Gump & Company

Chapter Two

Well, the next mornin Mrs. Curran come out on the porch with a cup of coffee an a doughnut. The rain had let up a little bit, but the sky was a dark pearly gray an there was thunder growlin off someplace like God was mad.

"I guess you'll want to go out to the cemetery," Mrs. Curran said.

"Yeah, I guess so," I tole her. I didn't really know if I wanted to or not. I mean, somethin was tellin me I oughta, but it was the last place I really wanted to go.

"I've got little Forrest ready," she says. "He ain't been there since... Well, I think it would be a good thing for him to go along. Just to kind of get used to it."

I looked behind her an there he was, standin behind the screen door, lookin sort of sad an puzzled.

"Who are you?" he ast.

"Why, I'm Forrest. You remember when I met you a while back? Up at Sava

"You're the one with the fu

"Yeah. Sue. But he's not a monkey. He's a purebread orangutang."

"Where is he now? He here?"

"Nope. Not this time," I says. "He got bidness someplace else, I reckon."

"We're go

"Yeah, I know," I says.

Mrs. Curran, she put us in the car an we drove out to the cemetery. Whole time, I got these horrible butterflies in my stomach. Little Forrest, he just lookin out the winder with big ole sad eyes, an I am wonderin what in hell is go

It was a really pretty cemetery, as them things go. Big ole magnolia an oak trees, an we wound around an wound around till we got to a big tree an Mrs. Curran stopped the car. It was a Sunday mornin, an someplace church bells were chimin away. When we got out, little Forrest come up beside me an looked up, an so I took him by the hand an we walked to Je

"Is that where Mama is?" little Forrest ast.

"Yes it is, darlin," Mrs. Curran says.

"Can I see her?"

"No, but she's there," says Je

"I just can't believe it," Mrs. Curran said.

"I can't neither," I says. "It ain't right."

"I'll go back to the car now, Forrest. You probably want to be alone for a while."

I just stood there, kind of numb, twistin my hands. Everbody I really cared for seemed to have died or somethin. Bubba an Mama, an now poor Je

I turned aroun, but ain't nobody there.

"I said it's okay, Forrest," the voice says again. It was... It couldn't be... It was Je

Cept there still ain't nobody there.

"Je

"Yes, Forrest. I just wanted you to know everything's go

I must be goin crazy, I figgered! But then alls of a sudden I kind of seen her, just in my mind, I guess, but there she was, as beautiful as always.

"You're go

"But how?" I ast. "I'm a idiot."

"No you're not!" Je

"I know, but..."

"Anytime you really get stumped, I'll be there for you. Do you understand that?"

"No."

"Well, I will. So go on back and get busy and try to figure out what you're go

"But, Je

"Well, it's me all right. Go on, now, Forrest," she says. "Sometimes you act like you ain't got sense enough to get in out of the rain."

So I gone on back to the car, soakin wet.

"Was you talkin to somebody out there?" Mrs. Curran ast.

"Sort of," I said. "I guess I was talkin to mysef."

That afternoon, me an little Forrest sat in Je

Second quarter it was worse, an by half-time the score was forty-two to nothin, an the sportscasters were all talkin about how I wadn't there an nobody knew where I was. I finally got through to the locker room, an all of a sudden Coach Hurley got on the phone.

"Gump, you idiot!" he hollered. "Where in hell are you!"

I tole him Je

"Who in hell is Je

It wadn't too easy to explain all this, so I just tole him she was a friend of mine. Then the owner got on the phone.

"Gump, I tole you that if you don't show up for a game, I'm go

"But see," I tole him, "it was Je

"Don't hand me that bullshit, Gump! I know all about you and your so-called agent, Mr. Butterbutt, or whatever his name is. This is just another cheap trick to get more money. An you ain't go

"Did you explain it to them?" Mrs. Curran ast, when she came back into the room. "Yeah," I said. "Sort of."

An so that ended my professional football playin days.

Now I had to find some kind of job to help support little Forrest. Je

Next mornin, I looked through the papers at the job ads. Wadn't much goin on. Mostly they wanted secretaries an used car salesmen an such, an I figgered I needed somethin, well, more dignified.

Then I spotted a ad in the column marked "Other."

"Promotional Representative," it says. "No experience necessary! Huge profits for hard workers!" An it give an address for a local motel. "Interviews at 10 A.M. sharp." "Must be able to deal with people" was the final line.

"Mrs. Curran," I says, "what is a 'promotional representative'?"

"I'm not sure, Forrest. I think it's... Well, you know the guy who dresses up like that big peanut outside the peanut store downtown and hands out little samples of nuts to folks? I think it's something like that."

"Oh," I says. Frankly, I was expectin somethin a little higher up on the ladder. But I am thinkin about them "huge profits" the ad talked about. An besides, if it was bein a peanut man or somethin, at least people wouldn't know it was me inside the costume.

As it turned out, it was not the peanut man. It was somethin very very different.

"Knowledge!" says the feller. "Everthin in the world depends on knowledge!"

They was about eight or ten of us done answered the ad for "Promotional Representative." We had arrived at this dinky little motel an was sent into a room that had a bunch of foldin chairs set up an a phone settin on the floor. After about twenty minutes, the door suddenly bust open an in comes this tall, thin, sunta