelry. In a niche above the drawers were wooden heads, each with a different style of hat on it.

"They’re so beautiful," Elaine said, examining the fine material of the clothing. By being closed behind the doors for all these years, they were in better condition than the furniture that was left exposed to the elements.

"One door left," I said. "I hope that leads somewhere."

I opened the single door next to the closet Elaine was examining and found, curiously enough, a brick wall. It was as if someone had sealed the room or corridor to which this door originally led.

"I guess the only way out is the way we came in," I said, walking back over to the main doors. I bent down and examined where the handles had broken away. There was no way I could access the lock and the door didn’t have any protrusions that we could have grabbed and pulled to doors towards us.

"It looks like we’re stuck in here," I said, throwing my hands up in the air.

"So now what?" Elaine asked.

"Now we do nothing," I said. "There’s nothing we can do. Mr. Williams knows we’re up here, if I don’t come back before he closes at 5:00, he’ll probably come up and check to see if everything okay."

"And what if he doesn’t?" Elaine asked.

"Then my parents or sister will notice that I’m not home tonight and they’ll call Mr. Williams," I said. "Either way, we should be out of here in a couple hours."

"Good," Elaine said. "This place is giving me the creeps even more now that it’s starting to get dark. What time is it?"

"Quarter ‘till five," I said, glancing at my watch.

"It gets dark early here," Elaine said.

"It’s the mountains," I answered. "We’re in a valley between them so the sun seems to set much earlier. It gets dark real early during the winter."

"I’d imagine," Elaine said.

She sat down on the edge of the canopy bed.

"It’s really getting cold," she said, shivering again. "Can we build a fire in that fireplace?"

"Perhaps," I said. "There are enough fallen branches on the balcony to last us for a while and I’ve got matches in my pocket."

I walked over to the fireplace, which was in the front wall of the bedroom and opposite the doors to the balcony. Sticking my head inside and looking up, I saw an unobstructed view of the orange twilight sky above.

"The flue is open," I said. "And I don’t see anything blocking the chimney. I’ll go get some wood."

I walked back out onto the balcony and gathered an armful of fallen sticks and branches. The balcony stretched around the two sides of the bedroom, but there was no way I could reach a window to any of the other rooms. I returned to the bedroom and dropped the bundle of sticks on the hearth. I pulled the leaves from the branches that had them and made a nice bundle on the iron cradle inside the fireplace. I struck one of my matches and lit both ends of the bundle of sticks. A few seconds later, the room became bathed in the flickering orange-yellow light of the fire and we could feel the heat radiating from it.

Once I was sure the fire would manage by itself, I walked over to Elaine and sat down on the bed next to her.

"I’m sorry about this," she said. "If I hadn’t insisted on coming here so much, this wouldn’t have happened. I hope I’m not keeping you from anything you were suppose to do tonight."

I shook my head.

"I’m a boring guy," I said with a smile. "You’re only keeping me from sitting at home alone and thinking about how boring my life is."

Elaine smiled.

"You’re sweet," she said, placing her hand on my elbow. "But you mean that you don’t have a girlfriend or someone you can spend tonight with?"

I shook my head and said, "nope. I haven’t had a girlfriend in a couple years. Not since I graduated from high school. What about you? I know you’re not married. Don’t you have a boyfriend you could be with right now?"

Elaine shook her had.

"Most of the men in my life are real jerks," she said. "They only care about one thing and that’s all I am to them. I haven’t found a guy who cares about me yet."

"Come on," I said. "There has to have been someone."

"I thought there was," Elaine replied. "But every time we got close, they turned out to be losers or scumbags.

"When I was seventeen, I though I was in love. His name was Jason and he was the quarterback of my high school’s football team. We’d known each other for years, since before grade school even. We were at this party and I got really drunk, he offered to drive me home afterwards. Even though I was almost unconscious, I knew I could trust him.

"He didn’t take me right home because I wouldn’t be able to sneak in without my parents seeing how drunk I was, so we went up to Tower Mountain and parked. We stopped and he bought some coffee on the way up. We sat in the back of his pickup and he made me drink coffee until I was sober enough to think clearly.

"That’s when we hit it off. I thought Jason was a good guy because he didn’t take advantage of me when I was drunk, even though I probably wouldn’t have stopped him.

"We started seeing more of each other more and more after that. We went to movies and had dinner together. This was during the Korean War and he wanted to enlist and go fight the Reds. He loved watching the news reels before the movies.

"One night he and I went to the movies and we got there early enough to get one of the boxes. They showed movies in the old opera house so it had private boxes. I can’t remember what movie it was, I just remember it was a romantic one. He put his arm around me and I leaned my head on his shoulder. I felt so safe with him.

"Then he started touching my breasts. I didn’t mind at first. I was kind of flattered actually. I’d never been touched like that before, at least not by another person.

"Then Jason tried to put his hand in my shirt and into my bra. I told him I didn’t want to do that, but he said I was being prude. I really didn’t mind what he said, but it’s how he said it that made me upset.

"I let him put his hand inside my bra.

"We started kissing and he started getting more aggressive. It made me uncomfortable, but I really wanted him to like me. He started unbuttoning my sweater and said ‘Don’t worry, it’s dark in here and no one will see us.’ Then he got up and locked to door to the box so no one could accidentally interrupt us.

"‘Why don’t we go somewhere more comfortable’ Jason said. I knew he wanted to go lie down on the floor behind the chairs; between the chairs and the door. It was the same thing, I wasn’t really comfortable with it, but I still wanted him to like me. So we went back on the floor behind the chairs.

"Like I said, I’d never let anyone touch me before, and now Jason was opening my sweater trying to take off my bra. I can’t remember whether I asked him to stop or not. I probably didn’t because part of me was really enjoying it. At the same time my skin was crawling and the pit of my stomach felt tight and painful, like I would be sick.

"He got my bra off and started kissing my breasts. It really felt good, especially when he started licking and sucking my nipples. He was mumbling all these dirty things about how much he liked my body.

"Then Jason put his hand up my skirt and pulled down my panties. I knew I should have stopped him there because once they were down there was no turning back, but I didn’t say a thing."

She paused and seemed to be contemplating whether or not to continue. I took her hand and she squeezed it tightly.

"I’ve never told this to anyone," she said.

"It’s okay," I said to comfort her.

She was silent for a moment before continuing.

"I’d touched myself down there before, when I was showering and wanted to feel what it was like. But feeling Jason’s fingers down there was different. His touch was rougher than mine was, especially when he slid a finger inside of me.

"‘Just relax,’ he kept saying over and over again. ‘Just relax. Just relax.’"

A tear bulged at the bottom of her eye the then slid down her cheek. She took a deep breath and continued.

"Before I knew it, he was pulling down his pants. That was the first time I’d ever seen a penis. I’d heard some of my girlfriends talk about it before and I was expected much more. It was so, so ugly!

"I closed my eyes and tried to pretend this wasn’t happening. I felt him pressing against me, between my legs. He slid back and forth against me a few times and came close to entering, but it was like he missed.

"Finally, he got the tip of it inside me. He didn’t have a condom on, but he went inside me anyway. It hurt at first; it was much larger than his fingers. I felt sure that it wouldn’t fit all the way inside or that he would break something. My girlfriends always said the first time was painful but that it would get better.

"But it didn’t get better, it just kept hurting. The deeper he pushed into me the more it hurt. And it wouldn’t have been as bad if he was still, but he kept thrusting and thrusting and going harder and harder. To me it sounded like we were making a lot of noise and I was sure someone would hear us.

"It just hurt so much, John. You won’t believe how much my first time hurt.

"Then it was over. I guess he’d had an orgasm, but I didn’t feel anything. He started kissing me and asking me how I liked it. I didn’t want to make him mad so I smiled at him and said I liked it."

She laughed bitterly. "Even after that, I didn’t want to do anything that made him not like me.

"We got dressed and watched the rest of the movie. He didn’t seem to notice how quite I was. We went out a few more times after but we didn’t have sex again. He tried, but I wouldn’t let him. After a while, he stopped calling me and asking me out. Then I learned he was seeing someone else."

Elaine grabbed a pillow from the bed and held it tight. It was old and dust billowed up when she squeezed it, but she didn’t seem to notice.

"So what happened?" I asked.

Elaine shook her head.

"Between Jason and me, nothing," she said. "But two weeks later I discovered I was pregnant. I was seventeen, still in high school, and unwed. That doesn’t seem as bad today, but back then, a girl like me who became a mother was ostracized from everything. I would have had to drop out of school and my parents would have kicked me out of the house.

"So I went and got an abortion. But abortions were illegal in the state so I had to get it in the back alley clinic. He wasn’t a doctor. He used an old coat hanger and rusty equipment. I got the abortion, but it made me so sick I couldn’t get out of bed for a week. I told my parents I just had the flu and they bought it.

"Do you know how much would have been different if I had said ‘no’ to Jason? Do you know how close I cam to ruining my life? How close I came to dying? Goddamn him for doing that to me. And Goddamn me for not stopping him."

Elaine wiped a tear from her eye and sniffed a couple times. The dust still hanging in the air from the pillow didn’t help any.

"Hey," I said, reaching out for Elaine’s hand. "It’s okay. That happened a long time ago. You got through it and you’re a stronger person because of it. You can’t keep feeling guilty about it. Under the circumstances you probably couldn’t have done anything much differently."

"I know," she said, pulling a tissue from her purse. She let out an embarrassed laugh. "Look at me! I shouldn’t be telling you this. I barely know you. Besides that, I’m old enough to be your mother."

"I’m twenty-one, Elaine," I said, trying to comfort her. "To be my mother you’d have to have had me when you were ten, maybe eleven."

"Close, thirteen," Elaine said, smiling. She took my hand and kissed it. "Thank you," she, looking into my eyes with a warm glance. She repeated even softer, "thank you."

We were quite for a moment, just staring at each other.

"So what about you?" Elaine asked. "It’s not very fair for you to know about my sex life and for me to know nothing about you."

"What do you want to know?" I asked.

Elaine shrugged.

"I don’t know," she said. "I told you about my first time. You’re an attractive young man, I’m sure you have many stories to tell."

Although Elaine didn’t say anything about it, I’m sure I blushed.

"I’m no virgin," I said. "But I don’t know if any of my experiences will make good stories."

"Come on," Elaine said, taking my hand in hers. "Well, how many girls have you been with?"

"Just one," I said. She was my senior year girlfriend."

"What was her name?" Elaine asked.

"Sarah," I replied. "She was a year younger than me."

"How long did you and Sarah date?" Elaine asked.

"A year and a half," I answered. "We started dating around Christmas during my junior year."

"And why did you break up?"

"She moved away to go to school," I answered. "At Yale."

"Yale!" Elaine said, slightly shocked.

"Yea, Yale," I replied. "She’s one of the smartest people I’ve met. Sarah’s got an incredible talent for physics."

"How many times did you and Sarah sleep together before she left for Yale?" Elaine asked.

"About sixty times," I answered, with a slightly embarrassed smile. "Once we started, we really didn’t want to stop."

"Sixty times, huh?" Elaine said, laughing. "Some people go their entire lives and never do it half as many times as that. Think about those sixty times, are there any that come to mind?"

I sat and thank about that for a second. Sarah and I had sex many places and in many different ways while we dated. We did it in beds, in cars, in showers, on tables and counters, on couches, in chairs, outside, inside, in bathrooms, in the shower, in a hot tub, and in a swimming pool, to name a few. We used the missionary position, with her on top, doggie style, rear entry, spooning, standing, sitting, and just about every other position you can think of.

"There was this one time," I said as one memory came to mind. "It was the summer before my senior year, I guess that would by in sixty-eight. Sarah and I drove up to the Feather Canyon State Park to go hiking and have a picnic lunch.

"We left the parking lot at about eight in the morning and were planning on following one of the trails up to the top of Jefferson Mountain and then have a picnic there around noon. But neither Sarah nor I were very good at following directions and somehow we strayed off of the hiking trail and onto an old logging road.

"By the time we figured out what had happened, it was time for lunch and both of use were tired. It was harder hiking along the logging road than on the actual hiking trail. We found a spot in the shade beneath a large tree, spread out the picnic blanket, and started eating.

"There was no one around, at least we hadn’t seen anyone in hours. The parking lot was nearly deserted when we left. We started feeding each other, especially grapes. I love grapes.

"Sarah had me lean back against the tree and she lay next to me, placing the grapes into my mouth so I could eat them one at a time. Occasionally, she would tease me by sliding a grape across my lips or pulling it out of my mouth just as I tried closing my lips. Sometimes she would suck on the grape herself.

"Sarah was wearing a brown shirt that was really low cut. It showed a lot of cleavage. When I had eaten enough grapes, I took one of them and placed them in the little groove between her breasts. Sarah’s breasts were just the right size, just large enough for my palm to cover them.

"I grabbed the grape from her breasts with my lips. Sarah seemed to like it so I did it again, and again. Then we started kissing and I began feeling her breasts. Sarah was a very warm person. I don’t remember any part of her body being cold every.

"We kept kissing and Sarah started pulling up my shirt and rubbing her hands across my back. I untucked her shirt and slipped my hand under her bra. She loved it when I played with her nipples.

"I guess that most girls like to have their nipples played with, but it seemed like I could almost make Sarah climax just from that. I would pinch them gently between my fingers and roll them around. Sometimes I would be gentle; sometimes I’d be more forceful.

"After a few minutes of doing that, my hands slid down for the button of her jeans, but Sarah stopped me.

"‘Not here,’ she said. ‘Let’s go down there.’

"Sarah was pointing at an abandoned railroad bridge about twenty yards away from us. The rails had been removed, probably to be used somewhere else, but the wooden trestles were still there.

"We got up and ran hand-in-hand down the hill to the railroad bridge. Beneath the bridge, we dropped onto the ground and I pulled Sarah onto me. We started kissing more passionately and I was a little rougher as I massaged her breasts.

"Sarah unbuttoned my shirt and I pulled hers of. She was wearing this red lace bra underneath. It was one of my favorites because it was so soft. I reached behind her back and unhooked the bra. I’ve become something of an expert at removing bras one-handed.

"Her nipples were already hard and I could see the flushness of her face had spread down onto her breasts. That was one of Sarah’s signs that she was really aroused. She pulled my shirt off and I unbuttoned the fly of her jeans. Sarah was kneeling over me.

"Sarah rocked her hips back and forth, pressing them against mine. She knew that I was turned on and was anxious to be with her another time. No matter how many times we did it, Sarah and I never grew tired of making love to each other.

"She pulled her jeans and panties down to her ankles and I did the same with mine. There we were, lying half-naked in the dirt and rocks beneath an abandoned railroad bridge in the middle of a forest God-knows-how-far from where we were suppose to be. Sarah took the condom out of my wallet and slipped it on me before mounting me one more time.

"Again, we rocked and moved our hips together. I entered her slowly – we always did it slowly – and she sat upright. Sarah really loved this position. I pushed my hips up and down and she moved her forward and backward, slowly at first and then faster and faster later. I stroked her breasts and plaid with her nipples and she placed her hand between her legs and stimulated herself with her fingers.

"I can generally get her to climax by myself, but sometimes she just wants to climax quickly. She knew exactly what she liked so it was usually better to let her do that little extra bit of stimulation.

"I held my climax back as long as I could. The thing I like about being in that position is that it often takes me longer to climax, so the whole experience lasts longer. Of course, when I try to, I can come pretty quickly.

"I knew she was starting to get close when she began to bite her lip, like she was holding back a scream. I could tell from the strain on her face that her hips were getting tired, but she reached up and grabbed the trestle above us. Being able to push off of that gave her the little bit of energy she needed.

"When I felt that she was having her orgasm, I let myself climax as quickly as possible so we could share the experience. When it was over, Sarah and I, both covered in sweat and breathing heavily, lay there in the dirt and held each other.

"After a while, we got dressed, cleaned ourselves off in the river, and went back to our picnic blanket and bag. We backtracked the way we came along the logging road and eventually found our way back to the hiking trail and then back to the parking lot.

"Sarah and I went out hiking in that park a few more times, but I don’t think we ever made it to the top of the mountain."

I smiled and nodded, signaling a finish to my story.

"Well," Elaine said. "Your story is certainly better than mine."

I glanced down and noticed Elaine’s hand between her legs, partially inside her skirt. Had she been touching herself as I talked? I didn’t really pay attention while I was talking.

"What time is it?" Elaine asked.

I looked at my watch and said, "nearly seven. I wonder how much longer before they notice I’m gone."

"I kind of like this time," Elaine said, smiling. "I’m glad we’re getting the chance to get to know each other."

"We know about each others’ sexual history and, Hell, we haven’t even been out on a first date yet," I said.

"Nope," Elaine said in agreement. "And if this is a date, then you sure have some strange ideas about how to romance a woman."

Both of us laughed.

"So what do we do now?" She asked.

"I don’t know, but I’m getting hungry," I said. "I usually eat dinner right around six."

"I haven’t had anything since lunch," Elaine said. "I have some sandwiches in my car, but we can’t get to them."

"That doesn’t help us any," I said. "I guess we’ll have to take our mind off of our hunger."

Outside, the wind started blowing a little harder and the rolls of thunder in the distance were drawing closer.

"It’s probably going to start raining soon," I pointed out.

"I hate rainstorms," Elaine said. "Especially thunderstorms. They used to scare me is kid. I was born in London and we lived there through the war, we moved to the United States right afterwards. My father’s brother offered to give us a place to live.

"I was just a little kid, not much older than an infant, but I remember my mother holding me as we hid in bomb shelters as those German rockets hit London. It sounded just like thunder. Sometimes it was far away; sometimes it was near. And when it was near the ground would shake and sometimes the lights would go out. That’s really the only thing I remember about the war.

"But years later on my uncles ranch in Montana, the thunderstorms always terrified me because the sounded like the V2 missiles exploding."

Off in the distance, the thunder came closer and the flashes of lightning made the windows light up.

"I should be over that by now, but I’m not," Elaine said.

"That’s okay," I reassured her. "I’m still afraid of spiders. When I was one, a large wolf spider crawled into my crib one night and started making a web in the corner. My parents killed it as soon as they saw it, but I can’t stand to even see the smallest spider today."

"I guess you and I both have a lot of deep-rooted phobias," Elaine said. "Are you scared of the dark?"

Elaine looked around the room, where the only light came from the fireplace and the occasional flash of lightning outside.

"Not anymore," I said. "I actually like the dark because I relate it to sleeping. I love sleeping."

We both laughed and the conversation died again. A couple moments later, drops of rain started falling on the balcony and a cold draft blew in through the broken windows. The curtains seemed to dance on the air currents and the sweet smell of mountain rain overpowered the musty smell of the house.

That’s when we started hearing the children.

"What’s that?" Elaine asked, looking around the room for the source of the sound.

"It sounds like kids playing," I said. "They’re probably down on the beach having fun in the rain."

"No," Elaine said quickly. "It’s not coming from outside, it’s coming from inside. Inside the house."

I was silent for a moment and listened to the sound of laughter and chatter. Sure enough, the children seemed to be inside the house. I ran to the door, hoping they were outside the room and I could yell at them for help. If they couldn’t push the door open, they could get someone who could.

"Hey," I shouted, pounding on the door. "Hey. We’re stuck in here. Help us."

But the laughter continued uninterrupted.

"Hey!"

The laughter faded and I stepped back from the door. There was a chill in the room and the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end.

"This isn’t your house, you don’t belong here."

It was a deep, whispering voice the location of which I couldn’t tell.

"Did you hear that?" Elaine asked, almost whispering.

"Yea," I said, stammering. "I heard it."

"You must leave this house at once. It wasn’t built for you."

"Okay, this is starting to freak me out," I said, backing up towards Elaine.

I’m not a superstitious person by any stretch of the words and I never believed in ghosts or goblins or things that go bump in the night. I sat down on the bed next to Elaine and we put our arms around each other.

"Who are you?" I said towards the voice. "Where are you."

"Get out."

The voice was now inside the room. Elaine and I held each other tightly. She was shaking, and so was I.

"It’s in here," she said. "It’s in here with us."

"If you want us out, unlock the door!" I yelled.

We looked around the room but didn’t see anything. The flicker of the firelight cast ominous shadows in the corners of the room, but the flashes of lightning dispelled all notions that someone was hiding in the shadows.

"Look," Elaine screamed in terror, hurting my ears.

Across the room, by the doors to the balcony, the curtains were blowing into the room. But they didn’t move with the wind, it was as if someone was walking beneath the curtains. The outline was clearly visible, but there was obviously no one there.

"It’s just the wind," I told Elaine, trying to reassure her. "That’s all it is."

I knew she didn’t believe me. I didn’t believe myself for that matter.

A cold breeze circled through the room, much colder than the night air, and made the curtains of the canopy bed sway.

"Help me, somebody help me."

A second, higher, feminine voice said. I seemed to come from all around us.

"I’ll fall if you don’t help me."

"Where are you?" I asked reflexively.

"On the balcony. Please hurry. I can’t hold on much longer."

"Stay here," I said to Elaine as I jumped up and ran towards the balcony.

"Wait, John, don’t go out there," she called after me, but I didn’t listen to her.

"Help me!"

I stepped onto the balcony and looked around. To my surprise, a man in evening clothes stood in the opposite corner. I couldn’t make out the details, but I knew he wasn’t supposed to be there. As soon as I stopped moving, he whirled around on his heels to face me. His face seemed pale and pasty.

"This isn’t your house!" he shouted angrily. "This is her house. You shouldn’t be here!"

He took a step towards me and I took one away, almost paralyzed with fear. Lightning flashed through the sky but instead of making him more visible, he seemed to disappear in the flash of light. He was only visible in the near darkness.

"Leave now!"

I couldn’t move. My feet were locked in place with fear.

"Help me, I’m slipping."

It wasn’t the other voice that called me; it was Elaine. She was shouting form inside the bedroom. That was enough to overcome my fear and I ran back inside.

Elaine was standing in the center of the room, arms spread wide, with her head back, staring upwards. But she wasn’t standing, I noticed, she was suspended in mid air with her feet dangling inches above the ground. One of her shoes fell off and landed on its side on the floor.

"Elaine!" I called. "What’s wrong. Elaine!"

She didn’t answer me.

And the floor around her fleet, the leaves and other debris that had blown into the room over the years was circling around her, as if Elaine stood in the center of a whirlwind.

"Help me, I’m slipping."

Elaine spoke the same words at the same time as the second voice, but whereas I could tell exactly where Elaine was, the voice seemed to come from all around the room. It came from the walls, the floors, the ceiling, from everywhere.

"I tried to save her," a voice said from behind my shoulder. I turned and saw the specter of a man standing in the doorway. He wasn’t as angry as he appeared moments earlier on the balcony.

"By God I tried to save her!" he said.

"I can’t hold on any longer," Elaine and the female voice said in unison. "I’m losing my grip. Help me Julius."

Elaine’s left arm fell to her side, as if it had slipped off of something. The man took a step forwards, towards Elaine, but stopped. He couldn’t pass through the doorway.

"Help me!"

Elaine’s other arm fell to her side and she collapsed to the ground in a faint.

"Elaine," I called, running towards her. I knelt down next to her and placed my fingers on her neck. She had a pulse and was breathing; she had only passed out for a moment.

"John," she said in a weak voice. "What happened?"

"You fainted, Elaine," I replied. "But you’re okay now."

I held her head in my arms and stroked her hair.

"I tried to save her," the man said from the door to the balcony. "But I wasn’t fast enough. She fell before I could get there. The neighbor’s kids were running around outside, like this was their house. I was trying to get them to leave." There was sadness and remorse in his voice, bordering on tearfulness.

"You did you best," I said to him, not knowing what else to say. "You can’t blame yourself."

"But she blames me," he answered. "If I had been faster, she wouldn’t have fallen."

Elaine turned her head and looked at the man. There was only compassion in her eyes, no terror.

"But she doesn’t blame you," Elaine said. "She told me that herself. She knows you tried. The balcony crumbled beneath her. It wasn’t your fault."

I looked down at Elaine, wondering what had just happened to her.

"I know you tried to save me."

Out on the balcony, a young woman in a blue evening gown appeared after a flash of lightning.

"Martha!" the man exclaimed. He ran over to her and put his arms around her.

"You’re free now, Julius," the specter of a woman said. "You are not responsible for my death. Your guilt shouldn’t hold you here anymore."

The man turned back and looked at Elaine and me.

"Thank you," he said. "You’ve set me free."

What could we say to that? It was the first time I had seen a ghost, and I was pretty sure it was Elaine’s. We just smiled.

"You may go now," the man said. Behind us, the bedroom doors opened wide. "But before you leave, I want you to know something. Behind that door is a brick wall. On the other side was my private study. That is where I hung myself and that is where my body still is. I bricked it closed from the inside and waited for the mortar to dry before I tied the noose around my neck. When you leave, I want you to have someone come back and remove my body."

"I will," I said, nodding at him. "I’ll make sure you received a proper burial."

"Thank you," the man said.

He turned back to his wife and they embraced each other for a few, fleeting moments. Then they turned and walked hand-in-hand off the balcony and into the night.

They disappeared before our very eyes.

Elaine and I sat in silence for a few moments, not sure of exactly what to say.

"Is what just happened what I think just happened?" Elaine asked.

"I’m not sure," I said. "Let’s get out of here, though. I don’t know if anyone’s going to believe us anyway."

We put out the fire and left the house as quickly as we could, pausing only to lock the front door and the main gate. Elaine and I drove back into town as quickly as we could.

"So what do you think about that house?" I asked Elaine as we turned onto the main street towards town.

"I’m not so sure about it anymore," Elaine said. "I think maybe I’ll buy one of those small houses with a white picket fence out front."

* * *

Mr. Williams was still at his desk when I walked back into his real-estate office.

"Are you still here?" I asked him, surprise at seeing him.

"Yea, I just had some paperwork to take care of," he answered. "What time is it?"

"Nearly eight," I said.

"I guess time flies when you’re not having fun," Mr. Williams said. "Say, you were up at the McCormick Mansion for quite a while, how did things go?"

"I don’t think she’s interested in that anymore," I said. "But you’re never going to believe what happened."

I then proceeded to tell Mr. Williams the events Elaine and I had just been through and what we discovered. But I had to make it quick because Elaine was waiting for me out in the lobby.

I’m not sure if Mr. Williams believed me or not, but the next day he called the police and they went up and check out the McCormick Mansion. The broke through the wall and, sure enough, discovered the body of Julius McCormick. It was little more than a skeleton on the floor, the rope had broken years earlier from age. He was given a proper burial in the town cemetery, next to the body of his wife.

And that was the end of the story of McCormick mansion. We were never able to sell it. In October of 1984, it burnt down during a firestorm. The ruins of the mansion are there to this day.

* * *

"Let’s get something to eat," I said as Elaine and I left the real-estate office.

"John," she said, stopping just outside. "Thank you."

"For what?" I asked. "Getting you trapped inside a haunted house?"

"For showing me than not all guys are jerks or slime-balls," she answered.

"You’re welcome," I said, smiling at her.

Elaine leaned forward and kissed me on the cheek. I took her hand in mine and held it tightly. We kissed each other on the lips and hugged each other.

"I’d like to go back to my hotel room first," Elaine said. "I’m pretty dirty and want to clean up."

"Okay," I said. "You lead the way and I’ll follow in my car."

We drove back to the Baker Fall’s Motor Inn, where Elaine was staying, and parked in the empty spots in front of her room. We went inside and Elaine turned on the light.

It was an ordinary hotel room with two twin beds, a dresser with a black-and-white television, a table and two chairs, and a bathroom. Elaine removed her jacket and set it on the back of a chair before walking back towards the bathroom.

"I’ll just be a second," Elaine said, unbuttoning the top buttons of her blouse. She stopped at the bathroom door, then walked back towards me and kissed me full on the lips.

"Why don’t you join me," she said into my ear.

I looked into her eyes for a second, unsure of how I should answer. Elaine was a very attractive woman who was thirteen years older than I was. We had just been through something extraordinary and shared intimate secrets about each other. I felt like I had known her for years.

"Okay," I said with a smile. "I’d love to."

I reached for her blouse to unbutton it and pushed it off her shoulders. Beneath she was wearing a white lace bra that covered her perky breasts.

We kissed and I followed her into the bathroom. She started the shower while I removed her shirt.

"Maybe it was fate that brought us together, John," Elaine said.

"Perhaps." I answered, holding her in my arms and unfastening her bra.

A few seconds later, Elaine and I stood in the shower, beneath the cascade of hot water. The steam billowed out of the shower stall above the glass door and was sucked away by the ceiling vent.

We pressed our bodies tight against each other and I kissed her neck and shoulder while her hands gripped my buttocks. My hands slid up and down her thighs and played with the outside of her womanhood, pressing between the folds of skin and rubbing against her clitoris.

"I love your touch," she gasped. "You can do that to me forever."

Gently, I slid one finger inside of her and arched it back towards me, searching for the most erogenous zone of her body. I pressed hard against it when I found it and her body turned to putty in my hands. I slid my finger in and out and added more fingers. After a few moments I had three fingers stimulating her from the inside and my thumb rubbed her clitoris on the outside. I moved my hand faster and faster, pressing my fingers deeper into her body with every thrust.

At the same moment, her fingers wrapped around my very erect penis and began stroking it. I bent my back slightly and kissed her breasts, taking her nipples into my mouth and feeling them grow hard against my tongue. I held the orgasm inside my back as long as I could; I wanted her to climax at the same time I did. Simultaneous orgasms are always exhilarating experiences.

I moved my hands faster and faster and stimulated her harder and harder.

"Oh, God!" Elaine exclaimed as her orgasm drew nearer.

Her legs began to shake as she lost control of her body. Her thighs pressed together and I had to separate them with my legs so I could still move my hand.

"Oh, my God, John!" Elaine exclaimed just before she climaxed. "Don’t stop."

When she climaxed, I felt her whole body become limp and the juices from her body flowed out around my hand, only to mix with the shower water and disappear down the drain. I let go of my control and climaxed almost at the same time as Elaine. My ejaculate covered her hands and abdomen afterwards.

We held each other for a few minutes before finishing our shower and getting dressed. We had dinner at the motel’s restaurant and returned to her room to make love again. I left around ten, but that wasn’t the last we saw of each other.

Elaine and I began dating, despite the thirteen-year age difference. I finished college and got my bachelor’s degree in 1974 and we were married in 1978, we’ve been happily married ever since.

Today Elaine and I have two wonderful children, one of whom is just starting college herself. I worked for the CIA during the 1980s and we lived all over the country and even over seas. But when the Cold War ended in 1991, I decided to leave the CIA and we returned to Baker Falls.

We live in a little, two-story house in one of the older parts of town. During the summer months, we have an American flag proudly flying from our front porch. When I’m not at work as a high school teacher, I relax by keeping our front lawn and shrubs well manicured and make sure the picket fence out front always has a fresh coat of white paint.

And every Sunday afternoon, Elaine places an apple pie on the kitchen windowsill to cool. I can smell it from a block away.

This story is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to living persons or actual events is entirely coincidental. This story may not be redistributed without permission from the author.