Jimmy Wright and the Woodpecker (part 3)

After High School, I joined the Air Force and went to war. After that, I went to College, then I got married and worked for a few years. Then the kids came and then we all moved back to town. We bought a little, affordable fixer on the "Bluffs". The river had chewed on Warren Hill (up to the knees) and our house was about seventy five feet from the steep drop down to the river. That was the back yard and the view was stunning. Since there was no access to the river, it made the house affordable. And it was a two room cabin with a small attached bedroom on a gravel road out in the sticks, that helped also. Anyway, Betty just loved the place and all I heard was "cute", for weeks. Everything was squeelee cute, except me, I was manly. Betty always the diplomat. Oh, did I mention that I was very much in love with her?
I got a job managing a sporting goods store and life was good. Money was tight, with two kids and all, but we didn't mind much, it was enough to scrub, paint and fix, some clearing and raking, a small garden with flowers and tomatoes, a lot of herding the crumb snatchers, you know, it was cute.
Warren Hill looked like a giant, green, two level birthday cake, with sporadic trees sprouting on the steep sides and a pretty good crop on top. Across the road were more cabins, some tucked into the band of trees that edged the slope. So guess who lived about a city block from us? He was renting a tiny cabin, no electricity, no running water, he paid what he could afford. Jimmy had no steady job, no food, no friends and no clue. He had aged some, was taller than I remember, but otherwise looked the same. Lost boyish, mildly wild and a tad deranged, stuffed into some oversized and ancient overalls with a flannel shirt that hung flaggish off his bones. Betty adopted him the moment she spotted him standing in our dirt driveway.
"Honey, who's that?"
"I don't know." An itinerant scarecrow? A rag collector? Is that Jimmy? No! Yes! I recognized him when we got close. What was his last name? Damn.
"That's Jimmy, Sweetheart. Jimmy Fright, I mean Wright." I was flustered.
What is he doing here? From the back seat an eruption of demands to be set free of the car.
"Out. Out. Out." that chant from three year old Jason, who didn't talk much, but made up for it in volume. Maggie the five year old chimed in. Soon as the car door opened they were racing toward Jimmy and then began to pogo bounce in front of him. Jason started chanting again: "UpUpUpUp!" Arms extended skyward. Wait, let me hose the mutt off first..... I slowly approached Jimmy, reluctantly extended my handshake and introduced my family. The kids were behaving like salivating puppies and were trying to convert him into a standing playground. I was amazed and dumbfounded. Betty proposed: "How about a nice lunch! Can you stay for lunch, Jimmy?" A shy nod and flash of a smile.

to be continued......