It was fierce, one of those end-of-summer storms that, more or less, goes down as a reminiscent reference point in the years to follow, for kids and grown-ups alike. One of those community incidents that seems to grow up beside you, such as a certain tree around the bend of a certain road, which has always been there but never seems to age. But why, afterward, was my troop disbanded, you ask? I know why; we all know why, but that doesn’t offer any sense of closure or certainty on the matter–I assure you.

No one saw anything in particular, that much is for certain. Only that moment when everything was too late, and history already made. But the events in question again precede me, which is why I’m finally formally recounting them I suppose. I imagine it like this, had i been the strongest fly on a very sturdy wall:

Of the rows of boy scout tents zipped up tight, standing strong in the stormy night, one tent among them was left wide open, flapping wildly, like a violent flame in the gusts of wind. The howling tent was so persistent that the boyscout beside it finally unzipped his tent and squinted, peering outward with his flashlight, only to witness that dark and mangled figure leaping out and disappearing at once into the rain; and the tent, free from its stakes and with nothing substantial left inside, blowing away with the wind into the darkness beyond.