by Leah Atwood
No answer.
“Eli! Where are you?”
Still no answer.
It’s not as if the house were so big he could be too far away to hear.
She stepped into her son’s room and saw him sitting on his bed, back leaning against the wall, earbuds firmly in place. Someday they would have to get those things surgically removed. Avery wrapped her knuckles against his door, and Eli lifted his eyes.
When he saw her, he had the decency to remove one of his earbuds. “What’s up, Mom?”
“You need to pack. We’re leaving on a trip tomorrow.”
Eli jerked his head, pointing it toward the wall behind her.
Avery turned to see his suitcase. “You’re already packed?”
“Uh, duh. Isn’t that obvious?”
She rolled her eyes.
“Careful.” He gave her a parental stare. “They might get stuck in the back of your head.”
She returned his stare with The Look.
Instead of squirming the way he did when he was eight years old, he laughed. “Come on, Mom. I’m telling you what you always tell me. If you roll your eyes too much, they’ll get stuck in the back of your head, and you’ll never be able to see anything but your brain ever again.”
She’d done this to herself. She’d tried to raise the boy with humor. That was before she’d realized he would eventually get old enough to turn it back on her. What exactly had she been thinking?
Back to the task at hand. “Did you pack a toothbrush?”
He shrugged. “I put a new one in so I wouldn’t have to worry about it.”
“You sure you’ve got everything? Should we go through it?”
“Yes, I packed enough underwear, but if you want to count, go ahead. Just be sure to put everything back the way you found it when you’re done. I don’t want to have to repack afterward.”
She backed out of his room to go take care of her own packing, then stopped and popped back over the threshold. “I gave Mitchell a huge lecture today about how he was ruining your Christmas. He let me go on and on about it. The whole my-son-will-hate-me-forever speech.”
Eli’s lips twitched.
“Were you ever going to tell me you’d spoken to him?”
“Nah. I know how much you enjoy ranting. Figured I was doing you a favor by giving you a reason.”
“Did he at least tell you the name of the town we’re heading to?” When Eli shook his head, Avery took great delight in filling him in. “We’re heading to Nowhere, Oklahoma.”
Her son paled a bit at her words. “Who names a town Nowhere?”
She shrugged. “Guess we’ll find out when we get there.”
“Will they even have electricity? Will I be able to charge my phone? It has all my music on it.” Eli squinted at her before shaking his head. “Nah. You’re pulling my leg. That can’t be for real.”
Avery laughed as she headed down the hall. “Give me twenty minutes to pack, then I’ll fix dinner!” When she got no response, she figured the earbuds had been safely replaced. Either that, or Eli was trying to come up with an excuse to get out of eating. If she’d had his aversion to well-balanced meals as a child, she’d have starved to death.
Thirty minutes later, Avery conceded defeat. She’d noticed but hadn’t really registered the size of Eli’s suitcase. Then she’d gone to pack her own bag. By the time she’d added her laptop, tablet, notebook for jotting down ideas, and a couple reading books, she had no room left for her clothes. As she studied the faded green cloth of the suitcase nestled among the piles of clothes on her bed, realization hit. “Eli!”
“What’s up, Mom?” His head popped around the edge of her door. It was a wonder he’d even heard her.
“You took my suitcase.”
“I needed room for all my stuff.”
“I’m standing here trying to figure out why everything won’t fit, and it’s because you left me with the small suitcase.”
“You’re kidding, right? You picked it up and put it on your bed. Surely you noticed the size. And you even saw the other suitcase in my room. It’s not like I was hiding it or anything.”
Avery stared at him, blinking. He was right, but there was no way she was going to tell him so. “I’m going to have to go get the other big one out of the attic.” She sighed, hoping her son would volunteer to climb up in there and retrieve it for her.
Instead, he nodded his agreement. “You want me to pull the ladder down for you?”
She grinned to herself as she nodded. They had a regular battle about the attic. Neither of them liked going up there. Since he’d gone up to retrieve all the Christmas decorations earlier in the month, she’d let him have the victory this time.
After Avery scaled the creaky ladder up into the attic, she scanned the web-dusted contents, quickly locating the suitcase she needed. It was older and more faded than the green one, and it had a rust-and-mustard-colored seventies floral pattern on it. At least no one will try to steal it.
As she dragged the suitcase with its one broken wheel across the attic floor, a cloud of who-knew-what gently puffed up into the air around her. Then she got a mouthful of it and started coughing, which led to more grime and dust billowing into the air. That, of course, led to more coughing.
Avery lost her balance and started to fall out of the attic opening, but the suitcase blocked her way enough to pause her descent, giving her time to reach out and grab the back of an old chair that had been in the attic longer than they’d lived in the house. The suitcase wasn’t so lucky. It fell zipper-over-wheel down the attic ladder and landed with a loud thud on the carpeted floor below.
By the time Avery pulled herself back to her feet and made her way down the ladder, she expected to find Eli standing there wondering where his dinner was. Alas, her teen was blissfully unaware of her near-death-by-attic experience. He was in his room listening to music.
It was for the best. She wouldn’t want him to pull a muscle laughing at her.
Eli and Avery sat down at the dinner table. Regardless of how busy their lives got, she insisted they eat at the table whenever they were both home together. No television, radio, phone, or computer. Just the two of them.
On cue, Eli set his phone down. “Come on, Mom. It’s only music. What’s wrong with listening to music while I eat?”
Avery offered a wide smile. “Well, son, I would enjoy spending this time visiting with you. That’s hard to do when you’re listening to someone else instead of me.”
He pushed his phone to the edge of the table.
She continued to look at it pointedly until he grudgingly reached over to power it down. When the screen was black, she gave him a nod. “Would you care to say the blessing?”
“Sure.” He bowed his head. “Dear God, please bless this food to our bodies. Bless the hands that prepared it. Help Mom’s cooking not to kill us. Amen.”
Avery took a bite of her chicken salad sandwich. “One of these days you’re going to have to start getting more original when you pray. You’ve been praying the same prayer since you were ten years old.”
“That’s not true. Sometimes I ask God to kill my taste buds so I don’t hurt your feelings when I take a bite of something new you’ve cooked.”
Avery was truly blessed to have such a thoughtful son.
She took another bite before speaking. “So, it’ll be you, me, and Gavin. He’s the photographer I’ll be working with on this one.”
Eli’s right eyebrow lifted. “I guess that means I’ll get the back seat all to myself?”
She shrugged. “Gavin might want the back seat.”
“Nah. Adults always want the front, and since you force me to respect my elders, I’ll have to let him have it. You ever meet him before?”
“Nope. The car rental place is supposed to pick us up tomorrow at ten, and Gavin’s going to text, letting me know where to collect him.”
“What if he turns out to be some creepy old geezer?”
Avery almost spat out her baked veg
gie chip. When she instead forced herself to swallow, it went down the wrong pipe. She coughed until she couldn’t breathe. Great. Her cooking might just kill one of them yet.
Tears were rolling down her cheeks by the time she caught her breath. “I’m sure he’s not a geezer.”
Eli laughed. “Great. You’re sticking me in a car for hours and hours so I can spend quality time with you and some guy that’s probably old and creepy but is not a geezer. This is going to be the best Christmas ever.”
She’d done a little too good a job raising him to laugh off his troubles. He’d grown into a teen with a cutting wit. As his mom, even she couldn’t always tell the difference between his humor and a normal person’s sarcasm. When in doubt, she chose to believe he was suppressing an unquenchable laughter behind words that masqueraded as sardonic.
“Hey, it’s four days. You’ll still get plenty of time for skiing.”
“Are you gonna let me do any of the driving?”
“Uh… will that make a difference in how you treat everyone else in the car?”
“It wasn’t going to, but now that you mention it, I think it might. You should let me drive to keep me happy and agreeable.”
She polished off the last bite of her sandwich and wiped her hands on her napkin. “I’ll take that under advisement.” She’d let the rental agent tell him it was against policy. Then she wouldn’t have to be the bad guy.
“Come on, Mom. This is New Mexico we’re talking about. It’s not like there’s going to be any snow on the ground. Letting me drive would be totally safe. You can think of me as your chauffeur. We’ll put the top down, and you can sit back and let the wind flow through your hair while I do all the hard work of driving.”
“We are not getting a convertible. We’re getting a nice sturdy SUV, even if I have to pay the difference out of my own pocket.”
“What’s wrong with a sports car?”
“A, There’s no way on earth I’d ever let you drive it.” So much for leaving that for the rental agent to tell him. “B, We’re going to have three people, their luggage, and camera equipment. Unless you plan on riding on the roof, there’s no way that’s going to happen in a sports car.”
Eli picked up his plate and grabbed hers, too, before heading to the kitchen sink. After he put the plates down, he winked at her. “I’ll be driving. You can ride on the roof. Unless you want to put the creepy old geezer up there. I’m sure we’ll be able to find a bungee cord or two to secure him in place. What’s the worst that could happen? His denture cream dries up from the wind, and his false teeth get blown out of his mouth? I’m sure even he’d say it’s worth it for a sports car.”
Avery shook her head as she wiped the table down. “Go grab the green bag out of the front closet and load it up with snacks.”
“Isn’t the newspaper paying for your meals?”
She gave him a pointed look. “I know what a picky eater my son is, and I know things don’t always go according to plan. Pack as many snacks in there as you can handle. We’ll also take a case of bottled water to be on the safe side.”
“My mother…” He headed toward the closet. “…winner of this year’s Over-Planner of the Year award.”
“Don’t knock it, bub. It’s kept us out of the poor house and off the evening news, so it must be working.”
Like any other family, they had their moments. For the most part, though, Avery and Eli got along. They joked, had fun, and dissected movies together. After years with just the two of them, they could pretty much complete each other’s sentences. Avery knew he was going to grow up and leave home someday. She looked forward to Eli becoming the man God intended him to be, but she knew she’d miss him desperately when the time came. Aside from her job and her faith, he had been her whole life for fifteen years.
When she heard a thunk by the front door, Avery poked her head around the corner of the kitchen to see Eli had dropped the green bag there. “Got it all packed with food?”
“Yup.”
“Did you pick anything I might be happy to eat, or is it all your favorites?”
He shrugged. “I got a variety. Need me to do anything else?”
“Take out the trash. Then put your suitcase by the front door so we’re ready to go in the morning. Since they’re not coming till ten, I plan to sleep in.”
“You don’t sleep in unless you’ve stayed up till four in the morning reading a book.”
“And I’ve already picked it out. It’s going to be a good one!”
When Eli came back in from emptying the garbage, he noted what Avery was doing and, with an exasperated sigh, raised his eyebrows. “Coffee? You’re going to be crabby all day tomorrow if you drink coffee tonight.”
“Will not.” She was proud of herself for not giving in to temptation. She did not stick her tongue out at him.
“Uh, yes you will. It’s always the same. You drink too much coffee and stay up way too late. Then you get, like, two hours of sleep, and you’re in a bad mood the whole next day.”
Gazing from Eli to the brewing coffee, she knew he was right. There was no way she was going to admit it, though. She was really looking forward to this book. Even if she wasn’t driving the whole trip, she wouldn’t get much reading in. Carsickness had plagued her for as long as she could remember. Reading while in a moving vehicle was out of the question. Avery let out a heartfelt sigh. “Fine, you win. Only half the pot. I promise.”
“Does that mean you’ll be in a bad mood for half the day tomorrow or that you’ll be in a halfway-bad mood all day?” She gave him The Look again, and he backed out of the kitchen, hands in front of him. “Hey, I’m only asking so I know what to prepare for.”
Chapter Three
December 23, 9:15 a.m.
Eli would never let Avery live it down if she told him he was right. She obviously should have skipped the coffee the night before.
Avery knocked on Eli’s bedroom door then opened it. She didn’t bother to step into the room before hollering. “Get-up-or-we’re-going-to-be-late.” Her words were slurred together from too much fatigue and not enough slumber. Schlepping her way down the hall and into the kitchen, she hoped the haze in her brain would soon clear. To help it along, she promptly started making a pot of coffee. As she inspected the grounds in the filter, she shook her head. She should have known better. Then she dumped in two extra scoops of her late-night nemesis and hit the brew button.
She moved back down the hallway and stopped in the bathroom long enough to turn the shower on before going back to her room where she rummaged around for something to wear. Life as a single parent meant all she’d been able to afford was an older house. There was one bathroom, and it took forever for the hot water to reach it. Avery hoped the head start she was giving the pipes would guarantee something hot and steamy upon her return, but she knew better than to expect it. Regardless of temperature, when she got back to the bathroom, she was going to have to climb into the shower if she planned to be ready before the rental car agency came for her and Eli.
When she got into the bathroom, she tested the water. Still cold, but not bone-chillingly so. She shouted a warning down the hallway. “I’m getting in the shower. Make sure you’re up by the time I’m out!” If Eli hadn’t used the bathroom while she was making the coffee, then he’d simply have to wait until she was out of the shower.
Avery closed the door again and took a quick look in the mirror. Ugh. When had she gotten so old? Crow’s feet inched their way out from the corners of her eyes. Okay. Maybe not inched. That was an exaggeration. They were centimetering their way out. She could still remember, though, when they were millimetering. She lathered on her anti-aging face cleanser then stepped into the almost-warm shower. Maybe they’d get to stay at a hotel with actual hot water, instead of lukewarm. That would be nice. And complimentary coffee, of course.
A quick shower, and then Avery was in the kitchen savoring the smell of coffee in her mug as she tried to wait for it to cool down so she could s
tart drinking it. She hollered again. “Eli, are you up yet?” She loved that kid, but it was so stinking hard to get him up in the morning.
When the sound of movement from Eli’s room reached her, followed by the click of the bathroom door, Avery glanced at her watch. Five minutes till ten. She hoped the rental agency was running a couple minutes late.
While Eli was in the shower, she double-checked to make sure the back door was locked, the windows were all closed and latched, and the coffee pot was shut off. She moved her suitcase to the growing pile by the front door.
As if conjured by her thoughts of him, Eli walked into the kitchen looking far too perky for someone who didn’t care to get out of bed in the morning. Meanwhile, Avery, normally the morning person, would have rather been anything other than vertical at the moment. Eyeing the clock on the kitchen microwave, she began to wonder where the rental agency people were. It was already twenty after ten. A little bit late was okay. After all, they’d been running pretty late this morning, too. Don’t they usually call if they’re behind schedule?
“Where’s the people with the car?” Eli opened the refrigerator while he asked. Without removing anything from the fridge, he closed it and moved to the cupboard where she normally kept oatmeal, sugar, flour, and other baking supplies.
What was he doing? Did he think the ingredients had magically mixed themselves into muffins while he slept?
After he closed that one, he moved on to the next cupboard. Dried beans, rice, macaroni, and cans of soup.
Avery, who had been trying to hold her laughter in, couldn’t fight it anymore. It didn’t have the decency to slip out delicately, either. Because she’d been trying to hold it in, her laugh escaped with a loud snort. Then Eli started laughing at her, and she was lost. She laughed until the room started to darken around her.
“Hey, Mom. Mom!” Eli’s voice broke through the fog and got her to stop laughing. When he came into focus, she saw he was holding out her cellphone. “Mr. Jones is on the phone for you.”