The First Love Of Alipang Havens

Good action, good chastisement. Gotta know when to fight. As Kenny Loggins says "You've gotta know when to hold em, know when to fold em, know when to walk away, and when to run".
 
The city of Smoky Lake had not much more than than twenty thousand residents; the only reason it had use for two high schools was because rural students from the north and the west also attended them. Such a small city would not have been expected to attract a lot of interest from Beltway political hacks and the W.A.L.N.U.T. organization; but as public radio and other organs of the hard left went to work, the more perceptive Smoky Lake citizens--including Eric Havens and Pastor Stetzer--began to grasp the reasons for the unfriendly attention.

Small Southern town, old-fashioned values.

But close enough to D.C. to give journalists an easy commute.

Dumb country hicks, easy targets for stereotyping.

Simultaneously invoke rich-person envy, regardless of contradictory images. A sly enough journalist _ought_ to be able to make Eric Havens look at once like a bigoted hayseed AND an evil corporate fat-cat.

Make the town look like Ku Klux Klan Headquarters--but be sure never to let the audience know how many _nonwhite_ residents of Smoky Lake see things the same way as the white conservatives.

Invent boogeymen to scare adherents of the dominant political party; convince them that _only_ controlling all three branches of the federal government isn't nearly enough to keep them safe from the frightful menace of Navy SEALS veterans and outspoken dentists in small towns.

As of the first weekend after the shooting at Rafferty's, no lawsuits were yet forthcoming against the Havens and Tisdale families; but the friends of these families, including Tom and Isobel Stetzer, Police Chief Costamesa and Amy Gordon at WVVV, were not waiting for subpoenas to be served. By the internet, and every other means at their disposal, they began proactively seeking to rally support, particularly from Christian legal-defense organizations and alternative media. Where interviews could be obtained, they made sure to put forward nonwhite spokespersons where possible, such as Isobel Stetzer and Chief Costamesa, since demagogues like Rhoda Gardner were trying to bring in the race card.

While this counterattack was rallying, a young couple hovered uneasily in the eye of the storm. Alipang Havens and Kim Tisdale continued resolutely working at keeping their relationship intact; they would not give their enemies the satisfaction of breaking them up--not even when the truckstop cravenly suspended them from work.

It was on Sunday night, as they sat together (for the first time ever) on the edge of Kim's bed (though with Leo the cat between them), that Kim said to Alipang:

"Al, I just realized that I've never seriously said that I love you."

Alipang felt waves of blazing magma sloshing around inside him. "Does, um, does that, like, does that mean, you know, does that mean.....you DO love me?"

Kim smiled shyly. "Yeah, it does. I guess I've loved you for awhile by now, but I wasn't ready to say it. Must have taken TWO times close to gunfire to jolt it up onto the conscious level. I love you, Al. No groping allowed yet, but I love you."

Al had no plans of groping; he was awestruck. "I, I, I guess I'm a lucky boy, Kim, because I love you too."

Kim favored him with her most deliciously radiant smile, which by itself was almost as good as being made out with. "Lucky man, you mean. You're a man in everything but one more birthday."

Alipang nodded. "Next fall, then, when I'm eighteen....we can begin to discuss, um, our future, you know, our, uh, long-range plans."

"You can say the word 'marriage,' Al, it won't panic me....anymore. That's not to say that we ARE engaged; but I can see it as a possible thing now. If you're really good, I might even obey you one day out of every week."

Alipang leaned past the cat and kissed Kim, encountering no resistance; then he told her, "That's going to be an interesting discussion we have coming after my next birthday. I just hope our families won't be bankrupted by politically-motivated lawsuits before then."

Kim gave him a return kiss. "Even if they are, God forbid, I'll still hang on to your silver spurs."
 
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It was a chilly evening in March. In a posh condo in Alexandria, one of the suburbs of the nation's capital, a woman who had been ultra-gorgeous and who still was fine-looking for forty-three....sat alone with her cigarettes and the stereo. She was listening to Eighties music: specifically, "Eternal Flame" by The Bangles.

Once Deborah Wesselrood had looked, and dressed, like one of The Bangles. Her husband, a few years older and highly successful, had dropped his first wife for Deborah on NO other basis than what she looked like. Still, she had flattered herself that her act of husband-theft was "true love," and that its flame would be eternal. She knew better now. Bryce was out partying with some rowdy Japanese clients, and she was not required.

The door buzzer startled her. What she saw through her own security-camera feed startled her more.

"Lorraine!! Come in, dear!"--and she hit the admittance button.

Soon the former trophy wife and the potentially-former trophy wife were hugging with reasonable sincerity amid the tobacco haze in the condo. "Isn't Bryce home?" asked Lorraine.

"No; he's 'protecting' me from exposure to the kind of entertainment his latest clients enjoy. But I shouldn't complain; I heard how Craig left you."

With the door shut again, the two friends sat down close together on the sofa. "I can't complain, either," Lorraine declared. "Something happened since Craig left me that--makes up for a lot."

Deborah regarded her quizzically. "Something religious, wasn't it? I seem to have heard rumors. What was it you joined, the Moonies?"

Lorraine laughed softly. "No, nothing so exotic. I only found out that Jesus Christ is really alive and active, and that He can cure both the harm I've suffered AND the harm I've done...."

Deborah was startled at herself: she was in a mood to listen to this.

The two women spoke together for nearly three hours, during which Deborah found herself agreeing to visit Lorraine's Beltway-area church sometime soon. Lorraine had come to share her faith with a member of her former social circle; it was a serendipitous bonus, coming up somehow as they talked, that this friend proved to know something else of interest. Bryce Wesselrood owed some of his business success to having successfully licked the boots of certain organizations not normally friendly to private enterprise. One organization he had gotten along with excellently was the World Association of Legal Networks for Urban Transformation.....
 
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The office of the Attorney-General of the Commonwealth of Virginia stands on East Main Street in Richmond, not far from Interstate 195. Several of the former homeschoolers of Smoky Lake, while still in homeschooling, had gone on field trips to the state capital and visited most of the civic buildings.

One of these former homeschoolers was Summer Heron. She was now navigating as Pitik Imada the Escrima master drove a car, threading the streets of downtown Richmond on a Wednesday afternoon. Also in the car was Summer's boyfriend Evan; he and Summer had gotten their parents' go-ahead to skip one day of school for a good cause, though the parents themselves had not been able to get away from work. Master Imada, being self-employed with more freedom of action, had stepped up to provide adult supervision for the expedition.

When the three small-town residents entered the building and submitted the contents of their pockets and Summer's purse to a security inspection, Summer was carrying a big thick envelope.

Passing the inspection (Master Imada had left his knife in the car, and the guards had no idea what he could have done with the wooden cane he carried), they proceeded to a receptionist. As the eldest, Master Imada spoke first: "Excuse us, miss, we have a formal letter that we need the Attorney-General to see. We're not asking for an in-person interview, we just need to know that the letter is being delivered."

"I see," the woman said blandly. "What does this letter concern?"

"We're from Smoky Lake," Evan told her. "Recently, a sheriff's deputy in our town was forced to shoot a criminal who was about to shoot a friend of ours. But the criminal had connections."

"Connections with W.A.L.N.U.T., and with labor-union power brokers," clarified Summer. "He was one of a gang of strongarm goons who were trying to scare people into agreeing with mandatory union membership in all sorts of workplaces."

Evan took over again: "The case is bound to be in your computers, and besides, our letter tells time, place, names and details. But the point is that political partisans, who are in bed with the big unions, are trying to make the sheriff's deputy look like a murderer in the news media--trying to make _anyone_ who opposes forced unionism look like a monster. Our letter is essentially a testimony to Deputy Sheriff Kramer's good character, and a petition for authorities to disregard the lies that are being told about him."

The receptionist, herself a union member, lifted an eyebrow. "Just who is lying about this deputy?"

"Almost every so-called mainstream news outlet that has mentioned his case so far," said Pitik Imada.

"One thousand four hundred and eleven voters in and around Smoky Lake signed this letter," Summer continued. "A duplicate copy is being hand-delivered to the Governor's office right now. Among the people delivering that copy is a girl named Callie, whose life was once saved by Deputy Kramer. We're serious about not letting our Deputy be railroaded with slanderous accusations."

"And we'll ask you to do us a favor and give us a signed receipt, telling exactly when this petition was handed to you," added Master Imada. "We'll provide our own names to be recorded on it also."

The receipt was given, if not enthusiastically.

The trio later joined Callie's party at a previously-selected restaurant, so they could eat an early supper and not fight peak rush-hour traffic. While they were waiting for their food Callie told Summer, "The man who accepted the letter from us didn't act thrilled about it; but we made him give us a receipt so he couldn't pretend he never got it."

"Same with the woman we spoke to," said Summer. "They're union members, and they're indoctrinated that the union can do no wrong. But it's just too bad if they don't like us petitioning for redress of grievances; that's a right that 'Change' hasn't been able to take away from us yet."
 
On the following Saturday morning, Alipang and his friends Dan, Brendan, Jason and Brickpile stood in the center of a crowd of more than two hundred local teens and adults. With them was Pastor Stetzer.

"Everybody listen!" the pastor's voice projected. "The Mayor is allowing us to do this march because he trusts us not to let it become a riot. But there are people who want to _make_ it a riot, then say that _we're_ violent. They spent the last eight years loudly declaring that dissent was patriotic, but now they want anyone who dissents from _their_ agenda to shut up! So they'll do _anything_ they can get away with to discredit us. They will provoke us any way they can. If you look straight behind me, you'll see two vans with out-of-state license plates; those are camera crews who came down _with_ those counter-demonstrators you saw on the other side of the police line. They want us to retaliate in some way to the abuse that's coming, so they can film it selectively and pretend that we picked a fight! So you must not retaliate in any way!

"If all else fails, they may resort to one hundred percent staging; that is, they may have some of _their_ people pretend to assault _others_ of their people, and film that. But you all know what we're doing to defeat that tactic. Let's get ready now!"

There was a group prayer, led by Wilson Kramer's own Baptist pastor; then the marchers formed up.

"Please, Al, you've got to let me take point," argued Brendan. "If you're visible in the front, the W.A.L.N.U.T.-cases will go ballistic, and gang up on you till you're _forced_ to fight back, which they'll _still_ trump up as an 'attack' by you. Remember that they've got illegals in their crowd....and some of those might be friends of the thugs you put down on Christmas Eve. So be safe today, brother: be a rank-and-filer."

"Do what he says, Al," Kim anxiously concurred. "You don't need to prove anything; and I've certainly re-learned my lesson about caution and prudence."

"I'm with Kim and Brendan," said Chilena, coming up alongside her boyfriend. "We already know you could flatten any three of those political gangsters, and thirty of them if they came one at a time. But we're making a statement here, not fighting a battle."

"Or you could say that making the statement is HOW we'll fight the battle," Dan added.

Alipang sighed with his eyes closed. "All right, future Marine, you're on point; and God go with you."
 
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Quinn Kramer was not present with the marchers. Neither was his father, precisely because Wilson Kramer was the subject of the march. But they were waiting for a phone call from the pastor of House on the Rock Baptist Church, who was there.

The call came; and young Quinn immediately passed the word online to twenty-eight fellow bloggers, each of whom signalled another dozen. In close coordination with the start of the march at the reservoir park, the announcement of the rally, with an explanation of the reason for it, went up all over the internet.

One particularly important fact which was displayed--just soon enough to be timely, and too late for the counter-demonstrators to adapt to it--was the tactic Pastor Stetzer had devised to prevent imposters from pretending to be part of the march and then doing things to discredit it. Every single placard being carried by the true marchers (and this was known to the authorities) had one of only two approved slogans:

KRAMER IS
INNOCENT!

NUTS TO
W.A.L.N.U.T.!​

These two designs were being publicly revealed for the very first time only after the marchers had started walking. Their course would take them around the perimeter of Lakeshore Park, then into town, ending up--to the dismay of devoted W.A.L.N.U.T. supporter Principal Flora Lewiston--on the grounds of Smoky Lake East High School.



Brendan Hyland marched front and center, flanked by the two pastors and by Jason and Brickpile. Brendan's girlfriend Jennifer was walking directly behind him--not as a patriarchal gesture of suppressing women, but so that Brendan's body would shield her from the hail of eggs, tomatoes, dirt clods, and plastic bags filled with fouler substances, which the lovers of "change" began hurling from early on in the march. Farther back, Dan and Alipang were similarly shielding Chilena and Kim. The police, both city and county, were doing the very least amount of interfering that was possible, consistent with preventing mortal injury to anyone. This, not because they sympathized with the slanderers of Deputy Kramer, but because they were not about to bestow cheap phony martyrdom on W.A.L.N.U.T.'s imported mob with arrests if they could help it.

"Keep cool, everyone," Brendan shouted at one point with egg yolk dripping down his face; "hysteria is _their_ department!" As he marched onward, he was thinking of two things:

At the Battle of Gettysburg, the Rebel troops taking part in Pickett's Charge had been forbidden to fire a shot until they were on top of the Union position. They had had to march and march, under fire, waiting for their moment.

Every one of the W.A.L.N.U.T. rioters would have claimed to be an admirer of Martin Luther King. But just who was now emulating King's nonviolent protests, and who was trying to coerce and intimidate?

The march proceeded on course and according to plan. Alipang, being a rank-and-filer in the middle, realized that Brendan had been right. If Alipang had been facing the brunt of the abuse up front, it would have been _extremely_ hard, even for the boy who had calmly let the bully Rocknose pummel him, to let this cowardly harassment go on without smashing the heads of some of the harassers.

By the time three-quarters of the route had been covered, the troublemakers were getting desperate. With tedious predictability, they tried to play the Hitler card. As their bought-and-paid-for news cameramen filmed, imposters posing as part of the march rushed out of alleys in town, carrying Nazi flags and "White Power" signs, to make a pretense of assaulting the W.A.L.N.U.T. supporters. It didn't matter that the incident at Rafferty's Truckstop had had not the slightest connection with racial issues; all that mattered was creating emotional impact.

But even as the peddlers of chaos and fraud were playing their last card, Amy Gordon was on the air live with a mobile radio unit, explaining for all hearers, and for the record, what was really happening. The two tomatoes that struck her in the course of this, she wore as a badge of honor.

When the rally for Deputy Kramer concluded at the high school, Brendan just could not resist one final gesture. Standing on the roof of his own car, now joined there by Jennifer and Alipang, he led a mighty roar to which dozens added their voices:
"FREEEEEE - DOMMM!!"​
 
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The union thug who had fallen to Deputy Kramer's bullets when trying to kill Alipang had, ironically, not died in vain from the viewpoint of his own faction. His own faction, of course, continued stubbornly maintaining, in defiance of unanimous testimony to the contrary, the fiction that "corporate thugs" had been the aggressors that night at Rafferty's. More to the point for the union racketeers who had sent the goon squad, the management of Rafferty's knew what corrupt unions were capable of...and they went belly-up, waving the white flag to the same gang which had instigated violence on their property. Rafferty's Truckstop would stage a sham vote on unionizing, supervised by W.A.L.N.U.T., with no secret ballots. This was as much as to say that a union was now in charge.

The fact that Rafael Imada withdrew his Asian-buffet operation from Rafferty's, and the fact that over half the population of Smoky Lake instantly vowed never to give Rafferty's any business ever again, meant no more to the W.A.L.N.U.T. organizers than the death of their mercenary thug had meant. What counted for them was increasing their economic and political power. If Rafferty's went broke due to its loss of popularity, they would count on it being bought out by someone equally compliant.

Alipang Havens and Kim Tisdale were left in a twilight zone. The jobs they had left at the good old Pansit Paradise to man the Eastern Paradise at Rafferty's were now held by others; they couldn't, and didn't, ask the Imadas to fire those persons for their benefit. Rafael was hoping to start a catering business, and give the young couple employment with this; but for the moment, Alipang and Kim were out of work.

So it was that, on the day after the march for Deputy Kramer, Alipang and Kim emerged from church with no place they urgently needed to be. They had lunch together at the Havens household, relaxed awhile and digested while persuading Eric and Cecilia Havens to listen to a bit of Tori Amos....and then went on a very short drive in Kim's old white sedan, to General Longstreet Park in town, the scene of Brendan Hyland's rescue of Alipang last year. Walking back and forth among the budding trees, they discussed the things they still hoped would happen despite current troubles. Especially, they discussed the awkward year they would face when Kim would be a community-college student, while Alipang would still be in high school, though finishing two years in one thanks to his homeschooling advantage.

"If it comes down to it," Alipang reluctantly conceded, "I have no right to tell you that you _can't_ go out with other boys. We're not engaged or anything."

Kim halted and turned the unresisting Alipang to face her squarely. "It probably makes you feel better to have come out and said that; and I do appreciate you not acting like an owner with me. But you know what?" She leaned forward to kiss his cheek, then continued: "I'm not even slightly interested in any other boys anymore. I've got three older sisters to keep me informed about the condition of the collegiate male generation--full of dweebs who think they're studs, and who look for their manhood in a bottle. Posing and posing and posing, I'm too sexy for my shirt--forget it! Like I told you the other night, Al, you're a man at heart, not an Animal House pledge. You're someone who works, thinks, loves...."

This much from Kim was enough to give Alipang the boldness to kiss Kim on the lips. When he drew back from this, Kim was smiling, but not finished talking.

"There, Al, just look at yourself: no other boy would be satisfied with so little of anything physical from me. Do you realize that you _don't_ bother even thinking about whether you can score and have something to brag about to your friends? Do you realize that you're a knight in shining armor? You're the best thing with a Y chromosome that ever happened to me; do you even imagine I'd throw that away for a bum who just has an earlier birthdate?" Now she hugged him, and he hugged back.

"God knows, I _want_ you to keep on wanting me," Alipang breathed into her dark-chocolate hair. "But it's a lot to ask of you, to have college kids maybe laughing at you for having a minor as a boyfriend."

"Remember, Al, I'm an indie girl; I wouldn't feel right if I _were_ considered part of the ordinary crowd. I'll make it clear that our relationship is pure. And maybe something could be done to bring you some of the respect you deserve. I know that the community college has Tai Chi classes, taught for the fitness and the faddishness; maybe they would allow an Escrima club to be started on campus, which you would lead. Eight or nine jocks lying flat on a practice floor, with you standing over them, would definitely give you some street cred."

Alipang thought of his nickname, "Filipino Fireball," which no one had actually spoken recently, and laughed. "Maybe that would work. Especially if we start by persuading some college students to come to Master Pitik's existing class at his house; then they'd know that I have a serious training background and I'm not just making stuff up. Thank you for thinking of that, Kim."

"You deserve respect, Al; I'm just thinking of how you can get some of it."

"Having _your_ respect is more important than having an Escrima club, though now I do hope it happens. Escrima has helped me to stay alive more than once....but Kim, you are more and more becoming what I'm living FOR."

That earned him another kiss.
 
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The self-delusions of "change" advocates notwithstanding, it was the six surviving thugs from the Rafferty's incident, and not Wilson Kramer or the young couple he had rescued, who faced genuine criminal charges--though only for aggravated assault, attempted extortion, racketeering and "felony menacing." The one to whom a clear charge of attempted murder would have stuck....had already paid the penalty.

Tuesday saw Alipang and Kim released from school for the morning, to give testimony at the grand jury hearing in the county courthouse. In the spectator seats, on behalf of his radio station, sat Otto Grundzig, general manager of WVVV, taking meticulous notes on all that was said from the witness stand.

Holding down the fort at the station was Amy Gordon. Sitting at the manager's desk, it was she who received an intriguing visitor: one Lorraine Sloane, who had a briefcase with her.

Their conversation, by Lorraine's request, occurred with the office door locked.

"I've seen you at Redemption Church," Amy declared. "Aren't you the one who was asking about Wilson Kramer some time back?"

"Yes, and I found him. Better yet, I found the Lord Jesus, with the help of your own pastor's wife. That's the turning point in an otherwise terribly sordid story, the story of a shameless adulteress--who IS ashamed now. I know that we can't earn God's forgiveness, that it's paid for by the blood of Jesus; but ever since God got my attention, I've been wishing that I could DO something to make amends to Wilson, the man I deserted. Now I've done it."

She set the briefcase on the desk, so it would open toward Amy.

"You know what the W.A.L.N.U.T. organization is: anti-God, anti-family, anti-everything normal and good. The joke is that, before I came to repentance, I moved in social circles which included some of their financial supporters. Now the joke's on them. They love it when someone leaks information that injures their adversaries; but now the leak is going to let air out of _their_ tires. Everything here is yours to play with: names, dates, transactions, online correspondence, memos. A ton of evidence of W.A.L.N.U.T.'s unethical activities, including vote fraud and fake racism lawsuits."

Amy looked in the briefcase and gaped. "Where did you get all this?"

"Ironically, from a fellow husband-stealing tramp. One who I hope will soon be joining me on the redeemed side."
 
Love it. Kim and Al's little convo was great. Y'know...morality is so underrated these days. It's so sad. I'm sure you're fully aware of that, since you're making it a big part of this story. I really appreciate those parts that talk about how their relationship isn't built around physical things, and whatever is physical is so pure. What a great gift purity is when you can give it to God and your future spouse.
 
On a night near the end of March, Alipang, Kim, Chilena, Dan, Grant the singer-guitarist from Redemption Church, and Cecilia's brother Doug Fairhope were praying together in the maternity waiting room of Shilohsville General Hospital. Diana Wicklund was _inside_ the birthing room, assisting the obstetrician. Harry and Kwai Richardson had come by earlier, and had taken Melody and Harmony home with them when the little girls could no longer stay awake. Tom and Isobel Stetzer would be coming as soon as they could get away from an unrelated emergency back in Smoky Lake.

Eric Havens was also in the birthing room with his wife; and contrary to stereotypes about men and childbirth, he neither panicked nor fainted at any point. But this didn't mean he had no worries. Terrance Havens was taking a terribly long time emerging from his mother, though the obstetrical team so far did not judge Cecilia or her baby to be in grave danger.

"My Mom tells me that I was mighty slow arriving, too," Dan told Chilena, as she clung to him for moral support.

Uncle Doug patted Chilena's shoulder. "And I can tell you that _your_ mother was also slow coming out of _our_ mother; so don't worry--it runs, or maybe plods, in the family."

Alipang, though physically clasped almost as close with Kim as his sister was with Dan, had his own words of attempted encouragement for Chilena--impulsively uttered in Tagalog, which they had not used for many weeks. "Our brother will be fine; God wants me to do VeggieTales voices for him, too."

It was nearly one a.m. when the Stetzers came in. Once they had heard such news of Cecilia as was available, Pastor Tom in a very few words reported that the nonviolent but angry domestic dispute they had been mediating seemed to have been resolved in an acceptable manner. Then he and Isobel settled into the prayer vigil. It was another half hour before Dr. Wicklund emerged to announce:

"It's all right! They're both safe! He's out and crying up a storm, and he weighs nine pounds one ounce."

The waiting room erupted into an indescribable amount of whooping, cheering, hugging, and joyous weeping. Cecilia Havens finally had NOT suffered a miscarriage. When the first wave of jubilation subsided, Pastor Stetzer asked Grant to lead a short praise chorus, which he did.

Everyone had a chance to see the red-faced but healthy-looking Terrance, after which most of them said their goodnights. Only Cecilia's husband and brother would be staying overnight at the hospital.

Dan and Kim, by prior agreement between the two of them, parted company for the night with Chilena and Alipang there at the hospital, allowing the siblings to drive home together and share this triumph on their mother's behalf.
 
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It was Chilena's car, but Alipang was more awake, so he drove. Chilena fell asleep before they had gotten four blocks away from the hospital.

Since their Aunt Tracy, Uncle Doug's wife, was stuck back in Pennsylvania taking care of urgent needs on her own side of the family, it was an empty house that awaited Alipang and Chilena. The blonde beauty still was fast asleep. So Alipang ran to the door of the house, unlocked and unlatched it, then hurried back to the car to fetch his adoptive sister. When he scooped her up in his arms, she half-consciously murmured, "Dan?"

Alipang whispered back, "No, sweets; this is apples, not oranges."

She said nothing further while he carried her inside. He settled her on the couch which for years, until recent months, had been their meeting place every night. In the kitchen he took a drink of water, and brought a cup of water to Chilena. "Sit up, Chil, have a little water." When she had drunk, he lifted her again, carried her upstairs, gently placed her on her bed, and pulled the shoes off her feet.

"Not here," she mumbled. "The place where it's okay."

Alipang had only a second's delay in realizing what his sister meant. They were alone in the house, and had not had any really substantial time alone together in weeks. So he began to pick her up once more, but she was regaining full awareness and stood up on her own. Her standing up close to him turned smoothly into a close embrace.

"What kind of world will our new brother grow up in?" Chilena suddenly whispered into Alipang's ear.

His own face immersed in Chilena's long golden hair, Alipang replied, "One in which his elders will be forced to fight every day to preserve for him even a fraction of the freedom you and I have known. He'll be truly fortunate if he gets to be homeschooled like the rest of us."

"Let's have this conversation when we're settled down."

So they went into their parents' bedroom, where once again they improvised a bed to share on the floor: the place where it was okay for them, both fully clothed, to lie down closely wrapped in each other's arms. Here Alipang resumed their talk:

"Deputy Kramer's case--I should say, the case of the thugs Kim and I fought, but the media turned it into Deputy Kramer being on trial--from all I hear, it looks like turning out well. The attack stories against him on television seem to be fading away; I don't know what happened, but I get the feeling that _something_ somehow disarmed or discouraged the attackers."

"It might be the petitions that Summer and the others delivered to Richmond," Chilena suggested.

"No question, those played a part; but I have this hunch that there was more besides. Something that we haven't heard about yet."

"Anyway, what about the whole world?"

Alipang squeezed their bodies still closer together. "I wish I could be all optimistic; but it's going to be rough. Whole armies of liars like the W.A.L.N.U.T. weasels, calling evil good and good evil, calling it 'hate' if we try to keep anything normal. If you have a normal marriage with Dan, and I have one with Kim, we'll be the ones treated as weird by a world that wants everything _except_ what's normal. But we have to keep trying to do right."

There was a spontaneous pause, in which they kissed for the first time tonight.

"Let me listen to your heart, Al, please?"

From lying on their sides front-to-front, Alipang helped Chilena up on top of him so she could plant an ear over his heart. Once more they enjoyed that special, undemanding, peaceful intimacy they had grown up with, for several relaxing minutes. Then they kissed again....spoke randomly about what they would do to help their mother with Terrance....kissed more emphatically....felt sleep overcoming them....kissed goodnight, and sank into dreams.


~ ~ END OF PART TWENTY-THREE ~ ~​
 
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PART TWENTY-FOUR:
SIDEWAYS TO THE FUTURE​


The flowers of spring were blossoming in Virginia. Cecilia Havens was blossoming with renewed youth as she had a baby to raise again. Harmony Havens was blossoming in her thrilling new role as an _elder_ sister.

And on the Saturday morning after Easter Sunday of 2009, a suggestion made by Kim Tisdale was also blossoming, looking as if it would bear fruit.

Alipang, Chilena, Gilberto Costamesa, and several much younger kids, all in athletic attire, were in Pitik Imada's basement gym in their capacity as regular students. Guests were also present: Wilson Kramer, still showing the relief of having been exonerated of all wrongdoing in the shooting of the union thug who had tried to kill Alipang; a near-thirty and hippie-ish woman, self-named Curving Breeze, who taught Tai Chi at Doverwood Community College where Baeline Tisdale was a student and Kim would be; two teenage girls who were her best Tai Chi students; and Kim herself, eager to see what came of the meeting she had lobbied for.

"Students, give respect to the visiting teacher," Pitik ordered his class; he and the Escrima students all bowed to the Tai Chi instructor. "Very good. Now, all of you know that I like to expose you to different fighting styles, and I never try to stop anyone from learning other styles. Today, an excellent contrast is provided to us: the classic contrast between 'soft' styles like Tai Chi Chuan, and 'hard' styles like our own. One undeniable advantage of Tai Chi is that it is easier on the joints than Escrima, so that a person can keep on practicing it to an older age than most Escrimadors can continue. Miss Breeze, please take the floor, show us the Tai Chi form, and explain a little about it."

Flanked and imitated by her two students, Curving Breeze gracefully executed the traditional Tai Chi movement set which could be seen everywhere in China and in many American cities. Then her students sat down, and she spoke about the history of her art, with a subtle boastfulness growing almost imperceptibly as she spoke. Master Pitik remained placid, and his example kept his students quiet, while their visitor went so far as openly stating that her own martial art was "more refined" than "crude, primitive linear styles based on unthinking force." Kim, sitting as near to Alipang as she could when she was not a student, winced with embarrassment. The effort to enlist Curving Breeze as an ally in persuading the college administration to welcome an Escrima club on campus wasn't going as well as she had expected.

Master Pitik's lessons on courtesy and patience had not been for nothing. None of the Escrimadors betrayed any indignation at the insult being offered to them in their own school. But Curving Breeze herself provided the opportunity for vindication.

"Master Pitik, with your permission, I would like to stage a little demonstration of simplistic movement versus enlightened movement: an exercise which will compare types of technique without any hazard of anyone getting hurt. May I borrow your best student?"

Alipang was taut as a drawn bowstring, trembling with eagerness to uphold the honor of Filipino Escrima. All he needed was to hear his master say what he now said: "Curving Breeze, meet Alipang Havens."

The young man seemed not to rise to his feet, but to rematerialize in a standing position. " Thank you, Master," he said to Pitik; then to the woman before him, " Teacher, please tell me what you wish me to do."
 
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Goodness, you surely _can't_ be thinking that I would be so politically incorrect as to depict my male hero outperforming a _woman_ at something, can you?? :rolleyes:;)
 
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