One day one of the fellers come up to me an says, “Look here, Gump, you need to get yourself an agent.”
“A what?” I ast.
“Agent, you dummy. Somebody to represent you and get you all the money you ever wanted. You ain’t gettin paid enough around here. None of us are. But at least we got agents to deal with them bastids up at the organization. Why, you ought to be makin three times as much as you are now.”
So I took his advice an got me an agent. Mister Butterfield was his name.
First thing Mister Butterfield does is go an start an argument with the people at the Saints organization. Pretty soon I get called in an everbody is mad at me.
“Gump,” they says, “you has already signed a contract for one thousand dollars a pass and ten thousand dollars a touchdown for this season. Now you want to go back on it. What the hell is this!”
“I dunno,” I said. “I just got this agent to...”
“Butterfield! Agent my ass! That man is a crook. Don’t you know that?”
When I said I didn’t, they tole me that Mister Butterfield had threatened to hold me out of the playoff game if they didn’t give me triple what they were now.
“Let me tell you this, Gump,” the owner says, “if you miss just one game because of this ridiculous attempt at highway robbery, I will not only kick you off the team personally, but I will see to it you don’t never get another job playing football anyplace—at least for money. You understand that?”
I said I did an went on out to practice.
That week I finally quit my job sweepin up at Wanda’s strip joint. The hours was kind of gettin to me. Wanda said she understood, an anyway, she said she was gonna fire me anyhow account of it wadn’t “dignified” for me to be playin football for the Saints an be her janitor at the same time. Besides, she said, “Them people ain’t comin in here to look at me anymore, they is comin to look at you, you big oaf!”
Well, the day before we was fixin to leave for the Dallas game, I gone to the post office an there is a letter there from Mobile, Alabama. It is from Jenny’s mama. Now, I always get kind of excited when I hear from Jenny or anybody even connected with her, but this time, I dunno, somethin felt kind of funny. Inside the envelope was another letter, not even opened. It was the one I had sent Jenny with the last check for thirty thousan dollars. I begun to read what Mrs. Curran was tryin to tell me, but even before I finished, I wished I was dead.
“Dear Forrest,” she said. “I don’t know how to tell you this. But Jenny got very sick about a month ago, and her husband, Donald, did, too. He died last week. And the next day, Jenny did, too.”
There was a bunch of other stuff she said, also, but I don’t remember much of it. I kept lookin at them first lines, an my hands started tremblin an my heart begun to beat so hard I thought I was gonna faint. It was not true! It couldn’t be. Not Jenny. I mean, I had knowed her all these years, ever since we was in grade school, an I had loved her too—only person besides my mama I’d ever really loved. An I just stood there while big ole tears run down onto the letter an blot out the ink except for the last few lines, which said, “I have little Forrest here with me, and he can stay as long as I can care for him, but I’m not too well myself, Forrest, and if you can find the time between your football games to come and see us, I think we’d better have a talk.”
Well, I ain’t sure exactly what I done next, but somehow I got back home an thowed some stuff in a bag an caught the bus to Mobile that afternoon. It was the longest bus drive of my life, I think. I just kept goin back over all them years with Jenny an me. How she always helped me out of trouble in school—even after I accidentally tore off her dress in the movie theater—an in college when she sang with the folk music band an I screwed up by haulin the banjo player out of the car while they was makin out, an then up in Boston when she was singin with The Cracked Eggs an I went to Harvard University an got in the Shakespeare play—an even after that, when she was up in Indianapolis workin for the retread tire company an I became a rassler an she had to tell me what a fool I was makin of mysef.... It just can’t be true, I kept thinkin, over an over again, but thinkin don’t make it so. I knew that deep down. I knew it was true.
When I got to Mrs. Curran’s house, it was nearly nine o’clock at night.
“Oh, Forrest,” she says, an thowed her arms around me an begun to cry, an I couldn’t help it an begun cryin, too. In a little while, we went inside an she made me some milk an cookies an tried to tell me about it.
“Nobody knows exactly what it was,” she said. “They both got sick about the same time. It was very fast and they just kind of slipped away. She wasn’t in any pain or anything. In fact, she was more beautiful than ever. Just laid in the bed, like I remember her as a little girl. Her very own bed. Her hair all long and pretty, and her face was just like it always was, like an angel. And then, that morning, she...”
Mrs. Curran had to stop for a while. She wadn’t cryin anymore. She just looked out the winder at the streetlight.
“And when I went in to see her, she was gone. Lying there with her head on the pillow, almost like she was sleeping. Little Forrest was playing out on the porch, and, well, I wasn’t sure what to do, but I told him to come in an kiss his mama. And he did. He didn’t know. I didn’t let him stay that long. We buried her the next day. Out to the Magnolia Cemetery in the family plot, alongside her daddy and her granny. Under a sugar maple tree. Little Forrest, I don’t know how much he understands about it all. He don’t know about his daddy. He died up in Savannah, with his folks. He knows his mama’s gone, but I don’t think he really understands about it.”
“Can I see it?”
“What?” Mrs. Curran ast.
“Where she was. Where she was when...”
“Oh, yes, Forrest. It’s right in here. Little Forrest is sleeping in there now. I’ve only got two...”
“I don’t want to wake him up,” I says.
“Why don’t you,” says Mrs. Curran. “It’ll make him feel better, maybe.”
An so I gone into Jenny’s bedroom. There was little Forrest asleep in her bed, didn’t know nothin really about what was happenin to him. Had a teddy bear he was huggin an a big blond curl across his forehead. Mrs. Curran started to wake him up, but I ast her not to. I could almost see Jenny there, peaceful an asleep. Almost.
“Maybe he ought to just rest tonight,” I says. “They’ll be time in the mornin for him to see me.”
“All right, Forrest,” she says. Then she turned away. I touched his face an he turned over an give a little sigh.
“Oh, Forrest,” Mrs. Curran says, “I don’t believe all this. So quick. And they all seemed so happy. Things sure do turn out bad sometime, don’t they?”
“Yes’m,” I says. “They shore do.” We went on out of the room.
“Well, Forrest, I know you’re tired. We’ve got a sofa here in the living room. I can make you a bed.”
“You know, Mrs. Curran, maybe I could sleep on that swing out on the porch. I always liked that swing, you know. Jenny an I used to sit on it an...”
“Of course, Forrest. I’ll get you a pillow and some blankets.”
So that’s what I did. An all that night the wind blew, an sometime afore dawn, it begun to rain. It wadn’t cold or nothin. Just a regular ole fall night for around here where I grew up. An I don’t think I slept much neither. I was thinkin about Jenny an little Forrest an about my life, which, come to think of it, hadn’t been much. I have done a lot of things, but I ain’t done many of them very well. Also, I’m always gettin into trouble just about the time things start goin good. Which, I suppose, is the penalty you pay for bein a idiot.