Place: Red Creek
Characters:
Steve Newborn Junior,
Steve Newborn Senor
Selena Newborn, wife of Steve Newborn Sr. and mother of Steve Jr.
Oscar Lockhart, Selena's next door neighbor from childhood and long ago standout player at Red Creek High.
Names and places are entirely fictitious.
It was early spring the last time I passed through Red Creek. I had spent the night up at Peaty and as usual planned on having breakfast in Red Creek. I been doing it for years. They were just now erecting the large sign at the entrance of town proclaiming the Red Creek Devils as last years state football champions. The sign was replacing an older dilapidated sign proclaiming the Devils as champions over twenty years earlier. Two championships in twenty years, not bad, I thought.
Red Creek is a typical small southern town. The cotton gin shut down years ago and the cotton mill has been gone for over fifteen years. The high school is still there, two banks, four lawyers and a small, down in the mouth strip mall, line the highway passing through town.
If it's Walmart you want that's going to be eight miles up the road just before you get to Peaty.
Only a small portion of the residence of Red Creek actually work there. Most wage earners drive to the near by towns or up to the city for work or maybe pilot an over the road truck to distant states. There are lots of ways to get by and still come home to Red Creek, if your lineage runs deep here.
McDonald and Burger King split most of the food business but Lonny's All Night Diner still occupies choice real estate at the corner of state road 26 and the main US highway through town. Lonny's All Night Dinner has a smaller sign underneath advising that the restaurant is open seven days a week from 7 Am to 8 pm except Sunday when the hours are 8 am to 6 pm.
In small towns all over the south I've noticed that local men will congregate for breakfast. As a traveling man I always wonder what their connection is. They are generally middle aged to retired but as old ones move on new ones seem to phase in. It's a tradition that seems to endure. Often as not the locals refer to it as the liars table.
Tables are pushed together to accommodate 6 to 12 men. One man may leave to go to work and another will take his place. Over a morning breakfast period the table will change faces several times. I have been eating at Lonny's for so long that nothing is said when I sit at the liars table even though I'm not a local.
In the fall and into the winter the table seems to always be populated with large men that talked loud about football. During the season, during any given morning they will dissect every game from every angle. And after that they will once again recount their own glory days when they starred for Red Creek High or those periods they spent at Berton State Teachers, or some other obscure school on a scholarship that didn't pan out.
But it was later in the year at the liars table that I began picking up shaded remarks surrounding a dark revelation about the Red Creek football dynasty.
That was where I first heard of Steve Newborn Junior, Steve was the quarterback for the Devils and had practically carried them single handed to the championship. He had just signed to a scholarship at the state university and the town of Red Creek was cheering him on.
Steve's parents were Selena Newborn his mother and Steve Newborn Senior his father for whom Steve Junior had been named. They are a prominent family in Red Creek.
Selena met Steve in her junior year in college. Steve was from Bullard which was only 25 miles south of Red Creek. Their homes being so close it was only natural they would commute to and from the university together. They were just friends during college as Selena and Steve both sampled college life.
Selena graduate a year ahead of Steve and took a teaching job in the nearby town of Rutlege. During the next school term Steve called and asked would she like to come down and visit him during homecoming at the university. Steve was still in school since he was studying dentistry and the program required longer than the the teaching program which Selena had recently completed.
Being bored with social life around Red Creek Selena accepted the invitation and afterward started seeing Steve regularly. Steve didn't push for sex but Selena liked Steve and was already seeing him as the mother of her children so she subtly began pushing the relationship in that direction. Steve was very pliable and soon they were a couple and it wasn't long after that before Selena was thinking about a big church wedding at the Red Creek Methodist Church.
Steve was what a lot of women want in a man. He was loyal, witty, trustworthy and a good earner. But to Selena he did have one flaw. Even though he was a religious person he was not blessed. With a four inch package Steve struggled to satisfy Selena. After several years of torrid college sex, sex with Steve was just so so or less.
Nevertheless, Selena decided that was a small trade off to make a good marriage and the wedding took place. After the marriage Steve finished dental school and entered a practice with an older dentist up in Peaty. They found and old house in Red Creek with lots of charm and even more rooms. Selena was planning on a large family.
They started working on the family soon after marriage but nothing was happening. Selena consulted a doctor who proclaimed her perfect for conceiving and advised to just give it time. The diagnosis on Steve was positive also although the doctor had not assured him that he would eventually father a child. In fact he had been very pessimistic.
A couple of years went by with nothing to show for their efforts. It didn't seem to bother Steve although he didn't want to disappoint Selena. For her part Selena knew that she was becoming more than a little bit bitchy.
Oscar Lockhart
Selena had just turned onto Main Street going north to Peaty when she saw a very familiar form walking away from her in the same direction. Without seeing the face she knew that it was Oscar Lockhart a neighbor from her childhood on Wicker Street.
Oscar had lived two doors down from her and although he was three years older she had always had a crush on him. He had everything a young girl admires, good looks, muscular build, played the guitar and most of all he was the star quarterback on the Red Creek Devils foot ball team. It was Oscar that had led the team to a first ever division championship.
After high school Oscar had gone to the University on a football scholarship. The coaches had shifted him from quarterback to corner back and after 2 years of little playing time and bad grades Oscar left school. Although his family still lived in Red Creek Oscar didn't return. Selena had heard that he had gone to Nashville to pursue a music career and another time someone told her he was working with a roofing contractor in Florida.
But today Oscar Lockhart was definitely going in her direction on Main Street in Red Creek. Selena eased her new red BMW sports car that Steve, her husband, had recently bought her along side of Oscar.
"Hey neighbor, do you need a lift." Saline shouted as she pulled to stop along side Oscar.
Oscar turned and approached the vehicle before he realized who it was. Each exclaimed their surprise in this chance meeting. After a moment Selena repeated her offer.
"So, would you like for me to drop you off somewhere?"
"No, gotta meet a fellow just around the corner. We're going up to Peaty together. Thanks anyway. These are nice wheels you have. I hate to miss a ride in it. I bet it's fun to drive."
"Yeah, it's kinda fun, I'll let you drive it sometime."
"That's great. I'm going to take you up on that. Don't forget you promised." And with that he blew her a kiss and started back walking up the sidewalk.
Selena pulled back into traffic smiling at having run into someone she used to fantasize about. After a moment she realized that she was a titter about seeing Oscar again. She mentally chastised herself for being so immature.
Even though Oscar was still on her mind she was surprised the next day when the phone rang and it was Oscar.
"Hey, I'm ready for that ride you promised." He started out.
Caught by surprise Selena was flustered and confused although she quickly recovered and told him that sure the ride was on even though at the time she thought of it as just a friendly reply. Surely Oscar wouldn't think she was serious. But he was serious and now he was suggesting that this every afternoon would be a good time
. A few hours later Selena found herself driving towards Rutledge which was about 20 miles from Red Creek and a much larger town. Selena was relieve that Oscar hadn't suggested meeting closer because she wasn't sure she wanted to be seen riding in a car with him..
She shouldn't have worried. When she met Oscar in the parking lot in front of Kroger he opened her door and indicated she should slide over and let him drive. Three blocks down the main road he turned into a local motel and parked in front of one of the rooms.
"Come on." he commanded as he turned the engine off and started to get out of the car. " I got us a room."