The Hermit of Scarecrow Valley

by Robert Lubrican

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Chapter Two

Jennifer kept saying it wasn't that bad. But the people who came out and looked at her in the truck acted like she was about to die or something. They brought a gurney, and when she got out, six people grabbed her and lifted her, yelling at each other not to jostle her or let her bend her back. They laid her ever so gently on her stomach on the gurney. She looked for The Hermit, and saw him standing to one side, talking to someone who was taking notes. For the first time she realized that his lower right pants leg was dark with what had to be blood. She couldn't believe she hadn't noticed it before.

As they started moving the gurney, one of the people talked into a walkie talkie. He described her, and then said, "extensive tissue damage, with what might be exposed spinal bone. I think she's going to need way more than we can do for her. We need to do a neurosurgery workup and alert the chopper to be ready to go stat."

"Exposed spine!" yelled Jennifer. She twisted her head to look at The Hermit, despite the pain that cause. "You never said anything about an exposed spine!"

But he couldn't answer, because they were whisking her away. Five people at once were trying to talk to her. One was asking for her name and address, and how to get in touch with her parents. Another was asking her if she had insurance. Still another was asking her what her pain level was on a scale of zero to ten, while a fourth was asking her if her vision was blurred. Finally she shouted "Shut up!" and was surprised when they all did.

"One at a time, please," she said.

The next three hours would eventually be classified as the worst three hours of her life.

Bobby sat in a corner of the ER by design. Coping mechanisms sometimes look complicated, but they are almost always very simple at heart. Someone had decided that the helicopter wasn't necessary after all, but had told him he had to stay there. Bobby Higginbotham tried his best to stay away from people. That was his coping mechanism for what ailed him. A high school science teacher would have said he was like a molecule of some gas, always trying to get as far away from other gas molecules as possible. It was that simple. In a room full of people, he found the place where there were the fewest of them. In a city, he found the place where people didn't go. In a nation, he had found a place where he might only see another human being once or twice a year. True, he interacted with people more frequently. He talked to them on the phone, or sent them payments in the mail. He had to answer questions sometimes, in the process of doing commerce. But it had been over three months since he'd had a face to face encounter with another human being.

Another part of coping with his particular situation was that he was very introspective. He thought a lot, and he thought about things in extraordinary detail. That's because he spent more time thinking about some things than most people did. I say some things because it wasn't every thing. When he went to the kitchen to make a sandwich, he didn't spend an hour deciding what kind to have, for example. But when he went for a walk - out on patrol, as he thought of it - he might take an hour thinking about what route to take, and what to take with him. If he was building something, he might think about the design for days, or even weeks, if the need wasn't urgent. He planned things out in his mind in exquisite detail before actually doing anything. And while most people, when they determine a need for some object, spend most of their time looking for a good deal in buying it, he spent most of his time figuring out if he could make it or not.

So his current situation was difficult, and his coping mechanisms were being strained to the maximum.

He was in a room full of people. People were noisy anyway, and most of these people were in pain or unhappy, and those kinds of people were quite noisy. The only people noisier than that were bullshit artists ... people like scam artists, con men, politicians and those trying to lay blame elsewhere than where it belonged ... such as lawyers. Those people were professional noisemakers, who made so much noise that a person couldn't think. And when you can't think, you can't identify bullshit when you hear it.

A number of people wanted things from him. That wasn't unusual. Most people wanted something from you. It wasn't like your unit. In your unit, all people wanted was for you to pay attention and do your job. The guys in a squad, or platoon all depended on each other, which meant that they wanted everybody in the unit to be at the top of their game. It was a matter of life and death, after all. So in a unit, you didn't take from each other. You gave to each other, to ensure that every member was as on his game as possible. You cared about whether things were going good for him back home. You cared about whether that muscle he'd pulled was healing. You cared whether he had a good book to take his mind off the fact that his girlfriend had broken up with him because he was ten thousand miles away and she couldn't take it that he might die any day without warning. You wanted him relaxed, and as happy as possible under the circumstances. So you did things for each other. You took care of each other. You loved each other.

But back in the world, people just wanted things from you. They didn't give a shit how you were doing. They just wanted you to give up something they wanted.

Like now. Two people were yelling at him, demanding to know what happened to the girl. How did she get injured? Where did she get injured? What was she doing while she got injured? Who was she? Who was he? Where were her parents? Why didn't he know what they wanted to know? Why wasn't he cooperating? Did they need to call the police?

For him it was simple. "She's hurt. You know how to fix her. So fix her! It doesn't matter where or how she got hurt. Her skin is torn. Stitch it back together for Christ's sake!" Finally he told them to leave him alone, and call whoever the fuck they wanted to call.

It was good that he didn't have a weapon, because his gut instinct was that none of these people meant him well, and might even try to hurt him.

But he couldn't leave. He had brought a buddy to the aid station, and he couldn't leave until he knew how that buddy was doing.

Two things happened that made things much better.

The first was that somebody in the ER recognized that this man probably had PTSD. That person was a paramedic, who was a vet, and who had spent time in the same places as Bobby. He recognized a brother and what that brother's problem was. He told the administrative types what he thought. He didn't have the authority to do anything else, but they listened to him and backed off.

The second was that Jennifer, used to answering questions from adults, did so, rather than resist them as superfluous, like Bobby did. She had been given a shot, and it had quenched the fire in her back. There was still pain, but now, at least, she could reflect on how amazing it was that she had done so much after being badly hurt, and wasn't even aware she was hurt at all. She mentioned that to the nurse who was putting an IV into her, and the nurse told her all about shock, and how that worked.

Her mother arrived forty-five minutes later, in full panic mode. That was made worse when no one wanted to allow her to see her daughter, but wanted her to sign all manner of forms allowing them to operate on the patient. When Mindy went into a full blown screaming rage, they finally took her to the little alcove where Jennifer had been lying for over an hour. They took her there more in an effort to get her to stop screaming, rather than because of any compassion on their part. The doctors and nurses all wanted to "protect" Mindy from seeing her daughter's injuries. Obviously, no "civilian" was capable of dealing with emotional trauma that would surely result from seeing those types of wounds. So they put a sheet over Jennifer's back. Nobody thought about the fact that this particular sheet wasn't sterile, or that they might be doing harm to the patient. They were too wrapped up in being insulted that the mother of their patient didn't say, "Of course you're right. You know best. Where do I sign?"

I won't quote what was said. Suffice it to say Mindy expressed love and concern for Jennifer, and was relieved when her daughter was able to speak back to her.

Then, after leaving the patient lying there until parental consent could be obtained (for legal, liability purposes) it was suddenly of emergency importance that the patient be whisked off to the operating room, where a full crew of surgeons stood by to save the day. Mindy was pulled back gently and forms were once again thrust in her face.

"I don't know my insurance number!" she wailed, at one point.

"No problem," said the administrative assistant with the forms. "You can go get it while they operate on her."

Bobby sensed someone standing in front of him, and opened his eyes. He had been thinking. Some people might have called what he was doing 'meditation' but to him it was just thinking. Plus people didn't usually speak to you if your eyes were closed. But this might be someone with news of the girl, so he opened his eyes.

It was the girl's mother. He recognized her from seeing her back when he had their place under surveillance.

"Are you Mr. Higginbotham?" she asked. Her voice was in the lower registers, what singers would call an alto voice. Her brow was frowning, but her lips were in a half smile, as if she were hopeful.

"Yes," he said.

"I'm Mindy Franks," she said.

Things in his memory often seemed to pop up, like a rocket at a fireworks show on the 4th of July, bursting full blown onto a dark background. Something the girl had said did that now. "Jennifer Franks," she had said.

"Jennifer's mother," he said.

He saw her eyes widen as her face went through several iterations of emotion, none of which were clear to him. He wasn't good at reading people.

"May I sit down?" she asked.

He looked at the empty chair next to him. Of course she could sit down. There was an empty chair right there. If she wanted to sit, why didn't she just sit? Then he realized she was asking his permission. He wasn't used to that.

"Yes," he said, somewhat stiffly.

"They said you brought Jennifer here," said Mindy.

He nodded.

"Where did you find her? How do you know her?" The woman looked scared. Bobby knew that look. He'd seen it on the faces of all his buddies. "Who are you?" she finished.

The first two questions didn't seem very valuable to Bobby. He could tell the woman where the accident had happened, probably to within fifty yards, but it would involve language that he knew she probably wasn't familiar with. Civilians didn't understand azimuths and grid coordinates. The answer to the second question was "I don't know her," and he was pretty sure that wouldn't be helpful, either. But the answer to the third question was one of the things he'd been thinking about. She had called him The Hermit of Scarecrow Valley. It sounded like an official name, though he'd never heard it before. His uncle's land was in Scarecrow Valley, and he did live what some people might call a hermit's life, he supposed. He looked at the woman.

"Apparently, I'm The Hermit of Scarecrow Valley."

The woman's face went blank and then showed what had to be surprise. "What?"

"That's what Jennifer called me."

"I don't understand!" moaned Mindy. "I don't understand any of this!" She started crying.

PTSD is a difficult malady to understand. Nobody knows much about it. More accurately, it should be said that a lot of things are known about the affliction that is, today, called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, but which has been called dozens of other things in the past: shell shock ... Battle fatigue ... cowardice ... exhaustion ... and on and on. But while much was suspected or known about each of these things, none of it was assembled and put together, because nobody understood that they were all really the same thing. Add in that different people react in different ways to the problem, and even today, the medical field doesn't quite know what to do about it.

Bobby Higginbotham behaved in ways similar to someone who has autism. Eschewing too much stimulation was something he had in common with an autistic person. But he wasn't autistic. Physical contact wasn't painful or distasteful to him. And he was perfectly capable of empathy, especially when someone was in pain and misery. He understood pain and misery only too well. So while his reaction to Mindy's frustration and tears was the exact opposite of what his parents (and many other people) might have expected, it wasn't actually unusual at all. Not for Bobby.

He got to his knees and hugged the crying woman.

It was an interesting hug, on several levels.

Mindy felt the empathy in this stranger's embrace. It was the first good, strong, caring hug she'd received in ... she couldn't remember how long. He smelled good ... clean, yet like leaves ... a hint of musk. His beard felt soft against her cheek and neck. It was a very comforting and genuine hug. She'd have sworn to that in court. And as a result, she hugged him back with equal passion.

And yet, she was hugging The Hermit of Scarecrow Valley! She had also heard the stories about this man. She, like many others, had assumed he was some antisocial, surly curmudgeon. Now she was rattled by the obvious error in her assumptions. She also felt badly that she had dismissed him so easily, without ever having met him at all!

As for Bobby, this was the first hug he'd gotten from a female not in his own family in ... he couldn't remember how long. She felt soft under his hands, and the scent of her hair made him almost dizzy. Her pain seeped into him and he welcomed it, imagining his life force was cleansing hers, lightening her burden.

In this position, with him slightly lower than she was, Mindy could look down his back, to his lower legs, stretched out on the floor. She saw the bright red of fresh blood on his right pants leg. Confused, she looked over to where he had been seated, and saw a pool of blood that made the outline of his boot on the floor.

"You're bleeding!" she gasped, pushing him back. His eyes stared into hers. They were hazel, almost golden looking in this light.

"A tree fell on me," he said. "Your daughter used my chain saw and cut it off of me. She probably saved my life."

While this was information that would make any mother proud, Mindy wasn't prepared to hear it. It did not fit any possible scenario she had tried to imagine. All she knew was that Jennifer had gone out, like she always did, and that the next thing she knew the hospital was calling, wanting to do surgery on her back. Then there was The Hermit, who wasn't anything like she would have expected him to be, and now his babble about trees falling and her daughter saving his life! It just didn't make any sense.

But as she stared into those hazel eyes, something clicked inside her. She could almost hear her daddy saying, "It will be all right, Mindy. Stop crying. Everything will be all right." His voice had been magic, back then, when she was a little girl. Her ultimate faith in him was never dashed. He always had made everything all right.

It wasn't that she saw her father in this man's eyes, or heard him in her ears. He just had the feel of competency about him.

"Please ... tell me what happened," she said, her voice suddenly calm.

By the time he finished, Mindy felt much better. Jennifer couldn't be too badly hurt if she'd been able do to all that after it happened. That her daughter had risen to the challenge did not surprise her. Mindy had always had difficulty being independent, and having the confidence to solve problems. It wasn't until Mark had abandoned them, taking all their savings with him, that she'd been desperate enough to do whatever it took to survive. She'd surprised herself. But she'd never been surprised at Jennifer's capabilities. The girl was incredible.

She wasn't happy with Bobby's characterization of Jennifer's actions as "spying." Like most people who live in the forest, they think of all of it as being one big place, and not as plots, like city folk do. She had taught her daughter to leave the forest as she found it, and never waste or destroy any of God's creation.

At the same time, she was quite sure Bobby wasn't mad about Jennifer's trespassing. After all, she had saved his life. He hadn't been quite so glib in telling Mindy what he'd have had to do if it had happened while he was by himself. It all would have come down to whether or not he could clear out the leaves and mulch under his chest with his hands, giving him some breathing room, before he passed out from the pressure. She couldn't imagine trying to dig like that, scraping leaves out from under one's self just to get a little more air into one's lungs. And it would take days to dig out completely.

But she was somehow absolutely sure he'd have tried to do that. She was also pretty sure, somehow, that he would have eventually succeeded.

But he hadn't had to.

Then she asked him to describe Jennifer's injuries.

"They told me her spine was exposed," she said. "How could that be? It should have knocked her out!"

"What I saw was the white of bone down inside one really bad gouge," he said. "But it was only a little bit, and I think it was to the left of the spine. I'm not a doctor, though."

"Well thank you for bringing her here," said Mindy.

"I had to," he said.

"No you didn't. You could have called an ambulance. Most people would have done that instead of going to the effort to bring her themselves."

"She was hurt. She needed help. I had to help her." His logic was as simple as his morals. You helped each other. That was the way it was supposed to be.

A man in green scrubs approached. He looked at the man on his knees in front of the woman the nurse had pointed out as his patient's mother. Nothing had been said about a father. He also saw the bloody foot print, and the soaked pant leg of the man.

"Mrs. Franks?" he asked. "I'm sorry to intrude..."

She looked up and tried to stand. The front of her hips struck Bobby lightly in his face, and he leaned back. His injured right leg wouldn't support the weight and he rolled to fall with a groan on his right shoulder.

"Oh!" yipped Mindy. "I'm so sorry." She leaned down to help him, but he waved her away. He pointed at the doctor, and said "Talk to him."

"Mrs. Franks?" the doctor asked again.

"Miz Franks," she corrected automatically. "How is she?"

"I'm Doctor Zimmerman. It wasn't nearly as bad as we were led to believe. She said a tree fell and part of it hit her. That matches the kind of damage we found. There was one pretty deep excision that bared a section of a rib. That was what took the longest to clean out and suture. She's going to have a scar, I'm afraid. Everything else we were able to clean up and just bandage. Whoever did the first aid on her cleaned most of the wounds up pretty well before she got here."

"Thank goodness," sighed Mindy. "They said she might have spinal damage."

"Nope." He smiled, happy to give good news, for once. "She's going to be sore for a couple of months, and the scar will need some TLC for a while. That will help minimize the damage. I'll see that you get instructions, and order a special ointment for her from the pharmacy. I'm sure we got all the bark and chips and such out of the wound, but I still want to see her in my office in a week, to make sure things still look good."

"Thank you so much!" said Mindy, obviously relieved.

The doctor turned to Bobby.

"Would you, by chance, be the man she called ... The Hermit?"

Bobby winced, but then made his face go calm.

"I suppose so," he said. "I wasn't aware people were calling me that."

"She said you were hurt. I can see she was correct. Why hasn't someone looked at your leg?"

"It's nothing," said Bobby.

"I spent a decade becoming a doctor," said Zimmerman, his voice dry. "How about you let me be one, okay? There's at least a pint of blood on your pants and the floor, not counting what you lost on the way here. And I can see something protruding from the material of your pants leg. It's not bone. Based on what my patient told me, I'm going to take a wild guess and say you have a splinter that needs to be removed. Come with me and I'll get you taken care of."

Bobby resisted. He didn't like hospitals. He'd spent way too much time in them. The only reason he'd stayed at all was because he needed to make sure the girl would be all right. Perhaps, if he hadn't lost so much blood, he would have simply gotten up and walked out. But when Mindy took his arm and insisted they go with the doctor, somehow he couldn't just refuse.

Doctor Zimmerman led them through the double doors that separated the ER from the waiting area. Curtained alcoves held patients with various problems. He took them to the last alcove. Bobby was limping visibly, now.

"Take off your pants. I need to get back to the OR, but I'll get somebody in here to take a look at your leg. Don't leave." He looked at Mindy. "Don't let him leave. Got it?"

She nodded. He was already gone by the time Mindy thought to remind him that The Hermit might not want to take his pants off in front of her.

She was right. He tried to pull his pants leg up, but then winced again.

"It's stuck on something," he said.

The curtain was whisked aside by a new doctor. He had a nurse with him.

"I'm Doctor Foster. I'll be taking a look at your leg." He stared down at the bloodied pants. "Let's get you on the table," he said.

The doctor may be forgiven for assuming that Mindy and Bobby were married. Bobby was five years younger than Mindy, but with his beard it was hard to tell that. And they were in the room together. The normal routine was for the ER admin folks and nurses to screen non-family members out of the process, having them wait in the waiting room. So he just assumed that had been done, and ignored her presence.

Bobby got on the table and lay on his stomach. The doctor approached the leg and bent over. He put the tip of one gloved finger on the thing sticking out of the cloth.

"Doctor Zimmerman said there was a tree involved, but that's all he had time to tell me. How did this happen?"

"I was cutting a tree. It was hollow, and when the saw bit into it, it flexed and the trunk shattered. The whole thing came down on top of me. A girl was there and she rolled it off of me. While she was doing that I felt something stab me down there. But she was hurt too. When the tree fell, the crown fell on her. So I didn't pay that much attention to it because she needed help worse than I did."

While he had been talking, the doctor had taken scissors and cut the pants leg up the middle, from the cuff to the knee. When he laid it aside, Mindy saw two inches of bloody wood sticking out of his leg. The nurse held out her hands. In one was a small metal cup with clear liquid in it. In the other was a stack of four by four gauze pads. Doctor Foster picked up three or four pads at once, dipped them in the liquid, and started cleaning around the splinter.

"What kind of tree?" asked the doctor.

"Who cares?" blurted Mindy. "Just help him!"

"Oak," said Bobby, as if she hadn't spoken.

"Good," said the doctor. "You've got a chunk of wood stuck in you. If it's Oak, it probably won't come apart as I pull it out. But it's going to hurt. You want something for the pain?"

"No. Just do it." Bobby lay his forehead on his folded arms.

"I need to clean you up first. I'll warn you before I pull it."

Bobby made no response. The doctor used more squares of gauze to wipe the calf clean. At one point the nurse asked "What is that?" but all the doctor said was "Old injuries. I need more gauze."

"You used them all," said the nurse.

"Well go get some more then," said the doctor. His words were testy, but his tone of voice was not.

When the nurse left, Mindy could see the scars. It looked like there were hundreds of them, thick, white lines, about an inch long, and maybe an eighth of an inch wide. They dotted and criss-crossed all the skin she could see. It looked like his leg was covered with dead inch worms that had somehow become scars.

"Afghanistan or Iraq?" asked the doctor, swabbing iodine around the wood sticking out of the man's leg.

There was a distinct pause. Then: "Afghanistan," said Bobby's muffled voice.

"Thanks for your service," said the doctor.

"Yeah," said Bobby.

The nurse returned and stood by the doctor again. Despite her desire not to, Mindy moved so she could see what they were doing.

"You ready?" asked Doctor Foster.

"Go for it," came The Hermit's soft voice.

The exposed wood was long enough that the doctor could wrap a rubber glove around it and then grip it with his gloved fingers. He didn't pull it quickly, like taking off a bandage quickly. That's what Mindy expected. Instead, he looked like he was easing it out, moving it in a small circle as he did so. It looked like it must hurt horribly. Bobby's other leg went stiff and his toe kicked the table three times.

"Sorry," said the doctor. "I don't want to leave anything in there. If I do, you'll have to go see Doctor Zimmerman, up in his operating room."

Bobby said nothing, and Mindy watched as what turned out to be a four inch long spear of wood was pulled from his leg. She covered her mouth with her hand, but didn't cry out. The doctor soaked up blood, and then pushed and pulled at the open wound. Mindy wanted to yell at him for torturing his patient, but she bit her tongue. She knew he had to do this.

The nurse came back with a paper-wrapped parcel of gauze squares. The doctor used a third of them to wipe away blood, and then finally pressed several there and taped them down.

"I want to see you in two days," he said.

"I don't have insurance," said Bobby, who wasn't quite panting.

"I don't care," said the doctor. "Just come to my office so I can make sure there's no suppuration. I left the wound open instead of stitching it so it can drain if there's anything still in there. I want to see it in two days. Got that?"

"Yes sir," said the man lying on the table.

The doctor turned to Mindy, still under the impression they were married.

"Make sure he comes to see me."

"I will," she said, and was surprised to find that it felt perfectly normal to take on that responsibility.

When they brought Jennifer out, she was wearing Bobby's red checkered shirt.

"Where did you get that?" asked her mother.

"My shirt was torn up by the tree," said Jennifer, who was quite happy, seeing as how the pain killer they had given her had kicked in. "It was torn down the back, so he gave me a shirt." She pointed past Mindy to The Hermit, who was standing now, and looking a little nervous.

"Thank you," said Mindy, over her shoulder.

"No sweat," he said. His voice had gone soft again, and was hard to hear. "I'm glad you're going to be okay," he said to Jennifer.

"We'll follow you home," said Mindy. Having learned that The Hermit of Scarecrow Valley wasn't at all like the stories she'd heard, she was now curious about where he lived, and what that looked like. "We'll get her shirt and you can have yours back."

"That's not necessary," he said. "She can just keep it. I have more."

"Of course you do," said Mindy. "That's not the point. You were nice enough to loan it to her, and we always repay our debts."

He was still arguing with her when they got to the parking lot, but it did no good. He was used to barking at people to make them leave him alone, but he couldn't bark at this woman.

And that's how Mindy Franks became the first woman in decades to see the inside of the A-frame house owned by Gerald Higginbotham, and lived in by his nephew. Well ... the second woman, come to think of it. Her daughter had beaten her to it. She looked around interestedly while he went to get the shirt, and was drawn to the book shelves. It would have taken hours to scan all the titles, so many were there, but she saw that the various genres were all there. She saw Shelley's Frankenstein and giggled. Her mother had been named after Mary Shelley, and had always joked around, calling Mindy her little monster. As she grew up, Mindy had seen her mother re-read that book at least three times.

She had opened a book by Zane Grey when Bobby returned. In his right hand he held the shirt, ripped and bloody. In his left he held the torn bra. Mindy looked at the shirt, which was obviously ruined, and was horrified at the amount of blood on it. She took the items, wondering why the bra had been taken off. Then she saw the hooks had been ripped out of the fabric.

"She can't wear this," said Mindy. "I'll launder your shirt and bring it back to you."

"Really," he insisted. "That isn't necessary. She can just keep it."

"Nonsense," said Mindy. "This shirt makes it quite clear that she would have been in bad trouble if you hadn't helped her. I wouldn't be able to sleep at night if we took advantage of your kindness."

"If I hadn't been cutting down that tree, she wouldn't have gotten hurt at all!" he argued.

"And if she hadn't trespassed, then you could have done what you liked without having to worry about hurting anybody!" complained Mindy, unaware she had used the very word she had objected to him using at the hospital.

"But if she hadn't trespassed, I'd probably be dead right now," he contended.

"So!" Jennifer's rather too loud voice stopped the bickering pair. "Is this how married people fight?"

Both adults stared at her, and then glanced at each other, then relaxed tense shoulders together. Mindy tried to laugh it off.

"Tell you what. I'll wash the shirt when we get home. You can come over for dinner tonight and get it back."

"I couldn't do that," he objected, thinking about how it had been literally years since he'd eaten in anyone else's presence. He stayed away from people ... he didn't go to dinner at people's houses.

Mindy waved a hand. "I know you're a hermit and all that. And that's fine. But this is different. You already know us. Please ... come to dinner. I promise I won't ask you a bunch of awkward questions or anything. We'll just have a nice, quiet meal and you can get your shirt back. It's the least we can do for you helping Jennifer."

They could see him vacillating, but the fear apparently won out. "Thanks ... but I can't."

Mindy stepped back. "Okay, but I'm going to set an extra place, just in case you change your mind. You're welcome to come. We're having chicken fried steak tonight, and mashed potatoes. I think I still have some ears of corn in the freezer and they need to be used up."

His eyes went unfocused and he sighed. He couldn't remember the last time he'd eaten like that. "It sounds nice," he admitted. Then he realized what was happening and he stiffened. "But I can't. Thanks, but I have too many things to do around here."

"Your choice," said Mindy, admitting defeat. "Let's go, Jenn. You need some rest. You can bring him his shirt back when you're well enough to hike again." She turned back to Bobby. "She can bring you the shirt ... right? You won't shoot her for trespassing or anything ... right?"

He was visibly upset. "I'd never shoot her!"

"Good," said Mindy. "Thank you very much for helping her when she needed it."

"You're welcome," he said, automatically.

For Jennifer, though, mere words weren't enough. She felt like she had a bond with this man, even though she still didn't know his name. She came towards him, a little unsteadily, because the pain medication was making her woozy. He stood, stiffly as she hugged him, sliding her hands between his arms and his chest. He raised his arms, but didn't hug her back. Partly, that was because he didn't want to touch her back. But this was also a different situation than when he had hugged Mindy. Then he had been empathizing with her pain and grief. This was something different. She was offering him affection, and he felt vulnerable, offering himself in a return of that dangerous emotion.

It was even worse when she kissed his furry cheek.

"Thanks," she whispered. "I'm sorry I spied on you."

The last thing Mindy said as she waved goodbye was, "Remember, six o'clock. There will be a place at the table for you."

On the way home Jennifer leaned her head against the window, where it met the door post. Mindy glanced down at the bloody shirt and broken bra on Jennifer's lap. It occurred to her, for the first time, that at the point where Jennifer put the shirt on that she was still wearing, her upper body had been completely bare. Thinking back to the A-frame's design, she could remember no place that could have provided privacy. Even the toilet was exposed.

"Honey?" she said.

"Mmmm?" Jennifer wasn't dozing, but was close to it.

"Where was Mr. Higginbotham when you put his shirt on?"

"Who's Mr. Higginbotham?" asked Jennifer. Her mind was fuzzy enough that she didn't connect the name to "his shirt."

"He's The Hermit," said Mindy, figuring that was the easiest way to answer. It suddenly occurred to her that she didn't know his first name, and she felt guilty for not asking.

"Oh. He put it on me. I couldn't lift my arms because it hurt too bad."

"So he saw you ... naked?"

"No, Mom," said Jennifer, dragging out the name in that way only teenagers specialize in. "I had my pants on!" She said it as if it should have been obvious.

"So he saw your breasts?"

"He said they were pretty," sighed Jennifer.

"He did?" Her mother's voice sounded full of emotion, and it woke Jennifer up enough to clarify. "Well, he said I was pretty, but he was looking at them when he said it."

"Did he ... touch them?"

"No, silly!" scoffed Jennifer. "He only looked at them. He's a nice man. He tries to be mean, but he isn't."

Mindy glanced at the bloody cloth in her daughter's lap. He could have left that on her. He could have called an ambulance. Before she met him, she would have thought him capable of just leaving her injured daughter in the woods, to fend for herself. She was honest with herself about that.

But the man hadn't done that. He'd cared for her, even though he had a spear stuck in his own leg.

Something else occurred to her. "Lean forward, honey," she said to Jennifer. "Don't lean on your back. It will hurt."

Jennifer tried to put her arms on the dashboard, but the seat belt prevented that. She leaned back and said "It's okay. It doesn't hurt."

In that time, though, Mindy got a good look at the back of the shirt. No blood. Mindy wasn't stupid. That was, in fact, one reason her husband had abandoned her and her little girl. She was a lot smarter than he was, and he knew it. And that ate at him. His resentment had eventually acted like a cancer, growing and killing the marriage. When he'd met a waitress who turned out to be the poster girl for dumb blonds everywhere, and it turned out she loved to fuck, he had thrown over his family, cleaned out the bank account, and taken his waitress to Vegas, where he lied and married her, becoming a bigamist. Mindy had never heard from him again, but wasn't the kind of woman to give up or feel sorry for herself.

But because she was intelligent, she imagined the scene, and deduced that the shirt had been put on backwards, its only purpose being to preserve the girl's dignity and modesty. Most men, at least in her opinion, would have left the teen naked out of prurient interest, and claimed they only did so because putting a shirt on would have touched the wound. Mr. Hermit-of-Scarecrow-Valley Higginbotham, however, had not. And that's because he was a true gentleman. And possibly a war hero.

That made her think about those scars on his leg, and how the doctor had somehow known they came from the war in either Iraq or Afghanistan. She'd heard that a lot of vets had trouble adjusting to civilian life, but she hadn't thought much about that.

Now she did.

Once home, Mindy told Jennifer to go to bed and get some sleep. The girl stumbled off in the direction of her bedroom, and Mindy started getting things ready to cook supper.

In her bedroom, Jennifer took The Hermit's shirt off. She bunched it up and pressed it against her nose, inhaling deeply. It didn't smell like him, exactly ... it just smelled different than her clothes. And that was interesting. Still, her mind was fuzzy enough that she just tossed the shirt into the hall, where she knew her mother would find it. Then she undid her jeans and pushed them down. She left them on the floor and, now in only her panties, laid down on the bed. That felt good. It wasn't cold, and it wasn't hot. It was just perfect.

Within a few minutes she was snoring softly.

Mindy did find the shirt and put it in the washer. While she waited for it to be done, she alternated between working on a project and watching the meal. When Mark had left them, she hadn't been working. After he left, though, she got job as a cashier at a local quick mart. The salary wasn't much, but food stamps had helped. She knew she'd need something better than that, so she took some classes online. She didn't get credit for them because she couldn't afford to pay. Still, she learned what was in the curriculum and within a year understood computer programming well enough to become a web developer. Her first account was with a woman who came into the quick mart all the time to get cigarettes. Her name was Florence, and she was a loud, overly made-up woman with flaming red hair that came from a bottle. She ran a mail order business on the web that drop-shipped everything it sold. When she suggested Mindy go to her site and buy something, Mindy did go to the site, but the next time she saw Florence she suggested ten ways the site could be made better. After she did ten hours of work free, Florence hired her to completely revamp the site. Sales had quadrupled, and Mindy had been maintaining the site ever since. She had six other clients now, and they all loved her. She and Jennifer were comfortable, if not wealthy, but what she loved about it the most was that it let her live where she wanted to, and work from home.

She set the table for three. She didn't actually expect him to come, but she was a stubborn woman, and she made a habit of keeping her word.

She was surprised, then, when she saw movement at the sliding glass door that led from the dining room to the back porch, and saw him standing on the other side of the glass. She motioned him in, trying to make things as low key and relaxed as possible. Then she stirred the potatoes, even though they didn't need it, as he entered.

"I'm glad you decided to come," she said. Only then did she look over her shoulder. She realized she was flirting with him, and shook her head mentally. She saw he had Jennifer's bow and quiver in his right hand.

"Thanks for inviting me," he mumbled.

"Where did you get those?" she asked.

"She dropped them in the woods," he said.

"And you went to find them? With a bum leg?" Her voice rose to indicate surprise.

"Exercising a wound helps it heal," he said.

"Well, put them over there," she said pointing to one corner. "The food is ready. I'll start setting things out. You want to go tell Jenn you're here? She crashed when we got home and I haven't heard a peep from her since then. She's probably still sleeping. Her room is the second one on the left, down the hall."

He felt like he was in another world, as he crept down the hallway. He realized he was walking on tiptoes and grimaced. There was nothing to hurt him here, and he didn't need to be worried or careful. He turned and walked into the room, not thinking that there might be a need for privacy. There was little need for privacy in his world.

The pain medication had worked well ... so well in fact, that Jennifer had turned onto her back while she slept. That's how she normally slept, with her arms thrown wide, as if she were welcoming slumber like a long, lost friend. Her modest breasts were mere swells on her chest, and yet they communicated classic female curvature to his eyes. Her nipples were pale and pink, well formed, and perched on areolas the size of a quarter. Her stomach was slightly concave, rising and falling slightly as she breathed. The white cotton panties with little flowers on them somehow seemed to grace her loins, instead of just being worn. Her mound of Venus pushed the cloth upwards, as if advertising that part of her body. It was easy to imagine soft, brown hair under that cloth, and pouting pink pussy lips below that. He had seen such only once, just after boot camp, and before he went to his first unit ... and the war. His girlfriend, Kathy Hoskins, had let him have her virginity as they made wild promises to each other about the future. As is so often the case, things happened so quickly that Bobby couldn't actually remember it any more. He felt like he was still a virgin.

But it turned out Kathy liked losing her virginity. Enough that she didn't want to wait to re-create it until he got home. She was pregnant and married before he had been gone four months.

He stood, riveted to the spot by the graceful beauty of this sleeping girl. To his eyes, she was a vision of innocence, beauty, and femininity. His chest hurt, and his groin tightened. He felt like he might have a panic attack, and did a picture perfect about face. When he got back to the kitchen, he was pale and almost panting.

"What's wrong?" asked Mindy.

"She's sleeping!" he gasped. "I have to go."

Mindy would never be able to explain why her intuition told her to do what she did. She just did it.

"Sit!" she ordered, pointing to a chair. "Breathe! Do not move until you feel better."

"Yes Ma'am," he said, automatically, and pulled the chair out to sit.

Mindy went to her daughter's room, and understood instantly what had happened. She shook Jennifer awake, whereupon the first thing the girl said was "Owwwww."

"Get up, get dressed, and come to supper," said her mother. "You can have a pain pill when you eat."

She made Jennifer sit up, and did not leave until the girl stood. Then she returned to the kitchen. She wasn't sure he'd still be there, and sighed with relief when he was. That made her wonder why she cared, but she pushed that thought away.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I assumed she'd just lie down still dressed. I wouldn't have sent you in there if I'd known."

"I didn't know what to do," he said softly.

"You were a gentleman, just like last time."

"Last time?"

"When you put your shirt on her to cover her nakedness."

"Oh." He sounded nervous. "She told you about that."

"No. I deduced it. There was no blood on the back of your shirt. I assumed you put it on her backwards ... to afford her some modesty."

He was silent, until she had stared at him so long it made him nervous. "Yes," he finally admitted.

"So you are a gentleman."

"No I'm not," he said.

"Because you stared at her? Because you told her she was pretty?"

"She told you that?" He sounded miserable.

"You made her feel good, actually."

"That's not true."

"It is true," she insisted. "My little girl is not overwhelmed with friends at school. She's not busty like the popular girls. She doesn't put out, like the sluts. I assume there are still sluts in high school. There were plenty when I went. Anyway, what I'm saying is that she's lonely, because boys don't pay any attention to her. She has self-image issues."

"That's crazy," he said. "She's beautiful."

"If only men her own age would see that as well," said Mindy.

"I'm sorry." He sounded sorry. "I feel like a pervert."

"Oh, you're not a pervert, Mr. Higginbotham. I'll vouch for that. You, sir, are a gentleman, even if you have not properly introduced yourself, and I still don't know your first name."

His eyes widened. "Robert," he said. "But most people call me Bobby."

"Bobby Higginbotham," she said, trying that name out in her mouth. "Pleased to meet you, Bobby." She stuck her hand out to him.

"How can you say that?" he asked, both of his hands stuck firmly in his pockets. "I ogled your daughter."

"Are you a man?" she asked.

He blinked. "Of course I'm a man."

"Do men like looking at naked women? At women's breasts?"

His eyes darted away.

"Come on," she said. "Tell the truth. I already know anyway."

"Okay," he said, but that's as far as he'd go.

"So you're a normal man ... right?"

"Why are you doing this?" he asked, anguish in his voice.

"Because I don't think you're anything but a nice guy," she said. "You can be a hermit if you want, but I want you to know you have at least two friends, who you can talk to any time you like."

"I don't know if I can do that," he moaned. "People get frustrated around me."

"You mean family," she said.

He didn't speak, but his body language answered for him.

"They knew the old Bobby ... before Afghanistan," she said.

He stiffened.

"Stop that," she said. "I just heard the doctor, that's all. They knew that Bobby, but I've never met him. I don't know what you were like before. I just know what you're like now. I don't have any expectations about you. You helped my daughter. I'm beholden to you for that. You made her feel good by being a man, and I appreciate that too, as odd as you might think that sounds. You hugged me at the hospital, and I suspect that was hard for you. You have a lot to give, and nobody to give it to. This is the Bobby I met ... and I like this Bobby just fine. If I get frustrated with you, I'll just tell you I'm frustrated. You can do the same for me. Deal?"

He looked wary, and again, she wasn't sure he'd stay, but finally he relaxed.

"I'll try," he said.

"Good. Now, dinner is getting cold. She should be dressed by now. Go see if you can light a fire under and get her here."

"Really?" He looked amazed.

"Really!" she barked.

He scurried off. Orders were orders. Even if given by a civilian.

Well ... at least if given by a civilian you liked.

As odd and unexpected as that felt!

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