Stan rubbed the back of his neck with his hand. "Uh—well, Ford an' I were lookin' for you, and—and—"
Ford continued to look at his brother pointedly.
Stan sighed. "I was upstairs—your bedroom door was open—and—and so was that trunk of yours…"
Fiddleford blinked slowly. "Y' looked at what was inside. "
Stan gulped. "Yeah. I'm sorry—I—I shouldn't 'a' been lookin' through your stuff…."
Fiddleford closed his eyes, and Stan gulped. Aw, man, if I've hurt the little guy's feelings, Ford'll kill me.
After a moment, the twins' small companion opened his eyes and looked straight into Stan's. "Well, I s'pose I should've told y'all about that stuff a long time ago—I just—never really had the courage. It's all right, Stan, I'm glad you looked. "
Stan blinked. He was relieved, but surprised as well.
"You—you were in a children's home of some sort?" Ford ventured to ask.
The look in Fiddleford's eyes made the twins think that his mind was somewhere far away. After a few moments he said, "An—an orphanage, actually. My mother—my mother died soon after havin' me and my father—my father went 'n' shot himself soon after that. "
Both Stan and Ford drew sharp breaths.
"Aw, kid, I'm sorry. "Stan said. Ford placed a hand on his younger friend's shoulder.
Fiddleford just shook his head, his eyes still indicating that he was in that far-off place in his mind. "I—used to have a newspaper clipping about how my father shot himself, but—it got lost over the years. That orphanage was the only home I knew for most of my life.
"I was—well, I was little, so the older boys pushed me around quite a bit. I would hide from them wherever I could, an' when I was alone, I would—well, I would make things out of whatever I could get my hands on. "
Ford grinned. That last statement did not surprise him in the least.
Fiddleford continued. "When I got a little older, I found myself fixin' things around the orphanage—an'—sometimes usin' spare parts to build other things."
The look in his eye still far away, he smiled. "I can remember making a lot of toys out of metal scraps and things that the kids younger than me would play with. It was nice to see them enjoyin' them. "
He drew a deep breath and sighed. "When I was fifteen, I left the orphanage. After a month or two on my own, I became apprentice to a welder. At first I would just get things for him when he told me to, but one day he went out to do somethin', and I saw that he had a project that wasn't finished. I'd watched him work enough that I figured I could do things the way he did, so I finished the project for him. "
Stan noted that his brother blinked, but smiled.
"When the gentleman came back, he was at first angry that I had messed with his things, an' told me to get out. I was packin' to leave when he came in and apologized—he said he—"
Fiddleford went red. Stan and Ford looked at each other, both having the suspicion that, as usual, Fiddleford didn't want to "brag on himself" as he would have put it.
"He liked your work, didn't he?" Ford asked gently.
As he often did when he was embarrassed, their small friend bit his lower lip and nodded quickly. "He—he did, yes. He said—he said that I was—a—a weldin' genius, and that he'd never seen such intricate work. "
Ford's smile went wider and he said aloud, "That doesn't surprise me at all. "
Fiddleford's face turned an even darker shade of red, and Stan thought,
If the kid blushes any harder, his head might pop.
"There was a homeless gentleman who used to lollygag around the shop sometimes—when there wasn't much to do I would make him food an' listen to him play. "the youngest of the three men continued, looking down at the banjo in his lap and smiling fondly. "He's th' one who taught me how. "
Ford felt a sense of awe wash over him. Fiddleford is so young—but what a life he's led already.
"When I was almost seventeen, both the welder and the old homeless man died—within months of each other. Well, I was caught with my pants down when I found out that that ol' welder had left everything to me, him havin' no children and all. Another homeless gentleman brought this to me—" Fiddleford indicated the banjo—"—and told me that th' man who'd taught me to play wanted me to have it. "