Starling Farm.
Two Weeks Later
“MRS. STARLING, CAN RUTH have company?” Diana was not surprised to find Frank Spencer’s son Jerry at the kitchen door when she answered the timid knock. He held a bouquet of flowers in one hand and a book in the other. “I picked these early bloomers this morning,” he said holding out the flowers for Diana’s inspection. “I thought they might cheer her up.” He extended the bouquet for Diana to take as she opened the door wide and invited him in. “Thank you Jerry, I’m sure they will. She is in her room and doing much better. I know she’d love to see you. Why don’t you have a seat in the living room while I put these flowers in a vase and then I’ll call her.
Frank and Diana had hardly gotten Ruth home from the hospital day before yesterday when Jerry called to see how she was doing. Frank took the call and Diana could tell, listening to his end of the conversation, that Jerry needed assurance Ruth would be O.K.
“She had a small fracture…”
“Yes, that’s right…
“A very small one…”
“No, the doctor said there was no permanent damage…
“Wants her to stay in for a week and not exert herself for at least a month.
“Then…yes, that’s right, then he thinks she should be as good as new.
“No…with the bouncing and all it probably won’t do for her to try to ride Gypsy in the parade.”
“Gypsy? Oh, the vet gave her a shot of anti-venom and she’s doing fine.”
“Yes Jerry…I’ll tell her you called. Give her a day or two to rest up and I know she’ll be glad to see you.”
“Jerry Spencer’s a nice kid,” Frank said as he hung up the phone.
A mental picture of the gangly neighbor boy formed in Diana’s mind. Jerry was the eldest of the Spencers’ four children and turned fifteen about two months before Ruth’s twelfth birthday.
Like Frank, Fred Spencer was a deacon in Lone Oak Church. Jerry had known Ruth since she was a baby, but Frank and Diana agreed it was her first day in school when they really bonded and when Jerry seemed to have made Ruth his special responsibility.
Diana remembered Ruth was anxious about going to school for the first time. Hoping to lift her spirits, she took her daughter shopping in Lubbock for some new clothes the Saturday before school started.
That Sunday, on the church parking lot Frank and Fred were in a conversation when Frank mentioned Ruth being a little anxious about starting to school. “I guess the first day can be kinda scary, what with new faces, new surroundings and all,” Fred volunteered.
Only when Ruth grabbed his pant leg did Frank realize she had been standing behind him and heard Fred’s remark. “Is school really a scary place daddy?” Her eyes brimmed with tears, her chin quivered, and there was near panic in her voice as she looked up at her father. “If it is, I don’t wanna go!”
Jerry, who was also nearby, heard his dad’s remark, came up beside Ruth, put his hand on her shoulder, and mustering all the confidence a ten year old could manage said, “school’s not scary Ruthie, if you’re not by yourself…And you won’t be, because I’ll be with you.”
Jerry’s promise must have been all the assurance she needed because she let go of Frank’s pant leg and skipped away with the Spencer children to do whatever kids do.
That Sunday evening after church Frank watched as Diana helped Ruth try on her new outfit. After tucking in her blouse, Diana stood back admiring Ruth’s reflection in the mirror. “You look great honey,” she said, giving her a reassuring smile! “You’ll be one of the prettiest girls in kindergarten.” Frank knew his wife hoped her upbeat manner would ease the worry both of them saw on Ruth’s face.
“Jerry will be there won’t he? At school I mean.” Ruth sought out Diana’s reflections in the mirror for assurance.
“Sure he will, honey. Don’t you remember Jerry’s promise this morning?” Frank interjected.
The next morning Frank stood in the front yard with Ruth, watching as a distant trail of dust announced the coming of the yellow school bus. He felt Diana’s eyes watching them through the living room windows. Seeing her baby leave for school for the first time was especially sad for her so after helping her dress they hugged and said their “goodbyes” in the house.
He would never forget the look of relief on Ruth’s face when the bus came, the door opened, and there stood Jerry, as good as his word, on the top step.
“Come on Ruthie.” He was smiling from ear to ear. “I’ve saved a seat for you by me,” he said as he reached down and took her hand.
Jerry stood as Ruth entered the living room holding the vase containing his flowers. After putting them on an end table, they exchanged hugs and sat down together on the couch. “Thanks for the flowers.” She gave him that familiar flick of a smile Jerry felt hinted at more unspoken.
“I brought this too.” He picked up the book beside him and gave it to her.
“My favorite,” she said glancing at its familiar title.
“I know. I had to look a long time before I found it in the library. With Miss Flowers gone and all I…”
“I know.” A radiantly youthful Miss Flowers and Timmy, surrounded by yellow crocuses flashed in Ruth’s mind.
“But we’ll be with both of them again.”
“Both?”
Jerry’s questioning look told her he did not understand what she meant by both. “Tim and Miss Flowers I mean…I saw them both in my dream,” she said.
“But they’re…”
“Dead? Jerry, my dream told me dying is just the way God sometimes moves us from one place to another. They’re both in a beautiful place and someday we’ll join them.”
“Maybe you Ruthie…I’m not so sure about me.”
Jerry felt the conversation taking him somewhere he’d rather not allow his mind to go. Like those stormy Sunday nights the pastor always seemed to pick to preach on the return of Christ. Those sermons, filled with descriptions of war and earthquakes, he delivered to the accompaniment of booming thunder and lighting, were double wallops to his conscience, reminding him he wasn’t ready for the great event.
But Jerry’s uncertain response was the opening Ruth needed to tell him about her dreamed decision to trust Christ, and its real follow-up in the hospital after she came out of her coma.
“Jerry, you can be sure just like me,” she said, and added, “next Sunday when Pastor Duncan gives his invitation for folks to come forward and declare their faith in Jesus I’m going. He came to see me yesterday and I told him about my decision. When I told him in my dream, God showed me the difference between believing about Jesus and on Him, he said he wanted me to give my testimony in church.”
Ruth looked at Jerry inquiringly. “Do you know the difference
Jerry,” she asked, never letting her eyes drop from his.
Jerry’s look of befuddlement dissolved into one of conviction. Dropping his eyes, he said wistfully, “I’m happy for you Ruthie. I guess I’d like to have what you have, but I’m just not ready to make the kind of decision I think you’re talking about. There are things you don’t know about me, things I can’t…” Jerry’s voice trailed away leaving his thought unfinished.
“I hope you understand the risk you’re taking Jerry,” Chief Detective Walters of the Lubbock police department said the next day as he fixed Jerry with an appraising stare.
“Look,” Jerry said, returning it. “I took on this job because I’m tired of seeing school buddies being sucked down a black hole of drugs and I’m not quitting until you guys know the supplier and put him away. Just last week I visited one of my friends in the hospital who tripped on something that fried his brain. They had him tied to a bed and he was screaming to the top of his lungs. The doctor told his folks not to expect him to ever be normal again.”
“I’m sorry about that Jerry. I just wanted you to understand the downside of this operation,” Walters replied, “and the possible consequences if the drug dealers at your school finger you as a snitch.” Having given his warning, he yelled “pull” and Jerry launched another clay pigeon that shattered in mid-flight at the blast of Walters’ shotgun.
It was here on this gun range Jerry first met Walters several months ago. His keen eye and steady hands with his 22 along with a mature manner for one so young had impressed the officer and quickly won the crusty officer’s confidence and respect. It was also here, a few weeks before Ruth’s recent accident, Jerry told Walters he thought he knew who was selling drugs in the high school. “If we knew for sure, we could trace them to their distributor, work up the gang’s operational chain and break this case wide open,” Walters observed.
That was when Jerry put himself on the front line of the probe by volunteering to try confirming the sellers’ identities, then win their confidence and learn the name of their source. “I have a plan that might do the trick,” he said without discussing what it was.
Jerry immediately started dropping inquiries about where he might pick up some “meth” with kids at school he knew used drugs and after several dead ends, one finally volunteered he might want to talk to the Brady brothers.
His inquiries must have circulated quickly because a few days later one of the brothers approached him in the lunchroom wanting to know about his interest in “meth.”
“I’ve never taken you to be a user kind of guy,” Brady said eyeing Jerry suspiciously. When he told him his interest was financial rather than personal, it seemed to perk Brady’s interest because he suggested they meet at his car on the parking lot after school to discuss some possibilities.
Both Bradys were in the car, one behind the wheel the other in the back seat, when Jerry joined them. He floated his drug networking idea, involving the recruitment of kids in the city’s middle schools as sellers and both brothers immediately warmed to it. “If we work together, you guys can make added profits now as well as making new customers for later in high school,” he said, adding that if they liked the plan his cut would be a percentage of sales in the middle schools. A deal was struck when he added his network of sellers would only be an extension of theirs rather than a separate operation.
“You’re quite the businessman Spencer, for a country boy,” the brother at the wheel said as he reached across and opened Jerry’s door. “Not a bit like most of the other hicks from the sticks the schools bus in.”
“Just tired of being poor I guess,” Jerry replied then grinned and faked a laugh.
“We’ll give you a heads up after we talk to our supplier,” the brother in the back seat said as Jerry shut the car door, “I’m sure he’ll want to meet you.”
As Jerry walked away from their car, he was glad they brought up the subject of the supplier, sure that had he done so it would have raised suspicion.
Yesterday when Jerry told Walters his suspicions were right, it came as no surprise the sellers were the popular Brady brothers. “Too fancy a car for kids and too much cash being flashed,” he observed stoically, adding, “it will sure blow the minds of the local football fans to know their star quarterback and defensive right end are dealers.”
“I think the Bradys have bought my idea,” Jerry loaded another clay pigeon into the launcher as he was speaking. “Yesterday they told me they would give me a ‘heads up’ when their distributor was ready to meet me and discuss my plan.”
“To discuss your plan? Well maybe.” Walters cocked his head and squinted down the barrel of his shotgun. “But to check you out…most definitely,” he said dryly just before shouting, “pull” and blasting the last clay pigeon from the sky.