Chapter 1

April, 1970

Bobby surveyed the back door of the Harris residence, and frowned at the long stretches of rotten wood in the jamb and lower quarter. The whole thing would have to be replaced, frame and all. He’d have to use Mamma’s pickup truck, or get the lumber yard to deliver all the pieces. He’d never had to buy anything he couldn’t carry away with him and, despite being twenty-one years old, and a master repairman, there were still things he was unfamiliar with. The policies of the lumber yard were among them.

“What do you think?” asked the woman standing beside him.

He turned to Prudence. The blackness of her hair and the dark clothing she habitually wore made her skin look almost luminescent white. She didn’t get out much, at least not out in the sun. She was a teller at the bank, and when she wasn’t at work, she stayed close to home. As far as he knew, Bobby was convinced she didn’t socialize with anybody, male or female.

That was a shame, he decided, as he looked at her. Her black hair was up in a bun. It had always been, any time he’d ever seen her. Her husband had died when Bobby was just a boy, but she still favored dark clothing that gave the impression she was still in mourning. Even her stay-at-home comfortable clothing, which Bobby assumed the dark gray sweat shirt and sweat pants she was wearing were, seemed somber. The only thing that relieved her strained, sober appearance were eyes that were so startlingly blue that they looked completely out of place in her face. It was like looking at his own eyes in the mirror.

Bobby had never seen her smile. Even when she thanked him and paid him for fixing her gate and painting her fence, her face had been almost stern.

“I think that it would be a very good thing if the lumber yard delivers,” said Bobby, smiling himself. Her almost sad visage practically required that he smile for both of them. “Once I have the materials, it shouldn’t take but half a day to install.”

“Well, then,” said Prudence. “I’ll take you down there and we’ll get things moving.”

Bobby still didn’t own a car. He was working for various people, saving up for one. The farm took all the proceeds it produced. His mother had done a wonderful job raising eight children without a husband, for all practical purposes, and he wasn’t about to cause a bump in the road by diverting family funds for something that was, as far as Bobby was concerned, a luxury. Mamma had an old truck. It worked well, thanks to him, but it was old, and didn’t need the extra miles that would be put on it if he or his sisters gadded about in it. Bobby, despite being a man, still got around on his trusty old bicycle.

They rode with the windows down. Prudence had a fairly new Chevy Malibu, and it had a motor in it that would have appealed to a young man when it was new in 1966. She didn’t hotrod it, though, driving sedately. Everything Prudence did was calm. She wasn’t much of a talker, either, so Bobby just watched her drive, when he wasn’t looking out the window.

An errant breeze pressed the cloth of her sweat shirt against her body, and Bobby realized she was in better shape than he’d thought. Largish breasts rode high on her chest, and there was no bulge below that, to indicate extra fat. He’d never been to the bank, or seen her dressed for work, and everything she wore at home was baggy and comfortable.

Fortunately, the lumber yard did deliver, and all the arrangements were made.

“I should have had you look at the downspout before we went,” said Prudence, as she drove them back to her house. “There might be something you need to fix it where we just were!”

“It’s a small thing,” said Bobby.

“I hate to waste your time,” said the woman.

“You’re not wasting my time,” said Bobby. “I like making new friends.”

She stared straight ahead. “I’d think you’d prefer making younger friends.”

“Why?” he asked. “Everybody is interesting. It doesn’t matter how old or young they are. I guess I just like people.”

“There’s nothing interesting about me,” she said softly.

“Ah,” said Bobby. “That’s where you’re wrong. I know there are lots of things about you that are interesting.”

She snorted. “How could you know that?”

“You had to come from somewhere. You grew up and did things ... saw things. You’ve lived at least thirty years, based on your appearance, and at least one interesting thing happened to you each of those years.”

“You think I’m only thirty?” she asked, expression pulling her brow in to lines. “Are you trying to flirt with me, young man?”

Bobby laughed. “No ... not unless you want me to. I guess I’m not all that good at guessing ages. Ages don’t make that much difference to me, so I don’t pay that much attention to them.”

Prudence turned her head, and looked directly at him. “Why would I want you to flirt with me?”

Bobby looked right back at her. “You’re a woman. Don’t all women like to be flirted with?”

“Some women,” she said, peering intently at him. “Others know how destructive it can be.”

“Destructive?” Bobby looked confused. “How could a little harmless flirting be destructive?”

“You have no idea,” said Prudence. She looked ahead, wishing she hadn’t said anything. She had flirted with her brother-in-law at a family picnic. She’d thought it was harmless, like Bobby had characterized flirting. But her husband had gone into a jealous rage, and raced off in the car. He’d never come back. The car, with him still in it, was found wrapped around a tree. The police estimated it had been going almost a hundred miles an hour when it left the road, on an unmarked curve. Prudence had held herself responsible, both then, and ever since. There wasn’t a day she woke up in an empty bed, that she didn’t remember how her flirting had killed her husband.

Once back home, she showed him the downspout, which had only come loose, up where the gutter was. He climbed her ladder and put a new screw in it, from a jar of them he carried in his tool bag.

“You make that look so easy,” Prudence commented.

“It is easy,” he said. “You could have done it.”

“Nonsense,” said the woman. “Women don’t fix things.”

“Please don’t tell my Mamma that,” said Bobby, grinning. “If she didn’t fix half the things that go wrong on our farm, I’d never get away. My sisters fix things too. I’m even teaching Mary - she’s my oldest sister - how to rebuild the motor on the lawnmower.”

“Surely, you’re teasing me,” said Prudence, actual surprise on her face.

“Why on Earth would I tease you?” asked Bobby. He had been folding up the ladder, but unfolded it again. “Here,” he said. “Take this screwdriver and climb up there.”

“I couldn’t do that,” demurred Prudence.

“Come on,” said Bobby, reaching out to grasp her elbow, and exerting force to move her a step closer to the ladder. “I’m going to prove it to you.”

“This is silly!” said Prudence, looking up at the gutter.

“Climb up there, and I’ll tell you what to do.”

“You’ve already fixed it,” said the woman.

“You’re going to break it again, and fix it yourself,” said Bobby.

“This is ridiculous!” she insisted.

“You get on up there, or I’ll start flirting with you again,” said Bobby, having no idea how negatively that might be received.

It wasn’t received negatively ... at least not in terms of making her feel guilty again. It had been, in fact, over a decade since any man had paid more than ten minutes attention to Prudence Harris. That was because most men saw immediately that she was not interested in being paid attention to. Her appearance raised a very effective barrier to friendly overtures. But Bobby had passed that ten minute point, and Bobby was just being ... Bobby. Prudence put her foot on the bottom rung of the ladder, because, in truth, a man had told her to.

“I’ll fall,” she said, testing the ladder with her weight.

“I’ll hold the ladder. You won’t fall. Go on ... climb.”

She did, feeling something that she hadn’t felt in a long time ... excitement. This, little as it was, was something different than she usually did. If she needed to change a light bulb, she just climbed on a chair. Ladders were for men. Yet, here she was, actually climbing one. She looked down, and Bobby was braced, both hands on the ladder, which trembled a little, because Prudence’s knees were trembling a little.

“Now,” said Bobby, when she was high enough. “The screw I put in has a slot on it. The tip of the screwdriver will fit that slot. Put it in there, and turn it counter clockwise.”

She did, and found that the tip of the screwdriver seemed to slip out of that slot a lot. She had to push toward the screw, and then it moved.

“It’s moving!” she said, her voice higher than normal.

“Keep going,” said Bobby. “As it starts to come out, grab it with your fingers, so it won’t drop on the ground.”

She didn’t judge it well, and the screw suddenly leaned, and popped out. The down spout fell three inches, to where it had been before Bobby had fixed it.

“I lost the screw,” she said, petulantly.

“I have more,” said Bobby.

She looked down and her heart lurched as she saw he’d left the ladder, and was bending over his tool bag.

“You’re not holding the ladder!” she said, breathlessly.

“You’re fine,” he said, not looking up. “Just stand still.”

He stood up and handed her a screw. Then he went to the downspout and pushed up on it until it slid over the projection on the gutter.

“Tell me when the holes for the screw are lined up,” he said.

Prudence looked, and saw the outer hole slide by the inner one. She told him about that, and he moved it back.

“Stop!” she yelped.

“Now, thread the screw in with your fingers. Remember, clockwise, this time.”

She did, and the screw went in easily.

“Now, tighten it with the screwdriver,” he said.

She did, until the screwdriver slipped out of the slot again.

“Come on down,” said Bobby. “You just fixed your first downspout!”

Prudence, who could give a math teacher a run for her money, came down the ladder feeling a lightness she hadn’t experienced in years.

“I did it!” she said. “I really did it!”

“Yes, Ma’am, you did,” said Bobby, grinning. “You’re an honest to goodness tool-using woman.”

She looked at him, and saw him staring at her face.

“You should smile more often,” he said. “You have a beautiful smile.”

Prudence realized she was smiling. She hadn’t done that in a long time either.

It was bound to happen. Mary had extended her “kissing lessons”, as she called them, beyond bedtime kisses, which had turned into bedtime mutual masturbation, if the truth be known. What had started with kisses, a year and a half ago, had eventually turned into half hour or hour sessions of petting. She was, to be honest, a little worried about their “bedtime kisses”. She’d been feeling the urge to do things with Bobby that sisters don’t do with their brothers. She didn’t count the kissing and mutual masturbation, which she had somehow rationalized as “lessons”, in her mind.

She went on dates, and used what Bobby had taught her, and now she was pretty serious with one boy, named Fred Brogan. She had spent hours kissing Fred, who was beginning to affect her almost as much as Bobby did when he kissed her. She had let Fred slide his hands all over her breasts too, both outside and inside her clothing. But she had never let him touch her anywhere else ... like Bobby routinely touched her ... after those dates. Bobby never put a finger in her. He’d started to one time, at which point her maidenhead had complained, and he’d never done it again since then.

That was the problem. Mary had the strangest urge that seemed to want something inside her, down there. She just knew it would feel wonderful. She knew girls who admitted they had sex, and they all claimed it was wonderful. She couldn’t figure out how to proceed, or even whether to proceed, or not. She avoided making that decision by letting only Bobby touch her down there, because, when she was with him, she was sure that nothing else would happen. She also delighted in long kisses, exchanged in the chicken coop, or barn, while she helped Bobby with some chore.

Bobby didn’t really mind. The only woman he was currently making love with was Sherry Winston, who had had his daughter, Jessica. She was breast feeding Jessica and her husband, Sam, had gone on some longer trips lately, to make up for the time he had spent at home while she gave birth to the child he thought was his, and his wife recovered from the ordeal. Anyone who looked at Jessica, though, if Bobby was standing nearby, would instantly see the resemblance. Her hair was light, but her facial features resembled him.

Sherry entertained him ... and herself ... about once a week, but what had been hours long lovemaking sessions were no more. Jessica slept, but not for more than an hour or two, usually. Bobby had to satisfy Sherry during those times. Then, when Jessica woke up, usually hungry, she fed her ... and Bobby ... both breasts spurting milk that both hungry humans delighted in sucking up and swallowing.

Still, it was only once a week, usually, so Bobby didn’t mind at all when Mary wanted a long, tongue-swapping kiss in the chicken coop.

What was inevitable, was that sooner or later, one of his sisters would walk in on them.

That sister happened to be Beverly, who was, at the time she walked in on them kissing, sixteen years old.

“What on Earth are you doing?!“ was the first indication to Bobby and Mary that they weren’t alone.

Mary blanched, and pulled back. She was a senior in high school, but she wasn’t prepared to defend her actions.

“Kissing,” said Bobby, completely calm. “What did it look like we were doing?”

“Kissing?” asked Bev, her eyes wide. “Why?”

“Mary told me she likes Fred a lot,” said Bobby easily. “I was giving her a few pointers on how to kiss him.”

Bev turned to her older sister, her mouth open. “You haven’t even kissed him yet?!”

She took Mary’s extreme embarrassment for an answer to her question, instead of the mortification of being caught with her tongue in her brother’s mouth.

“You haven’t?“ squealed Bev.

“Of course I have!” blurted Mary, suddenly feeling ten years old. “Just not like that, yet.”

“You’ve been dating him for six months!“ yelped Bev, who had entered puberty about the same time the U.S.A had entered the sexual revolution, and saw things a lot differently than her older sister.

Mary reverted to big sister mode, mostly because she didn’t know what else to do.

“If you tell anybody about this, I’ll tan your hide!” she yelped.

“You can’t tan my hide anymore!” said Bev, sticking her chin out. “I’m too old for that!”

“You’d better not tell!” squealed Mary.

“I’ll tell if I want to!” shouted Beverly. “In fact, I’m gonna go tell Mamma right now!“ she squealed, grinning.

She turned, but hadn’t counted on her big brother’s strength or speed. She was suddenly grasped around her waist, and lifted, kicking and squealing, off the ground. She watched the world spin, confused, as he lifted her upwards, and then twisted her. Her breath whooshed out of her as her stomach hit his shoulder, and she was suddenly suspended, draped over his shoulder like a sack of seed.

The chicken coop was too small and confined for what Bobby wanted, so he carried Beverly, who was trying to get her breath back, and was kicking feebly, twenty feet to the barn, where there was a hay bale sitting on the ground. Bobby sat down, manhandling his sister until she was draped over his lap, instead of his shoulder.

“I’m big enough to paddle you,” he growled, and he brought his hand down on her jeans-clad butt with a crack.

The breath she’d just gotten, to scream with, came out in an agonized, “OwwwBobeeeee“.

“Don’t hurt her!“ yelled Mary.

“I’m not hurting her,” said Bobby, giving the other side of her butt a slap that was just as hard as the first one.

“Owww!“ wailed Beverly. “Stop Bobbeeeee!“

“Will you behave?” he asked, grabbing her waist as she struggled.

“Okay, okay!” she cried.

Bobby knew better than to trust her, though, and as soon as she struggled up, he pulled her down on his lap.