Nora Ray (Ray Trilogy)

chapter Twelve

As soon as classes were over on Monday, Nora went to the bookstore to buy stamps and envelopes to send off a letter to Jeremy.

She chided herself thinking of what Jeremy had said about missing her. She had apparently not taken him seriously enough. She had doubted that she would hold his interest in her if he was away and had all those other girls to entertain.

It was sadly good to know that he missed her as much as she missed him.

She wrote him a letter after she finished her homework that night to drop in the mail the next morning so he would have her mailing address.

Soon they had a letter coming from each other every day. Nora thought this is almost like receiving the newspaper every day. She hoped he enjoyed her letters as much as she enjoyed his.

After the spring semester Nora longingly looked at the summer schedule wishing she could stay and take more classes. She worried about her mom needing her and Jeremy being home expecting her to be there. She could work at the hospital to earn some extra money she thought.

When she pulled into the driveway at home, Danny was sitting on the porch watching for her. She jumped out of the car and ran to give him a hug. They walked into the house arm in arm.

Laura put down her potholders and met Nora at the kitchen door to give her a hug. Nora looked around at the food prepared on the stove and her favorite pies lined up on the counter. She breathed in deeply, “Aah, this smells like home. You cooked my favorites.”

“We could hardly wait for you to come home. We’ve missed you so much,” Laura said as she turned to finish the meal.

Danny told her about trying out for the junior football team for the fall season. He and Aaron practiced every day to perfect their skills. All during this time he set the table and filled the glasses. He placed napkins perfectly under the silverware.

Danny had grown up so much trying to be the man of the house.

Nora was so proud of him but afraid to say anything because she didn’t want to embarrass him.

Later she mentioned to Laura, “I am so proud of Danny helping you so much.”

“Now that it’s just the two of us we depend on each other much more,” she confided. “You should see him out there mowing the lawn. He does a really good job.”

Laura had grown bored at home by herself so she had found a job to occupy herself while Danny was in school. Her friendship with Mary Roberts grew even closer with Aaron and Danny playing so much together.

Nora felt good about the progress they were making, each of them developing close friendships and finding things to occupy their time.

The next morning, Nora asked, “Danny, would you like to go with me to visit our cousin Jordan?”

“Sure!” Danny jubilantly replied.

As they arrived at the Johnson farm, Little Jordan came hurrying out of the front porch doing his funny little walk on his metal crutches that fit on each leg. The polio had made its mark on him but he wasn’t letting it keep him down. Nora hurried over to give him a hug as Aunt Betty came out to greet them.

After hugs all around from Aunt Betty, she invited them in for lemonade. Soon Jordan wanted Danny to go outside with him and see the new cats in the barn.

Aunt Betty told her, “I am so proud of Jordan learning to walk with those cumbersome crutches. He seems to be in good spirits. He will start first grade in the fall. I hope he will have as near normal school life as possible.”

“He’s a smart and happy child. That can help him overcome in a lot of circumstances,” Nora assured her.

“I worry the most about the other children making fun of him and breaking his spirit,” Aunt Betty sighed.

“You might try talking to the teacher privately before school starts and explain your fears and the situation to her. She might be able to nip that in the bud.”

“Thank you, Nora,” Aunt Betty exclaimed. “Since when did you get so wise?”

Nora shrugged her shoulders and smiled.

“I seems like you are getting all grown up,” Aunt Betty said. “Sometimes, we don’t think about our children becoming adults and getting wise and all.”

“There’s something I wanted to tell you,” Nora said becoming serious. “I have found out that there is a new vaccine out now for polio called the Salk vaccine. It was developed in 1955 about the time that Jordan contracted the poliovirus. It’s a tasteless liquid squirted on a sugar cube that the child places on his tongue. The government is giving it out free to all school children. I hear it is to be distributed in 1957, so apparently it will be here before the end of the year.”

She sadly shook her head, “Sorry that it’s too late for little Jordan, but I’m so thankful that it will save thousands of lives and save many children from being crippled.”

“That almost breaks my heart,” Aunt Betty leaned over her legs with the sorrow, knowing that the vaccine came two years too late for her son. “Again, like you, I am thankful for all the other children it will be able to help.”

Jordan and Danny appeared at the door carrying a kitten in each arm to show Nora.

Nora remembered Jeremy’s last letter telling her that he would be taking finals until the end of May so she didn’t expect for him to be home until the first week of June. She wanted to talk to him before she applied for a job at the hospital. It depended on what his plans were whether she wanted to enroll in the summer session at college. In the mean time she looked around to see what she could do to entertain herself.

She walked outdoors. “Aah, the flowerbeds need me,” she happily told herself out loud.

Nora phoned Jamie Rhodes, her friend that she obtained while working at the hospital.

“How is medical school?” Jamie inquired.

“I’m still mostly studying basics, but they have a great library. I have access to all kinds of interesting books to read. This last semester I took Anatomy which was something neat,” Nora said.

“I’m getting into the medical books a little faster since I’m not shooting for a doctorate.” Jamie commented. “Bacone specializes in LPN’s and RN’s. If I can obtain an RN degree, I will be happy for now.”

“Have you heard what’s going at the hospital? Do you plan to get a summer job there?” Nora asked.

“Actually, I planned to check on that tomorrow. We could both go together, if you plan to work out there, too.” Jamie suggested.

“I might,” Nora said trying to make up her mind, “I wanted to talk to Jeremy and see what his plans were, but I guess it wouldn’t hurt to put in an application just in case.”

“Sure,” Jamie agreed, “I’ll be by in the morning.”

Jeremy called Saturday evening to let her know that he was in town. “Mom asked if you could come over for Sunday dinner, what do you think?”

“Sure.”

“Good, I’ll let her know. Nora, may I come over right now?”

“Absolutely! Mom and I wanted to go out, so could you watch Danny?” Nora asked innocently.

“What?” Jeremy couldn’t believe his ears.

“Got ya’,” she teased. “Of course! I want you to come over. I’ve been waiting days for you to come home.”

“I’ll be there in five minutes.”

“I’ll be in the drive way.”

She met him at his car door.

He jumped out of the car and picked her up and whirled her around. “Let’s go in before I embarrass both of us.”

Laura had discreetly gone to her bedroom to give them privacy and directed Danny to do the same. Danny had gone to his bedroom but left the door ajar so he could peek at his sister and Jeremy.

Jeremy noticed immediately that Danny’s door was open so he intentionally brought Nora in line with Danny’s view and soundly kissed her. Danny giggled. Then Jeremy turned toward Danny’s door and bowed.

“Nora and I are leaving for a while, so you can come out now.”

Danny came out and Jeremy reached out his hand to shake Danny hand. “It’s so good to see you again. I feel like I’ve been gone for so long.”

Danny shook hands and tried to stand taller. “Life sure is more boring without you and Nora here. Aaron and I have a lot of fun though.”

Nora knocked on Laura’s door, “Mom, Jeremy and I are leaving for a while.”

Laura came out and hugged Jeremy, “It’s so good to have you home. I feel like one of my children is gone without you here coming and going.”

“Thank you,” Jeremy returned. “I’ve been here so much; it feels a lot like home here to me, too.”

They left Nora’s house and drove to the park to talk.

They sat at one of the park tables holding hands in companionable silence. It wasn’t dark yet and there were children still riding on the tall swings. Others rode around on the merry-go-round, laughing and running beside it to keep it in motion. Two little boys performed acrobatic turns on the monkey bars. The grass had been freshly mowed. The creek that circled around the park was still full from the spring rains. The big pipes that bridged over the creek still tempted Nora to try to walk across them. The swimming pool had closed down for the night.

Jeremy pointed toward the sunset just starting to light up the western sky with streaks of orange and pink, underlining the cumulus clouds with yellow.

She nodded and whispered beautiful.

The parents began rounding up their children to take them home. Jeremy and Nora watched the sunset continue to grow in the sky and then felt the peace of the evening as it began to grow darker.

Nora slapped her arm as a mosquito bit her.

Jeremy laughed and said, “I enjoyed sitting in the park with you but we need to go in now or we’ll be eaten by mosquitoes. How about we go to the Dairy Mart?” He wiggled his eyebrows, “Maybe my girl will snuggle with me.”

She laughed remembering what he used to say about her always scooting next to him there. “If you’re lucky. Maybe.”

“Really, Nora, you are getting to be quite a tease.”

“Wonder who I learned that from?” she replied poking him in the ribs.

After they got in the car, he pulled her over to sit next to him. He put his arm around her. He smelled of her hair and brushed the side of her face and ran his finger over her lips.

She could see the longing in his face. She reached up and felt the pounding of his heart. “I love you, too.”

He turned and started the car and drove to the Dairy Mart. They ordered ice cream floats.

While they were enjoying the floats, Jeremy spoke, “Nora, remember I said I wanted to talk to you?”

She nodded.

“I think I’m going to try to get a scholarship to come to OU. I’m not sure how I will work that out yet. I know I have good grades, but I need something to balance the scales in my favor.”

Nora watched in fascination at this side of Jeremy which he didn’t let her see often. He seemed more mature, being away from home where he didn’t want to be was taking a toll on him, she decided.

“I took a horticulture science class this past semester. It’s fascinating stuff,” he said his eyes beginning to glow.

“Really? Tell me about it.” Relieved to see him snap out of his melancholy mood, she looked at him in anticipation.

“There has been a study during the last few years where they discovered that the hybrid plants that they have been cultivating mostly since the 1930’s, has significantly decreased nutrition in the food that they produce.”

“Hmm,” Nora replied. “Wonder why that would be.”

“They have done a wonderful job of choosing desirable traits, such as breeding disease resistant qualities. The production had exceeded all expectations in providing farmers huge yielding crops. There are corn hybrids, for instance, that they have produced through plant breeding where the stalks are shorter but yield much more corn. It’s like the plant nutrition somehow goes toward the making more corn on the cob rather than making a larger stalk.” He stopped and looked at her, “Am I boring you yet?”

“No, it’s a fascinating topic,” she agreed. “I can see how it would catch your interest.”

“I won’t go into all of what I’m looking into, but on my own I have been studying molecular biology. In 1953, so this is relatively new technology,” he interjected, so she would understand the significance of it, “these guys discovered that the two helical strands which make up the DNA provide coded information which directs the linear organization of the amino acids in proteins.”

Nora frowned, “What are you trying to tell me, Jeremy?”

“My dad wants me to work in his law office everyday this summer,” he explained, “I’m okay with that because he will pay me which will give me a little money to set up a lab in the back of Mom’s flower shop. Nora, I have some ideas about this molecular biology using data from crystallography work on this DNA which could be revolutionary. If I can get my ideas to work, I think this might be my ticket to a scholarship anywhere I want to study.”

“Wow! Jeremy.” She said in amazement.

“Do you see how important this could be for us?” he said excitedly. “The work I’m doing is fascinating to me but I’m also looking for some financial independence.”

She nodded.

“After work at the law office, I can spend my evenings working on this project. Maybe I’ll be successful, maybe I won’t but I want to try.”

“Okay,” Nora agreed, “You’ve answered a question that I wanted to ask. I put in an application at the hospital, my question was whether I should stay and work here or go back to college and take Summer classes.”

“Would you rather take Summer classes?” Jeremy asked.

“I did want to take Summer classes, but if you are here, I would rather spend time here with you.”