Tranwestia

It hadn't worked, she remembered. There was a boy who went to church with her. He had recognized her from his second grade class. Anne shuddered at how he had made fun of her and finally fought her himself. That time she had won and the boy hadn't said any more--everyone at church knew he had been beaten by a girl.

By a mere girl; but there was one more. There was Jim Thaxton --and now Anne remembered him. Jim had been a very close friend of the boy she had fought. But afterward he had admired her very much. So she had taught him until her parents had decided she should no longer go to church.

She remembered how she had taught Jim that girls don't fight -unless they have to and can't help it. That instead girls are friend- ly and pretty, that they are gentle and don't even like dirty jokes. Anne smiled to herself as she remembered herself as a little girl -how things had changed!

Then, seized by impulse, she ran to her phone. Dialing frantic- ally, she called Jim; by luck, he was still at the office. "I under- stand now, Jim! I remember meeting you, playing together, talk- ing. And laughing. God, we were young then, weren't we?" Anne added as an afterthought.

"I know," he said simply. "When I was alone in my office this morning, I thought I remembered where we'd met before. That's why I wanted to see you in private.'

"Then you remembered how it used to be?" she asked.

"Of course I do, Anne. It's more than a part of me now and I admire you for it too."

"You always did. I'll see you tonight, Jim. Goodbye now."

"Goodbye," he ended satisfiedly.

That evening Anne dressed in her nicest cocktail dress for Jim She wore a lovely form-fitting gown enhanced by an exquisite se of tiny jewelry. Her hair, piled high, was interrupted in the bacl

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