Episode #5

Following our trick-or-treat adventure, I was forced to hobble around on crutches for awhile.  Getting to most of my college classes was doable, but twice a week I had Economics 101 in a building at the top of Bascom Hill.  It was a fairly steep climb for a girl with torn ligaments in her ankle.

(As a side note: one day the professor started the class by writing the word “BOOKKEEPER” on the blackboard.  “This word,” he said in his Boston accent, “is the only word in the English language with three double letters.” It’s the only thing I remember from Econ 101.)  Back to the story.

I didn’t want to skip two weeks of classes since I was already having trouble keeping supply and demand straight.

Enter my knight in shining armor.

Or perhaps PB was feeling a little guilty about my injury.

Either way, he showed up at the bottom of Bascom Hill right on time twice a week and gave me a piggy-back ride to the top.  It seemed like a fitting penance for dumping me off his shoulders and onto the sidewalk on Halloween.

When he carried me up the hill on those November afternoons, I started to believe that he loved me.

As I sat in that lecture hall taking notes on the Cost-Benefit Principle of goods and services, I began to see the many benefits of PB’s good heart.  I started to believe that I loved him, too.