Five weeks later
February, 1980

 

 

Fred called me last night and asked me if he could come over this afternoon around 1:00. I thought I detected a note of sadness in his voice, and I asked him if everything was alright. He said yes, but that he just wanted to see me. Of course, I said yes, but after we hung up the phone, a twinge of uneasiness went through me. I didn’t like the way he sounded.

 

 

I saw him arrive on his bike (we were in the middle of a thaw), and greeted him at the door before he even rang the doorbell. I reached up and gave him an awkward hug because my left arm was still in the cast.

“Just one more week ‘til I get this stupid cast off and we can give each other a proper hug.”

“Yeah, that’s great,” he said without much enthusiasm. I could tell immediately that something was off.

“What’s wrong, Fred?”

He took my hand then and led us into the living room where we sat down on the sofa. He turned to face me and said, “I’ve g-got something to tell you that I know you aren’t going to like, and I wish it wasn’t true, but I’m going to be moving in three weeks to Seattle, Washington.”

My mouth dropped open when he said this, and I muttered a quiet, “Oh, no.” Tears started forming in my eyes.

“Yeah, my dad just got a promotion at work, and they want him to head up a new branch in Washington State starting in three weeks.” He started choking up as he said this. He took both my hands in his and we just sat there looking at each other, trying to hold back the tears.

“Will I ever get to see you again?” I asked, my voice trembling. “Seattle is so far away.”

“I don’t know. I hope so. Abby, I don’t want to go. I want to stay here where you are, but I don’t have any say in the matter.”

“I guess you’ve got to go where your family goes. I’m just going to miss you so much,” I said as the tears came streaming down now.

We agreed that we’d write each other letters to try to stay in touch, but I knew letters would be a poor substitute.

“I’ve got something I want to give you before I leave,” he said, “But it won’t be ready for at least a couple of weeks.”

I’m going to make something special for him too, I thought.

He put his arm around me, and we just sat there for a while not saying anything.

It would have been nice to go ice skating again, but the ice on the mill pond was too thin to skate on now due to the thaw, and I still had my cast on, so we decided to take a long walk together instead. We walked into town and had some Cokes and French fries at the diner and listened to some records on the jukebox. Then it was time to go home.

Back at my house we kissed goodbye, and he told me he’d see me at school on Monday. I know he was as sad as I was right then. He got on his bike and pedaled home.

 

Three weeks later
March, 1980

 

My cast came off a couple of weeks ago, and I’m happy about that but still really down. Today was Fred’s last full day in Butler, and he would be leaving in the morning from Pittsburgh on a flight out to Seattle. He came over this afternoon to say goodbye. Mom and Dad were there when he came in, and we all sat down in the living room to talk about the coming move.

He had walked in carrying a roll of something wrapped in brown paper under his arm, and he gave that to me when the conversation died down. I took off the brown paper and carefully unrolled the paper beneath.

It was a pen and ink drawing of me performing “Scheherazade” at the exhibition in December. You could just see a little of him in the foreground, but I mostly filled the frame. I was bent forward, and my arms were stretched out straight from my sides as my right leg was raised high in the air following a flying camel spin. It was an exquisite picture of me, captured just at the perfect moment. He had colored it with water colors.

I had seen his work plenty of times before, but nothing compared to this. He had put his heart and soul into it, and it brought tears to my eyes.

“I love it, Fred.” I couldn’t say much more than that without completely breaking down right then.

“I drew it from a picture my dad had taken during our performance.”

Mom reached for the picture right then, and she and Dad studied it closely.

“This is very elegant, Fred. You captured the moment perfectly,” she said. “You’re a very talented artist.”

“Thank you, Mrs. St. Claire.”

I then gave Fred a present that I had made for him. It was a mahogany box, stained dark, with his initials on the hinged lid in gold leaf. It was perfectly smooth, and there were no nail holes in sight. It had a felt interior.

“You can keep my letters to you in there if you’d like, although you might run out of room because I intend to write you a lot.”

“I love this, Abby.” He ran his hands all over the smooth surface and traced his initials with his index finger. “The craftsmanship is beautiful. Thank you so much. I will treasure this forever.”

We talked for a while more, and then Mom and Dad got up to leave.

“You’ve been a great friend to Abby and our whole family, Fred,” said Mom as she pulled him in for a hug. “We will surely miss you.”

Dad gave him a hug too and wished him well.

“Thanks, Mr. and Mrs. St. Claire. You’ve been so nice to me, and I’ll miss you too.”

They left then and Fred sat down next to me again on the sofa and put his arm around me. I snuggled in close. We began reminiscing about the wonderful times we had spent together—about how we had met, and began skating together, and those awful girls the way they teased us, and how Fred had put an end to that.

Eventually we ran out of words and just sat snuggled up together for a while without talking. We both had tears in our eyes. Then he said it was time for him to go. I lifted my face up, and we kissed before he stood up and faced me for the last time.

“Goodbye for now, Abby. Hopefully not forever.”

“Bye, Fred. I’ll write to you soon,” I said as my voice cracked. I couldn’t say any more and just hugged him one last time.

Outside, he got on his bike and waved to me as he passed by the big picture window in front. As the tears flowed down, I waved back at him, and just like that, he was gone.