January 7

Judellen appraised her brother’s attire.  While long-haired Patrick was basically a sweatshirt and sneakers guy, Mitch’s brown hair was trimmed and he dressed as if perpetually ready for a job interview. He was majoring in meteorology.  Anyone phoning Nerd Hall got an always-erratic message that usually included a Mitch MacNeal weather report.

“Who’s driving?” Jude pulled a Goodwill pea coat across her shoulders and crammed her curly red hair under a knit cap.

“Jake. He just got his pickup back from the garage.”  

They started down the stairs together.  Judellen had graduated early from Shenango High, but she didn’t attend the local Penn State campus. She was earning an online degree in forestry while working part-time as a Perrypark landscaper.  Both MacNeals were fascinated by nature and loved being outdoors.  They shared the same interests and most of the same friends.

“Decent!  I hope he brings Beamer.  That cat’s like a dog, the way he likes riding in Jake’s truck.”

The truck itself sounded its tinny horn and Mitchell pulled open the front door to reveal the battered green Dodge chugging fitfully under a street lamp.  Snow blew around the spotlit truck, then swirled into the darkness. Beamer was standing with his paws against the truck’s passenger window, looking out.

The MacNeals squashed in, Jude setting Beamer on her lap.  She smiled at Jake, whose long, coffee-colored fingers were coaxing the gear stick into drive.

“Didn’t Dane fix this thing?” Mitchell’s breath fogged the windshield.

“Supposedly.”  Jake shook his shaved head and the streetlight glinted on the gold ring in his brown earlobe. “Gotta say it’s better than it was, but…” the complaining transmission finally acquiesced.  “It still needs work.”  Jude had long thought Jake’s skin, voice, and style were as smooth as caramel sauce.

They drove past Benson Avenue’s brightly-lit homes, tires crunching patterns into the snow, the buzzing heater keeping them toasty.  This was Shenango’s prosperous, older residential area where doctors, bankers and other wealthy citizens lived.  Great grotesque structures loomed over the avenue; mansions with dormers and turrets vied with huge stone Gothics over vast lawns and winding drives.  The MacNeal house wasn’t quite as ornate, but Jude loved its tall entryway with the hanging gold-and-glass lantern that illuminated their front door.  Her dad, widower Ross MacNeal, was publisher of the Shenango Sentinel.

The Dodge slid in the slush to the Shenango campus lying at the bottom of West Hill. A half dozen buildings constituted the school grounds, flanked by old houses converted into student dorms. Nerd Hall was a big gray clapboard with two entrances.  As Jude, Mitch and Jake—carrying Beamer—approached the left doorway, they heard laughter and music accompanied by the spicy aroma of marinara sauce.