(Flashback)
Curly: [There are few things in life that a kid can consider sacrosanct as a Saturday. Only a fool would attempt to defile such a hallowed notion. My parents proved themselves such fools on that first weekend in the wake of the whole fire alarm fiasco. As I looked up the stairwell that led into the family attic at 9:15 that morning, I could feel that image getting a big kiss goodbye.]
["Well? You had breakfast!" Snarled Lawrence. "Now quit standing there like a union grave-digger!"]
Curly: [The first half hour was boring. Attics are supposed to be chambers of mystery and enchantment comparable to King Tut's tomb! But other than some old suitcases, season appropriate clothes and assorted holiday decorations, ours wasn't anything to write home about…or so I initially thought.]
["Hello my sweet, what are you?" Curly asked to himself.]
[Obscured by the plastic box of holiday China was the last thing Curly expected either of his prosaic parental units to possess; a paintball rifle. A reverent and ethereal glow seemed to envelope the weapon as Curly reached forth his seemingly unworthy hands toward it. Apart from the red, black, and white camo color pattern and hopper, it almost looked real…too real. But confirming its status as a weapon of leisure was the name and address of a nearby paintball range branded onto the butt]
Pollock's Paintball Park. 44 Cody Street. Hillwood, Washington.
[As he brushed some of the dust off the tank, the boy could hear something sliding around on the inside chamber…something that judging from the sound of the scratching, clearly wasn't a forgotten projectile.]
Curly: [Of all the things I considered Lawrence and Monica, people were never one of them. People with fears, desires, hopes, disappointments. Two individuals that for one reason or another made a pact to stick together in spite of having no idea what comes next, but still doing their best to figure it out-]
"-(Pfftt). WHO AM I KIDDING?"
As the Gammelthorpe lad continued to chuckle like a gassed circus clown, Dr. Bliss tapped her pencil and glanced a couple times at her watch.
"Phew! I needed that. Anyway, inside the hopper was this dinky little key that belonged to a footlocker."
(Flashback)
[Sitting in the far, far rear of the attic, covered in a dusty and moth-gnawed tarp was an imposing black strongbox big enough to fit a fully grown adult into. Of course, a cloud of dust fills the room as Curly dramatically unfurled the covering and unceremoniously threw it off to the side. The word 'Sherb' had been painted onto the lid in white coating, but years of abandon and exposure to the elements took its toll on it. On the front side, beneath the giant lock keeping it impenetrable, was a modest aluminum name plate bearing the name Wanda H. Sherb followed by a year of birth and death.]
CCCCRRREEEEEAAAAAAAKKKKKKK!
Curly: [At first, I could feel the disappointment set in again, then confusion. Other than an old camera and some undeveloped film cannisters, the crate was crammed with books. Books? What could be so damaging about them? But as the old saying goes, never judge one by its cover; and in that spirit, I grabbed one at random and begun to inquisitively thumb through the pages until I saw an image that would change the way I looked at every relationship I ever had or was yet to begin.]
[The picture floated gently onto the attic floor. The image it bore shook Curly as he flipped it over again and again to make sure he was seeing what he was seeing. Sitting in the library
of a nondescript college campus was a very lean and bookish young man surrounded by a stack of primers and notepads; completely oblivious to the fact that he was the subject of a photograph. If the genetic connection wasn't strong enough to confirm Curly's assumption as to who the man was, the accompanying journal entry made it crystal clear.]
["March 30, 1982." Curly reads aloud. "Mama warned me about boys like Lawrence Gammelthorpe when I left for the University of Puget Sound last fall …I'm hoping she's right."]