favorite pastimes—tormenting Beau. Finally reaching the foot of the stairs, he could see Ryan’s lanky frame facedown on the living room floor, growling ferociously at Beau from just about his level. Beau found this maneuver highly entertaining and reciprocated with several intimidating growls of his own before pouncing on Ryan and tugging at his shirt. This little ritual had been going on for years, and always culminated in Ryan feigning surrender and begging Beau for mercy. “Easy, Beau!” he shrieked as the dog growled and tugged at his shirt. “I give…you da dog, Beau, you da big dog!”
Capitulation and praise were a combo that always worked with Beau, and he released his death grip on Ryan’s shirt, yet not without a triumphant “Don’t mess with Beau!” look as he climbed off of his victim. Maggie’s familiar warning, “Beau, you get off of Ryan right now, you hear?” drifted in from the dining room, where she had been packing up some snacks for the boys’ trip.
“I declare, Ryan,” she admonished, “one day that dog is going to tear the shirt right off your back!”
“Nah, Mrs. Russell, Beau and I are pals. I’m really his therapist, you know. I encourage him to release all his pent-up aggression—keeps him more mellow around you guys!” he laughed.
“Well, I guess we’re in trouble now that you’re leaving,” Maggie sighed. “Sure you wouldn’t like to reconsider? You could come stay with us if you just need to get out of the house—I’m told boys your age just have to do that!”
“Not quite far enough, Mrs. Russell,” Ryan grinned. “Besides, what about Jules here? He’s gotta at least go north of Broad for a few years, don’t you think?”
“Ha ha! Trekking twenty-five hundred miles to the West Coast is hardly what I would call snobing,” Maggie responded, rolling her eyes while using the common Charlestonian colloquialism for venturing “slightly North of Broad.”
“You’re right about that,” Ryan agreed. Then with a twinkle in his eye and a bit of his usual wit, he added, “I guess we’re actually ‘swobing’…going significantly west of Broad!”
“We’re not going anywhere if you two don’t cut it out!” Julian interrupted from the entry hall at the foot of the stairs. “I thought you wanted to catch that group at the Orange Peel in Asheville tonight.”
“Yeah, I know. Just had to say goodbye to Beau here,” he smiled, patting Beau on the head, “AND give your mom one last tease!”
Tears began to well up in Maggie’s eyes as the truth of that statement swept over her. “I know you have to go,” she began, fighting them back and putting an arm around each boy, “really, I do. Ryan, you’ve been hanging around here since you were a baby, and Julian, you’re our only child. What else can I say? I knew this day had to come, but it still hurts horribly. I love you both so much, and I’m really gonna miss you!”
A flood of emotion now flowed from all directions as the three embraced and savored for a moment that indescribable human bond that love miraculously weaves between one spirit and another. It was as if all eighteen years were suddenly condensed into a single second and the intensity of feeling was overwhelming. As Ryan wiped his eyes, he looked down at Beau, who was providing a welcome moment of comic relief. “Hey you guys, look at Beau!” he laughed, as all eyes turned to the dog, who was lying on the floor, covering his ears with his paws.
“Oh Beau, you precious little fella!” Maggie whispered. “Well, at least one of my boys will still be around!” she sighed in an effort to console herself. Reaching down to give Beau a reassuring pat on the head, Maggie took a deep breath, and regained some measure of her Southern composure as she looked out the window and saw Ryan’s parents coming through the gate. “Time to get going, boys—here come Martin and Cathy. Julian, let me find your father so he can help send you off.”
Egos snapped back into place as that special moment of clarity and connection gave way to the demands of the task at hand. “Hey Ry,” exhorted Julian, “can you help me with this bag? It weighs more than I do!”
I doubt that, Ryan thought to himself, glancing over at his shorter and slightly pudgy friend. I’m gonna get that kid in shape if it kills me, he resolved as he reached down to help Julian with what was apparently the majority of his earthly possessions, carefully compressed into one overloaded receptacle. “Come on Jules, I got it,” he grinned as he effortlessly thrust the bag through the open doorway and toward the waiting van.
“I sure hope that thing is up to the trip!” Julian remarked, looking tentatively over at Ryan’s “hippie mobile,” as he called it.
“Oh, don’t worry about that!” echoed the voice of Martin Christie, as he and Cathy made their way through the garden to the piazza. “Ry and I went over that baby with a fine-tooth comb! She was purrin’ like a kitten by the time we finished,” he grinned. “No sirree, you boys are good to go. That thing would take you to China and back if you needed it to!”
Famous last words! Julian thought to himself, already having experienced quite a few breakdowns in the van since the Christies got it for Ryan on his sixteenth birthday.
Sensing his friend’s hesitancy, Ryan quickly concurred with his father, “Don’t worry, Jules…old Vinnie here is rarin’ to go!” On the day of its arrival, Ryan had christened his van Vinnie VanGo, a moniker still retained amid other original Christie works of art displayed ubiquitously on virtually every metallic surface of Vinnie’s exterior, in homage to one of Ryan’s foremost heroes. “Oh yeah,” he reassured himself, patting Vinnie affectionately as he hoisted Julian’s bag into an interior already packed with what appeared to be every imaginable item that Ryan could envision the two boys needing over the next four years—guitars, amps, microphones, speakers, books, computers, and even a few less essential items such as pots, pans, kitchen utensils, clothing, and last, but not the least, a US road atlas.
“Vinnie VanGone, I wish,” Julian thought to himself, as he stared at the van’s rather dubious epithet, boldly painted on the side facing the piazza, and recounted the numerous missions that had to be aborted due to Vinnie’s proclivity for mechanical failure. Surely, this wouldn’t be yet another of those, he hoped as the bulging bag containing nearly all his earthly possessions disappeared within the bowels of the beast.
“Don’t worry, Jules, everything will be just fine!” came Ryan’s voice from inside the sliding bombardier door. “Vinnie won’t let us down this time, you’ll see!”
“Sure, Ry,” came a slightly less-than-enthusiastic response. “Are we all loaded?”
“Just about. How about Beau? Think he’d like to tag along?”
“Don’t even think about it, Ryan Christie!” came a threatening female voice from the piazza. “One son lost for today is plenty, thank you!”
“Just kiddin’, Mrs. R.” Ryan laughed as he walked over to give his mom and dad a hug. “I’ll miss you guys,” he nodded, not quite able to muster the same level of emotion that had unexpectedly escaped him with Maggie and Julian a few moments earlier. The getting-out-from-under-the-parental-wings desire served as a counterbalance to whatever sadness he normally would have felt, for even though Ryan loved his parents dearly, he had definitely been a challenge for them, and more than a few unpleasant memories still lingered on both sides. He imagined his parents were feeling as much relief as he was, in spite of the love they all had for one another.
“Do your best out there, Ryan, and always know that you can count on us if ever you need anything,” Cathy promised as she gave her son a big goodbye hug.
“That
