The Blue Stone

CHAPTER ONE

“Happy Birthday, daddy,” Gordon’s daughter Melissa’s voice was still ringing in his ears after he hung up the telephone. Not one to ever let his emotions get out of hand, or to be too soft-hearted about most things, Gordon dabbed at the moisture at the corner of his eyes.

Gordon and Melinda, his wife of nearly 14 years, had been divorced about four months. Melinda had been offered a job as Special Assistant to the Senior Partner of a prestigious law firm in Tulsa. When Gordon objected to the move, insisting they stay in Oklahoma City, Melinda filed for divorce. Melinda’s law career had always brought them more income than Gordon’s work as a Carpenter, a fact that had gradually nagged her into feeling that Gordon was far too complacent about their well-being and the futures of their children.

The divorce would be final in two months. Melinda had been given custody of their two children.

Gordon loved his kids. Melissa was now twelve and Matthew was nine, the same age he’d been the last time he went camping in Colorado with his parents.

Gordon had fond memories of that trip with his parents. The smell of the pine trees, the cool mountain air. It must’ve really been something before all the tourists started coming into that area. Gordon and his parents had set up their tent on a grassy ledge twenty or thirty yards from a clear creek. He could not remember the names given to the camping area or the creek where they’d camped, but it was still a vivid picture in his memory.

Gordon glanced at the birthday card and the wallet-size photograph he’d received from Melissa and Matthew and smiled to himself.

Leaning back in his comfortable old recliner, looking around his cheap two-room apartment, Gordon glanced at the old Roi Tan cigar box on the lamp stand near his chair. He’d kept that box since he was a kid. It held a lot of memories for Gordon. He and his older brother, Rayburn, had each started keeping their “important stuff” in what they’d called their “private safes” when he was seven years old and Rayburn was ten.

Actually, it was Rayburn that started this keepsake tradition and Gordon had followed Rayburn’s lead. Rayburn was always the leader for Gordon, and Gordon didn’t mind that at all.

Rayburn died in a drowning accident a year later. Gordon still missed his older brother after all those years.

Now, having just turned fifty, Gordon was feeling a little nostalgic. He reached over to pick up the old Roi Tan cigar box and brought it over onto his lap. The lid on the old wooden box was worn to the point of almost falling off. Gordon opened the lid. The first item he saw was the old jack knife his Grandpa had given him when he was a boy. The bone handle on the knife was pretty worn and the big blade was broken off, but the two smaller blades were still intact and in perfect working order.

Other items Gordon had slipped into his old cigar box included the Bronze Star and Purple Heart he’d gotten in Vietnam.

Gordon spotted the valve stem he’d taken from the inner tube of Rayburn’s bicycle one summer a long time ago. It had been left over from a prank he’d pulled on Rayburn, flattening one of his bike tires.

Rayburn and Gordon had experimented with smoking one summer many years ago. The partially empty white muslin bag of Bull Durham tobacco was all that was left of that memory. Gordon could almost taste the dirty grass flavor when they lit up their ragged looking “roll-your-own” cigarettes. He still vividly remembered how he had thrown up behind the garage following that experiment.

Gordon dug deeper into the old wooden box, unwrapping the smooth stone he’d picked up on that camping trip with his parents. To Gordon’s amazement, as he unwrapped the stone, it seemed to be glowing.

“What th’ hell?” Gordon muttered aloud, his eyes widening.

The surprisingly light stone was about two inches across and a half-inch or so thick, slightly oval in shape, its smooth surface was emitting a soft, iridescent blue glow.

“This is weird!” Gordon sat upright in his recliner and held the stone up to the nearby table lamp, “I never noticed this before!” Thinking it might simply be an odd Geode or Quartz he’d picked up in that creek bed all those years ago, Gordon turned the smooth blue stone over and over in his hand.

Gordon decided he would keep the odd stone with him and have it examined by one of his friends whose wife worked in a jewelry store.

Stuffing the stone into the pocket of his khaki shirt, Gordon stood up glanced at his watch. It was a little past seven. Gordon cinched up his belt—he’d lost about twenty pounds since his divorce—and muttered to himself, “might as well go get a bite to eat at Dooby’s. If I wait and eat later, I’ll be up all night fighting indigestion.” Gordon had wondered if maybe he was about to have an ulcer from the stress of his recent divorce.

Dooby’s was a hamburger joint a half-block from Gordon’s hotel. A few minutes later, he was stepping through the front door at Dooby’s Burgers.

“Yo, Gordo!” the overweight black guy behind the cash register looked up and smiled as he pushed his Vietnam Vet cap back on his head.
Gordon and Dooby had a lot in common. They were both just under six feet tall, although Dooby’s chest muscles had drifted somewhat southward. Both had been skinny kids when they soaked their feet in some of the same rice paddies in Vietnam. Both had lived in Oklahoma City most of their lives. Both were divorced. Long-winded conversation wasn’t really necessary for them to have a pretty good understanding of, and respect for, each other.
“Hey, Dooby,” Gordon grinned wryly, “the health department didn’t close you down today?”
“This is the only place a cheapskate like you can get a decent meal,” Dooby laughed uproariously, “you better hope they don’t shut me down.”