Heaven

We were young, and we were unfettered, and we never felt anything so sweet in our whole lives.

How was it that the sun closed us in on that day, and the meadow was soft and sensuous, and our bed was warmer and gentler than it would ever be again, though we would sip the sweet nectar many times after that?

But he was a virgin and I was a virgin, and we met together in that meadow as equals.

His boyish, virgin skin was smooth and soft. He shed his clothes naturally, and I touched him all over: curiously, gingerly.

He helped me off with my clothes, then, and admired the pristine whiteness of my breasts with nubby digits, fingering the nipples clumsily--carelessly, but tenderly.

He asked if he could lick them, and the texture of his fat tongue rubbed across them, making them stand up big and tall and ripe-red.

I watched his manhood rise up, and he smiled proudly, as if to say, "See what I can do?"

And after a while, when his hands found other places, and his fingers got faster and harder, he climbed on top of me. And I never felt anything so sweet as the sweetness he felt like inside me. And I squeezed that sweetness, and squeezed it and squeezed it, while he all the while was pumpin' on me like a water pump or somethin'.

And I squeezed him till there was nothing left in that water pump and it shrivelled up slowly, into a soft little rag, as if he ought to put it back in his pocket. And we moaned and groaned like we were two actors in a melodrama with Nellie on the tracks, and we liked that alot...all that moaning and groaning...'cuz it felt good, and we just had to let that good, sweet feeling out.

So that's how I found out about love, which was a powerful thing, 'cept that it sorta soured from there on out.

On account of the baby, and the judging eyes, and all of that. And Papa forbidding me to see him again, which was a little like closin' the gate after the horses all bobbed out, and was about as likely as catchin' 'em again.

So I took off on my own. And me and Bobby figured we could make the meadow our home if that's the way it's gonna be...

Which of course it wasn't. So Bobby got a job pumpin' gas for the gas station, and we found a room to rent from Mrs. Switchadiddy, or Maryland, or somethin' like that.

And we used to go over to that meadow just to make love when Mrs. Whatchamabobbit said she'd watch the baby; but after those boys come spyin' on us, we decided our holy shrine had been descremated, so we didn't do that no more.

After a while, Bobby heard about a Magnum of Industry comin' to town, and we got ol' Mrs. Flipflop to watch the kids so he could go listen to the big talk the man was givin', and so I could be by his side when he heard it.

Low and behold, Bobby landed a job with the man sellin' all sorts of nicknacks and bibbledybobbles which made our little town practically like a turrist attraction.

We prob'ly woulda stayed in that town all our life, if the town hadn't left us. Jus' picked up an' moved one day. Tornado picked it up an' left pieces of it all over northern Oklahoma.

So Bobby says to me, he says, "Let's go to the Big City."

So we packed up Luke and Jeanie, and Mason, and Todd, and little Lucy, who we liked to call "little Lou", and we said goo-bye to Mrs. Matchamadigit, and we headed out.

The kids was sad to say goodbye to Mrs. Okeefenokee, but she was gettin' on in years anyway, and wouldn't of been able to chase them around much no more anyways.

We found a College Age Girl in the Big City, but she wasn't never quite the same as Mrs. Whoosadoodle. But she taught me a few things, the first of which was the value of a education.

Which was a good thing, because Bobby didn't make it much past Mary Margaret and Mary Andrews's first birthday.

Anyway, I don't know what I would of done without that College Age Girl, because she convinced me to enroll in night school, and she watched the kids while I did it, and with Luke and Jeanie both holding down two jobs apiece, I made it!

We all did. And you should have seen the celebration when I graduated! I promised Luke and Jeanie I'd get a job that paid well enough for them to go to college, and I got a very respectable one. But it wasn't until I sold this slapdash little story to a publisher about my uninteresting little life that I was able to do it--with that plus the advance for the movie version, which they think is very promising.

Thank you, Bobby, for all the seeds you planted in me for all the years. They all grew into beautiful children in their own right, and not the least of them was your quiet acceptance of me that told me I could do anything I set my mind to.

I love you, Bobby, wherever you are. Keep my spot warm in that meadow, 'cuz I know that's what heaven looks like, and I'm coming to be with you in it again someday.