Book Excerpt: Dog and Butterfly: Letters Home – John Riffice

Today John Riffice stops by to share an excerpt from his book, Dog and Butterfly: Letters Home. 

Excerpt from Dog and Butterfly: Letters Home

It seemed like hardly a day went by that Mama didn’t say things like “Where in the world does the time go?” and “It seems like only yesterday…”  I couldn’t understand how time could fly by so fast for her when it absolutely crawled at a snail’s pace for me.

Uncle Cam explained it away by saying that as a rule time moves very slowly for children.  “And dogs, too,” he added with a laugh.  “That’s why Ellis jumps around like a nut when you leave and come back five minutes later.  To him, it seems like you’ve been gone a week.”  Uncle Cam was pretty good at making sense of things that didn’t make much sense.

So for Mama time blazed by like greased lightning, but for me the six years that ambled uneventfully by and ushered in the eighth grade seemed a hundred-and-one lifetimes long.

“Just a few more months, Jimmy, and you’ll be in high school!” Mama beamed.  “And are the girls gonna love you!  You just get handsomer by the day!”

“Aw, Mama, come on!” I blushed.  Mama told me that the eyes of every girl in town grew “as large as saucers” when I was around.  I wasn’t so sure about that, but she absolutely insisted it was true.  Maybe Mama was right.  Maybe the girls werestarting to notice me; I don’t know.  But what I did know was that for the first time ever I was definitely starting to noticethem.

In fact, for a long while I walked home from school every day with a girl named Millie Faron.  Millie was real cute and real sweet but still pretty flat-chested, but I liked her anyway.  One day as we were on our way home she casually reached over and took my hand in hers.  The only other female hands that I had ever held belonged to Mama and Frances, but in a strange, new way Millie’s hand felt much nicer than theirs.  I kept hoping that she didn’t mind my sweaty palm too much.

A few of my pals who were walking on the other side of the street started to laugh when they saw us holding hands.  If I had ever entertained taking things to the next level, kissing her, I mean, their laughter threw a bucket of cold water all over that notion.  I don’t really know what Millie thought of their antics, but as for me, all I can say is that was the last time Millie Faron and I ever walked home together.  At first I felt ashamed for tossing her overboard like that, but at the time, not being ridiculed by my friends seemed far more important than acting with a little integrity.

My eye continued to wander from girl to girl throughout that year.  Uncle Cam must have noticed me noticing them, because one day I woke up and found a little note in Uncle Cam’s handwriting taped to my closet door.  It read: Many men choose a woman in a light so dim they wouldn’t choose a suit of clothes by it.  I was old enough to understand what that veiled message meant and tried to keep those words in mind from that day forward.  I believe I succeeded, too.

But that wasn’t the first time I woke up to one of Uncle Cam’s hand-written pearls of wisdom.  By then he’d been leaving me occasional words of counsel for several years.  I never forgot what any of them said, either, especially the first one.

I must have been in the fourth grade at the time and the influenza had Mama and Uncle Cam both a little under the weather.  Since it was Sunday, Uncle Cam said he’d drive me to church that morning and fetch me after, but that he and Mama wouldn’t be able to make it to that day’s services.  “If we attend,” he told me, “by tomorrow the whole town will be sicker than a dog.”

The First Calvinist Church was just a stone’s throw from Meisner’s Pharmacy, which was where Uncle Cam dropped me off.  “See you right here in an hour, okay?” he told me as I got out of the car.  Then he gave me a quarter for the collection basket.  “For the poor,” he said with a smile.

Once inside, I took a seat in the very last pew in the very back of the church.  It was strange to be in church without Mama and Uncle Cam, but at least I didn’t have to sit way up front in the first row.  Mama almost always insisted that we sit in the front, “so God knows we paid him another visit,” she would joke.  As far as I was concerned, the front row was a great place to sit in a movie house, but I sure didn’t think it was so great in a church.

Toward the middle of Reverend Kimberling’s sermon, which I couldn’t hear too well because of all the growling coming from my stomach, I got up and walked out.  I still had Uncle Cam’s quarter in my pocket, but it didn’t stay there very long.  I made a beeline right past the pharmacy and directly over to Holstrom’s Swedish Bakery where I bought two big, mouth-watering chocolate-dipped doughnuts.  And since it was such a beautiful, sunny day, I decided to take a seat on the bench right in front of the bakery and enjoy one of my chocolate-covered delicacies.  I still remember like it was yesterday how that doughnut hit the spot so perfectly!

After, I figured that if I high-tailed it back to church I could get there before anyone realized I was missing.  Of course, that meant that I would have to scarf down the last of my two doughnuts on the walk back.  That didn’t present much of a problem—I enjoyed the second almost as much as the first.  And as I did, I found myself walking past Meisner’s Pharmacy and who was already parked there but Uncle Cam, ten minutes early!  Fortunately, he had his nose buried in theSunday Sentinel and I managed to sneak by without him paying me any mind.

By then I’m sure my face was bathed in far more chocolate than sunlight, so I pulled my handkerchief out and made certain I was all spiffy again.  Relieved that I had actually gotten away with what I’d done, I returned to my pew just as the organist started playing “How Great Thou Art.”

It didn’t take long for me to start feeling bad about my transgression, not only because I left and wasn’t where I was supposed to be, but also because I bought two chocolate-dipped doughnuts with money that was earmarked for folks a lot hungrier than me.  So, before leading all the other congregants out of church that morning, I squeezed in a little prayer asking for forgiveness.  But the memory of those two delicious doughnuts still lingered on, and that made me wonder just how badly I really felt about my misdeed after all.

“Jump in, Jimmy!” Uncle Cam said through the open passenger’s window.  He folded his newspaper neatly and set it down between us.  “So how was church today?” he asked as we pulled away.  “Did I miss anything?”

“No, not really,” I muttered meekly.  The pangs of guilt had begun to set in.

“And how was the sermon?”

“Fine,” came my spartan response.

“What did Reverend Kimberling have to say?  What was the sermon about?” Uncle Cam persisted.

“Oh, I don’t know.  Mostly he talked about God… and stuff like that.”

“Oh…” Uncle Cam slowly drawled, “he talked about God… and stuff like that.”

That’s about all Uncle Cam had to say about church, or anything else for that matter, until we got home.  As a result, the five-minute drive seemed nearly a week long and I finally understood what my little Ellis had to deal with at least once a day each and every day of his life.

Uncle Cam turned up the driveway and shut off the engine.  He just sat there without moving and then after a few long seconds he finally spoke.

“Jimmy, is there anything you’d like to tell me?”

“No, Uncle Cam, I don’t think so,” I answered with more than a twinge of guilt.

“Hmm,” he said, stroking his chin.  “Very well.  But if by chance you happen to change your mind, you just come and see me, okay?”

“Okay, Uncle Cam,” I answered.  “I will.”

At supper that night, Mama said, “Well, my headache’s finally gone and I’m actually feelin’ a little better.”

I didn’t feel too well myself, but of course for reasons that had nothing to do with the influenza.

“How ‘bout you, Cam…  Feelin’ any better?” Mama asked as she passed a bowl of broccoli to Uncle Cam.

“No, Charlotte, not just yet,” he answered.  Uncle Cam spent most of the dinner hour shuffling food around his plate.  “I’m sorry, Charlotte, I just don’t have much of an appetite tonight. I’m still running a little fever and my stomach’s all topsy-turvy.  I think I’ll just go sit on the back porch a while.  Maybe the fresh air will do me some good.”

After I helped Mama with the dishes, I watched Uncle Cam as he sat on a porch step all by himself.  I finally screwed up the courage to take a seat next to him, an effort which required over thirty long minutes.  I sat there another five before I was able to speak a word.

“Uncle Cam, do you remember earlier today when you asked if I had anything to tell you?”

“Yes, Jimmy, I remember.”

“Well… I think I do.”

Uncle Cam wrapped a big, brawny arm around my shoulder and pulled me tight.  “Do you know what ‘character’ is, Jimmy?” he asked.

“I think so,” I responded quietly, thankful that he was sparing me the embarrassment of an uncomfortable confession.

“Well, just in case you’re not too sure, let me tell you.  Character is the very thing that makes a boy a man, Jimmy. Sometimes character is as simple as saying that you’re going to do something and then actually doing it, whether you really want to or not.  More than anything, though, character is doing the right thing when it’s easier to do the wrong thing.  Not everyone has character, Jimmy.  But when you have it, when people see it, it’s unmistakable.  People know.  They just know.” Uncle Cam looked me square in the eye and paused for a moment.  “I think you understand what I’m trying to tell you, don’t you, Jimmy?”

“Uh-huh,” I responded with a nearly imperceptible nod.

“Good.  I knew you would,” Uncle Cam answered with a smile.  “Well, I’m tired and not feeling up to snuff.  I think I’ll get to bed.  By mornin’ I’ll probably be as good as new.”  Then he gave me a quick hug.  “Good night, Jimmy.”

“G’night, Uncle Cam,” I answered quietly.

I sat there for a long time afterwards, considering what he had said.  It didn’t take much to figure out that Uncle Cam was right on all counts.

When I awoke the next morning, Uncle Cam had already left for work.  Taped to my closet door, though, was the very first note he ever left me.  It was short, only two words in all, and I don’t think I’ll ever forget it.

Character counts, he wrote.

About Dog and Butterfly: Letters Home (2013) After his brother’s untimely passing, Cam Freeland takes in his sister-in-law and four year-old nephew, Charlotte and Jimmy, just until they get on their feet and find a place of their own. But that day never comes. Cam enjoys having them in his life, and they enjoy being there. Cam raises Jimmy almost as though the boy were his son, forming a bond of love, respect, and friendship that will last beyond a lifetime. In doing so, young Jimmy slowly discovers that his uncle Cam is far nobler than he could have ever imagined, a stand-up guy in every respect. 

Except one. Cam has a skeleton in his closet, one which shames him terribly, and fate calls on Jimmy to investigate further. He does, and the secret he uncovers surprises him. And so does the next. And the next after that. But the biggest revelation of all lies in Jimmy’s discovery that fate controls every aspect of his life and that there are no accidents and there are no coincidences, just as Uncle Cam had always told him.

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About John Riffice Author John Riffice passed the first half of his adult life working in heavy industrial construction. After a serious work-related injury, he pursued a lifelong interest in teaching and took up a career in education, culminating in a rewarding life instructing children with disabilities. This experience, coupled with his understanding of the challenges facing single parents as well as all the intimacies of alcoholism, enable him to weave interesting tales of love, friendship, betrayal and deceit. He demonstrates an uncanny ability to paint a unique literary landscape as seen through the eyes of both children and mature adults. He has a grown daughter and lives in Chicago with Karen, his wife of twenty years.

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About the Author:

I was born in Barnsley, South Yorkshire, England and have always been a bookworm and enjoyed creative writing at school.

In 1999 I created the Elencheran Chronicles and have been writing ever since. My first novel, Fezariu’s Epiphany, was published in May 2011. When not writing I’m a lover of films, games, books and blogging.

I now live in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, with my wife, Donna, and our six cats – Kain, Razz, Buggles, Charlie, Bilbo and Frodo.

David M. Brown – who has written 862 posts on Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dave.

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