“Hey, how did school go?” Betsy asked him.
Mark was intrigued that she was focussed on how his day had been, and was taking no apparent notice to his state of undress.
“Oh, same old same old,” Mark sighed. “It was a typical day, nothing more. I'm a member now, by the way. I filled out a form and now I have a probationary membership.”
“Mark, that's wonderful!” Betsy cried. “Good for you for taking that step, and for being that accepting of me, and everyone else here.”
***
Meanwhile, back at Mark's house, his parents were suspicious. They hadn't seen anything of Mark in the morning, and now that the school day was over, they still saw no sign of him.
“Where's our son?” barked Mr. Turner.
“That's what I'm wondering!” cried Mrs. Turner. “Why hasn't Mark come home? As soon as we find him, he's going to be in so much trouble, he'll wish he'd never been born.”
“You don't think ... ” pondered Mark's father, “I sure hope it couldn't be, but you don't think he's run off to Sunny Palms, do you?”
“Oh dear,” shuddered his mother, “I've been wondering that in the back of my mind, but it's such a horrid thought I haven't really allowed myself to think about that.”
“Well, I guess that's that,” muttered his father. “I've been hoping we'd never have to do this, but if it's the only way to find Mark, I suppose we'll have to. We'll call the resort.”
Mr. and Mrs. Turner thumbed through the phonebook until they came to Sunny Palms. Then, Mark's father picked up the phone, and dialled.
“Sunny Palms,” came Susan's voice on the other end, “how may I help you?”
“Did someone check in called Mark Turner?” asked Mark's dad. “He's our son, and we want to know if you've let him in.”
“I'm sorry,” replied Susan, “but for reasons of confidentiality, we do not disclose our members, or others who enter our premises, to outsiders.”
“WHAT?!!” barked Mark's father.
“Anything more you need?” Susan asked.
“But what but wh eh ah DAAAAAA!” spluttered Mr. Turner, and slammed the phone down.
“What is it honey?” asked his wife. “What did they say?”
“They won't tell us!” he cried.
“Oh!” gasped Mrs. Turner.
“Well!” cried Mr. Turner, “I guess that leaves us with no alternative. I never thought, in all my life, that I'd be doing this, and I really don't want to have to, but Mark has left us with no choice.”
“And what's that dear?”
“Drive to Sunny Palms and get our son out!”
“Brian!” protested Mark's mother. “No! We can't! We won't! We mustn't! We're not going anywhere near that ghastly place! There has to be another way!”
“Do you want to stop our son from mingling with these perverts or not?!” yelled Mr. Turner.
“Of course I do, but, oh Brian! For mercy's sake, we can't go in there!”
“We don't have to go in!” he yelled. “We just have to go to the gate! Now come on!”
Slowly, and shaking, as though they were walking on a bed of nails, Mark's parents made their way to their car. Mark's father started the car, and they drove away.
***
Meanwhile, back at the resort, Betsy and Mark were talking about how they would market Betsy's art.
“We'll set up a website to advertise your work,” Mark beamed, “and the site will be called 'The World in the eyes of Betsy Parker' and it will have the URL www.theworldintheeyesofbetsy.com. People will come from far and wide to buy your drawings. I just know it.”
“Aw shucks,” smiled Betsy, with a laugh in her eyes and face. “I don't know if I'll be that popular, but if I can sell at least some drawings, I'll be over the moon.”
“I can buy you your art supplies,” Mark promised her, “then you can make your art here. I will take your drawings to my table and sell them as having been made by you. This is going to work, Betsy. I can just feel it.”
Right then, a hollering noise echoed over Betsy, Mark's and the other nudists' shoulders.
“What was that?” Betsy cried.
“I don't know,” stuttered Mark. “It sounded like a dying wolf.”
The noise sounded again.
“MMMAAAAAAAAAARRRKKK!!!” it went.
“It's someone yelling 'Mark!'” Mark cried. “Betsy, it's calling me!”
The noise sounded a third time, and, this time, Betsy and Mark noticed that it was coming from the gate.
“Oh for heaven's sake!” Mark stammered. “It's my parents. Never mind them, Betsy. I'm not going anywhere near there. They can go away on their own.”
“MMMMMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRKKKKK!!!!!” shouted the voices of Mark's father and mother together from just outside the gate.
“Susan will take care of them. Don't worry Betsy. I'm eighteen and moved out. All they're doing is making idiots of themselves.”
“Mark, they're your parents!” cried Betsy.
“So?” he responded in a purely indifferent voice.
“Maybe you should go over and reason with them. You might be able to work something out.”
“Yeah ... sure,” Mark laughed, “might as well reason with a doorknob while I'm at it.”
After the next bellowing of “Mark” echoed from the gate and all the way across the grounds, Susan approached Mark.
“Your parents are calling you,” she explained. “I think you had better go over, and see what it's about. They're disturbing the entire resort with their wailing.”
Mark still didn't want to go. He turned to watch Susan, who walked over, in the direction towards the gate.
“I'll go,” said Betsy. “Even if you won't go, Mark, I will.”
“Oh Betsy!” cried Mark. “Not you. That will be the worst of it.”
Nonetheless, Betsy walked, with Susan, towards the gate.
Mark sighed. This was it. If he was going to stay Betsy's friend, and keep a strong reputation with Susan, he'd have to go to the gate to face his parents. Slowly, and reluctantly, Mark hobbled his way over to the gate too.
When the trio arrived at the entrance of Sunny Palms, there were Mark's parents as red faced, and furious as a pair of TNT bombs blowing up.
“MARK EDWARD TURNER!!! YOU GET DRESSED THIS INSTANT!!!” hollered Mark's father, when he saw his son.
“What's with all the catterwalling?!” cried Susan. “You're disturbing the peace of our campers, both of you!”
Neither of Mark's parents acted as though they had heard Susan.
“AND YOU MARK!!!” Mark's father yelled so furiously, that Mark wouldn't have been surprised if his head had exploded. “GET AWAY FROM THAT CREATURE YOU CALL BETSY!!!!!”
“You are getting away from this gate even if I have to drive you away myself!” Susan yelled. “You're making a mighty embarrassment of yourselves, the two of you!”
By now, several other campers, either clothed, or wrapped in towels, were arriving behind the gate, and they all began yelling at Mark's parents that this was a private resort and that they had to leave. Meanwhile, Mark's parents continued hollering and bellowing that their son was coming home.
In a matter of seconds, the din grew to being so bombastic that no one could be heard anymore.
“NO!!!” Mark yelled, and he had an adrenalyn rush so powerful, that his voice carried above his parents and the campers. The entire racket stopped in silence.
“I AM NOT COMING HOME WITH YOU!!!” Mark yelled, when all was quiet. “MY HOME IS HERE! WITH BETSY!”
Mark was shaking and sniffling and badly beaten up inside, but he was determined to get his message out.
“I am a man!” Mark cried. “I am not a boy anymore. I am eighteen and that makes me legally an adult. I have a job, I can pay my own bills and I have moved out!”
“Young man!” yelled his father. “You have not moved out! You are coming home, with us, now, and if you think you are living with these sickos, which include
s Betsy, you are mistaken. Not until you have learned decency and respect for your parents will you be allowed to leave our roof.”
“I don't care!” Mark yelled. “I am not coming to live under your prison of a house even if you have to kill me! Betsy is not an animal, she is not a pervert, she is not an exhibitionist, and neither are any of my friends who live here or visit here! ... And ... Neither am I. And I am not your pet to take home with you!”
Mark's father made a grab at his son, so suddenly that Mark didn't even have a chance to avoid it, in an attempt to force him over the gate to carry him into the car. “Now you nasty, filthy son of a ...”
And Mark, with his full adrenalyn rush still reeling, punched his father in the stomach with a giant blow, and the large crowd that had gathered gasped.
Mrs. Turner looked on in horror, as she watched her husband collapse onto the ground, gasping, winded, in pain, huffing and puffing to regain his air.
Mark returned to his senses. “I'm sorry,” he sobbed, tears streaming down his cheeks. “I didn't mean to do that. Are you okay dad?”
“Bye bye Mark,” his mother sobbed. “Just goodbye. For good. We are no longer your parents. We never knew you, and you are a filthy disgrace, a disease to our family tree.”
Mark's father stood back on his feet and made one more breath for air. “It's over,” Mr. Turner muttered. “Go live with that creature, Betsy. See if we care. We don't have two sons, Mark. We have one son, and his name is Roger. We are disowning you. You are dead to both of us. We'll build a big bonfire in our back yard when we get home and we'll burn every picture of you, everything that reminds us of you, and everything that belongs to you. We will have nothing more to do with you.”
Mark's father turned back to his wife. “Come on Margaret. Let's get out of here. I feel filthy and disgraced that we ever came to this place.”
And Brian and Margaret Turner departed from the gate of Sunny Palms, while the campers dispersed to continue their afternoon in the sun.
18 The Art Sale
Mark should have been proud that he had driven his parents away. Since their arrival at the gate where they started bull roaring for him, the only thing Mark had wanted was for them to get lost. He had wanted that so much he'd been willing to do anything to get that, and that was precisely what Mark had done.
But Mark felt guilty. He was not a violent person, but he had hit his own father ... in the presence of Betsy!
What was Betsy going to think of him now? Was she going to think of Mark as some abusive, violent, dangerous assailant, and leave him? Had their plans to become artists shattered? If Betsy didn't want to work with Mark anymore, because of this, was Mark going to crumble financially because he might not be able to make an adequate living to reside at Sunny Palms on his own?
“Betsy,” Mark stuttered, as the two of them walked away from the gate, “I ...”
He looked at Betsy's face. She was upset, but was she upset with him? Mark hoped, oh please, not.
“Mark,” Betsy sighed. “I'm sorry it had to come to that.”
“Please!” Mark cried. “Please don't be mad at me! I've never hit anyone in my life, and I wouldn't hit you if someone held a gun to my head.”
“I know,” Betsy replied, in a soothing voice. “You're not that kind of person Mark. I actually think you were very brave.”
“You do? I mean, I wasn't trying to be brave, Betsy. I didn't want to put on a show or anything. I just wanted my parents to go away. In the end, after everything they were doing to me and after everything they were saying about you, my fist just shot out from me, like I didn't even have control over it.”
“Thank you for defending me,” Betsy smiled. “Don't feel bad Mark. It's unfortunate it had to come to this, but I think, in the end, it was the only way.”
“Yeah,” Mark nodded. “I just feel bad that you had to see that.”
“There's no need to feel bad,” explained Betsy, in soft comforting tones. “They were kidnapping you, Mark. You had announced that you'd moved out of their home to live here, and they had no right to disrespect that. You have every moral and legal right to live where ever you choose.”
“Thank you Betsy,” Mark smiled. “It's so comforting to have someone who understands.”
Betsy smiled at Mark in return.
“And Betsy,” Mark continued, “all those things my parents said about you, you can forget about that. I know that is not what you're like.”
“I know,” Betsy beamed. “Thank you for understanding and accepting me, Mark. It's what I have wanted my whole life. Honestly, I never dreamed I would make it this far, but” Betsy breathed a sigh of love and happiness, “here I am,” and she spread her arms open wide to embrace all the beauty around her.
“So,” Mark smiled. “I think it's time we got started on some artwork, don't you?”
“Absolutely!” cried Betsy in delight. “Just let me take a little walk around the grounds, find something to inspire me.”
“We'll walk together,” Mark smiled, “I'm still getting used to this place and my skin could use some sun and fresh air.”
Mark and Betsy walked along the lawn, feeling the grass on their feet, looking at the trees, and onto the lake.
“Oh look,” smiled Betsy, peering out onto the water.
There, sitting on the lake, was a duck. It was mottled brown, had miniature streaks of white among its wings, and had a blue-green beak.
“That's such a pretty duck,” Betsy smiled. “I think I'll draw that.”
Betsy, who had been carrying her pencils and sketchbook with her since they had begun their walk, started her work on drawing the duck as it paddled along on the water. Not only did she draw the duck itself, but she also drew the water around it and the ripples it made along the water.
When she had finished, she showed her drawing to Mark.
“Wow!” Mark cried in admiration of Betsy. “You are amazing. That duck just looks like it's going to fly up and out of the page any instant.”
“I'll keep making more drawings throughout the week while you're in school,” Betsy suggested. “Then, over the weekend, when you have more time, you can set up your table and sell what I have made.”
“That sounds like a great plan,” Mark commented. “Where should I set my table up?” he asked himself. “I know. How about down the road, at the turn off just up ahead? It's only a few hundred feet away, and the people who buy your drawings might feel drawn to come up to Sunny Palms and meet you, the real artist.”
“Thanks Mark,” replied Betsy, “but I don't want that much attention. I just want to get my work out.”
“I understand,” Mark replied, “but I think, whilst you're just getting started, the corner down the road will attract just the right amount of attention; enough that you can say you're selling, but not enough so that there are people in your face all the time. Then, when you get to be more pronounced, I can move my sales place somewhere more far away. There's a vacant lot next to the supermarket that I think would be good.”
“That's a good plan, Mark,” Betsy smiled. “I will keep drawing.”
And Betsy did. After drawing the duck on the lake, she drew the lake itself. Then, she drew a panorama of the trees that lined the sky. She drew a gorgeous sunset one evening. It was red, pink, purple, yellow, gold, mauve, magenta, and many other colors, and Betsy caught every single color and texture perfectly.
At the end of the week, Mark bought a table. It was a round, wooden table, easy to fold up and carry around.
He presented the table to Betsy, who reacted with joy at how elegant it was. “Wow!” she cried. “Great choice. That will be perfect for my art.”
When Friday arrived, Betsy gave Mark the drawings she had made, each one inscribed with her signature, so that her buyers could know it was really her. Mark put them in his bag, carried the table out of Sunny Palms and set it up just down the road. Mark sat, by the table, awaiting the first customers. Would anyone come? Surely someone would. If Mar
k had walked by an art table on a whim, and seen drawings of this quality, he wouldn't have been able to resist buying them for anything.
After a twenty-minute wait, a middle-aged man on the roadside passed by and caught sight of the table and the artwork.
“Oh my!” he cried when he saw what Mark had to sell. “These are wonderful. Did you make these all by yourself?”
“Actually, they're not mine at all,” Mark explained. “I didn't raise a finger, or a colored pencil, to create any of these. I am the salesman only. If you want to know the artist, all you need to do is read the signature.”
As the man gazed at what the signature on the drawings read, Mark awaited, in suspense, for his response. Was he going to react in shock and horror when he saw that they had been made by Betsy? Would the mere fact that it was her that had made him, drive this man away?
“Betsy Parker,” he murmured as he read the signature. “Hey, I know who that is.”
The man broke out in a smile that split his face. “Wow!” he cried. “Betsy is getting into art? These drawings are incredible. She is so talented.”
“She is,” Mark smiled. “I am proud of her.”
“And who are you?” the man continued. “Her sales partner? Her friend?”
“You could say I'm her friend,” Mark explained, “but my feelings towards her are growing deeper and stronger over time. Betsy has such a smile, such a character, and she really makes me feel like a child once again. She's just, so much her own person.”
“Yeah, she would be,” the man smiled. “Name is Douglas, by the way. Douglas Smith. I will be happy to buy one of these. I think I'll buy this duck right here.”
Douglas picked his wallet out of his pocket, and handed Mark twenty-five dollars. Mark took the money and handed him Betsy's drawing of the duck.
The Sheltered Life of Betsy Parker Page 14
