“OK, I'm going to have to do two of these – 'Mneme's Skirts' – because the silver-gray version is nice too, although you're right, Rob: the red version is prettier.”
Eleven-year-old Velma Trent was doing her second quick sketch of the sky this day in which Hurricane Mneme was throwing an arm as far north as Lofton County, VA, bringing torrential rain. The morning sky had been a glorious set of reds, and the last of the silver before the truly thick, dark clouds arrived was now scrolling overhead.
“Well, yeah, although – well, I'll try it too,” five-year-old Lil' Robert Ludlow said, and went to get his gray crayons before coming and sitting by his neighbor again. “I don't really like gray, but I kinda like this.”
“Growing up and learning new things is the fun part,” Velma said, and smiled as he snuggled his little blond head into her shoulder for a moment.
“I'm so glad you're best friends with my big sister Eleanor and big brother Andrew because, see, everybody needs a big friend who gets it,” he said.
“And I'm glad they have a little big brother who is kind and sweet like you,” she said, and kissed his little forehead.
“Little big brother – I like that!” he said, “because you see my real tall soul!”
“Yep,” she said, and smiled as he kissed her chin.
“Yep,” Mr. Thomas Stepforth Sr. said as he observed from his porch. “I thought so … despite his namesake grandfather's fearsome reputation, Robert Edward Ludlow III is definitely a lover. It helps to be five years old, but he really is a sweetheart … already easing up on the heart of our granddaughter and he doesn't even know it!”
Mrs. Velma Stepforth laughed.
“Simplicity is the new complexity,” she said. “We see his cousin-brother Grayson and Velma's sister Gracie doing the same thing in a different way: just living life, loving life, and loving each other in the innocent, honest way they do as children. But Rob is special in a special way, because when you watch even his fearsome grandfather with Thalia and the little Ludlows, you see he is moving toward Rob in spontaneous sweetness. Capt. Robert Edward Ludlow Sr., in seeing the innocent mirror of his own personality, is consciously re-integrating that part of himself into Ludlow Family 2.0.”
“Yeah, Rob has some serious gravity, even pulling on his grandfather,” Mr. Stepforth said. “He really is the other bookend of that family – Eleanor and Andrew will probably give that generation leadership openly, but Rob's immense gravity may eventually shift the balance in his direction. Wouldn't be the first time a Robert Edward in that extended family ended up doing that.”
“Yeah, his Lee genetics come out right there,” Mrs. Stepforth said. “In no other way do you see a connection, but that immensity in a baby boy in that family is a tell. Which is why it is good that Rob is being exposed to all kinds of people as people to love. We pray he never gives himself over to hate.”
“Well, our Velma is definitely doing her part in him not having any excuses,” Mr. Stepforth said as he watched his middle granddaughter showing Lil' Robert how to use blue to make an interesting not-quite-all-gray sky.
“See, the sky is blue, so, we're going to shade the white paper blue first, and then it will make so much more sense,” Velma was saying.
“Thanks, Velma,” Lil' Robert said, “but that's a lot – I think I have some light blue paper – hold on!”
So he went and got the light blue paper, and they both did their drawings on that. Velma would later paint the silver-gray version, and include the silhouette of herself and Lil' Robert sitting on the porch together, watching Mneme's silver skirt swirl overhead … and this would be the beginning of her life as a public artist in Lofton County, for it would become an iconic image of that moment in the county's history.
