The Boy Beside Me
The Story of Tommy Kimbrough
Before Herbert was a story, there were two boys with a notebook.
Tommy lived in the same neighborhood as me, and we met in elementary school.
He was a shy guy with thick, dark glasses. What drew me to Tommy was his quirkiness. He was just naturally funny. He really didn't say much, but when he did, I knew there was a pretty good chance I was going to get some little nugget of comedy.
One day in our English class, we were given an assignment. We had to write a story.
Any story.
I'm sure Tommy and I talked about our stories during recess or over lunch. We both eventually turned in something—probably something we thought the teacher might actually like.
But somewhere along the way, another idea hit us.
What if we wrote one together?
There would be no assignment this time. No grade. And certainly no concern about whether the teacher would approve.
We would take turns.
Tommy would write a page. Then I would write a page.
And there was really only one rule:
Make the other guy laugh.
And with that, Herbert Mark Brett David Tommy Oxlenobobbybozo was born.
For months, the two of us kept writing. One page would try to outdo the page before it. Herbert and his ever-growing collection of henchmen wreaked havoc on practically everything and everybody unfortunate enough to wander into their path.
We put the whole thing into a red binder.
We even passed it around so other kids could read it and give us their opinions on all the craziness and chaos we had created.
We had absolutely no idea what politically correct meant back then. We weren't trying to make a statement about anything.
We were sixth-grade boys.
Two friends with wild imaginations, a red binder, and something of a Mad Magazine mentality.
And we were trying desperately to make each other laugh.
My Childhood Friend and Other Half of Herbert
Then Life Separated Us
When Tommy and I reached high school, everything changed.
There was a riot at my school. It was a bad time. During it, I was struck in the head with a pipe and hospitalized with a concussion.
Afterward, I began attending another school, away from Tommy and so many of the childhood friends I had grown up with.
Life moved on.
Years passed.
And somewhere along the way, that red binder disappeared into all the boxes and belongings that accumulate over a lifetime.
Until one day, I found it.
There it was.
Our treasure.
Every ridiculous page. Every crazy character. Every word Tommy and I had written together when we were just two sixth-grade boys trying to make each other laugh.
I couldn't get to a telephone fast enough.
I wanted to find my old friend.
I wanted to tell Tommy that I still had it. I imagined the two of us getting together again, opening that red binder and laughing at those two crazy kids we used to be.
Eventually, I found the telephone number for Tommy's parents.
I called.
They answered, and I explained who I was. I told them I had been Tommy's childhood friend and that I was trying to find him.
Then came an answer I never could have expected.
Their only son was gone.
Tommy had grown up and developed a real talent for music. The shy little boy I remembered—the kid with the thick, dark glasses who didn't say very much—had begun performing in downtown Little Rock.
He had come out of that shell.
He was sharing his music.
And he loved it.
One stormy, rainy night after a performance, Tommy ran toward his car to get out of the rain. Before he could leave, he was accosted and badly beaten. His glasses were broken.
Tommy managed to get into his car and tried to drive home.
He never made it.
His car struck a bridge.
Tommy was twenty-four years old.
Twenty-four.
I had picked up that telephone expecting to find my childhood friend.
I thought I was about to tell him:
“Tommy, you're not going to believe what I found.”
Instead, I learned that I would never hear his voice again.
And suddenly that ridiculous old red binder wasn't quite so ridiculous anymore.
It was something Tommy had left behind.
Tommy
Tommy loved to play his music
But some applause would really feed his soul
He had finally gotten over his stage fright
He knew the lights, the crowds and the music would make him feel whole
He couldn’t believe he could actually get paid
To do what he really loved
He was so thankful to have the gift of music
He had thought just playing in secret in his room would be enough
He got an opportunity to finally audition for a club
He practiced and rehearsed and danced
He didn’t want to miss his opportunity
Or to mess up this wonderful chance
He worried about his clothes and his big thick glasses
His friends joked he looked like a nerd
But he was determined to show them
And play some of the best music they’d ever heard
He was enough that glorious day
Standing so confident on the stage
He did get the job to play on the weekends
To share his greatest love and even get paid
The first few weekends were a blur
And he got to see the lights and feel all the applause
But there were a few who saw him play
That saw only his quirkiness and his flaws
Finishing his set late one night
And putting his beloved guitar in its case
He walked outside to see thunder and lightning
And the rain fall on his face
Running to his car in the downpour
He was confronted by some men
They had gathered around his car
As he tried to make his way in
They called him terrible names
Then took out his guitar
And dropped it in the rain
They knocked him down
And broke his thick glasses
He yelled for help but no one came
When they had taken his money
They all walked away laughing
He put his broken guitar inside his car
He couldn’t find his glasses anywhere
He didn’t know if he could drive or just how far
His dream had become a nightmare
His windows were foggy and wet
He just wanted to get home and try to dry off his guitar
And try to catch his breath and start to forget
The Ripples we leave in this life
Some are good and some are bad
Tommy was doing his best to leave Ripples of happiness
Never Ripples that were mean or sad
The men who confronted Tommy that stormy night
Will never know what they’d done
The world lost a pure soul on his stormy blind way home that night
A mother and father lost an only son
He was my friend and he’ll always be
I know he’s playing to applause so loud
I just wish I could finally tell him
All his happy Ripples still make me proud
Years later, I tried to put into words the story I had learned from Tommy’s parents. I wanted to remember not simply how my friend died, but how he lived—the shy boy who found the courage to step onto a stage and share his music.
I called the poem simply, “Tommy.”
From his story came the song “Ripples.”
The Red Binder
For more than fifty years, these pages survived.
They were written by two sixth-grade boys who had no plan, no rules and certainly no idea that anyone would still be reading them more than half a century later.
Tommy and I weren't trying to write a book.
We weren't trying to create something important.
We were simply taking turns with a pencil, one page at a time, trying desperately to make each other laugh.
And we did.
Somehow that old red binder stayed with me through all the changes that life would bring. The pages grew old. The paper yellowed. Pencil marks faded. The holes tore around the rings.
But the words remained.
And so did Tommy.
As I restored these ninety pages one by one, something happened that I didn't expect.
For a little while, I wasn't looking at an old notebook anymore.
I was sitting beside my friend again.
I could almost imagine handing him the next page and waiting while he read whatever ridiculous thing I had written. Then he'd pick up the pencil and try to top me.
Back and forth we went.
Page after page.
Laugh after laugh.
Neither one of us knowing how precious those ordinary days would someday become.
I wish I had found Tommy when I first went looking for him.
I wish I could have put that red binder in his hands and said,
“Look what I found.”
I wish we could have sat together one more time and laughed until our sides hurt.
I didn't get that chance.
But all these years later, I did get the chance to open our red binder again.
And this time, instead of passing it around a sixth-grade classroom, I get to pass it along to you.
So if you've laughed at Herbert, shaken your head at us, or wondered what in the world was wrong with those two boys...
thank you.
You just shared a little piece of my childhood with Tommy.
And somewhere inside these battered pages, the two of us are still doing exactly what we set out to do all those years ago.
Trying to make somebody laugh.
For Tommy.
The boy beside me.