Will never be here again, p.2
WILL NEVER BE HERE AGAIN, page 2
David Penderson and his wife, Martha, had taken the suddenly orphaned Wendy and Simon in without any reservations and done their best to help the young children recover from the loss of their parents, raising them as the Pendersons’ own. The memories of that transition in her life were still just as raw on some days as an adult for Wendy as they had been when she had first been told that her parents had died. It had been a long and difficult ordeal for her and Simon to overcome, and some days even now, she wondered if she had completely healed from the wound. And it was this love for her grandparents that had led her and Stuart to honor David Penderson by giving his name to their second son. And though it was still technically the same name, just shortened to accommodate this sudden and unexpected demand from Dave, it shot a dagger of pain into their hearts all the same.
It only became apparent in subsequent years that Dave’s insistence on no longer wanting to be called David was just the beginning of his curious desire to put distance between himself and Ashton…if not physically, then emotionally for sure…
When Ashton first noticed his brother’s new attitude and behavior toward him, he was not quite sure what to do about it, wondering if perhaps he had done something to make David—now Dave, he corrected himself in his head —angry with him. Being the sort of person he was, even at his young age, Ashton took a long, hard look at recent events between himself and Dave, but for the life of him, he could not come up with anything that he might have said or done that had launched this growing chasm between them. As long as he could remember, he and Dave had been the best of friends. They had shared their toys with one another with ease when they had been little kids…they had reveled in taking on roles for themselves when they had made up games from their imaginations when the things they had sometimes bored them…and on the annual treks to the shore with their parents each summer, they had wandered and pretended to be great explorers as they waded in the surf for miles on the sandy beaches near the cottage their parents rented each year.
Certainly, Ashton had begun to develop his own set of friends in the neighborhood and at school as they got older, as did Dave, but in the end, they had remained as close and tight-knit as they ever had…that was, until this inexplicable development. On several occasions, Ashton had tried to talk to Dave about this when he couldn’t come up with a reasonable explanation for his brother’s sudden cold shoulder toward him, but all his attempts were met with a stone wall. Stuart and Wendy had noticed this strange dynamic between their boys as well, but they just assumed it was part of a natural pattern that boys approaching adolescence went through. It would pass, they were sure, and really gave it no more thought or concern, leaving Ashton in the dark to deal with it himself.
As time went by and the boys formally entered their teenage years, the gap and growing hard feelings that Dave had developed toward Ashton continued to grow. Ashton finally just gave up trying to resolve whatever it was that had transpired between them and forged ahead with his life. In an odd revelation that got back to Ashton from mutual friends, he found out that Dave’s insistence on no longer being called David was just a shot at Ashton as well. Ashton was hanging out with Billy Ward, a fellow athlete, one day when Billy spilled the news.
“He said what?” Ashton asked Billy, sure that he had misunderstood what his friend had just said.
“His name, dude…he told Johnny and Norm that he wanted to be called Dave because he felt your name was so pretentious and conceited. He didn’t want even the more formal David to be a part of him anymore because of that.”
“That’s fucking nuts, Billy…”
“Tell me about it, bro…and don’t take this the wrong way, man, but there is really something wrong with your brother, you know?”
A long time ago, Ashton might have taken issue with what Billy had just said, but with all that had transpired between him and Dave in recent years, at least a small part of him had to agree.
“It’s the name my folks gave me, Billy. And that is somehow my fault?”
Billy shrugged.
“Like I said, man…he’s just not right in the head if you ask me…”
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Ashton was hoping that over time Dave might come around and explain just what it was that had caused him to turn away, but in the meantime, Ashton just looked forward as he immersed himself in his life in school. He excelled both academically and as an athlete, and was soon seen as a model by his peers, who aspired to be like him, and by his teachers, who wished all their students could achieve what he had. And as satisfying as all the adulation and praise he received in his life was, it had the unfortunate side effect of making him even more despised and reviled in the eyes of Dave.
It was years later when Ashton could sit back and really take an objective view of what that must have been like for Dave. But even though he was well aware of the increased scorn that Dave sent his way as he made the transition from junior high to high school, Ashton had absolutely no intention of lying back and doing anything but offering the best he had to offer, whether in the classroom or on the football field or baseball diamond. However, out of what might have just been a mild if longstanding case of sibling rivalry, the feelings in Dave’s heart grew very dark toward Ashton instead. He was envious and jealous of how easy everything seemingly came to Ashton and was fed up with being seen as the younger brother of the “perfect Ashton. ”
Dave was not a terrible student, nor a poor athlete himself, but as hard as he tried, he could never match the high bar that Ashton had already set. He felt that if he had to hear one more teacher say:
“This is good, Dave, but it’s not quite what we expected from the brother of Ashton…” or a coach bark at him:
“Gotta really want it, Carter, if you hope to be as good as Ashton…”
he would go screaming into the night. It was, he felt, as if no matter how good he was at anything, it would only be seen in terms of how it stood up to his brother before him. With all the awards and accolades Ashton was amassing as he made his way through high school, Dave even began to erroneously think that his parents also preferred Ashton to him and that he was slowly beginning to be just an afterthought in the family.
And when it came to girls, Dave continued to feel as if he was just second best as Ashton attracted the most desirable and sought-after girls in the school, leaving Dave to, as he often told himself, “pick through the leftovers.” On more than one occasion, Dave had ruined a perfectly good relationship with very sweet girls during his high school days because he always saw what Ashton had as being far better. It was only when Dave was a junior in high school and Ashton was graduating to begin pursuing his college degree at the University of North Carolina (UNC) in Chapel Hill that Dave finally felt some relief. Though Chapel Hill was only about two hours away from Beulaville, Dave felt it was in another universe from him as he looked toward his last year in high school…finally, he would get some relief from having to be around Mr. All-World Carter 24/7. But even with Ashton away at school, Dave was soon to find out that his life and how he felt about his brother would not change all that much…in fact, with what lay ahead…even with events that would soon send shockwaves across the globe…his life, as he saw it, was about to get even more miserable…
Chapter THREE
EDWARD ANDERSON’S BOYHOOD HOME
2005 Peachtree Blvd
Atlanta, GA
1958–1976
As was pointed out previously, even as small as Beulaville is, there existed an unofficial, but definitive, demarcation of neighborhoods based primarily on socioeconomic status. Just a few miles away on a map, but in essence, an enormous distance from where Ashton and Dave Carter grew up on Martinette Street, a much more prosperous neighborhood flourished. Cherry Hills Circle was by all accounts the most affluent and elite section of town. Even as well off financially as he had become since his practice exploded following the New River lawsuit had made him, even Everett Simmons knew that Cherry Hills was beyond his grasp. It was home to just about every high-level professional in Beulaville…doctors, lawyers, financial advisors, and more.
It was also the home of Edward and Nancy Anderson. But before getting to that, a quick side story is required to preface Edward and Nancy’s arrival in Beulaville. Neither Edward nor Nancy was a Beulaville native, though most of the residents of the town were. Edward Anderson had grown up in Atlanta, the son of one of the wealthiest CEOs there, if you took Ted Turner out of the running . Edward had enjoyed just about every advantage and benefit one might imagine available to someone in the league of his father, William. But to his father’s great dismay, or perhaps just “disappointment” might be a more accurate description, Edward refused to attend any of the major universities in Georgia, including his father’s beloved University of Georgia, where Edward would have been welcomed with open arms due to his father’s long-running history of alumnus support.
It was not that Edward needed any assistance or undue influence from such a legacy, though. He had breezed through his formal education at the series of private schools that his folks had sent him to, and there was probably not a single college anywhere around, in Georgia or elsewhere, that he could not have gained admission to. But as Edward neared the time in which he was to make a decision as to what his future held for additional education beyond his high school-level experience, he shocked his parents by announcing that he was taking a year off to volunteer his services overseas for a Peace Corps-like organization.
Edward knew that college was definitely in his future, but with all that he had been blessed with, he felt as if he wanted to step away from the life of privilege he had experienced and see the real world while he offered his hand to those who had far less. Furthermore, Edward had no idea just then what he wanted to pursue and was hoping some real-world experiences might make this path a bit clearer. William and his wife, Laura, though a bit stunned by the decision, fully supported Edward’s announcement, feeling a swell of pride in the character of the son they had raised. After two years in the bush of several poor countries in Africa working with Visions in Action (VIA), Edward felt like he had achieved exactly what he had set out to do when he had put his college plans on hold back in Atlanta.
With this experience under his belt, Edward returned to America and to the delight of his folks, enrolled at the University of Georgia (UGA), his father’s alma mater. With all that he had seen and been exposed to in Africa, Edward knew he wanted to continue keeping his hand in some enterprise or effort to support the types of programs like the one, VIA, he had signed onto with. How he was going to do that was still a mystery to him as he began as one of the older freshman students at UGA, but Edward always assumed that an answer to that question would be revealed to him in due time. But his own vision of what he wanted to pursue in that regard came in a way that even Edward was not expecting.
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The University of Georgia
103 Hooper Street
Athens, GA
1976–1980
Edward threw himself into his undergraduate pursuits with the same fervor and focus with which he had done with everything in his life up to that point, including his two -year hiatus abroad with VIA. When he began his academic career at UGA, he still had no clear-cut plan or strategy to get to where he wanted, but he had no doubts that in time it would come to him. But in this case, as often happens in life, the solution came his way in a manner which Edward would never have imagined no matter how hard he might have tried. And the trigger, of all things, presented itself while he was on a brief break, one sweltering afternoon in the student center between classes .
Edward was used to the oppressive weather like that day’s both from growing up in Georgia and his time in Africa, but still, he struggled with the humidity at times. On that day, it felt like a particularly stifling afternoon, and he had ducked into the student center to try to get a brief respite from the heat as a developing thunderstorm seemed to promise an imminent deluge. As he sat on one of the couches near a huge expanse of windows to keep an eye on the brewing storm, Edward was reminded of his days abroad and how violent some of the rainstorms he had endured in Africa had been for the struggling villagers he had been working with to try to improve their lot in life.
As the first wave of water poured from the skies and cascaded down the windows while a loud echo of thunder shook the walls of the student center and multiple streaks of lightning ripped across the dark clouds overhead, Edward startled in his seat. His attention was diverted from the storm as he caught a glimpse of a girl in a bright blue blouse and jeans across the room. He had promised himself to stay focused on his classes when he had begun at UGA, but he could not believe his eyes as he watched the girl take a seat as well. Sure that he was just mistaken, Edward rubbed his eyes before looking again. It couldn’t be, could it? he asked himself. Just a similar face, he was sure. But when she looked up at the next clap of thunder and jumped a bit like everyone else around them, Edward was pretty sure it was Nancy Quigly, the same girl that he had met on his stint with VIA.
Nancy had been taking some time off after her own high school days, he recalled, when they had first met in Zaire. They had only worked together for a few months before Nancy had been sent off to Uganda while he continued on in Zaire. But she had stuck in his brain even after just a brief encounter. And now she was here at UGA, too? It seemed impossibly coincidental to Edward, but he knew there was only one way to find out if he was just imagining things or not. Edward began to think that maybe this might be a good time to cut the first class he had ever skipped at the university as he arose and weaved his way through the throngs of other students who had taken refuge in the center from the storm.
Nancy was immersed in some class notes as Edward came closer, and she finally looked up when she caught a glimpse of him at her side.
“Nancy?” Edward asked tentatively, preparing himself for embarrassment, sure that this wasn’t really her.
She dropped her notes in her lap and looked at Edward, her mouth agape.
“Holy crap!” she finally uttered. “Edward Anderson?”
He smiled and nodded eagerly, still flabbergasted at the bizarre situation. In all the time that had gone past and of all the schools that they both might have landed in, even Edward’s keen analytical mind could not calculate just how enormously implausible the odds of it all were. Nancy stood, her notes fluttering to the floor as she hugged him warmly before gathering up her mess and moving aside on the couch she had been sitting on so that Edward could join her. When they had both been volunteers for VIA, Edward had felt an attraction to her as they worked side-by-side, but had known that anything serious between them was not a good idea since the organization often moved people around as needed and that their time together then would likely be very brief.
As it turned out, he had been correct, and Nancy was moved after just a few weeks of working on the project he had been assigned to in Zaire. He had sensed that she might have been drawn to him as well, at the time, but it had been just too awkward and inappropriate to pursue. But now here they both were, and all bets were off. Edward’s vow to himself to remain totally focused on getting his degree and creating some sort of effort to continue the type of work that he had been involved with in Africa had just taken a direct hit. They chatted for a long time that day and discovered that they both had similar goals for what they wanted to pursue following their time at UGA.
A common pursuit of a professional life after graduation, along with what soon became a serious emotional relationship between them, was way more than either of them had planned on when they had enrolled at UGA. Edward and Nancy were rarely seen apart in the semesters to come, and as they began their senior year together, they began to map out a plan and a strategy to fulfill what they both saw as a very fulfilling mission.
Chapter FOUR
THE UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA
103 Hooper Street
Athens, GA
1979–1980
During both their junior and senior years at college, Edward and Nancy began to formulate a definitive plan as to how they would create and establish their own independent organization to continue what they saw as a much-needed flow of aid to countries that were still struggling just to get through each day in one piece. But during their break before their junior years, they decided that whatever it was they were planning on building would need to be in a vastly different mold than Visions in Action. Despite the wonderful work that VIA was doing, they both felt frustrated and annoyed that a lot of the organization’s time and efforts had to be spent on begging for funds rather than just getting more work done on the ground where they had programs operating.
Like politicians who seemingly had to always be asking for campaign donations, even while in office in preparation for the next election cycle , VIA was subjected to a similar situation, and both Edward and Nancy were sure there must be a better way. On a quick trip to the shore, just before they were to head back to school, Nancy pitched the idea to Edward that would make everything that was to come in their lives together in the future different…and far beyond anything that either of them had quite imagined. When she tossed out her idea as they were walking along the beaches near Tybee Island, just east of Savannah, Edward was thoroughly impressed, and wondered why he had not come up with it himself.
