Chapter 1
Judas George grew up in the backwoods of Tennessee with a Dad who cared more about moonshine than he did about his kids. Judas George was the seventh son of a flock of eighteen children. There had been twenty-three but his Momma had lost the other five children through childbirth or shortly thereafter when the babies got sick and poorly and just died.
Judas George thought that he was a lucky boy to have survived just being born and then having to live with his other seventeen brothers and sisters. It was a really tough life that they had. He and his brothers and sisters slept in a big room, in three beds together in a house or as he called it a shack while his Mother and Father had their own bed in their own room.
Only three beds with six children in each bed trying to sleep! Judas George was usually up all night trying to keep himself amused until he could stay awake no more and would gradually nod off and fall asleep on the big rug in front of the bed. Keeping himself awake usually meant stealing a read by flashlight from a book or two that he managed to bring home from school. He was always dreaming of far away places where the sunshine and the weather was warm and had a gentle sea breeze close by. As he watched his brothers and sisters sleep, he wondered to himself how they would all survive.
Judas George knew he would survive. He had spent many days just scouring for food when the others had given up. He would go to the mountains and search out the best berries he could find. Then he would kill a squirrel or a rabbit, skin it and he would cook it over an open fire in the little pots that he had gathered from behind stores where the pots and tin cans had been discarded! He took great pleasure in knowing that he could keep himself fed and warm in the Smoky Mountains. He prided himself on being a survivor.
Judas George would be gone for days on his own and just be happy living off the land. When he finally wandered home, he would bring home leftovers of the food he had made for his younger sisters and brothers to eat! They were ever so grateful when Judas George went hunting on his own. They knew that he would always bring them something back that they would be happy to eat.
His Momma was always tired. Seemed like she was having a baby every time he turned around. She had large, big eyes that seemed to be sad all the time. But her skin was soft, white pale and was so smooth and creamy that just to touch her cheek made him feel like he was close to an angel. She always smelled like lavender and he loved to sit next to her so he could smell the flowers, that earthy perfume you get when you lay in the meadow on a beautiful sunny day looking up into the clouds! But she was ever so sad all the time. She didn’t say much about why she was sad but Judas George knew that she was besot by the hard life that she faced with so many children and a man who was not a good or caring provider.
Judas George noticed a long time ago that his Daddy was a smelly, fat man with no care for himself, his wife or his children. He did notice that his Daddy liked to make children with Rose, his beautiful Mother even when she didn’t want to. He would get in from being out drinking moonshine all day with the boys and drag Rose into the bedroom even when she was dealing with the little ones and there would be a rough half hour of his being loud and Rose being very quiet. After it was all over his Daddy would fall asleep and Rose would come back to the sitting room and be like the sweet Momma that she always was.
He soon realized that his Daddy was a bully and a bad bully. Rose would try and make it all better by reading a story to the children before she went to bed, which usually meant that she slept on the settee. She couldn’t stand to lie next to a man like his Daddy who smelled and was such a mean person! The whole town knew that Caleb Whitey was a mean man and they hated to see him come into town! When he did come to town there was always a scuffle and sometimes Caleb would spend the night in the lock-up much to the happiness of Rose and the children! More times than naught though the Police let him walk home in the dark hoping that he would fall into some hole and never be found. Everyone thought that this would be the best outcome for the Whitey Family. Judas George could never understand how the other children never picked up on the unhappiness of his beautiful Mother, who he adored.
Chapter 2
The Whitey Family was well known in Gatlinburg for being the poor hillbilly family that lived in the hills and only came down for school and to go to church. Their Momma made sure that all the children went to school everyday and showed up for Sunday service dressed as good as they could be. She made sure that God almighty knew that they were there. She needed to know that her kids would at least be educated in the basics of reading, writing and arithmetic. She felt that they had no chance in this ever-changing world if they couldn’t read, write or count.
Joshua was the oldest boy and he was a lot like his Father, hard and short tempered and just as mean as his Daddy. He would take his feelings and his short temper out on the younger children and he knew what he could get away with when it came to his siblings. After watching his Father and how he treated his Mother and the other children he felt at ease when it came to getting his own way in the family. Judas George was a middle child and he knew where to hide when the times got rough around his house.
While Judas George believed in God, he wasn’t quite sure how a God could bring so many people into one family and still expect them all to be ok with little food and clothes and a house so small that they were sleeping on top of one another. He used to say his prayers but he soon realized that his prayers weren’t being answered by the God that he was praying to.
Judas George sought refuge in the great, Smoky Mountains when he didn’t have to go to school and sometimes he would stay a little longer and miss school on a Monday morning. He would get a trimming from his Mother when he showed up late the next night when the other children told her that he never made it to school that day.
Still he loved the outdoors and when he could he would leave on a Friday after school and make his way into the woods, up the steep hills and he would steal away at a hut that he had made out of logs and tree limbs. He would sit under the clouds and the black night and just marvel at the shooting stars that would move ever so fast through the sky! He would build a fire and just think how lucky he was to be by himself, all warm and free under the moonlit sky. This was his refuge, his sanctuary a place where he never had to answer to his Daddy or his horrible big brother. A place he could really call his own home. And it was becoming bigger and bigger every time he went back. He would bring more things to make it a real place to live.
He never was bothered by his siblings trying to follow him but he had recently become worried when his little sister Lara, a couple of times had tried to follow him after school. He caught her sometimes on his heels and had made her go back when he noticed her behind him. One time he had to bring her back because she had followed him to far into the deep woods. He figured that she would get this out of her head after a few times being turned back. Over time though she would prove to be a problem he couldn’t shake.
One dark cold evening when the rain was coming down in buckets, Judas George decided that it would be too muddy to try and scale the deep woods and the big mountain, so he spent his Friday after school back home at the family farm and did some extra chores for his Mother. She seemed appreciative that he had decided to stay around to help her out when the others had wandered off doing their own thing like they did when a weekend rolled around. His Daddy had been in town that day and stumbled home drunk as usual. The smell on his clothes told that he had been with the easy ladies of the night. When he came in this time he didn’t bother Rose and just fell into the bed and she shut the door and fell asleep on the old sofa in the big room. The younger children were glad that there would be no fuss tonight and they sat around the hearth silently, as Rose drifted into sleep. This was a good and quiet night for the Whitey Family, a night that they really appreciated once and a while. Though these nights were few and far between.
Chapter 3
Judas George was up early this lovely Saturday morning and although he knew that the woods were still muddy from last nights rain, he knew that by the time he got to his hut that it would be all dried up. He crept out of the house and with his backpack he briskly made his way into the woods and started the steep climb up the Smoky Mountains to get to his weekend retreat. He thought he heard something behind him but every time he looked around he could see no one and he assumed that it must be a fox or squirrel scampering around. Little did he know that Lara had been practicing her stealth and she had become quick as quick could be. She could keep up with Judas George and make herself scarce when he became aware that someone or something was out there.
When Judas George stopped and finally got to his camp, he heard some rustling of branches and a crunching of rocks. He thought that perhaps it was the bear or the lynx that he had fought off a couple of times with his big stick and fire rag. He waited and the rustling stopped. He went into his hut and started to get settled when he heard the noises again. The light was dimming quickly as it does in the Smoky Mountains when the sun starts to set in the sky. He took his flashlight out and shone it around the darkening woods and he was startled to see Lara in the light. She stepped onto the path leading to the hut and she smiled as he shone the light in her face. She had managed to keep up with her brother and she was very proud for doing so and she knew that he was ever so surprised!!!
“What are you doing out here Lara?” Judas George asked firmly.
Lara replied, “I came to see where you go all the time to get away from the bad times at home. I can’t stand being there anymore with all the fighting and drinking. If you can get away from it, then maybe I can too. Do you know that Joshua has been trying to get me to do things with him in the barn that makes me feel really uncomfortable?”
Judas George looked at her in astonishment. He was really upset at this news. “ What are you saying Lara? Does Joshua hurt you, does he beat you?”
Lara shook her head. “No, Joshua takes his pants down and tries to put his thing in me and I won’t let him do it. Patty and Lizzy let him do it to them so he won’t beat them with his belt. They told me it’s better than having to go to school with welts all over you and people asking questions.”
Judas George was dumb founded and didn’t have any words to say to Lara. Instead he ran to her and hugged her. He took her inside and got her settled and got a place ready for her to sleep that night! She was cold and he wrapped a blanket around her shoulders. He started a fire and made some warm cocoa that he had on hand. He heated up some beans in a pot and then threw a couple of eggs into the pot and made a nice hearty egg and bean stew with dried bread. They both sat around the fire and gobbled down the lovely supper.
Sipping on the hot chocolate Lara finally broke the awkward silence. “Why do you always want to get away from us back at the farm?”
Judas George turned to Lara and responded calmly, “For the same reason you are here with me tonight, to get away from all the madness and our terrible life. I came here to stay healthy and sane, so I won’t turn out like father. “
Lara nodded in agreement. “ You have to let me stay. I promise I can keep up with you and I won’t get in your way.”
Judas George agreed. “You can stay.”
They had decided that because of what was going on back at the farm that they were fine right now. It would be a long time before they went back to Gatlinburg. They would live off the land and try and make do with what they could scrounge up for a meal. Judas George soon learned that Lara was a natural in the wild. She could keep up with him and was very good at snaring small animals like a partridge or a rabbit but she left the skinning of the little beasts to her older brother, who wasn’t bothered with the smell and the bloody bits.
She loved her time in the mountains with Judas George and she felt that this was the best time of her life, being free and not having to worry about her lecherous older brother Joshua who had tried to hurt her so badly. Still she wondered about what was happening to the rest of her brothers and sisters back at the Whitey Farm. They had decided to stay away for almost a month and they were surprised that no one had bothered to even look for them, as they had been gone so long. There came a time when they both felt that they needed to see what was going on back home. Judas George had kept his calendar close and he decided on a Saturday coming that he and Lara would go back home to see what was going on and see how the family was doing. It was hard to leave the serenity of the Smoky Mountains but they both knew that it was time to pack up and make the trek back down the mountain, back to reality.
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