Crossroads

by Tracie Peterson

  Darrin breathed a sigh of relief. Apparently she didn’t remember him, or if she did, she wasn’t acknowledging it. “I don’t know. I’ve never been here before. What do you suggest?”

  “Well, it depends on what you like. If you’re looking to stay awake all night, I’d suggest a double espresso with your favorite flavoring. If you’re looking for something to warm you up from the cold, but don’t want the caffeine, I’d suggest a decaf latte.”

  “What do you like?” he asked, taking a stool at the counter.

  Leslie looked up for a moment. “I’m particularly fond of the grand-sized latte with raspberry.”

  “Does that come in decaf? I don’t think I want to be up all night,” Darrin said with a quick glance around the room. The place was nearly deserted, and he suddenly felt quite conscious of the fact.

  “You can have it in decaf,” Leslie told him ad picked up a mug. “Is that what you’d like?”

  “Sure. I’ll give it a try.”

  “Is that for here or to go?”

  “Here.”

  She smiled and went to work, bringing back a glass mug of rose-tinted liquid. “I hope you like it.” As she handed it to him, her face assumed a look of concern. “I’d feel pretty bad if I suggested it and you turned out hating it.”

  Darrin took a taste and nodded. “It’s good. Never thought about raspberry coffee before.”

  “We get all kinds here,” Leslie said, busying herself with odd jobs behind the counter. “The kids can come up with some really crazy combinations.”

  “Kids? You don’t look like much more than a kid yourself.”

  “Oh, aren’t you the charmer?”

  “I suppose you get a lot of those, too,” he said, taking another drink.

  Leslie laughed. “Yeah, like I said, we get all kinds.”

  “But seriously,” Darrin began, “don’t you go to the university?”

  “No. I’m the owner of this shop. I graduated from there some time ago, and now I spend all my time here. Or so it seems. My name is Leslie Heyward.”

  “I’m Darrin,” he offered, deciding against giving his last name in case she made the connection. “Well, it looks like a great place. I’ll have to remember it.”

  “We’d love to have you back.”

  The small talk seemed to wear on his nerves, and yet he was drawn to the petite blond in the same way he had been on the plane. “So, when you’re not here, what do you do?”

  “Mostly I spend time at home with Travis. HE consumes a lot of my time, especially now.” The telephone rang and Leslie excused herself.

  Travis? Darrin couldn’t help but wonder who Travis might be. Would it be rude to come right out and ask? He sipped at the coffee and waited for her to return. But when Leslie hung up the phone, she grabbed a tray and went out to clean tables. Darrin had no choice but to turn around if he wanted to talk with her or ignore her and act like a regular customer whose attention was on coffee and not the proprietor. His heart won over and he twisted around on the stool.

  “So, you were telling me about your off hours.”

  Leslie kept her back to him and continued wiping at the table. “I don’t have many of them, but like I said, they’re usually consumed with about a million things. My parents recently died – in fact, the funeral was just a few days ago. It’s about all I can do to keep up.”

  Darrin was glad she couldn’t see his expression because he was certain he had grimaced. “I’m sorry about your folks.”

  “Yeah, me too. It’s been especially hard on Travis.”

  “Who’s that – a boyfriend?” There, the question was finally asked.

  Leslie laughed. “No. I don’t have a boyfriend. When would I find the time?”

  Darrin found himself relieved at her answer and, for reasons beyond his understanding, almost smiled. But her next words put aside such joyous thoughts.

  “Travis is my little brother. He’s only five. Guess you could say he was one of those late-life or at least mid-life surprises for my folks.” She turned and straightened, the glass-ladened tray balanced expertly in her hand. “Travis isn’t dealing very well with this at all. He’s not talking much these days, and it’s becoming pretty evident that he’s going to need some professional help to get through losing his mom and dad.”

  Darrin felt instantly sickened. A child! A little boy named Travis was now without his parents because Darrin’s own father had. . .It was too much to even consider. Why was it suddenly so much worse than before? It wasn’t like he didn’t know that people were affected by the Heywards’ deaths, but he’d never for one moment envisioned that a child would be orphaned by the accident.

  “I’m so sorry. How horrible for a little boy to be confronted with the death of his parents. I suppose you were left as his guardian?”

  She nodded. “Mom and Dad had the good sense to plan it all out with a will, but I would have cared for him anyway. We’re terribly close.”

  “I suppose something like this is never really planned for.”

  “No, not really, but Mom and Dad did their best to make it easy on us. They had one of the prearranged funeral plans.” She smiled rather sheepishly. “I could have saved myself a great deal of worry if I’d just bothered to go through their private papers first thing. I don’t know why I put it off. I guess going through those papers made their deaths more real – more final.”

  “I can understand that,” he replied sympathetically. “So everything was arranged and taken care of, and you only had to worry about seeing that their wishes were carried out?”

  “Pretty much so. Wish it could be that easy for Travis. When you’re five, death has very little meaning.”

  “But when you’re an adult watching a child deal with death, it has a great deal of meaning.”

  He could see Leslie’s eyes sparkle with tears. “Yeah, it’s really hard to watch him deteriorate like this. I love him so much. Everybody does. He’s so good-natured – or at least he was. It’s just not fair.” As if embarrassed for her muted outburst, she offered a pain-filled smile. “Sometimes I’m not very understanding when it comes to trusting God to work this out for the best.”

  “I completely understand. I have my fair share of questions to ask Him. And that’s on a good day!” Darrin removed a five-dollar bill from a monogrammed wallet and handed it to Leslie. She began to fumble for change in the pocket of her apron, but Darrin reached out and placed his hand on her forearm. “No, you go ahead and keep that.”

  He got to his feet and drained the rest of the coffee. “Thanks a lot. I really enjoyed this place.”

  “I’m glad. Thank you for listening to me. I don’t seem to be getting much contact with the outside world, except for my aunt. Between our hours here and watching Travis, we don’t have much time for heart-to-heart conversations.” Clearing Darrin’s mug from the counter and wiping the pinewood with a damp cloth, Leslie turned to face him. “Do come back.”

  Darrin smiled. “I plan on it. See you later.”

  As soon as he was out-of-doors, Darrin heaved a sigh. He felt like a wound had not only reopened, but that it had become deeper. Leslie and her little brother were suffering from the sins of his father. A five-year-old child was left with only an overworked, overworried sister and an aunt to care for him. A twenty-four-year-old woman was left with a business, a grieving brother, and no additional guidance. And he was left with the guilt. The guilt of knowing that, had it not been for the irresponsible acts of Michael Malone, they would be a very happy and complete family.

  EIGHT

  As the weeks blended together, Leslie found herself growing more and more weary of everything. She was sick of the shop and the routine there. She was tired of dealing with problems that she had no answers for and had reached an absolute limit with Travis.

  In the weeks since their parents’ accident, Travis had gone through a period of silence and distancing. He chose to stay in his room for hours on end, and even when Leslie tried to draw him out, h
e would refuse. It was a real trial to take him to church or the park or anywhere else for that matter. But during the last week he’d passed into another stage of mourning. His security level plummeted, and he demanded to have Leslie’s utmost attention at every turn. He cried every time she left him, and whenever she’d return to the house, he’d cling to her for hours. This happened even when she was working late at night, and it worried her more than she could say.

  She’d fully intended to seek some counseling for him, but her pastor didn’t think it would require anything so professional or detailed, at least not at this point. He suggested she just give the boy time and let nature run its course. But as far as Leslie was concerned, nature’s course was beginning to frighten her.

  The Saturday evening crowd finally thinned out and eventually left the shop. Leslie was exhausted, partially because of being on her feet since late afternoon, and partially because Travis’s nightmares often kept them both awake at night and she wasn’t getting much sleep. Leslie cleaned up, counted the money, and headed for her car. She was too tired to think and knew that she shouldn’t be driving, but the trip home was short and she tried to focus all her attention on the steep hill that was Fourteenth Street. She breathed a sigh of relief to find it clear of snow and ice, but nevertheless slipped the car into low gear to save wear on her brakes.

  Just as she crossed the intersection at Kentucky Street, Leslie had the scare of her life. Out of nowhere a car came barreling down the street, and before Leslie could clear the intersection, it clipped the back of her Toyota and spun her around.

  “Great!” she exclaimed as she came to a stop. “This is just what I need.” The shock of the accident kept her foot firmly on the brake and her hands on the wheel for several long minutes.

  The driver from the other vehicle had run a red light and, after hitting Leslie, had run the front end of his car up on the sidewalk. There it sat, precariously balanced half on and half off the street. For a second, Leslie took a mental inventory. She felt all right and didn’t think any real injury had come to her from the accident.

  The car – well, that would take getting out to survey the damage, and since it was after midnight, Leslie was hesitant to do so. She’d just read how people were sometimes rear-ended or run into in order for the driver of the other vehicle to do further harm to the occupants of the incapacitated car. But no one in the other vehicle seemed inclined to get out and check on her. Maybe they were hurt. Maybe she should go to them and stop worrying about the consequences.

  She sat there wondering what she should do, when to her relief the flashing lights of a Lawrence police car came into view behind her. “Thank you, Father,” she whispered as she turned off her engine.

  The police car was soon joined by another. Leslie gave her statement, trying to remember every detail. She was amazed at how much she took for granted. How fast was she going? Was the light green or had it already turned amber when she went through? Was she wearing her seat belt? Had there been any ice on the roadway?

  She tried to make certain of her answers. The seat belt situation was easy – she always wore it and demanded that anyone riding in her car wear theirs as well. Aunt Margie often protested, saying that they never worried about such things when she was a child, but nevertheless she’d wear one for Leslie. She gave the answers that she thought were correct. She was certain that she wasn’t going over the speed limit because she always geared down to come down the hill and she hadn’t yet geared back up when she’d been hit.

  The officer was noting everything, and it was while he was finishing that she noted the other driver was led away in handcuffs. His loud protests left Leslie little doubt as to his sobriety.

  “It doesn’t look like there’s much damage here,” the officer told her. “In fact, you were very lucky.”

  “It wasn’t luck,” Leslie replied, her breath coming out in puffs of steam against the cold February night. “I’m sure God was watching out for me.”

  The officer seemed unimpressed with her faith and, after finishing his report, gave her a copy of the insurance information from the other driver and offered to follow her to her house in order to make sure the car could operate properly. Leslie thanked him and headed the car in the direction of home. She had just reached down to turn up the heater when she noted that the dashboard clock read 1:35.

  “Oh, Margie will be sick with worry,” she exclaimed.

  Ten minutes later she pulled into her driveway and waved to the police officer as she made her way to the house. Margie was waiting for her with a fearful expression on her face.

  “Where have you been? I called the shop, but you were already gone.”

  “Oh, I know, and I’m so sorry. I was coming down Fourteenth when a drunk driver hit my car. He barely clipped the backside, so the damage is real limited, but it scared me. Coming home just now, I thought of Mom and Dad and how they didn’t fare as well from their drunk driver.”

  Margie nodded. “People are so thoughtless to drink themselves into a stupor and then get behind the wheel of a car. Even if it wasn’t illegal, they ought not to take people’s lives into their own hands.”

  “Well, I’ll have to call the insurance agent tomorrow. Do you think I can get ahold of him on Sunday?”

  “It’s hard to say, but I’d imagine there’s some kind of emergency number. How do you feel? You weren’t hurt were you? Whiplash sometimes doesn’t show up right away.”

  Leslie rubbed her neck. “No, I don’t think I’m hurt.”

  At this, both women were startled to find Travis screaming Leslie’s name as he ran down the stairs. “Leslie! You’re hurt!”

  “No,” Leslie said, lifting him in her arms. He wrapped his arms so tightly around Leslie’s neck that she was nearly deprived of air. “Trav, stop squeezing so tight,” she gasped and pried his arms away. “Travis, I’m okay. I had a little accident tonight, but I’m okay. God was taking good care of me.”

  Travis sobbed hysterically, and it was an hour before Leslie and Margie could get him calm. Leslie finally decided to let him sleep in her bed that night, even though she questioned the sensibility of it. What if he decided he needed to sleep with her every night? That would certainly never do.

  She carried him upstairs, talking soothingly all the way, while Margie followed behind, snapping off lights. “Tomorrow,” she told Travis, “we’ll go to church and then maybe we can. . .”

  “I don’t want to ride in the car. The car will kill me,” Travis told her adamantly. “The car killed Mommy and Daddy.”

  Leslie exchanged glances with Margie before answering. “No, sweetie, it wasn’t the car’s fault. It was the fault of the person driving the car. Remember, I told you. The man had too much alcohol to drink, and he didn’t know what he was doing. He shouldn’t have been driving. Just like the man tonight. He shouldn’t have been driving, but because he didn’t think about the consequences, he did what he wanted to anyway. No I’m all right, and we need to get some sleep, so I want you to just stop worrying about it. Okay?”

  Travis nodded sleepily but said nothing. Leslie shook her head at Margie’s mournful expression and took Travis into her room. It was going to be a long night.

  ❧

  “But Travis, I though you understood. Remember what I told you about the car? It can’t hurt anybody by itself. We’re just driving to church and back. We won’t be hurt, I promise.” But even as the words were out of her mouth, Leslie wondered how she would ever explain it, if by some strange twist of fate, they were in another accident.

  Travis had planted himself under the bed and refused to come out. Even now, as Leslie lay on her stomach and tried to coax him from his hiding place, she could see that her pleas were having little effect. He was terrified, and there was no way he was going to climb into a car again without a great deal of thought and possibly professional help.

  “Come on, Trav, I’ll take good care of us.”

  “No!” he scooted back toward the headboard end o
f the bed.

  Leslie sighed and glanced up at Margie, who waiting in anxious worry by the door. “Margie, you go on to church. I don’t think we’ll be going today, but maybe you could have everyone pray for us.”

  Margie grimaced. “Are you sure you don’t want me to stay here with you?”

  “No, we’ll be fine. Travis and I just need to spend some time together.”

  Margie left in silence, and for several minutes Leslie just lay with her cheek against the hardwood floor of Travis’s room. Travis watched her without moving. The terror in his eyes made Leslie feel terrible. She felt like it was all her fault. If she’d only been more cautious telling Margie about the accident, Travis might never have heard. On the other hand, it was probably only a matter of time until his fears had taken over anyway. Better to deal with it now, she guessed.

  “Hey, Trav, I know what we could do.”

  “What?” he asked softly.

  “Well, it snowed again last night, and I was thinking maybe we could make a snowman in the yard.”

  “You won’t make me ride in the car?”

  “No,” she answered. “I love you, baby. I don’t want you to be afraid.”

  He started to cry. “I miss Mommy and Daddy.”

  Tears formed in Leslie’s eyes. “I miss them, too. Say, would you like to walk over to the cemetery?”

  “So we can see them?” Travis asked, sounding almost hopeful.

  “Well, they aren’t there, not really. You remember what I told you about them being in heaven, don’t you?”

  “You said they just left their bodies here.”

  “That’s right.” Leslie’s back began to ache, so she sat up, thinking that perhaps Travis would at least come to the edge of the bed in order to better talk to her. “It’s like your box of toys. You have the outside box, but the real treasure is the toys inside. Mommy and Daddy had bodies that were kind of like boxes to hold their spirits. Their spirits are the very best part, and that part has gone to heaven to live with Jesus.”