Chapter Eleven: The Dive.

A perfect Jack knife dive.

Her big brown eyes widened as she dropped her peddle bike to the curb, mindlessly stepping over the front wheel that held a slight wobble in its final spin to stop. One foot felt for a toe hold on the first rail of the limestone perch, her second effort helped her gain the height of the bridge rail. Steady she would tell herself. Look out at the horizon. Limber, flexible, calm, take a breathe, breath one in and one out, focus. She held her practiced arms loose at her side. Her calves flexed, tensed then relaxed, a slight swing of the arms and the athletic motion propelled her up, out and into the air high above the creeks lightly rolling waters. At the perfect moment, the absolute peak of the dive she slightly bent in and the torqued all the way in a beautiful full Jackknife position, hold it, hold it and release, grabbing for the bottom, a smile of triumph and satisfaction formed on her youthful face. I did it, she felt assured. She flowed deep into the black water, then she held a troubling thought, she had been taught early on in her swimming career, do not dive into unknown waters. The hair on the back of her neck stood frozen. A serious chill shuddered this time, a strong sense of foreboding scratched through her brain, the silhouette of a hulking, rusted Chev sedan smiled broadly at her as she glanced to the side. I could have broken my neck. I will never dive like that again, she determined silently to herself.

The surface of the water was met with the boyish grins of the local boys from the rowing club. They were bronze gods working their muscles in the morning sun, nice dive Ev, waved the oarsmen. We saw you ride up and watched your dive, really nice dive, but you left your bike on the bridge, someone might take it. With that the froth from the wake of the low slung boat whispered out of sight as it snuck under and away, pressing hard to leave the Broad Street bridge behind.

Ev swam hard to the Yacht club pier raised her hands up on the dock and in one leopard like thrust sprang from the water, shook, looked back up at the distant bridge and tried to spy her bike. It was still there now she felt satisfied she had bested her demon of the fear of heights, she was a good diver and a great swimmer, nice. Each day was thrilling, she was happy to be young and alive.

It was June, 1942, she was 16, dark haired with flashing brown eyes a sweet smile and the out look of youthful exuberance. It was the spring of that terrible and hideous war over there. Europe was on fire, for a small town, prairie girl she held a complete optimism in her heart. She felt things would turn out, in the end, the power of God and goodness would triumph over evil. She scrambled back to her bike and road home to help her momma, she was really the youngest of the family, sheltered from the outside world by her youthfulness and her loving family.