There was a tap, tap, tap. The sound was coming from the water pipes in the house. I got up and responded to the sound with my own taps on the plumbing, and walked out the front door. Sara Bess and I had concocted a private communication scheme. The country was still in the great depression and my family had not the luxury of a telephone and no phone bills, of course. I made my way up the hill to the house next door where I found Sara Bess sitting on the porch waiting for me.

"Hi,” she said, “Did you bring your book?”

“Yes ma'am,” I said, and sat down beside her. “Do you remember the assignment?”

She remembered, but before we went inside to study we were compelled to sit a while and cuddle and woo. Eventually we did go in and study our French assignment.

French? Why in the world was I studying French? I really had no interest in French, or any other foreign language. My interests lay in mathematics, science, etc. Anyone could guess the reason. I had found that Sara Bess was signing up for the course.

There were several attractive girls in my class. After the class advanced to high school I began to take more interest in them. There was a certain mystery about them that I wanted to learn more about. A good deal of that mystery lingers yet. Sara Bess had been in my class all along. For some odd reason I became more interested in her than in any other. She wasn’t the fairest damsel there. I was more than a foot taller than she, and her protruding chin looked odd, but I thought she was cute. I was a shy guy and I wanted her to think of me as her guy, but I was hesitant to move.

Soon after my newfound interest, my family moved from the flood plain to the mountainside. I was ecstatic, because I found that Sara Bess lived in the house next door. This would surely make it easier for me to get acquainted with her.

I quickly learned to give up my habit of getting to school in just the nick of time. Sara Bess usually got there ten minutes early. I had to be ready to leave home sooner, so as to be able to “happen” to meet her on the way to school. After a while walking together became natural, sometimes even holding hands. In time we were hanging around together on her front porch in the evenings. When the weather cooled she invited me inside. We had become a couple, or as they say these days, an item. Once we had discovered that noises in our plumbing systems could be heard in both houses we decided on our taping arrangement which we used for other than academic purposes. 

Things went well for a couple of years, then during our senior year an intruder appeared on the scene. I suspect he first showed up while I was honing my football skills on the gridiron. I learned when I saw him pass my house one evening, that he was Charles Roach. I was acquainted with Roach. We had been in the same Boy Scout troop. He was a good-looking boy, so I could see why a girl might be attracted to him. I had serious reservations about his honesty, however, because I had seen him cheat on several occasions in scout activities. I cautioned Sara Bess to be sure she could trust him. She probably thought it was my jealousy talking.

Occasionally when I asked to see her, Sara Bess would say that she was busy. So I began to see her less often. Word of this got around among our peers. Our class crystal-ball-gazer looked ten years into the future.

“Donald Jessee and his wife, Sara Bess, are taking a world cruise so that Sara Bess can forget Charles Roach,” she said.

During the summer after graduation I not only saw less of her, but her ardor had cooled a good deal. She was surely smitten by the Roach.

In the fall Sara Bess went to Milligan College and I enrolled at Lincoln Memorial University. I met several new girls at college. Some were interesting and fun to be with, but I could not forget Sara Bess, so off I went to Milligan College to see her. We had a friendly visit, but she wasn’t her former self. I concluded that she had chosen Roach as her favorite guy. So ended the first romance of a young lover.

Fifty years later at the class reunion I was excited to see Sara Bess again. She was the only classmate that I recognized. She attended the event with her husband, a retired navy officer. Our meeting was much more cordial than had been our last meeting at Milligan College. At dinner we reviewed major events in our lives over the past half-century. She told of how her first husband, Dr. Charles Roach, walked out and left her with four children to raise. 

“You were right,” she said, "I should have listened to you.” 

Regrets? Perhaps, but she seemed contented with her current life.