My Knight in Wet Armor

My Knight in Wet Armor

Today my husband and I traveled down to the town along the Alabama/Tennessee line where he and I first began. In honor of our love’s ten-year journey, over the next three weeks I am going to post snapshots of how the two of us eventually became one. This snapshot took place the summer after Randy and I met: I was sixteen, and he was twenty-two. This is the story his sisters say proved to them that he was in love. 

Randy had just started telling us about the chilling, occult occurrences taking place in the forest surrounding Sherwood when a barefoot man in tattered jeans and a cut-off shirt came stumbling out of the woods and leapt in front of Randy’s truck. Randy, mid-sentence, slammed on his brakes, and my forehead bounced off the back of his seat. The man stood in front of us–his scarecrow arms waving, his gaping mouth nothing but a dark hole studded with gnarled teeth and his eyes completely white except for a marbling of veins. I’d never felt such demonic-induced fear and looking up into the rearview mirror, I could tell Randy felt the same. While the man continued waving his arms in a series of jerky movements, Randy shifted into reverse, then into drive, gunned the engine, and swooped past him. It didn’t take long for the Dodge to put distance between us and the emaciated lunatic, but his frightening appearance had impacted us, and no one said anything for ten minutes.

Randy was the first to speak. “Everyone all right?”

Our eyes met in the rearview mirror, and I nodded.

My brother, with shaking fingers, tapped his cigarette ash out the window and said, “What in the world was that?”

“Well, I’m not sure it was of this world,” Randy said.

Joanne whispered, “Really?”

“No,” Randy replied. “He’s probably just on meth or something. There are meth labs all over these mountains.”

Randy drove a little longer and pulled onto a square of grass with a small sign stating the length of the Buggytop Trail and those responsible for its creation. We slipped on our backpacks, weighted with a week’s supply of food, and followed one another like dominoes into the South Cumberland National Park. The trail was beautiful. To keep Mother Nature from being injured, the tree-hugging students from the nearby university had only used hand-held tools for the clearing, and the path that resulted was thin and supple like a chocolate-colored ribbon looping across the forest floor. The hardy trees, left to their own devices for so long, soared above our heads, and golden needles of light punctured through their thick branches and the netting of leaves strewn above.

But the day was hot, and no amount of forest beauty could change that fact. Sweat beaded our backs, and humidity crept down our throats. Randy and my brother casually shucked their t-shirts like they were stripping husks from a corncob; the girls and I remained modestly garbed but green with envy. It was hard to remain focused on my footing with Randy’s broad, sun-speckled shoulders in my line of vision. For the most part I kept my gaze carefully averted, but when I heard the sound of water tumbling over rocks, I took this as my cue and began running in the direction of the noise. Within a few seconds I arrived at the creek, which had been created by rainwater rushing down the mountain furrows and crashing together in a blast of white foam. Heedless of my socks and tennis shoes, I sloshed through the shin-deep, cool water and found the source from which the tumbling sound emanated. Black rock the size of Roman boulders had been broken away by the pounding water, creating a twenty foot precipice from which the gushing water fell.

Clenching a cedar branch, I stepped upon a tablet-sized portion of the smooth black stone. I peered over; the water at the base of the boulders churned like a witch’s pot. I was still watching when the branch I’d been clinging to snapped; my wet sneakers grasped for traction on the wet stone and found none, and I went tumbling over with all the kinetic control of the water cascading around me. I emitted a reactionary, blood-curdling scream and flung out my arms, searching for anything to break or alleviate my fall. My right hip collided and skidded down a chunk of rock; this provided enough time for me to seize the lip of rock above and keep from falling fifteen more feet onto the protruding rocks below. In the distance, I heard a deep voice calling my name. Something thundered through the underbrush toward me with all the erratic noise and maneuverings of a panicked elk.

“Jolina!” the voice yelled again; I recognized it as Randy’s, and heat flooded my face.

My voice faltered, “Mmmh–I’m okay. I’m down here!” For the moment I knew I was safe, but my throbbing hip and adrenaline-steeped blood made it difficult to concentrate.

Randy’s face, white with worry, appeared above me. “Can you hold on a little longer?” he asked.

I sarcastically drawled, “Don’t have much choice, do I?”

My attempt to lighten the situation did not shift Randy’s face in expression or color. “Just a sec,” he said.

He reappeared with a thick, knotted branch and held it down to me. I bracketed my feet in a niche of the rock and held onto the branch with both hands. He tugged on the branch, and I slowly came up with it. When I was within reaching distance, he grasped my hands and pulled me the rest of the way. Once I was safely standing beside him, his chest began heaving, and his face regained some of its hue. His shirt was torn from running through the brambles, and the water from the creek had soaked his blue jeans black. He glanced down and realized our hands were still intertwined.

“You’re sure you’re all right?” he asked, releasing my hands to swipe a trembling one through his sweaty hair.

“Yeah. I bruised my hip pretty good, but I’ll survive.”

He nodded, then just looked at me. “You gave me quite a scare.”

“I can see that, Mr. Petersheim.”

The faintest smile christened his mouth and his eyes sparked, but the moment was lost as our group broke through the brush and barricaded us with questions and dramatic reenactments of Randy’s charge through the forest to come to my rescue. I could tell he was embarrassed by this, but I was enamored by the fact that he cared for me–at least a little.