Exceptional This can only happen to an oddball Traveling Incognito by Senyai Share Your Story contest entry

I had seven days off , unexpectedly given by a boss experiencing misplaced guilt pangs. "Think of me when you’re sitting in some place nice." He peered over his horn rimmed glasses looking overworked and put upon.  He did this once a year in the spring. So I bolted south, to south Texas. After driving 400 miles in that direction, I crunched into a truck stop’s gravel drive and found a parking spot. Gazing through the bugs on my windshield, I peered at the bustling traffic of people gassing up, going in to eat, or to relieve themselves with kids in tow. The baked hot white rock of the parking lot mixed with the aroma of weeds growing in the fields beyond, gave off a nostalgic scent. Inside, deep into the menu of Texas fare, the smell of cigar smoke, oily denim and leather boots wafted past me.  I looked up to a tall man staring down at me.  "Rose?" I searched the broadly smiling features who had a body with an outstretched hand. My mind, an attack dog with an oversized amygdala, went into play.  My eyes scanned my surroundings while trying to place the vaguely familiar face. The brown eyes were searching mine for validation. The sunglasses poking out of his shirt pocket had left slight red imprints on either side of his nose. He looked tired and road weary. Flipping through the cerebral files I settled in the neighborhood of thirty years ago. Then it hit me that this was Ron. Ron, yes it was. It was baby Ron who had had a crush on me for three years before I left for college. He was three years my junior and just a boy down the street.    "Do I know you?" ...But  I did know him. "Ron Henley." He had grown tall. It was so odd seeing this finely built man that used to be a lanky boy.  " Aren’t you Rose Minton? You look just like Rose Minton." His voice carried with it summer memories with fireflies winking in the dark. " No, Rita Johnson." But I smiled up at him and his confusion.  "You’re not Rose Minton?" He looked embarrassingly desperate for a second. "I could have sworn...," he retreated, quite puzzled.  "I’m sorry to have bothered you ma’am." He studied me while quietly backing into a booth several seats away. Taking out his phone he began thumbing through it like he was looking for something. Every now and then, he’d look up from his dinner and stare at me wondering how Rita Johnson had swallowed up Rose Minton over the years. When I got safely inside my Best Western room for the night with the door locked tight, I wondered why I travelled alone anyway. So I could play these crazy games? "Who the hell is Rita Johnson?" My words hung in the hotel air defying the hum of the air conditioner and smell of gently used comforters. I hugged the overly crisp pillow and felt I was somewhere back - way back when life was simple, young and inexperienced. The fireflies danced on the summer air as neighborhood children’s voices rose and fell as each in turn offered wisdom only the young can know... and Ron was there... among the seven, his long legs swinging from his spot on the porch. If he only knew how badly I needed him to always stay fifteen. Drifting off to sleep, I wondered if he’d even understand I had to preserve my memory of all those kids that predate adulthood. They were forever woven into the fabric of my childhood and held me up into the oddball I was today.  "I’m sorry Ron. I need you to stay fifteen for this oddball." ...and Gus, my dear boss, I’m in a nice place now so I’m thinking of you. I fell asleep to the Best Western sign shining behind the dark curtains and imagined a summer night full of fireflies dancing on the air.   Recognized Author Notes The beautiful image of fireflies is royalty free.

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