Running Barefoot

12. Interlude



August, 2000

A week before my junior year in high school, everything changed. Kasey Judd had lived in Levan all his life, just like me. His family had lived there for generations, just like mine. We’d been born a few days apart, in the same hospital, in the same year. We’d attended the same church, rode the same bus, and were in the same classes. Up until ninth grade, I was taller than him, and he wore braces and glasses. His curly hair was always unruly, his shoes always untied, and he constantly challenged me for first chair in the school band, which I found slightly annoying because I regularly trounced him. He had been a fixture on the periphery of my life all of my life, just like the comfortable couch in the living room, or the patterns on the walls. He was just another boy - until I fell in love with him.

Kasey’s dad was the football coach at Nephi High School, where every kid in the county, including Levan, was bussed to school. I played trumpet in the school band, so I attended my share of football games and cheered for my share of football players. Tara had a thing for football players, but I really wasn’t interested in hearing about every single player, their stats, the position they played, the way they looked in uniform. Tara knew everything about everyone, and I mostly listened with an uninterested ear. Her ability to talk non-stop without any encouragement from me made our relationship work. I never had much to say, and she couldn’t shut up, so it was a win/win all the way around. She was the only person I knew who had business cards touting her gossiping skills. The cards said “If You Want to Know How or Who, Ask Tara Ballow” (Ba LOO). I suppose her chatter filled a feminine need inside me. By this time all my brothers had graduated, married, or moved out, and I lived at home with my dad. He was almost as quiet as I was which meant girl talk, or any other kind of talk, was pretty scarce, and Tara happily filled the void.

My piano playing ability made band a nobrainer, and I was the first chair trumpet player in the high school band. We didn’t have orchestra at the school, so when I joined the band in seventh grade, I’d wanted to learn play a more classical instrument like the clarinet until Tara told me that trumpet players made the best kissers. I figured someone as awkward as I was needed all the help I could get, and I’d played the trumpet ever since. Tara played the flute - quite badly. But the competition wasn’t fierce in a small school, and she managed to keep her chair. She might have played better had she just stopped talking! The huge pink bubble she was always blowing didn’t help much either. Mr. Hackett, our band teacher, had forbidden gum in band, but Tara was constantly cleaning cherry Hubba Bubba out of her mouthpiece.

Tara had been telling me all about “that cute Kasey Judd” all summer long. She’d said his dad had had all the boys in the weight room getting them ready for football season. Tara had been up at the football field during several practices with binoculars to check out their new muscles.

We started band practice two weeks before the school year started to get ready for the upcoming football season. Practice was ridiculously early because it was “Hell Week” for the football team, which meant two-a-days. The band practiced early to allow members of the football team, who were also members of the band, to make it to morning football practice. At a small school it isn’t unusual for a jock to be in the band or sing in the chorus or to be in the school play. In my opinion, that is the best thing about going to a small school; less competition sometimes means more opportunity.

So I dragged into that first practice with my curly blonde hair in a sloppy ponytail, wearing an old pair of cut-off jeans, a ratty Survivor t-shirt and flip flops, only to discover my chair was occupied. I sighed. When would Kasey Judd ever learn? I looked, and then I stared. Kasey Judd had grown up. His shoulders were broad; his legs were long and stretched out in front of him. No more glasses, and no more braces. His hair was curly, like my own, but where mine was a light wheat blonde just like my dad’s (and his dad’s, and his dad’s), Kasey’s was dark brown and was now cut short to tame the once unruly mop.

I sat down next to him and shyly said “That’s my seat.” I hoped the freckles I always got across my nose in the summertime weren’t too noticeable, and I cursed myself for not at least applying mascara to my happily long, but sadly very blonde eyelashes. I’d started wearing my contacts on a more regular basis and was thankful that I’d taken the time to put them in that morning, saving myself from total ugliness. He looked at me with a little grin and a quirked eyebrow and said “We’ll see.”

His eyes were a hazel green, and his smile curled up at the ends. Dimples creased his suntanned cheeks. I almost fell right off my chair. I had never had a physical reaction to a smile before, but I felt Kasey’s grin deep down in my gut like a sucker punch, and I was a total goner. Over the moon, gone. He challenged me for first chair in the trumpet section that day and for the first time in umpteen years, he won - though I challenged him the following week and never let him have it back.

Two weeks later, we shared our first kiss under the stars at Burraston’s Pond - and despite our inexperience, it was not an awkward meeting of lips and teeth. That kiss was as natural as a prayer at bedtime - simple and sweet and sustaining. I fell so hard I saw stars, and the funny thing is I naively thought that that was just how falling in love was for everyone. We became inseparable from then on, to the point that our names became an extension of the other. Kaseynjosie. You couldn’t say one without the other. It was all so easy with him - easy to love him, easy to be loved.

I had many people in my life that loved me...and I was not necessarily lacking in love. What I craved was their awareness - awareness of me. I could sit quietly in my chair and read the night away, never demanding attention, never seeking it. I could sit behind the piano and play and have people appreciate the beautiful music and never take notice of the one who played it. I was a steady, quiet presence in the lives of those around me. But sometimes in my reading I would discover new insights, or have seemingly profound thoughts that would change my way of thinking. I would be hungry to share my inspiration with someone, so I would try to share my epiphanies with my dad or my brothers. They would remain politely quiet for a few seconds and then become distracted by something more interesting or urgent than my newly acquired knowledge, leaving me to talk to myself. I usually just stopped talking when I could see they really weren’t interested or listening - and they never protested or urged me to continue.

If I tried to philosophize with Tara she would stare at me blankly for a few minutes and then slowly cross her eyes and say “You’re losin’ me Jos!” I would laugh because I knew it was true, and I would tuck my thoughts away for another audience. My Aunt Louise was too literal, too real, too down-to-earth to enjoy the profundity of the universe and warned me away whenever I “started gettin’ deep.” Sonja had filled that void in many ways, but her own insights were so precious to me that when I was with her I found myself more interested in listening and soaking up her wisdom than talking myself.

When Kasey became part of my life he had seemed to enjoy letting me elucidate on any subject that had sparked my interest. He would quietly listen and look at me now and again. Often he would agree with whatever I said and hug me saying, “You are so smart, Josie.” He never had much to offer in the way of deeper discussion, but I so appreciated his interest in what I had to say that I didn’t much care. I had needed someone to listen to me and to seek out my opinions. I had needed someone to value me, to give credence to my thoughts, to be awed by my abilities, and there was nobody more aware of a pretty teenage girl than an infatuated teenage boy. It had felt new and wonderful, and his attention had kept me on a constant, heady high that was completely foreign to me.

I had felt God’s power and presence in beautiful music, I had been taught principles of goodness from classic literature, and I had always felt certain both were blessings from a loving Father in Heaven. I was just as certain that God had given me Kasey to assuage my deep-rooted loneliness, the loneliness that even music, words, and the love of my family had not been able to extinguish. I thought Kasey was God’s atonement for taking my mother.

Among my peers I was considered quaint and old-fashioned, but Kasey never seemed to mind. He too was a believer in the principles taught by simple, God fearing, and hardworking parents. We had both been schooled in faith and in a belief in God and family responsibility. We understood what was expected of us and wanted to make our parents proud. I’m sure during those two years our parents worried that we were too close. And we were too close…but they never tried to keep us apart. There is an intensity to young love that is hard to deny, but we managed to hang on to our virtue and keep our hands to ourselves for the most part. We were planning to be married, ending the torture, as soon as we graduated. Kasey had asked me to marry him on Christmas Eve, placing a little tiny diamond on my finger. Our parents shrugged helplessly and gave us their blessing. My dad looked at me with tears in his eyes and said “Josie, are you sure, honey?” I remember looking back at him in amazement thinking what a silly question that was. I’d responded with a laugh and a fierce hug. I’d never doubted it for a moment. Not one frisson of doubt. My dad had squeezed me back and kissed the top of my head.

“Okay, honey, okay ...”

Before falling in love with Kasey, I had assumed I would go to college and get a degree in music with a minor in English Lit and play piano professionally, making a living doing the thing I loved most. After Kasey, I wasn’t quite as desperate for that dream. It wasn’t that I had lost my ambition, but I couldn’t imagine any of those things giving me more joy than just being near Kasey and making a life with him. I had received a music scholarship to any school of my choice, and Kasey had a football scholarship to Brigham Young University. I figured I could teach piano lessons and make good money doing it; every Mormon kid takes piano lessons at some point in their childhood. I would get a little car so I could make house calls, which busy moms loved, and I could help support Kasey and myself while we both went to school. When we graduated, he would teach school and coach football just like his dad, and I would play piano professionally and compose, and we would be together forever. We had it all planned out.

Kasey was like air to me. No matter how much time we spent together it was never enough. He didn’t share my love of literature or my obsession with classical music, but he wasn’t threatened by it either. Kasey was probably the kind of man many women could happily love and be loved by. He laughed easily and liked to tease but never at the expense of someone’s feelings. He could be feisty and competitive but was quick to forgive and ask forgiveness. Unlike me, he never felt awkward giving and receiving affection; he hugged his dad, kissed his mom, and said I love you without me saying it first. He always made me feel like I was the best thing that ever happened to him. He was a very good son. He would have been a good man, a good husband, and a good father. He was the sun in my universe from our very first kiss.





Kasey asked me out of the blue one time if I’d ever been in love before. We were curled up on the big couch in his parent’s living room on a Saturday evening, homemade caramel popcorn between us and a couple of cold Cokes on little coasters on the coffee table in front of us. Things were being blown up and decimated on the big television screen and all was right with the world.

I laughed lightly, surprised at his question, and instantly replied “No!” as I grabbed his hand. He’d responded in kind and let the subject drop, almost if he’d expected my answer and mentally moved on before I’d even spoken. I sat in silence for a minute, holding his hand between mine, studying his palm, tracing his lifeline, and wondering what had inspired his question.

“Why?” I asked, suddenly unable to contain my curiosity.

Kasey glanced over at me distractedly, “Why what?”

“Why did you ask me if I’d ever been in love?” I prodded.

Kasey shrugged one shoulder, turning his attention back to the screen. “I don’t know, I’ve just been thinking....You may not have noticed me until last year, but I noticed you a long time ago.”

“Huh?”

Kasey sighed and picked up the remote, pausing the movie, making the guy who was being hurled through the air pause in mid-flight. He looked at me then, his eyes running over my face.

“Josie you’re beautiful, and you have been beautiful your whole life.” I warmed at the praise and found myself smiling sheepishly, embarrassed but pleased. “The nice thing about you,” he continued, “is you don’t seem to know it. When we were in junior high, my friends and I would talk about you. Some of the guys thought that you were stuck up because you were so quiet and you weren’t interested in any of us.” My eyebrows shot up, and it was Kasey’s turn to be slightly embarrassed.

“Well, you were so much more mature than everyone else, heck you were practically from a different planet. You were nice enough, but you were really distant, kind of like you were just putting in your time, you know? A few of the guys thought maybe you had an older boyfriend or something.” Kasey searched my eyes like he was gauging the effect his words would have - maybe wondering if I would volunteer that I had, indeed, had a secret boyfriend no one knew about.

“You were taller than all of us and looked a lot older, and you were definitely smarter. I knew better though. I knew you were just really shy, not stuck up. You probably don’t remember, but in 7th grade Science you sat right next to me. You were very sweet - never snotty or full of yourself. I looked forward to that class every day. That was when I decided that someday you were gonna be my girlfriend. I’ve liked other girls, but I always had my eye on you.”

I leaned over and gently pressed my lips to his, and the conversation was suspended as he kissed me back. His mom’s voice from the kitchen brought us tumbling back to reality, and we pulled apart and resumed a safer proximity. Kasey hit ‘play’ on the remote and the unfortunate victim finished his trajectory into the side of an apartment building. Kasey slung his arm around my shoulders, and I leaned against him, pulling my feet in fuzzy pink socks up under me.

I’d spent the rest of that evening in contemplation, feeling almost guilty. I’d been glad for the Schwarzenegger video Kasey had picked to watch; it had allowed my mind to wander as he enjoyed the destruction on screen. It had been a while since I had actively thought of Samuel. He still tiptoed through my thoughts every now and then. When the Twin Towers and the Pentagon had been hit, I wondered where he was and if he would be one of the Marines on the front lines in the war in Afghanistan. I had even watched the news coverage with his face in my mind. But I had not physically missed him, not really, not for a long time. After all, I hadn’t seen him in more than two years.

But as I sat there holding Kasey’s hand, I had to acknowledge my lie. I might love only Kasey now, but I had been in love before. I had loved Samuel. It was not a crush or infatuation. It had been love. Innocent, out of the ordinary, before its time, but….love. Time had provided perspective, and though I had never admitted it to myself, I knew it was true. The thought left me shaky.

I hadn’t ever told Kasey about Samuel. Not a single word. I wondered at my silence. I wasn’t ashamed of what had been - but there weren’t words. Some things can’t be explained or shared; they tend to lose their luster when passed around. It reminded me of the ‘pearls before swine’ scripture. A pig will never have any appreciation for a pearl, no matter how precious. He doesn’t have the experience or the capacity to comprehend its worth. My relationship with Samuel had been a glimmering pearl in my life, and even those closest to me, though certainly the furthest thing from swine, would be unable to grasp its intrinsic value. The saying ‘you had to be there’ pretty much summed it up. Nothing could be gained by me trying to expound on the subject - so I never had. Samuel was no longer a part of my life, and that night as I held hands with my future, I determined to keep him tucked away in my past.





The day of graduation, May 28, saw us lined up with our classmates, marching down the aisle, and getting our diplomas. Alphabetical order put Jensen and Judd side by side, and Kasey and I threw our caps into the air together. I was in the top ten in my class; I would have been Valedictorian had I tried. I made sure I wasn’t. Graduating number three meant I wouldn’t have to say one word into the microphone, and I had no interest in giving a speech at graduation. I didn’t shed any tears as people around me, including Kasey, hugged each other and cried nostalgically. High school had never been the pinnacle for me, and I was so ready for what came next…and what came next was Kasey and me in church, in front of the whole town, saying ‘I do.’ When I was a little girl, I had watched the musical ‘Seven Brides for Seven Brothers’ eight million times, and I was going to be a June bride. We had the date set, the announcements printed, and my wedding dress, the dress my mother had worn when she married my dad, hanging in my closet where I could see it as I fell asleep each night.

The after graduation tradition was an all night party for the seniors at a water park in Provo, about 45 minutes north of Nephi. Kasey was sociable and loved to play, so I happily went along, though water parks and all-nighters that didn’t involve books weren’t really my thing. Afterwards, the graduates would load into a school bus and head back to the high school for a big pancake breakfast served up by some of the moms. Kasey had a job stocking shelves in the early morning hours at the Nephi grocery store. He had to work that morning, so my brother Johnny was going to swing by and grab me at the high school after his night shift at the power plant ended. Kasey had planned to grab a shower and a quick nap in the employee break room before his shift began.

As usual, we tried to postpone our parting to the last possible minute. It was just before 5:00 in the morning and Kasey didn’t have to be to work until 6:30, so he decided he had plenty of time to run me home himself and still get a shower and a catnap. We’d called the power plant from the phone in the school office and Johnny had been paged to a nearby phone.

“I don’t mind, Johnny,” Kasey had said earnestly. Johnny had laughed at him.

“I’m sure you don’t Kasey, and I know Josie doesn’t,” he said wryly, “but you two have had no sleep, it’s 5:00 in the morning, I’ll be ready to leave in 45 minutes, and there’s no reason for you to take the extra trip.”

Kasey reassured him and I cajoled, and before long we were on our way to Levan in Kasey’s beat-up, green Ford. We liked the old car because it had a bench seat in front, and I could sit right next to him. I sat as close to him as I could while he drove. He kept his left hand on the wheel and the other hand in mine. We both smelled like chlorine from the water park, and our hair had dried in stiff ringlets. I’d twisted mine up into a clip, but his fell over into his eyes, and I smoothed the curls off of his forehead as we chatted non-stop all the way to my house.

The sun was just peaking up over the eastern mountains that shadowed the sleepy town when we rolled across the gravel in front of my house. I had spent many a day up Pidgeon and Chicken Creek Canyons in those mountains. That year we’d had a dry, cold winter and not nearly enough snowfall, and as farmers in the West usually do, we’d spent a lot of time fasting and praying for moisture. The canyon wouldn’t see much run-off that year, which would be hard on the farms. But I was too content to worry overmuch, and that morning, with the sun behind them, those mountains just looked like home to me, all framed in pink hope with streaks of golden promise spilling over the tops. Kasey stepped out of the car and I slid out after him, closer to his door than my own. He leaned back against the door and pulled me up against him, resting his cheek against my head. We watched the sun rise in silence. Teenagers ordinarily don’t like to get up any earlier than they have to, and we were pretty normal in that regard. We’d never watched the sun rise together, so that morning was a first for us, and I remember being completely filled to the brim with contentment. There is a silent music in joy, and the music of that morning still makes my heart ache when I allow myself to a revisit it. His muscled young arms were strong around my shoulders, and when he leaned down and rubbed his cheek against mine, his breath was sweet and smelled faintly of maple syrup.

“I love you so much, Josie Jensen,” he whispered against my cheek, and I turned in his arms and cupped his face in my hands. I felt a lump rise in my throat as I looked at him, and I felt strangely like laughing with the sweetness of it all.

“I love you too, Kasey Judd, and if you don’t kiss me right now, I’m going to shatter into a million pieces,” I whispered back. He leaned toward me, but I closed the distance, standing on my tiptoes and pulling him down. I tasted the lingering sweetness on his lips and breathed him in. My heart stuttered in a now familiar two-step, and we sank into each other just like the first time. Breathlessly, I had to pull myself from him, for there was a little edge to his kiss and an urgency in the way he held me to him. I thrilled at his passion, but knew Johnny wouldn’t be too far behind us, and I didn’t want to embarrass him or initiate a brotherly lecture on “being careful.”

Kasey’s chin dropped to his chest, and his eyes closed in mock agony. “UUHH” he groaned out. “Three weeks is too long! I’m going to be the one who shatters into a million pieces.” He echoed my words of a moment before.

“We’ll make it. It’s not forever.” I laughed up at him. Pulling me into his arms he kissed me again, hungry like before, and I reluctantly ended it once more, pulling away with my hands linked in his.

His lips turned down at the corners, and his eyebrows curved in his best hang dog expression. He looked wistful as he sighed out his goodbye. I laughed again, delighted by his need for me.

“Maybe we should stay apart until the big day,” I teased him with a helpful smile.

“It seems like forever,” he said quietly as he climbed into the car.

I stepped back and watched him pull out of the gravel drive. I waved and blew silly kisses. “Call me, later!!” I shouted, and he waved his hand out his window, signaling he’d heard me. I didn’t even watch him drive away. I turned and walked into the house, suddenly eager for a shower and my feather pillow. I had no premonition, no inkling that it really would be forever. It was the last time I saw him alive.