I'd like to say things got better for poor Jesse after that but they didn't. He finally got a letter from Theresa telling him to stop writing. She needed to think about things. She needed to concentrate on what she was learning. She couldn't deal with him or what they'd done or anything else right then.

I don't think I'd seen a soul look sadder than poor Jesse did after that letter came. I tried to talk to him but not much I could say would help him.

When it was time for Theresa to come home, I offered to go and pick her up. There was a lot to be done with getting the garage rebuilt so I think Lou was grateful. Though I think she was surprised Jesse didn't offer. He was scared to. I understood.

I was standing waiting for her when she got off the bus. She didn't look happy to see me which kind of hurt. But I guess I understood that too. I ambled over and grabbed her suitcase.

"Where's Lou?" she asked.

"Trying to help Al get the garage put back together and studying her brains out," I answered as I led the way to my car. "Used to be you weren't nearly this disappointed to see me."

"I just don't need it right now, okay?"

She flopped into the passenger seat and slammed the door for emphasis. I put her suitcase in the trunk and got in. I let her have her quiet for a block or two.

"It's not okay," I told her at last. "You being upset and closing off from everyone is not okay and you do need someone to get into this with you. I know you'd rather it be someone else but me. It ain't like there ain't others who'd listen to you. Joanie, Sherry…your sister."

"I can't possibly talk to her about this! I'm fifteen but I might as well be ten for how she treats me. There's no way she'd understand what I did."

"Do you even understand what you did?" I asked her.

"I feel stupid enough," she snapped. "I don't need the lecture."

"I ain't lecturing," I told her. "You made a choice. What I think about that choice ain't what's important. What you think about it is very important."

"I don't know what I think."

I let her be for a minute or two.

"I gotta ask something," I said at last. I didn't want to ask this. I wish I hadn't had to but, well, sometimes we all got to do what we don't want to. "I got one side of the story and I need to know it was what really went down."

"You think he was lying about us having sex?"

"No," I said. "I can tell by how you're acting and even how he was that you two did what you did. And I ain't saying he's lying about anything but he was awful nervous to talk to me and he went on a while about how hard he worked to make sure this was what you wanted and that he wasn't pressuring you none…"

"Oh that," she said. "He didn't lie about that either. I thought I was ready. I thought it would be beautiful and special. He was good to me. I don't want you to think he wasn't. He's sweet and I know he really cares for me. Just…it wasn't how I thought it would be. I can't believe I'm talking to you about this!"

"We ain't ever had secrets, Theresa. This isn't the conversation I ever wanted to have with you but you need to have someone to talk to. I am a trained professional."

She laughed a little at me then.

"I don't know what it's like being the girl in that but I can tell you the first time ain't ever what you think it's going to be."

"I just…he's so hurt sometimes. Everything he went through. The things his mom let happen to him. I wanted him to know someone loved him. I wanted…I can't even explain. Instead I just felt…weird."

"I tell you what," I said after thinking about things for a little bit. "How about after we stop by to see your sister, you come on over to the house with me? After supper, I'll take off and go for a ride and you can talk to Joanie about things. I know she had some weird and scary feelings after…well, after…you know."

"Were you her first?"

I nodded.

"Wow…and you want me to talk to her? You aren't afraid I'd learn too much about you?"

There was that mischievous glint in her eye she'd obviously gotten from her big sister. Somehow, I'd managed to make the kid feel a little better.

"You're a brat sometimes, you know that?"

I tried for annoyed but she was giggling and it felt good to hear it. I hoped talking to Joanie would put things to rights with her so she could put things to rights with Jesse. I didn't know if they was destined to be or anything like that. But she needed to talk to him and let him have some resolution.

"So how was camp?" I asked her trying to move on to lighter fare.

"Oh my God!" she began and then went gushing on and on about the other kids and all she'd learned and the food and anything else that crossed her excitable fifteen year old brain.

Well, things didn't quite go back to normal with Jesse and Theresa. I think Theresa felt better for talking to Joanie and she talked things through with Jesse. He came to me not too long after she got home and school started up again.

"Jimmy," he said catching me on the porch one Sunday. I'd been chatting with the other guys while the women made over Cody and Sherry's baby. The other men went in to watch the game and I was just about to do the same but I stopped when I saw Jesse's face. I gestured for him to take a seat and settled myself again.

It took a few minutes for him to seem to figure out how to say what he wanted to say. Finally it came out.

"It was a mistake," he said at last. "What happened between me and Theresa shouldn't have…I mean, we shouldn't have…"

I nodded.

"She's okay now and I don't think she's mad at me. But you were right when you tried to tell me about being responsible and taking extra care with her. I let myself forget…we're slowing things way down. I think she was worried that since we'd done it once that I'd expect it all the time or something but that's not what she wants. It's okay though. I just like being with her. I like listening to her talk and smelling her hair. I sound stupid, don't I?"

"No, you sound like a man who loves a woman."

"I just feel bad, guilty, I guess. Her first time messed her all up and she won't get another first time."

"She'll be okay, Jesse. She'll be just fine. Are you okay?"

"I think so."

"Want to go in and watch the game?"

He smiled and I could see the hopeful relief in those big blue eyes of his.

"Sounds good."

Well, things moved on. School started, like I said before. I went back to my usual crowd of ruffians and misfits. I say that but don't think for a minute that I didn't care about each and every one of them.

Joanie was still sorting through the mess the riots left with her dad and uncles. I didn't see much of her and by the time she got home, she was tuckered out. She'd come in and I'd fix her a plate and then she'd stare at some paperwork for a while before heading up to bed.

I pulled her away from her paperwork a time or two. Enough I guess because by the end of September, she was pregnant again. I was happy and I know she was. Or she was relieved which is pretty damned close to happy.

I worried, of course, that she was working too hard but she just said she had to and she was fine. And before the month was out, we all had something else to distract us anyway.

Seems while Billy and Sherry were enjoying their first weeks as parents, the network was enjoying something else. That something was the ratings and reviews of his broadcast from the day Noah died. It was a day the rest of us, Billy most of all, wanted to forget. But we never would be able to.

Billy got the call when the little guy was just a couple weeks old. It was the call he'd always been waiting for. He never wanted it to come like this though. That report went national. It was just too good not to. How he kept his voice steady while he stood in front of a screen showing one of his best friends dying in his arms. Why, Walter Cronkite himself couldn't have kept such professionalism.

That professionalism came at a cost though. He spoke just that once, on air, about the death without wavering. But he never could again. Any mention of how Noah died and you could see those baby blues of his start swimming and his voice would get unsteady.

Well, any chance of Billy getting over Noah's death or how it came about was gone when he got the call from the network. They wanted to give him a job. It was a great offer but he had a hard time taking it.

"I don't see how I can turn it down, Jimmy," he said to me one day in my office. He'd come all that way for lunch one day just to talk this over. That right there told me how much it was bothering him.

"Billy, you can do what you want."

"I'm a family man, I have a wife and a son now…how can I pass up this chance to support them?"

"Your wife ain't helpless," I pointed out. "As I recall, she's a doctor. Sherry's a good woman. She won't want you going against your conscience. Of course, Noah loved you like a brother and if he thought you were letting his memory limit you, he might come back from the grave to kick your ass."

"I can't shake the feeling that I'm getting my big break by leaving footprints on his corpse."

"It ain't like that, Billy," I argued. "There's plenty of blame to go around for Noah's death. We can blame anyone from the National Guard for shooting first and asking questions later, to Rosemary for being Rosemary to the police for raiding that Blind Pig that night…to Noah himself for being a stubborn and proud fool. But you are blameless. I can't say for sure what Noah would want but I like to think I got to know the man pretty well. I can't see him wanting you to turn away something good that could come from his death."

"I'll always know that's how I got the job," he said softly and his voice was so haunted, it broke my heart. I've said before there was more to Billy Cody than met the eye. If I ever doubted it, I was reminded every time we spoke of Noah.

"Billy," I said plainly. "I need you to really listen to me right now. I ain't saying you have to take the job. I think that's a decision you and Sherry need to make together. But don't you ever think for a second that you got this job offer because Noah was killed. Noah's death was a terrible tragedy. But you got this job offer because of how you handled yourself after Noah was killed. It was your skill at what you do that got you this offer. Don't you ever forget that you earned this."

Well, to make the long story short, he took the job. He didn't know exactly what they wanted him to do when he took it. They just said he'd be a correspondent. He knew that would be a lot of travel but he and Sherry talked it out and decided they could live with that.

Once he took the job, he found out where they wanted him corresponding from. Vietnam.

Now reporting on the war ain't the same as fighting in the war. For one thing you don't get a gun to protect yourself with. But it's not like the reporters got to always go back to their nice hotel room at the end of the day. And even if they did, the hotel room was still in a war zone. There wasn't really a safe place in that country.

And I already had one brother lost in that jungle. I wasn't sure I could handle another. We hadn't heard from Kid in a long while. Some was nearly giving up hope. But I knew. I still knew in my heart that Kid was still alive. Lou and me…we was the only ones I think by then. Emma would just look at his picture sadly from time to time and no one else talked about him except in hushed whispers.

I did though. I would take Bobby and Jack for ice cream or something and I'd tell them stories about the man I knew, about the boys we'd been. I promised him. I promised him I wouldn't let him die to them, no matter what. They'd know their old man as something more than a picture and a pile of letters.

So thinking of Billy over there, well, I didn't want to. Billy was a sweet sort. Really, he was. He was affable and smiling and I just couldn't reconcile him being anywhere near such ugliness. He seemed out of place in the riots too. I know he hated it but he always seemed like he fit best with Fluffy the trapped cat. He'd cuff me a good one for saying that but it's just because I knew the nice guy who made jokes to cover how much things bothered him. I knew how much the tough stories ate at him. Not the politics so much as the tragic stories. House fires, dead children, riots, war…those took a piece of his soul. Every one killed him a little bit more.

If I had trouble with it then Sherry damned near broke with reality over the whole thing. This was her husband after all. And they had this new baby and she just fell apart like I'd never seen before.

The time came and we had a little going away party for Billy. We tried to keep it happy but there was a cloud hanging over. It's not like he was going on vacation or just taking some job at the New York or DC office. He was going to a war zone.

Emma cooked like a madwoman and there was more food than even us men could pack away. The whole time I saw her fighting tears and Sherry was too. Sherry stuck close to his side and I don't think I saw Billy set that baby down once. I think we all understood and even the women who usually fussed over that infant didn't try to take him from his daddy. Billy needed all the time he could get with that baby.

I wasn't going to be seeing him off at the airport so I made a point to get some time to talk to him at the party. Sherry excused herself a minute so we could talk. Billy sat there on the porch swing rocking that baby.

"I'd tell you to come home safe but I know you already know all the reasons you got to do that," I said.

He nodded.

"I have to get back to them," he said and I knew he was talking about Sherry and little Billy.

"I know," I said. "And the rest of us too. I don't know when we'll see Kid again. If we lost touch with you…I just don't think…"

"I know. Believe me, I know."

We sat quiet for a while and sipped our beers and watched the baby sleep. Billy finally said something more.

"Jimmy, would you look out for Sherry for me?" he asked. "I know she's an amazing woman and she'll come through just fine but can you…just look out for her?"

"Of course," I said. "And not just for you…she was pretty special to me before you even knew she was alive."

I won't drag this out. It was tough saying goodbye like that but we did because we had to. And then Billy was off. He was halfway around the world and I wouldn't admit this at the time but there was a comfort in knowing he was closer to where Kid was. That maybe Kid would be able to feel him and draw strength from it.

Sherry wasn't handling things well at all. I went over after school some days and sat with her or played with the baby so she could put herself together. Emma went over too and I know Annie and Carol did as well. Joanie would have but she was so buried under work, she was hardly anywhere about then.

We all watched the news every night to see Billy's face and hear his voice and know he was alright. It looked scary around him but he had a way of putting people at ease. I don't know if it's something he learned at school or if it came natural but I always felt better after seeing him and I think Sherry did too.

A few weeks after he left, there was a knock on my office door. Or I should say the door jamb. I never did shut my door unless I wasn't inside or unless I had someone in with me. I looked up to see Sherry standing there, her hands resting on the handles of little Billy's stroller.

"You got a minute, Jimmy?" she asked.

I stood and crossed the room and gave her a hug.

"For you, I always have time."

I ushered her in and closed the door and then sat back down and watched her fish some things out of the big diaper bag she always carried.

"I got a package today," she said. "I don't know why it scared me. I know it had to have been mailed at least a week ago and I know I saw him on the news just last night…but still…"

"It's alright, Sher. You need some moral support is all. That's what I'm here for."

Soon she had everything laid out. A tape player and three tapes. One cassette was labeled "Jimmy". She handed that one to me.

"Listen on your own," she said. "This one isn't for me. Whatever he says here…"

Then I looked at the others. One was labeled "Sherry" and one "Billy, Jr." She put in the tape with her name on it first. We listened and soon we heard Billy's voice. It was scratchy and there was a lot of background noise but he knew how to make himself heard.

"Hey Darlin', I needed to talk to you. I miss you something awful. You know that. I know it'll make you mad to know this but I asked Jimmy to keep an eye on you while I'm gone. There's not another man I trust with what's precious to me like I do him. I'm keeping safe here. It's hotter than July every stinking day and the food's terrible but I'm alright.

"I know you're missing me too. I hope you're sleeping alright. If you have trouble some night…play this, maybe it'll help."

And then he started singing.

"You got a smile so bright…you know you could've been a candle…"

Well, you know the rest of the song. By the time the song finished, Sherry had tears streaming down her face and I had a few too.

"The other tape ain't much," his voice went on. "Just me saying some nursery rhymes and telling a few stories for the boy. Don't want him to forget his daddy's voice. I'll see you soon, sweetheart. I love you, Sherry."

And that was the end of that tape. We didn't listen to the tape for the baby. I think Sherry did at home. It was okay, she knew what the tapes were. He sent them every so often with new messages. As far as I know, he always ended the tapes to her with their song.

Once I got home, I went into Joanie's study and pulled out a tape recorder she used for dictation and popped the tape into it.

"Jimmy," he began. "I really hope you're listening to this alone. I don't want Sherry to hear all I have to say to you."

I got a feeling of dread in my heart then.

"I'm scared, Jimmy. I'm scared like I've never been before. Nothing is familiar here. The riots, as surreal as they were, as wrong as everything was, I could still see the landmark buildings and go home to my sweet girl. Here…well, it's all wrong and there's no right, no order, no comfort to be found. I'm real scared. I don't know why it helps me to tell you that, but it does. Maybe there's a damned good reason why you went into the field you did.

"If…if I don't come home…it could happen. Something could happen. I've been close to explosions and gunfire here. If I don't come home, I need you to watch over my family. Sherry, Billy, Jr. they'll need someone. I know I can count on you. I'm not giving up or anything but just in case. And you take care too. Give that wife of yours a hug for me. I hope to see you all again real soon."

And that was it…there was just scratchy silence after that.

War sucks! That is all. - J