Amy Brashear - The Incredible True Story of the Making of the Eve of Destruction

“So I was thinking,” I said, twisting my scrunchie around my wrist. “Do you want to be my guest?”

“What? Are you serious?” he asked, nearly dropping his bowl to the floor.

“Yeah, I’m serious,” I said.

“Really? Do you know what you’re asking?”

“I do.”

He got this big smile on his face and said, “Yes,” with so many exclamation points.

I’d made his day, year, life.

He put in a new tape, turned the volume to the max, and rapped (badly) to “Friends” [27] Whodini, Escape , Jive Records, 1984. as we finished our hot fudge ice cream.

I was one hundred percent sure that Terrence was going to tell everyone at school how he was going to be my guest for the contest, and I would have to deal with the fallout from that concerning Dana. The Doomsday Clock [28] The metaphorical clock is maintained by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. It all started back in 1947 as a way to predict how close the world is to global destruction. The original setting was seven minutes to midnight. Today it’s three minutes to midnight. was ticking. Mom was right—I probably shouldn’t have smiled at her when it was my turn to pass out the milk cartons in kindergarten.

Dennis had already left to open the hardware store when I made my first walk through the house. Terrence was trying to finish his homework while downing a bowl of cereal, and Mom was putting on her makeup over the toaster, waiting for what I assumed was a strawberry Pop-Tart.

“Good morning, sleepyhead,” Mom said. “I’m glad you’re up. I didn’t want you to sleep all day.”

“I would,” Terrence said.

“This is supposed to be punishment, not a vacation.”

“Mom, don’t worry. I have tons to do,” I said.

“Tons?”

“I do have a plan.”

“A plan to stay in your pj’s all day?”

“How’d you know?” I asked, reaching inside the freezer for the box of frozen waffles.

“Laura—”

“Mom—”

“Maybe you should go to the hotel with me.”

“Um. No. Those people make me want to bang my head into a wall.”

“Those people?”

“The guests.”

She shrugged. “Yeah, but you don’t. You have to have self-control.”

“Self-control?”

She nodded. “That’s why you don’t reach across the desk and slap them silly.”

Shortly after Mom and Terrence left, I had a second breakfast in front of the TV with Hope and Bo.

“Like sands through the hourglass, so are the days of our lives”: [29] The tagline for Days of Our Lives, a soap opera on NBC . Mom had started to record the show. It was legal now. The Supreme Court ruled that we were not going to jail if we recorded a TV show with our VCR.

My day of fun started off right. I had a list of things I wanted to do, and I crossed each thing off once I’d accomplished said item.

Read the paper—check

Take quiz about nuclear war from the paper—check

I was planning to drop the quiz off at one of the many locations it suggested once I went out for the day. My day. Laura’s Day Off .

But then an advertisement for an antinuclear meeting at Arkansas Tech that morning caught my eye. The advertisement was halfway down the page—a good three-by-five box.

My idea of a fun, relaxing morning changed. The phone rang. It was Mom making sure that I hadn’t gone back to bed. I promised her I was indeed up. I was stuffing my backpack with some essentials, two comics, and a spiral notebook. I promised Max I would make some progress. We were writing our own comic book. I did the writing and he did the drawing.

“So what’s your plan?” Mom asked.

“I think I’m going to go see Granny.” I left out the part about going to Tech.

Mom sighed heavily over the phone. Granny and my mom didn’t get along at all. Granny sided with Dad when the marriage went down the drain. And Granny’s my mom’s mom. That was what made it so surprising. Granny didn’t go to the wedding. Didn’t offer congratulations. Even though my mom was her daughter, she was no longer welcome in Granny’s home. I was. But we didn’t talk about Mom. I obeyed her wishes. I went to her house every Sunday to watch Murder, She Wrote , [30] A show on CBS that premiered this year. where we assumed Jessica Fletcher, aka J.B. Fletcher, was a serial killer who lived in Cabot Cove, Maine—population dwindling by the episode.

Granny didn’t have much. In fact, she moved into our old home (the home where Mom, Dad, and I spent many happy years) when she gave her life savings to Reverend Floyd Lowry at The Gospel Hour . Thousands of dollars went into the pocket of the televangelist. A year ago, he went on his TV show and asked the congregation sitting at home to bless him. He asked the people for $4.5 million. He pleaded for them to send anything and everything they had. Reverend Lowry believed that God wanted him to raise the money to “erect a church that would bring the nonbelievers to the feet of Jesus.” It was controversial. It was a scam disguised as a fund-raising drive. Reverend Lowry was adamant that if the church did not reach its goal, then God “would call him home.” As in, if he didn’t raise the money by a certain time, Reverend Lowry would die. Who knew God had the same tactics as the mob? His tears were used to swindle people out of money. He hid behind his faith and took everything that my Granny had. I begged her to not give him a single dime, to see if he would die. But she felt she had to. He was testing her faith just like God was testing Reverend Lowry. Reverend Lowry met his deadline and ended up raising $6.2 million.

My dad felt sorry for her. My mom was embarrassed for her. Great-Aunt LouLou, my papaw’s sister, always said, “A minister can praise you with one hand and reach for your pocketbook with the other.” And she always would add with so much bitter disgust, “If my dear brother had gone to the doctor for care instead of the mailbox to send a check to Brother Lowry, he’d be alive today,” and after she said that, she would spit each time.

When Dad moved to the base, Granny moved in. Dad started footing the bill. He got the house in the divorce settlement. And though Mom wouldn’t admit it, she was thankful that she didn’t have to deal with Granny.

“Be nice,” I told Mom over the phone.

“I am,” she said.

“Mom—”

“Yes, ma’am, check-in is at three p.m. I’m sorry, no exceptions,” my mom said, not meaning me. “Okay, Laura, I’ve got to go. Someone stopped up their toilet. I’ve got to go unclog it.”

“Gross,” I said, imagining the smell.

“Laura, be careful. Look both ways when crossing the street with your bike. And go with the flow of traffic. Love you.”

“Do you want me to tell Granny hey for you?” I asked.

“I guess,” she said, then hung up the phone.

I grabbed my backpack and headed for the garage, hopped on my bike, and headed south across the railroad track, down the road from Ellis Grocery, and across the way from the Raines’ chicken houses.