***A Tale Out In The American Neon Wilderness Night - The Girl With The Pale Blue Eyes

 

 

 

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

All Sam Lowell wanted, all he really wanted, the aged sixty-seven (too scary to use numerals, too easy to fudge) fires of desire seemingly gone out of him many years before, was to be paid attention to, to be looked at, to be prized even. He did not need or want love, or know what that word even meant so long after the layers of studied emotional indifference had melded, had been coated inside him, leaving him a shell, a muddling shell.

So when Melinda Loring came by, passed through his seedy has-been muddling love life, called him darling and meant it, whispered things in his ear, hell, just paid attention to him he was like an eager puppy. But in the end all he had left was to write, to write some big human heart home truths, some marginal political screeds, some be-bop language-twisted high heavens’ word stuff, some little etched and edged things that would stand in as his posterity, and speak of their time together flame-out. Love, what did he know of love in a flamed-out world after some many years without, having lost touch, having no frame of reference, he himself flamed out. She nevertheless would make him pay, and made him pay, pay big time, for not knowing that word, for not laying on an extra coat of armor against the onslaughts of the human heart, and of human sorrows. And so now all Sam had left was to write, write down the notes of the saga of sorrows, and try to exorcise the pain and be done with the thing. Damn.  And so he did and passed them on to me to be put into some remembrance shape…      

Who knows when or what will feed the miasma, the emotional miasma of the struggle against the human muck, the feelings that you have been betrayed, or betrayed, got caught on some Mandala wheel of misfortune before you even got up, got up to brush your teeth, and then something, something in the human range came and slapped you down like a dog and maybe you deserved it, and maybe you didn’t, but here it was all wrapped up in a bow, all the human grizzle of it, all the, as you might expect, the human dame of it, for what could drive your batteries, a man’s  batteries, to extinction better, or faster, than a human dame who let the air out of your tires, left you feeling flat, left you flat with egg on your face and more confusions that if you had never talked, never taken that first step, lo those, could it be, could it only have been five months before, let me count, yes five months although some of that was cyberspace time, some dead space too.

All it took to break Sam’s stride (to break his heart if he had been honest with himself if not with me his old friend) was one Melinda deadbeat cellphone call, one nada, nobody, nothing call, to finish their “thing” (the word they used between themselves to call what they had for each other since she screeched at words like “fling” and “affair”).  And then a Sam flight into despair in order to regroup and begin that bloody healing process that they say the human heart, crushed, is capable of recovering from, or about or with or whatever the damn process is.

For a few minutes, a few minutes that Sam was enflamed, reddened in the gray ghost day, the time before he had to ride the snickering hearse horse home he was at peace or about to make peace with his new found void, was ready to admit that some human dame had his number, had it good and it took no doctorate to be able to figure that out when he had to face his demons once again. And the corpse of his love not even twenty-four hours old, although truth to tell the damn thing had died weeks before but I will tell that part as I go along since he asked me to. So Sam stopped, stooped to regroup his inner forces and to put paid to the last embers of their “thing, ” ship it off via some mailed letter, no card, no note, just silence like the silence of the groves around the cemetery of their moment, he dared not call it love, did not think it was love, did not want it to be love but somehow it felt like that, that feeling in the pit of the stomach, gone gnawing gurgling empty, that clustered heart, bunched up against his broken chest.

So Sam had a minute reprieve against the bad heart beatings within his breast, a deep swallow before he had to admit he was licked, had been in love or something like that but the thing was too confused to live and, or, grow and so he was ready to accept that casted fate  when some young bucolic   giant of a lad came into the bank where he was making his penance, his retribution, his mailing,  wearing a University of New Hampshire Hockey tee-shirt (it had been a warm day, a warm day even for  late April after weeks of mucks and heavy winds portending those badly beaten attempts to figure out things rationally but the warm day only made him feel worse, feel sickly, feel that he needed, craved, overcast chilly days to fit his mood, to temper his sorrows), an unknowing tee-shirt proclaiming for all the world that he was snake-bitten, that far from that locale, the place where his love had faltered he was being mocked by unkind gods who refused to let him bask in his sorrows, his beating fast heart, his closed mouth breathe, ah, his, doldrums.

For a minute he thought about how before Melinda, before that infernal her who did not beget him (funny term, huh), he had not been in Durham (where the University of New Hampshire is located and where she worked as a professor but more on those details later) his old anti-war pals days in the early 1970s when he stayed at some plainsong Quaker house, a private house while working on a campus issues campaign. Hadn’t been there in Durham even when their thing started but only returned there one “the shining” day when she needed to get out of the house as she was recovering from her surgery and he needed to get her out of the house so that he could breathe, could ready himself for his other life. The life he led back in Boston, the life that would in the end prevail, for he was not made in the end for rural trees and laconic slow-moving country campuses with equally laconic teeming students. But that did not come until later, later when he, squirming, tried to do an end around in order to get free from the bucolic, the rural, and those damn trees that only sated him at twilight. And so that bank minute passed, that tee-shirted hulk child, with his own fevered dreams, his own ice palace fancies, subsided from his view, and from memory.

Forward he said, and forward Sam was going although with fits of angst, fits of sorrow, fits of remorse, and fits of missing his “girl on the rocks.” He was making small progress the next day, when Boston-bound, sweet home city, skyscrapers, teeming masses, honking horns, life-bound, he was waylaid again by her fates for him. Walking around the edges of a rally, a rally for some justice (really injustice) cause he was approached by an old comrade-in-arms, a fellow fighter against the American imperial night, against the night-takers, and their earthen dragons, a fellow from Nashua, Nashua up in New Hampshire where they, he and she, Sam and Melinda had met early on, early fresh bloom weeks on, in their, what to call it now, yes,  “fling,” in some Irish shabeen, some place where they would argue, always argue about what they were going to do, and while he did not like, had not liked the town he took his old comrade’s presence in a strange city, on a strange city street, as an omen, a portent, that he must think the thing through. Or thought he must think the thing through because isn’t that what people do when they have their hearts crossed, don’t they soul-search, bleed, bleed pores worth of bleedings to wash themselves clean.

Still Sam hesitated, thought he could defy the times, the gods, and the human feelings that he was hurt, had hurt her and was hurt. Later that night trying to confront some other demons, trying salve his wounded heart, he made plans to get away, to fear thinking, to freeze his heart against the coming voids, to count the minutes until the hurts subsided, until she, Melinda she,  was no longer under his skin. The place he was to hide, the place where sorrow’s face would gather sunshine was up in damn seacoast New Hampshire, a place they knew well and it was then he realized that unless and until he pulled the eyes out of those demons, had come clean (or as clean as he was liable to come since he had no seasoned track record of performing such hygiene, none, except perhaps the other way to add salt to wounds). And so he thought, or for him the same thing, wrote, wrote to try made sense of the begotten world that he had created for himself. Wrote to figure out each and every piece of the puzzle that he had created, and for which he had no solution. Damn.

 

And so he wrote some copious notes, some sketches which he then ordered, yes, ordered me so I knew that this mass was important to him, to compose something that he could read later, something to make sense of, and something to calm his nerves. I remember, as I looked at his disjointed notes, having written something a while back, a commonplace something although never-the-less true despite its humble imprimatur that sometimes a story cannot be told except that some technology-advancing event had occurred to drive the action. I noted there as an example that in a number of Dorothy Parker’s short stories where some bereft female was waiting by the telephone for some ill-disposed or vagrant lover to call you needed that damn gadget to have been previously invented or you could not have such a scene, the damsel in distress would probably have to be waiting for the mail, or a Western Union wire or something like that. That simple fact is true for my, uh, Sam’s story -the beauties of the Internet, e-mail and cell-phones made it possible and would otherwise have been impossible without those communication advances. Let’s flush out the details.

Sam had been thinking about his 50^th class reunion at North Adamsville High School since he had received an invitation to go to his 40^th reunion back in 2004. Although he had not been, as he perhaps had been at previous times, exactly “hiding” still he wondered how the class reunion committee had gotten his then current address. He later found out that it was easy as pie either through his membership in a state-wide professional organization, the Bar Association, or a zip through the “white pages” where he was publicly listed both via the Internet and Google searches. At that time Sam had dismissed the invitation with so much hubris because then he still thought that the bad luck that had followed him for much of his life had been caused by his growing up on “the wrong side of the tracks” in North Adamsville. He told me, a number of times, that he had spent half a lifetime blaming that affiliation on everything from acne to wormwood. 

Subsequently through some family-related deaths that took him back to the old town Sam had reconciled himself with his roots and had exhibited the first stirrings of a feeling that he might like to see some of his old classmates. In late 2013, around Thanksgiving he, at least marginally savvy on such user-friendly sites, created a Facebook  event page in order to see if anybody else on the planet knew of plans or was interested in making plans for a 50^th reunion. One day, a few days after setting up the page, he got an inquiry asking what he knew about any upcoming plans.  He answered in a short note his own limited knowledge of any such plans but that his intention in setting up the page had been to seek others to help out with organizing an event if nothing had been established as yet. In that reply he had forgotten to give his name. And that is how the girl with the pale blue eyes came into view.  

“Who are you?” asked Melinda Loring returning his message, a name that Sam immediately remembered from his high school days although he did not know the woman personally. He shot back a blushed reply about being sorry for forgetting to include his name, gave it, and casually remarked that he had remembered from somewhere that she was a professor at a local public university in the Boston area. He asked if she was still there. She sent an immediate reply stating that no she was no longer there but that she had been and was still a professor at a state university in an adjacent state, at the University of New Hampshire, and had been for the previous twenty-five years. She also mentioned that, having access to her Manet , her class of 1964 yearbook she had looked up his class photo, and said he was “very handsome.”

Naturally any guy from six to sixty would have to seriously consider anybody, any female, who throws that unanticipated, unsolicited comment a man’s way especially since she sent her class photo as well. That got them started on what would be a blizzard of e-mails over the next several weeks but just then got them together via Facebook as he “friended” her and she accepted. They quickly decided, both agreeing that given her profession (and those ever nosy college students who live and die to troll that social networking site), that e-mail was the proper vehicle for their correspondence.   

During the early stages of their correspondence Sam told Melinda that his previous knowledge of her had been perked a few years earlier when he had as part of his reconciliation with the old home town looked up and found his old high school running and running around buddy Brad Badger through a school-related Internet site and he had gone over to Brad’s house in Newton to look at his Manet and talk over old times. As part of that “look see” Brad had some material about the 25^th class reunion where Sam noticed Melinda’s name (and profession). That got both of them commenting on what a “fox” Melinda had been in high school, although Brad said he did not know her personally either.

 Sam, having had a few drinks that night and feeling expansive, related the following story to Brad and which he subsequently related in an e-mail to Melinda to her delight if disbelief. It seems that in his junior year at North Adamsville Sam had noticed Melinda around school (they later confirmed they had had no classes together, although having been in the same junior high and high schools for five years or so they must have run into each other or been in the same room sometime if only the auditorium, gym or cafeteria) and had an interest in meeting her after seeing her around a few times.

Of course in high school, at least back then, maybe now too, a guy didn’t just go up to a girl and start making his moves. He got “intelligence,” found out if she had a guy already, stuff like that. Usually this information was gathered in the boys “lav” (especially the Monday morning before school session when all the “hot” news of the weekend was discussed) but in this case since Sam was a trackman this happened after school in the boys’ locker room where he inquired of two guys he knew who knew her what she was like. Both agreed instantly that she was a “fox” but told him to forget it because she was “unapproachable.” Meaning low-rent raggedy guys like Sam forget it. Meaning, as well, that Sam as is almost always true with the young just moved on to his fantasy next best thing. And so they did not meet then. Melinda said she laughed when he related that story to her and in their further exchanges related lots of information to Sam about what she was really going through back with an extraordinary tough family life, lots of low self-esteem, and other problems too intimate to detail in an e-mail. 

Frankly, after the first few exchanges Sam had been more than a little intrigued. And as it turned out Melinda was as well. They discovered they both had much in common academically, professionally, politically and personally. I won’t go into the specifics of those “things in common” because in looking over my notes from Sam that would take more time than necessary to make the point and since I will be interspersing some of the story below with actual informational e-mails between them where they mention the common interests that should cover me. Stuff like this-

 

“Melinda – Thanks for the eight millions thoughts- Wow-somebody who is as interested in the NA [North Adamsville] past as I am. And strangely has many more things in common with me than you would think as you will found out. So I am pleased, no more than pleased, that you are writing to me like crazy and will ignore that venting ending. Between the two of us we will not figure what the heck happened back then, unfortunately the time for doing something about that is past, but we might have some solace in “analyzing” it.  This is what I have been looking for, no question. Even now I feel comfortable enough to tell you stuff and I hope you develop that sense as well.   

I know this is a busy time for you. Most of my friends and/or golf partners are professors or work in college administration. I hope that mention of golf doesn’t disqualify me in our friend thing that is developing, that now you will not dismiss me out of hand as a savage hitting an innocent white ball with a big club so I will response to your last message in parts via e-mail and we can talk on the phone when you are less busy or on vacation. Talking rather than spending lots of time writing all this stuff will free up lots of time. And I will sent my cell phone number then. Okay?     

First off and this may be a bizarre coincidence- when did your mother save that child’s life doing in the “projects” (that is what we called it so when I say that I mean Germantown-Snug Harbor where I went grades 1-6) ? How old were you? Was it a boy she saved? The reason that I ask is that I almost drowned at that beach (the one across from the Housing Authority) when I was either eight or nine. Typical boy story: I had grabbed onto a log, a telephone pole maybe, and started to ride it as the current went out. When I sensed I was going too far, way over my head, I, ah, let go of it. I started to go under. My brother on shore saw me and called for help and some lady came and saved me. I swore my brother to an oath not to tell our parents. I also have ever since had a love/fear relationship with the ocean-love to be near it (have to be near it like in Maine but later on that) but still really don’t like to go out too far. That would be something if it was her. I don’t remember the details of what she looked like but she was fairly young and an adult.

We moved from the projects in February of 1959 and I entered North Adamsville Junior High then from Broad Meadows so I was, as you were, in the first full graduating class in 1960. What I have been trying to find information about for a while since I missed it was the move from the high school to the middle school (oops, junior high). Also about the North Adamsville /Central division in our class (they came in1961). More importantly, I don’t think we were in the same classes at all, and I don’t remember you from around school then like I do from high school (yeah, we know the routine by now on that one, the “hot” girl who was “unapproachable,” and who wore those not 40 plus cashmere sweaters and was the girl next door and had a bunch of guys in the bowels of the building wondering and dreaming stuff- oh yeah, and a “Squantum” girl to boot.

Have I got it right so we can give it an acronym?). To finish this point I lived in a shack of house over on Walnut Street (which has now been cut by the Newport Street extension) just a couple of blocks from the Best Western Adams Inn where our reunion will be held. That shack on the wrong side of the tracks represented my parents’ best efforts to get us out of the projects. It did not save my older brother (who would have been in our class if he had graduated) or my younger brother who did (1966, and who that 1963 football rally sketch is dedicated to), and for me it was a close thing.

 That brings me to my last point for today (apparently we are destined to write an e-mail a day until we come up with that original new idea to save my poor fingers anyway - the telephone.). That point about alienation from family hit home-partly about politics, partly about craziness, mind and theirs. What I did not tell you about when I mentioned my mother’s death in 2007 was that I had not seen her in 25 years and my cousins who controlled the funeral arrangements did not inform me until after she was dead and buried. Thus the damn need to make sense of that whole thing, then and now. So yes, Melinda, we certainly have some things to talk about and that is, my I hope friend, is not another story but the story.  Later Sam ”

And this

“Hi Sam, 

Put pictures of the fallen with in memory

Your email message was really welcomed as I'd had a rough day otherwise, culminating in a nasty confrontation with a grad student in my class this evening at UNH-Manchester.  It's end of the semester craziness!

 First of all, I'm nervous too (very distracted!) and yet figure the worst that can happen is that we've become friends and that is pretty cool.  You've already helped me so much make sense of who I was and what I became, which is huge.  For the meet-up next week, I'll bring the yearbook, the 25th and 40th reunion brochures and we can just focus on high school over a nice meal, and you can fill me in on the committee's decisions from this week. Friends laughing over old times, sounds good to me!

I'd like to talk on the phone, not sure if you are a night person or not, but usually I don't get home from teaching til almost 8, which is the case tomorrow, Tues.  Or we could chat Thurs eve, but I think that's the Rockland reunion meeting for you? or Sunday eve?  If you're going to Portland the 11th-13th then maybe lunch on the 11th or dinner on - um - Friday the 13th?! 

 

Some literary license is fine with me now that I know that you've used that for the “hottie” page list, I actually looked up all those pages to see which girl you were referring to!  Glad you posted your yearbook photo, and also that you posted a message for Kathy.  I talked to her tonight and she said it was ok if I mentioned that she has breast cancer, how thoughtful of you to do that. I figure that any inspiring messages for our classmates are great! I've tried to add posts to those who passed on (how awful to me that only those with posts get red roses, like some sort of valentine mishap).  I'm hoping more classmates will add posts and profiles and pix!

For sure I want to know more about your "good lawyering" work, such as Courage to Resist and how that connects to your own military experiences.  Some major soulful transformations must've happened.  And yeah, that family stuff is powerful and so hard to make sense of, one step at a time. 

Animal rescue league is a good charity, my will is split between PETA, NHSPCA and Colorado State Animal Tumor center (where I took a cat that had cancer & they were amazing). I like how you named Willie!  My current cats are Micki, Queenie, Jinx and Elle. Three came with names, and since I was in a Phillipa Gregory (English queen historical novels) audio tape stint in the car, I renamed Rhianna  Queenie. She looks the part since she's a Norwegian forest cat with a gorgeous blond mane. Do you have any cats now? Yes, for me too pets, mostly dogs growing up, always a source of love and comfort.

My grandfather taught math at Boston Latin and had to tutor me in order for me to get thru Mr Leone's algebra 2 class.  OK, more later on our teaching (except tonight I still had to stand up and square off with a grad student no less! & tomorrow I have what I call the "young and the restless" class of 30 ed majors, avg age 20 and all my classes are doing the "very important to my career" course evals this week).  Interesting you got into BU and Boston State, btw I also did not get into UMass (ditto unh) and became a prof UMass/Boston, yes another connection since Boston State became UMass/Boston.  I of course want to know more about your upward bound academic career. I finally escaped to South Carolina, but after graduation I had a few months as a hippie in Colorado, where I wanted to be a forest ranger (what funny stuff was I into?!)  So it intrigues me about your vagabond adventures, apparently out west somewhere too, but probably longer than my short westward expansion.

The brief and jeans questions had no heavy stuff attached, just curious. pro bono work is fascinating and I imagine rewarding.  I just wear jeans a lot.  Jogging and golf, impressive as you must still have good joints and feet (my feet had major surgeries 3 years ago, now ok and can hike but probably not run any more 10ks as I used to in the 80s). I do remember the track team running on all the streets, often saw you guys since I often had to take the late Squantum bus and waited outside the school or on Newport Ave for it.  In our grade school years, I do remember my mom being very upset but also grateful that she rescued a boy, I'm sure it was you.  Since I was the youngest and couldn't be left alone I suppose, she took me to all her Snug Harbor parks and rec work, and I remember she plunked a sailor hat on my head because I got so many freckles out in the sun.  Remember a freckle faced girl with a sailor hat on the beach?!  

I sure do have this strong feeling we have met, its part of the very disconcerting part of this communication. But that means we can now have a happy reunion instead of a first meeting.

What talk time works for you?

(not cheating on this email, on my laptop; but anything sent in the daytime is from my walking around the house and multitasking and talking on the iPhone)

Good evening, Sam!

Melinda”

And back again, portending trouble in paradise:

“Hi Melinda –Well we have been on a roller-coaster so far and we have not even met in person yet. That is what is so surreal about this whole thing that had developed between us. That business from last night about me tracking your record down got me thinking though. Kind of has forced my hand about something that I had intended to bring up tomorrow as the first order of business to clear the air and give our friendship a proper footing. I was struck by the way you said you have been honest with me and that got me motivated to write this now instead of wait until tomorrow. I have, unlike you, not always been honest in the past. For example, not to brag or anything like that but to deal with the honesty question, a couple of times way back I have had five girlfriends at one time so there was no way I could be honest and juggle all that. So I was lying to beat the band. I have gotten better and tried to be honest with you and have been doing so. But sometimes you can be honest and still omit things and that is what this e-mail is about. I take it as something that we will work through as we go along and I hope you agree.

You know as well as I do that we both carry a lot of baggage, busted marriages, affairs, and so forth. On the other hand we are both old enough to have whatever level of friendship we want from just friends to an affair because with both as far as I know have no ties that would prohibit that. And even if we did in this day in age we could still have whatever relationship we wanted. As long as we both have our eyes open and know the score. That “know the score” part is what I want to talk about. It is nothing bad but it is a complication. And even if we decide to be just friends it is part of what is unfolding. I have decided to do the rest of this as a narrative so here goes.

Up until a few weeks ago for the past ten years or so since the end of my last serious relationship I was just rolling along writing, doing legal work, doing politics, playing golf and all the rest. Doing all of that while living in the same house as the woman that was my last serious romantic relationship, Laura, who is still my closest woman friend. I have known her for over twenty- five years and about twenty years ago we bought this modest house in Walton. As time went on though we had, as couples will, our problems until about ten years ago we decided that it wasn’t working. But we both wanted to keep the house (and the cats, Willie Boy, my Willie Boy and Sasho) and be friends (I won’t go into all of that but you can ask me about it). So that is what we did. And nothing wrong with that people make such arrangements all the time. And so time moved on. I did my thing-she did hers and we do things together. For example we still go out to Saratoga to Laura’s family for Thanksgiving and Christmas since I don’t have family that way. Stuff like that. At some level we have deep affection for each other but it is just easier and more comfortable to be friends.         

Then out of the blue you came along. You know how we “met” and all so I don’t need to go into that but what happened is that I was not sure where we were heading (at one point if anywhere) and so I made a point of keeping that information to myself. Remember I made a point about just concentrating on us and not on other baggage stuff. Part of it obviously is that if we were not going anywhere then such information didn’t matter and if we were then that would just be an awkward situation that we would deal with. That is what a lot of my concern about expectations, the way we have met and all of that has been about. I have told her about you in general terms (the only way to put it since we still have not met) and since this whole thing has been topsy-turvy that is where things stand right now.

If all of this seems like too much then so be it-but as for me I still say forward- if you don’t that is okay and we can work on some other way to be friends. I think we both strongly want to be friends and should be damn it if that is what we want. Later Sam”         

The tipping point for both of them, the piece of information exchanged that startled, hell, flabbergasted them both, made them think for a moment that destiny’s wings beckoned, made them think their flame thing might be written in the stars was an event that occurred when they were nine. Here is what I wrote at the time when Sam told me the story (after he told me that he was “smitten” with Melinda  and I begged him to be cool, be cool for Laura’s sake although I had always had an abiding interest in her, if she ever fell off of Sam’s wagon. Laura never did, damn, she never did):

“Now you have to know a little bit about Sam Lowell, about his attitudes toward things like mysticism, fate, kismet, the unknown and all of that to appreciate that he does not truck with any of that stuff. He fancies himself a man of science, or at least of there being rational explanations for things and this is why the information that he imparted to me baffled him. Me, I am more agnostic about such things but this one did have me scratching my head a little so I might as well get to it: 

“The year 2014 will be a milestone for Sam (and the same for me as well) marking the 50^th anniversary of his  graduation from high school, in his case  North Adamsville High School about twenty miles up the road from my hometown of Hullsville. For a whole number of reasons that should not detain us here Sam had been looking forward to that event for a couple of years in the expectation of going to his class reunion. He had never gone to any before for those whole bunch of reasons. Moreover he had actively attempted to put himself into the mix by setting up a class reunion event on Facebook.  What he was doing at that point was making an ad hoc attempt to enlist fellow classmates to help organize the reunion.  He got the usual early sparse response and then the response that triggers this sketch already mentioned.

A woman, Melinda Loring, a fellow classmate commented that she was interested in helping out but due her professional career commitments would not be able to do much. Also she lived up in New Hampshire and since the reunion would be held in Massachusetts that too would be a barrier. In any case Sam, looking to find some kindred help, began a blizzard of e-mail traffic with her. It seems that this Melinda was what they now call “hot” back in the day, a real looker, as a look at her yearbook picture testified to that Sam had forwarded to me, a fresh dewy “girl next door”- type who wore cashmere sweaters and who by popular opinion (boys’ locker room after sports’ practices opinion) was “unapproachable.” In any case Sam had seen her around school but that was about it.   

Well some things change in this wicked old world, some things are not eternally etched in stone and Melinda like all of us from the Generation of ’68  has learned a thing or two, had been through her share of ups and downs and survived to tell about it. Naturally Sam was all ears to hear about this life if for no other reason that he could say that he had actually talked to her, even at a fifty year remove, for some such reason which only Sam is privy to. And so the blizzard of e-mails continued (her almost as crazy as him to write, write, write).

One exchange, the one that matters here, involved the question of where they had gone to elementary school, she to Adamsville North and he to Adamsville South. That Adamsville South response by Sam brought out the fact that Melinda’s mother, Margaret, had been a swimming instructor down at the Adamsville South Beach during the 1950s summers and had during her career there saved a drowning boy. Melinda, nine at the time, had been present at the event.

Sam said he had flipped out when he heard that information. See, and I remember him telling me one time about his love of the ocean but fear of it, fear to go too far out when swimming because he had almost drowned when he was nine down at the Adamsville South Beach one summer. Typical boy story: as the ocean was rising he had spied a log, an abandoned telephone pole, and had grabbed onto it. He drifted out for a while and then, as he said sheepishly, he realized he had gone too far but instead of holding onto the log he decided to try and swim for shore. Not a good swimmer and just too far out he started going down. His brother who was on the shore called for help and the swimming instructor came out and saved him in a nick of time.

So what lesson did Sam draw from that today. Anything about fate, karma, or just plain good luck. No. He told Melinda that since they had already “met” maybe they should get together and discuss the matter more fully. And guess what, she agreed. Jesus.”               

And so they cast about for some fated thing from that experience. All of this back and forth in any case grew to a desire to know more about each other as they were kind of Internet-enforced “smitten” after a time and both agreed that the “so much in common” required more than a blizzard of e-mail traffic.

So they exchanged cell-phone numbers. One cold December night Sam, from his car sitting in an isolated parking lot, called Melinda and they talked for a couple of hours. Laughing, giggling and being somewhat shy while they were doing so.

Here is an e-mail that Sam sent after that first cell phone talk:

“Melinda –Well now I can truly say that I am “talking” to Melinda Loring and wouldn’t all those boys in that “phantom” locker room be jealous. And rightfully so. I hope that you got from the sound of my voice that I was, well, excited to talk to you (after that schoolboy weak-kneed, and dry mouth, anticipation nervousness).Now we can go easy with only one more “nervous” thing, actually meeting. I think we are going to be okay whatever happens. I haven’t felt like this since my last serious relationship ended about ten years. We both carry whatever baggage we have accumulated and will discuss that but we shall see. All I know for now is forward. BTW I am in favor of keeping our “talking” and whatever very private for now-meaning I am not going to be “boasting” to one and all about what we are up to-let’s say to the reunion committee or those long-ago locker room boys as I help prepare for the reunion and come in contact with those remaining. Later Sam”             

And her response:

“Hi again Sam, 

Me too, very positive about our first conversation. You have a very youthful voice, without our old Boston/North Adamsville  accent! Felt bad you were sitting in your car sorta late in the evening, not even haven't gotten home; but it sounds like you have a lot of energy, jogging very early in the morning on those "astroturf "soccer fields.

Okay, no bragging about our pre-reunion stuff! I did mention our connecting over the 50th to Kathy before I got that message, but will keep it private from here on in.

So much zigzagging over our lost histories! Of course I want to hear more about your having been chained to the White House fence! And these various volunteer groups for assorted war victims; and especially about how you train for nonviolent resistance and the philosophies that go with that (King, Gandhi, Thoreau & those wonderful Irish women from the 70s & you & so many more).

Ha ha, at least we have sound bodies, and it looks like pretty strong minds too!

Looking forward to our chat on Thursday evening, and I hope that the 50th committee work goes well and you have fun reconnecting with some of our classmates too!”

And to show you the tenor of their budding relationship his response back:

“Hi Melinda - I didn't mean to make a bigger deal out the private thing than maybe I expressed - Of course talk to Kathy and that kind of thing. What I was thinking of more is like the committee (made up right now of all women some of whom are part of a group of nine who have been meeting together for 30 years who may or maybe not like a little off-hand gossip.) Or a better example when I reconnect with Bill Cadger and a few others to get them to sign up for the site/go to the reunion. I was probably directing it more at myself now that I read this since I will be more in the line of fire. Okay.

It is funny about accents because when I gave a speech on Chelsea Manning's behalf down in front of Fort Meade just before her trial opened in June everybody came up to me and said I had a strong Boston accent. I am kind of with you though on the accent thing because I think my father's slight southern drawl leveled the Boston.”

 

A couple more cell-phone calls and another round of e-mails got this pair to the idea of meeting in person, a “date” like some hormonally-driven teen-agers. (Sam could not remember who suggested the idea first but neither flinched at that possibility.) They both admitted to nervousness as they planned to meet in Portsmouth up in New Hampshire at a restaurant that she had selected (he was to be at a legal conference in Maine and that locale was the closest convenient city for both of them). Needless to say they hit it off remarkably well. She even had thoughts that early on that finally, after two divorces and untold liaisons, she might have met her “forever” man.

Here is the drift of what they were thinking then:

“Hi Sam, this is a short one honestly. What, I think we still are forlorn teenagers, I certainly never outgrew that! And with a little bit of dyslexia I realized I'm on page 89 not 98!

Of course not one-shot does it all, and no matter what we're friends and also no matter what we're working on the collective memories piece for our upcoming reunion.

I look forward to some mundane topics as well; here's a starter what was your favorite movie from that North Adamsville theater off Hancock Street (The Strand, and I walked past it just three years ago with Alison it's no longer in business)? My mother had to drag me out of the theater with "Alice in Wonderland" because I screamed when I saw the Cheshire cat's teeth, but I think I liked "under the big top." But my favorite was "around the world in 80 days " How about you?

Now your turn to ask me a mundane question.

Later,

Melinda “

And back:

“Hi page 89- thanks for note and thanks, big thanks, for being nervous too. Yes, by all means let’s be casual (but shaking underneath, a little). Rudi’s looks like that kind of place from the link you gave me. Maybe if we are both nervous that will help. What I suggest is that we give ourselves the option of maybe a couple of “dates” just in case to see how things go so we don’t have to depend on one roll of the dice on Wednesday. We are going to be friends anyway no matter what (and I want that for sure, no question). What do you think?

We did not get much snow here but it must have been nice to see that snow on those pine trees. I hope you had good luck shopping and got everything done. I know about those tough Maine roads, especially Route 1 and 1A going up. Sorry you could not go to that Christmas party. See I can talk about just regular stuff too. In fact I will be very glad when, whatever happens, we can talk about such things as books and movies and music without my having to “impress” you with all this other stuff. And definitely not to have to fret about whether we are going to like each other or not like a couple of forlorn teenagers. I hope you agree.  Later Sam”          

 

And this after a second date:

“Dear Melinda (yeah, it’s that way, it’s dear Melinda now)-

Needless to say last night was great and all and whole bunch more. If you can believe this I am at something of a loss for words, a least cogent words and most of this requires that we talk in person or on the phone but I just have to get it out and we can save this e-mail for future talks. Here goes in no particular order-

One UNH Professor Melinda Loring, NA Class of 1964 is fragile and must be handled with care and affection. 

 I did not want to leave you last night and kept the conversation up to be with you a little longer.

 I wonder if anybody was listening to us whether they would have known we were only on our second date.

Funny since I wrote an e-mail earlier in the day that I had the distinct feeling that I wanted to jump into bed with you and then fly (not hitchhike showing our greater resources now) to California (to NOT cross the Golden Gate Bridge). Funny too after two dates already I was ready to fly some place with you. And neither of us thought that strange.

Of course jumping into bed implies the question of sex, if any, in our friendship which we have no talked about but all I know is when we were holding hands and all I had some, uh, funny feelings. And you know what I mean.

We need to go slow here –one step at a time- I don’t think you want a quick flame thing and then burn-out and I know I don’t.

Whatever happens in the future we should at least have experiences like last night, times like that to be together- isn’t the possibility of future times like last night better than not having anything just because of baggage?

I know we are going to have some disputes on this and that is okay but, pout or not, I have a special relationship with Laura  that I don’t see how can be broken. I don’t even want to break. I have always enjoyed doing things with her. She is a waif too. If we get serious (or better more serious because if last night wasn’t serious I don’t know what is) then it will have to be with that kind of understanding. But for right now isn’t it better like I said above to have special moments like last night rather than nothing. You know my answer.   

Jesus, a month ago I was walking around minding my own business, doing things with Laura and assuming that would be it, and NOT being a womanizer, and then you came along 

to, ah, disturb my sleep. I am glad but it sure is hard trying to do the right thing-very hard.

What I am trying to say with all this and what is causing me to be all balled up this morning is that as I suspected we would be good for each other-very good- at least I think so- if you want that then you are going to have to compromise a little and take what I can give you- while could be quite a lot-

I know you’ve had a rough time with men (and maybe when I was younger you would have had that with me too) but I think I have a lot to give and I don’t want to be feeling like I have to hide stuff- In short dear Melinda (yeah, it’s that way like I said) I really don’t want to do anything to hurt that smiling pretty face of yours. Obviously more later on this.         

It is very important to me that you get your work thing done and don’t feel harried so it is good in a way that you have stuff you need to do that means we have time away over the next week-Get it done and we can work around that Ms. Worker Bee- We are okay-we are moving forward and I like that idea-like it a lot- Later Sam”   

 

And Sam, with two divorces under his belt and that also untold number of liaisons, was also in his less lucid moments thinking along some just such lines. Except. Oh yeah, except Sam was, as he learned as they went along ah, “married,” had been “married” for many years to Laura, although for a number of years past they had been living as “roommates.” Roommate meaning separate beds, mostly separate lives, and most definitely no sex. That hard little fact, that “marriage” fact, a fact that I kept mentioning to him as he got deeper into the human sink of Melinda. Naturally he would not listen.  Although not because, and it can face the light of day now, I secretly, secretly then, wished that Sam would leave Laura, Laura who had disturbed my dreams for years. We later discussed this situation after Sam’s fever over Melinda had broken. Sam knew of my feelings for Laura, had known for years and acknowledged that if things had gone differently with Melinda he would have wished me well in my pursuit of Laura.

Naturally, or maybe not so naturally for the senior set, for  people in their sixties, and supposedly beyond sexual desire as they dote on grandchildren, gardening, golfing or whatever, the question of sleeping together, staying overnight together came up after several dates. Sam as part of his professional duties often went to Maine on legal business and so he suggested that they, he and Melinda, meet at a hotel a mutual distance between them and they did one Friday afternoon in frigid January. Melinda, assuming that the offer of meeting at a hotel meant that they would sleep together, had made provisions unbeknownst to Sam to stay that night with him. Sam, perhaps a little more backward in the dating game and its progressions expected them to just have a few drinks, go out for some dinner, come back and have a nightcap, let her go back on her way, and leave it at that. That afternoon Melinda came on strong, almost caught Sam flat-footed with her desire but he was not ready, had not been prepared for Melinda’s desire and so nothing happened that night except an unhappy Melinda who left unfulfilled around midnight.

That event left Sam in a quandary. He knew, just like Melinda knew, that he desired her, wanted to have sex, make love to her. But he also knew that once that happened that a bridge would be crossed, or so that was his thinking at the time. Still Melinda was there, still he wanted her so the next Friday afternoon he called her up out of the blue and told her to meet him at that same hotel. Oh yes, and feed the cats and bring an overnight bag. She was thrilled and arrived a couple of hours later. And that was that. Well not exactly because that night they a great long sex bout like fifty years of unacknowledged, unknown, unknowable desire surfaced. And that was their high point, the acme of their thing. That was also the point where Sam, back-tracking, began to squirm a little both at what he had done, that bridge that he had crossed and that home he had left behind for a minute. The omens thereafter were not good, although he never spoke of those nights to me and I only knew about them from the notes he handed to me.     

Who knows how some relationships turn from spun gold to dross in a short time, in time for a “forever” man to turn into a never man (the first designation an inside joke as it turned out since she had started to call him that in the early days when she was still smitten with him and expected to share her time with him that long, and everything was possible. In the event “forever” turned out to be, ah, significantly shorter.

Maybe the turning point  was Sam’s response to that second date, a December Friday a couple of weeks before Christmas date at a tapas restaurant in Portsmouth. Sam had never been to such a restaurant where they give you small portions of many good things to eat, well-prepared, served at intervals and a place which provided a relaxed atmosphere to while away the time in. They talked up another storm and could barely keep their hands off each other, gathered closer as the evening progressed. After the meal, the weather New England winter cold he escorted her to her car and before she left they exchanged several meaningful hugs (and he might have kissed her on the cheek). They left knowing they both definitely had a thing for each other.

But Melinda was a fretter and a planner, not necessarily in that order so at some point between that Friday and their resumption of e-mail traffic the next day Melinda possessed of some dream future with Sam tried to find out more about Laura, about that “roommate” arrangement and what was to become of her. See Melinda had certain rules as we all more or less do in that she took pride in her serial monogamous relationships. She was with a man, and a man was with her, or no dice. Once she finished with a man that was that. She told Sam that in an e-mail exchange set. He in a little panic over her position kept trying to calm her doubts, kept trying to pass over his longtime relationship as some platonic boy-scout trip, kept trying to keep his head above water with Melinda. That night, that restless Saturday night he tossed and turned trying to mull things over in his head and came up empty. Came up with the only conclusion that made sense-end the flirtation and walk away. He, and this is characteristic of Sam, “wrote” the thing out in his head first and then at the crack of dawn gathered himself from his bed and went to compose the following e-mail which he sent later that morning. Here it is: 

“Dear Melinda

I have to admit that I am all balled up about you but in the cold light of day I have also admit that I am perplexed by the tone of your e-mail last night (the “down the snowy road” one in case you have sent a later one). I am a little confused now about your reasons but from early on you seemed interested in my pursuing you, and encouraging me to that effect. And I certainly have been interested in pursuing you and encouraging you to make me feel that I should. Also I like you am amazed by the fateful number of common things we share but now I am beginning to believe we might be star-crossed. It is with you do not know how much great sorrow I have to write the following, I hope you will respond to my e-mail with an e-mail (seems we are better on such issues this way) and if you don’t I will understand and accept that you agree with my solution. In any case I hope you will think and reflect on what I have to say and not think too badly of your old classmate.

 

We are cursed you and I, we, the both of us with the three curses, A tendency to intellectualize things, over-analyze them, fret them to death, try to engineer things rather than let them take their natural course. We have also been around the block enough to be wary, defensive about relationships and things having taken and given our bumps and bruises. Of course, as well we carry those long ago created scars  about expectations, acceptance, need to be wanted, praise and the like. A lot to carry for sure.  

I know and I have said it before that you have had a rough time with men and now it looks like with me too. That has to color your perspective and that is not wrong. However your e-mail got me to wondering about why you have kept trying to throw up roadblocks to our blooming romantic relationship (formerly known as our possible “affair”). Not when we are together or on the phone but in your e-mails. I won’t argue the point if I have done the same but let me point out some things that will show what I mean:

Your general early wariness of my intentions and what I was about and lately about my “marital” status.

The criminal report incident where you assumed that in the whole universe I did such a goofball thing

The whole FB/ring thing

The womanizer issue

 Now this thing about my true relationship with Laura

    

 I wasn’t going to bring it up but since you asked about it and I have told you more stuff about myself than probably any other woman including Laura we have not been intimate for over fifteen years (part of our problem). Sure on trips and stuff we have shared the same room and even the same bed but that is it.  If that isn’t platonic I don’t know what is.

We share a seven room house she has a room and another room for her singing/mediation/photography- I have a room, a small office (which I am writing this in now) and we share a living room, dining room and kitchen. All modest and kind of small but with room for guests.

The big thing is that all of this in really uncharted because Laura and I have never had to confront a situation like ours. Who knows what would happen. All I know is she is the innocent party here and should be treated like that.

 Of course if our romance had blossomed then I would have no problem bringing you to my house. But I do not think you are thinking outside the box. I/we have resources so if something had bloomed I know (since I have done it before) that other arrangements could have been made. Laura keeps the house and I move out to an apartment. I move in with you and share expenses. We both move some place together. We run away to a cave off of the Pacific Coast Highway-they are plenty of alternatives.

All of this to say I really never would want to hurt you. I am sorry if I have but there are no guarantees. Although I would much rather have you holding my hand right now dear sweet Melinda I think perhaps it is best that we stop right now, accept that our time together has passed. We have been on a roller-coaster so I think just friendship would be hard, although maybe when I calm down and knowing the limitations maybe we could work something out. I hope you will respond but in any case I still hope to see you at the reunion. That after all is what got this whole thing started. Sam”

Sam never gave Melinda a chance to response since a few hours later, maybe two, he called her up and begged her to forget what he had written and that they should keep on going as best they could but that he planned to do right by her. Of course he sent me this new information and I blew my top but since it cannot anybody any harm, or minimal harm let me show you an e-mail he posted to Melinda after their “mini-break-up” episode:           

“Melinda -Glad to reach you this morning to make sure things were right between us and thank you for being understanding about me being a little crazy yesterday. Yes, crazy because why would any guy in his right mind walk away from somebody who was certifiable good for him. In any case the time for walking away is past. If I really wanted to do that I could have just done that yesterday. And you could have indirectly done the same by just saying to yourself why should I go forward with a guy who doesn’t have enough sense to come in out of the rain when somebody that is good for him walks through the door. So the walking away is done and while we probably still have rough patches ahead we are moving along-along in case anybody asks to the hand-holding stage. So something is up.

I still can’t get over my response when you started tearing up Friday night. I have been accused and rightly so in the past of not showing enough emotion but I almost instinctively reached over to you to comfort you like we had been together for a long time. I won’t forget that.

 Hope you are okay after your dental work-rest and take it easy tonight. Later Sam.”           

 

 

Maybe it was San Diego- Sometimes a guy can’t quite figure out what to do, can’t for the life of him, despite his age and the fact, the hard fact that he has been through many mills before what the right thing to do is, or maybe is too callous, too concerned with having his own way, having his kids’ stuff two women thing that he gets blindsided by the truth, by the equally hard fact that he cannot burn the candle at both ends. Melinda had screamed at him, raised bloody holy hell about the fact that he was taking Laura to San Diego with him, a few days in the sun he said to give her winter-weary body so Melinda would have to put up with the fact that he would be with “another woman” in the same room in the same hotel. That drove her to rages, to fits, to tantrums which made him cry bloody murder. He made sure that he called her every day but that every day was like a prison as she took aim at his situation. He made the supreme mistake though of one call making a comparison between the hotel room in San Diego and their love-nest in Portsmouth. That caused a burning flame for days after.          

Maybe it was after that Washington, D.C in February which was a trip that solidified, mainly, their desire for each other, but because she was taking a scheduled bus back to New Hampshire and he was grabbing his car from an off-site lot they had a rushed good-bye after furious movement at the airport where she had an odd exchange of luggage problem getting hers’ mixed up with another causing several headaches and problems for Sam at home when Laura received a telephone call from Jet Blue asking if that mislaid luggage was there.  The next day feeling some ill-wind had crossed their paths Sam had refused Melinda’s request of him to call her when she was confused by an e-mail that he sent because he had written it hastily as he had his hands full with Laura and her furor as fallout over the luggage problem.

Probably though the end started to crumble the month before the end when a few days after coming back from that fateful Washington trip Melinda took a big spill, a serious fall at a pool in Portsmouth where she swam to get exercise, that broke her hip bone requiring surgery and their budding romance came to a crashing halt as she convalesced and Sam took on the unaccustomed role of care-giver general. Not so much that incident itself since it was an accident but what it did to enforce her idleness which left her too much time to think about how she wanted him with her, wanted him to leave Laura, wanted to make those 208 plans (roughly) that Melinda spent her waking hours doing in order to have him come closer to her. And Sam needed to be in Boston, or wanted to be, and not stuck in some winter wonderland town in Podunk New Hampshire at the beck and call of her highness.

Not a meeting between them in that period went by without some variation of the on-going argument. Although there were some nice times, (one time he drove her to their North Adamsville youth homes and they had many laughs, and some sorrows, over that). Even when he had driven up in order to allow her to teach a seminar at UNH and then drove her the next day over to the Portsmouth General to get her cleared to be able to drive she/he/they argued over that same old, same old material. Now that Sam thought about it he believed that was clearly the case, the place where all hell broke loose, since he just from his end got tired of the arguments that were leading nowhere.             

The few days before the end had not been better (really a few weeks Sam thought since that damn accident put her out of commission placed a damper on their affair as he became a care-giver and she a patient). The inevitable Melinda war cry of when was Sam going to leave his “wife,” when he was going to leave Laura, and what, get this, constructive steps he had taken to break with her had led to a series of arguments starting with the day that she was finally given the okay by the doctor in charge of her case at Portsmouth General to drive.

Melinda, as an act of liberation from her confinement, had driven them to Newburyport and then to Plum Island where when Sam had expressed his concern about the change in their relationship from romantic to care-giving, that the “spark” had gone out somewhere along the line (she took his remark, the way he said it, as his displeasure at her). Melinda had exploded and said that “she wished he had never taken care of her during that month she was laid up if she was such a burden.” They talked but the fires had not been put out. Newburyport was significant for that was where he had brought her a trinket on their first trip there in December when they could hardly keep their hands off each other (and had their first “lean-in” kiss). The next day walking on Hampton Beach the smoldering fires erupted (slightly) again when an issue came up about Melinda doing a favor for her ex-husband. They kissed a statutory kiss and parted company she to Epping and he back to Boston.

Naturally the e-mail and cell-phone traffic (actually the diminished traffic, significantly down from the days when they would sent blizzards of e-mails to each other when he thought about it later) reflected those unresolved tensions. She needed to spent that first week of liberation catching up on work, house, social chores and could only spare that next Thursday evening for them to get together and since she was going to be in the Salem (NH) area they decided to meet in Amesbury for dinner. Before that though Sam made what would be a mistake, a fatal mistake, of putting into writing some of his feelings about where they were at in their relationship. Thus he sent the following e-mail which was the final piece of evidence that things had gone drastically wrong.

“Dearest Melinda -Where have those hands grabbing at each other across the table in delight/need/want at Moxy’s (and elsewhere) gone. Where has your hand grabbing my arm while walking outside of Rudi’s (and elsewhere) and me glad to have you do it gone. Where have the little stolen sweet kisses of Portsmouth parking lots gone. Where have those endless phone calls where we hated to sign off talking about great adventures ahead gone. Where have those roundabout hours of blissful silliness gone. Where have those shy but meaningful moments when our feelings for each other blossomed gone. I could go on with a million more examples when were on the same page and were relaxed and confident about our relationship and where it might head but you get the idea.

I sensed from this e-mail that you are beginning to get the feeling like me that you/I/we are not in a good place these days. Think about the first time at Newburyport in precious December and last week. I had already spoken about this last week and now I think you sense that too from your side. Our talk today where we got all theoretical about the future without any sweet talk kind of epitomized that. Frankly, and you can speak for yourself, I am unhappy with the drift of things now. I/you/we spent too much time thinking about the future, future plans, about the relationship itself and not enough about how to get out of the rough patch we are in. How to get the romance back and just relax with each other.  Why don’t we take a step back, maybe two, today and tomorrow and think about things we can say and do when we meet on Thursday to break the impasse. Why don’t we step back and just forget about the future for a little bit and just think we are “dating” for right now with all its sense of mystery in the now with no future goals. Or maybe that we should think about just being friends for a while. I always want to be friends with you that is for sure. These are only suggestions. The main thing is that you/I/we think about this and not rush into a blizzard of e-mails. This rough patch requires thinking not writing-

From a guy who misses those delighted hands across the table, that grabbing hand on my arm, those endless funny phone calls waited for in anticipation and nervousness, those sweet shy stolen kisses, that bubble silliness when the outside world didn’t matter for a bit, those intimate moments when you and I both blushed a teenage-like blush at how close we were, those all night talkfests, those candles flittering in the dark, serious Melinda and Sam just being foolish and off-guard, the kindnesses we did for each other just because we were special to each other, the sense that our thing was written in the wind, and lots of other things you remember as well as I do. Sam”

They had a short acrimonious cell-phone exchange after that e-mail but again agreed to meet in Amesbury the next day to figure things out. That next evening things started well enough, after Melinda had ordered wine with her dinner. The net result of their discussions was that they would go on as friends for a while and see where that led. Of course to go beyond the friend stage Melinda gave no uncertain terms to the proposition that she could not go on, was “ashamed” to go on under the circumstances unless Sam got a place of his own, left Laura.

Melinda ordered another wine, unusual for her, and that must have given her courage to speak again of the e-mail. She said it read like a lawyer’s closing argument, that she had been hurt and that he was basically a bum of the month. He became incensed, yelled at her and threw money on the table for dinner and walked to the men’s room to fume. When he came back he tried to tell his point but he was tired of arguing by then and just said “let it go for now.” They left, she put her hand in his arm as usual and he muttered that “they were in very bad place” as he walked her to her car. He looked at her shoes, the shoes she reminded him that she had worn in sunnier days down in Washington and he commented “that seems like a long time ago” as they arrived at her car. Rather than the usual kiss good-bye he yelled out “I’ll be in touch,” as he walked back to his own car.     

                

 

Since Melinda was not good at directions (and the Google maps were helter-skelter on this one) Sam had consented to have her follow him out of Amesbury on Route 27 which she did until they got to the U.S. 95 South entrance. A couple of exits up she veered off onto Route 133 for home. As he shifted gears from fourth to fifth to push on up to speed in the U.S. 95 night after he saw her automobile veer off to the northern route home he breathed a sigh of relief, and of sadness. And although there was some muted cellphone and terse e-mail communication between them later to officially finish up their affair they never saw each other again.