Otherworld
interview the star of the theater department’s latest play. Her name was Molly, and she was beautiful. She had the most glorious hair he had ever seen, long and wavy hair of amber that caressed her shoulders, and she had blue eyes he could only describe as beguiling. A clunky camcorder on a tripod recorded the interview. He didn’t want to miss anything. He wanted to see every wonderful blink and every word formed by her red lips.
    He kept the videotape and played it back over and over in his dorm room just to hear her voice. He asked her out on a date, and she accepted his invitation. They went out for Italian food and caught a movie at the local multiplex. At the end of the evening, he knew he was in love, and he hoped she was too.
    Four years after their first date, they married and began a new life in Houston. They loved each other very much, but as the years progressed, their relationship underwent times of stress. They always worked it out, though.
    They spent thirteen years working it out, but the solutions came to a halt without warning. And now Mike Walsh recovered from his all-night meeting with the Spotlight Magazine staff by lying in bed, under attack from the memories.
    The contents of that tape replayed in his dreams, and then the scene dissolved to another. He saw Molly walking out the door of their home, suitcase in hand, over and over and over again. Then he was running frantically from Gary Newsome, who was firing his BB gun at him. Each bullet found its target. And then he would tear into his house, scamper down the long hallway, and open the door to his bedroom, only to find himself standing in the mud by the river. The body drifted slowly to the shore.
    Here was a man who learned a brutal lesson as a young boy. The impermanence of life. A man who sought the love of a woman who was gone. A man who faced a life of loss. Of pain. A life of staring down the deep, deep hole …
    I’ve lost everything.
    â€¦ that lay in his soul.
    Â 
    June 29, 1995. Two long buses pulled into the First Church parking lot, screeched to a halt, and opened their doors to spew a hundred or so road-weary teenagers onto the hot asphalt in Drury, Louisiana. All were tired and hungry and very eager to go home, shower, and go to bed forever. All, that is, but one. A nineteen-year-old boy, hair and eyes chocolate brown, emerged refreshed. He, like the others, had been awake for close to twenty-four hours, but unlike the others, he loved every minute of it. He was the only teenager smiling.
    His parents stood waiting for him by their wood-paneled station wagon. He ran to them hurriedly.
    â€œDid you have a good time?” his mother asked, as if it wasn’t evident already.
    The words good time didn’t exactly describe it.
    â€œWell, let’s get on home, and you can tell us all about it.”
    They gathered his bags and put them in the rear seat—the one that faced backward. The “back-back,” as they liked to call it. The boy’s mouth ran the entire trip home and for quite a while once they arrived.
    â€œI’m just glad you all came home before your birthday. I hated the thought of you spending it over there,” his mother said.
    â€œIt would have been fine by me,” Steven Woodbridge responded. “I could have stayed another whole week.” He changed his mind. “Another whole month,” he said, but something inside corrected even that, saying, My whole life!
    â€œWell, your dad and I are glad you’re back, and we have a surprise for you.”
    Surprise. They had a party scheduled for him that same night, but he had been tipped off weeks ago by a friend who “just couldn’t keep a secret.” When evening came, they drove to the Drury West Community Center. The marquee read, HAPPY 19TH BIRTHDAY, STEVEN! and had balloons and streamers tied to it. All of his friends from school, work, and church were there, as well as the friends of his parents.

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