A Tourist in Mayberry

2/4) Riverview Retirement Center Staff Member: William Lawrence

Flashbacks - devices used in a story where an event that happened prior to the story is inserted in the story.

William Lawrence was homeless before he got his new job. After he was hired at Riverview, William's life became a little more stable. He got his own place, and while it was not a four star accommodation, his new apartment was warm and dry and it offered him a sense of community he had not had in several years. Uneasy at first with his fellow apartment dwellers speaking to him and caring about him, William soon got comfortable with his new family. They had their own problems and downfalls and knew how to respect boundaries and back off. And best of all, the apartment was within walking distance of his new job and since he had no car, this was perfect for William.

The new job and the new home meant things were looking up for William. It was about time something was looking up for William.

While all this remembering makes William seem like a hopeless case, it is important to know that William's life was not always so tragic.

After college, William Lawrence knew he would return to his hometown and raise his family in Mount Airy. He grew up in the nearby White Plains community right at the top of a notoriously dangerous curve called Pickle Curve. Pickle Curve was named, not for the fact it was difficult to maneuver, but because a Mt. Olive pickle truck wrecked and went off an embankment there. So, the pickle truck wreck proved it really was a pickle curve. William had the perfect childhood growing up on Pickle Curve.

William met his future bride, Raynie, in college at Methodist University. They were both education majors and shared many of the same classes and often worked on group projects together. William was smitten right away, but Raynie was not so sure. Raynie danced on the dance team, and William came to all the basketball and football games to watch her perform. She was so beautiful and delicate to William's clumsiness, he felt ashamed and unworthy to watch her performances, but he could not, not watch. He told her she was the best dancer on the team. William was doe-eyed and enamored with Raynie, and so she took him for granted.

William and Raynie's paths crossed on the small campus until destiny screamed "You belong together" so loudly William asked Raynie on a date. Raynie denied him for two years. She did not want to lose her new best friend, they became inseparable friends. William thought Raynie was adorable and could do anything. Because she loved to sing and sang all the time, William, a lover of all things musical, talked her into joining the university chorus. Raynie was busy and could not study or remember the words to the songs. She made up her own words which William thought was so funny. She taught William that, if you do not know the words, you can always mouth the word "watermelon" over and over and the audience will be none the wiser. She would practice this in the mirror with exaggerated expressions until William would laugh so hard his side hurt. "Watermelon" became their secret word with no special meaning other than it was their code for everything is ok, or this is boring, or this is so absurd, or time to go. It became their secret password for secrets only they knew.

William was persistent in his pursuit of Raynie. Raynie finally went on the date. She always called it the fairy tale date. Just like she always pictured the perfect date. It involved the opening of doors, a fancy restaurant, a dessert bar where she tasted five different treats, and a stop on the side of the road where William picked her a sunflower.

One week later, Raynie spent the night at his apartment. There was little sleep - only an exploration of a naked body William had already memorized clothed. At his request, Raynie danced the old college ballgame routine in the nude. William laid on the floor as she swiveled her hips over him. He'd never seen the dance from this vantage point, it was his favorite. After, William read aloud to Raynie from a copy of a book by his bedside, Watership Down. At that precise moment, Raynie knew what it was like to be completely in love with a man who might impossibly love her even more. She went back each night until they finished the adventures of Fiver and his rabbit friends and started on adventures of hobbits and elves and wizards.