Pootie Game Revived #2: The Kid

[puzzleme]

As the slow-moving freight train rumbled past the back gate, one of the trainmen tossed an orange out the yellow caboose window and called out, "Here ya go, kid, tell your grandpappy Zeke says 'hey!'"

[wvwoman]

yvette gave a quick wave before catching the flying fruit in her well-worn catcher's mitt, then called out, "hey, gramps, wanna share an orange?"

[gryhnd51]

Every night when it was warm enough, Zeke and his grandchild Yvette spent hours on the front porch watching the trains run slowly out of town.

[puzzleme]

Ezekiel Johnstone had passed his love of trains on down to Yvette who knew her grandpop had been a brakeman on the first Big Boy to climb the nearby mountain; what she didn't know was that he was a hero, too.

[imported_Lurker]

Over fifty years ago, as a young newlywed, Zeke had taken the well-paying three day run between Denver and Colorado Springs. The trip itself was not that long, but he was part of the loading crew, a dangerous job on an easy day. It meant only seeing his wife a few days at a time, but Zeke figured he could make enough in a year for them to buy a small home and start a family.

[imported_nanrich]

Yvette leaned back against her usual post and started to peel the orange. "Tell me a story about the ol' times, Gramps," she said. "Tell me one I haven't heard before."

[Barnabas]

Even now the memory of that summer day in 1956 seemed so clear, that day when Zeke, as a boy, had seen Trevor Rivers step off that empty boxcar with his knapsack.

[wvwoman]

"kick that crate over here, evvie, so i can put my feet up, and i'll tell you a humdinger!"

[puzzleme]

"Rivers, yep, Trevor Rivers", Zeke mused as Evvie pushed the crate under her grandpop's outstretched feet and settled in next to him on the porch swing.
"I was just about your age, Evvie - 11 years or so - when I saw that feller for the first time and I sure do wish it'd been the last. That varmint rode the rails off and on for years - free of charge, don't you know, because he could run fast and jump high. Never could hold a job and didn't care if he did."
Zeke chuckled as he scolded Evvie, "Now don't be spitting those orange seeds into Gramma's flower garden or she'll have both our hides!"
Zeke petted Evvie's curly red hair and continued his story, "Now, Trevor, bad as he was, had some good to him, too. He sure could be a charmer and he charmed us all that summer before the bad trouble started."

[universalmom]

" 'Dumb kid', is what I thought when I first saw him. He said he was looking for farm work, needed a job right away...but if you want to be a farm hand, only a dang fool shows up in early June! The corn and spring wheat are all planted, and winter wheat don't ripen until almost July." Zeke was quiet for a moment, staring at the heat shimmering from the railroad tracks. "Shoulda known right then he had other things besides farm work on his mind."

[Barnabas]

"Down at the corner of South Ferry Street and 6th Avenue," Zeke continued, "that was where a pie, cooling on a windowsill, disappeared later that evening. It seemed a small thing at the time."

[universalmom]

Evvie looked horrified, because she knew that address. "Not one of Aunt Donna's raspberry pies?"

[wvwoman]

"strawberry-rhubarb, and she was fit to be tied," zeke answered. "she had made it for her sister shanah's birthday the next day."

[momof7]

"You know, Evvie, as it turned out, she had baked her sister's birthday gift into the pie - a pair of diamond studs worth a fortune."

[imported_Lurker]

"Earrings! Oh, no!" Evvie exclaimed. "That's even worse than stealing a pie. Would serve them right if they bit down on one and cracked a tooth."