A New Start

by Morris Fenris

  An action that had landed him in jail four months later when he’d pushed Michelle off the porch before slamming the door in her face. Taylor’s dad hadn’t been amused, and Jimmy Baxter had spent the next 90-days in a rehab facility drying out and coming to terms with his wife’s death and how he’d treated his only child.

  Upon his sober return to Cathedral Hills, he’d tried to find Jenna, contacting the Four Corner’s shelter and getting nowhere. It seems that in-between the time Jenna had been taken there, and her father’s call, the facility had fallen victim to arson and burned to the ground. They had lost all of their records, as the incompetent facility director had made backups of their computer files, but then kept them locked up in her on-site office!

  He’d even hired a detective to try and find her, but had come up empty almost every time. The only lead they’d even found was that of a young girl who was doing court ordered rehab for drugs and alcohol in the Denver area. While the young girl was of the appropriate age, she had been part of the Denver juvenile court system for long enough that no one ever followed up, as no one had ever thought their Jenna Baxter would have done those things.

  After that disappointing lead, he had run out of funds and out of hope. During the last several years of his life, he had diligently prayed that Jenna would try to come home again, but it had never happened and he had died a lonely man. Trey decided to keep that information to himself for the time being, somehow knowing Jenna needed a chance to talk.

  Jenna nodded, “Yeah. I left the shelter and this kid there told me about a church that would help buy me as bus ticket home, so I went there and they were happy to help. I called my dad from Ridgway and asked him to please come get me.” Jenna stopped as she remembered the hatred that had spewed forth from the phone. “He was drunk, of course. He said so many hateful things to me that day. Including the fact that he no longer had a daughter and never wanted to see me again. He blamed me for killing my mother.”

  It’s a good thing the man is already dead, or I’d have to kill him! Trey was amazed at the violent emotions her story evoked. He was a peaceful man for the most part, but he had compassion for those around him that were hurting, and Jenna was hurting more than most. Father, help me maintain control and know how to proceed here? I’m really out of my depth.

  “Where did you go from there?” Trey asked, proud of himself for how calm his voice sounded in the face of her story.

  Jenna looked at the man sitting next to her and wondered what her life would have been like if her mother hadn’t died and she’d been able to finish growing up in Cathedral Hills. I bet I would have gotten a chance to kiss Trey at some point during high school!

  Jenna slowly began to speak once again, her voice softening as she shamefully told him about her descent into the world of drugs and alcohol. “For the first few days, I didn’t go anywhere. I hiked down to the reservoir and one of the yurts was empty, so I broke the lock and holed up there for a few days.”

  “Jenna, why didn’t you call Michelle? She would have come and gotten you, or had me do it?” Trey couldn’t imagine what must have been going through her head that she would have just ignored the fact that she had friends back home who cared about her.

  “You don’t understand! I’d already been hurt by the fact that no one ever called me, or tried to come see me. I didn’t know you all were trying; I just knew that I had been left alone in that shelter. For weeks! My father said some really hurtful things and I believed every last word.”

  Trey’s heart hurt as he listened to her speak about being discovered in the yurt by one of the park rangers and forced to leave.

  “It probably wouldn’t have been quite so bad if it hadn’t been raining that day. I was soaked to the skin and I started heading towards Montrose. This van load of kids pulled over after about an hour and offered me a ride.

  “I took it, but they didn’t stop in Montrose. They headed up into the mountains to a campout with other kids like them.”

  “Like them?” Trey questioned, not liking where her story was starting to head.

  “They were potheads, and they’re goals in life were to listen to loud music, eat junk food, and stay high for as long as possible. When they offered me my first joint, I was already high off the second hand smoke and readily took it. I don’t even remember how long we were in the mountains before everyone headed back to town.

  “The driver, I don’t even remember his name, he got pulled over, and while most of them got sent to jail, I was underage and the shelter had a missing persons report out for me. I got a one way ticket back to Denver.”

  Jenna took a breath and then looked around at her surroundings. That seemed so long ago!

  * * *

  Chapter 6

  “So what happened back at the shelter?” Trey tried to keep his voice even, as he made a mental note to make sure whichever park ranger had kicked a teenager out into a rainstorm wasn’t still working in the area! Her story gave new meaning to kicking someone when they were down!

  Jenna shrugged her shoulders, “Not much. I got lectured about trying to screw my life up even more by getting mixed up with those kids. I never told anyone that I’d made it all the way to Ridgway, or that I’d spoken to my father. It hurt too badly back then. As far as they knew, I only made it to Montrose.

  “They pretty much kept me under surveillance until I turned eighteen, and then they handed me a hundred dollars, the few articles of clothing I’d been wearing from the thrift shop connected to the shelter, and told me to find a job and try to make something of myself.”

  Trey fought the urge to pull her into his arms and comfort her. He’d had no idea the system worked in such a callous way. “Was this a State institution?” Trey asked, having trouble believing such horrific treatment of minors was allowed to continue.

  Jenna shook her head, “No. I started out in a State run facility, but after I ran away, they shipped me off to the mountains outside Colorado Springs to a privately run facility for wayward youth. It was more like a prison for juveniles than a half-way house like the State facility.

  “The people who operated it were only interested in keeping us there for as long as the State would pay them, and then we were out!”

  Trey was shocked and asked, “Did you even finish high school?”

  Jenna smiled, “Oh yeah! That’s where the hundred dollars came in. If you studied and earned your GED, they gave you a hundred dollars when they kicked you out. If you asked me, it was hush money more than a reward. If you didn’t get your GED, you got nothing! Needless to say, everyone earned their GED while I was there.”

  “A hundred dollars doesn’t go very far. Where did they expect you to live? Or eat?”

  “At the grown-up shelter, of course. They very kindly drove us into Denver and dropped us off a few blocks away from it. We were encouraged to check in there each night, find a job to work during the day, and work our way back into decent society.”

  “They actually used those words?” Trey asked, longing for the chance to tell her how unfairly she’d been treated.

  “Pretty much! The workers at the youth shelter made sure we knew that we probably wouldn’t ever make it off the streets. I don’t know that any of them actually wanted to be working there. It wasn’t until I tried to kill myself the first time and ended up in the state hospital that I met a counselor who truly seemed to care about me as a person. Attempted suicides almost always involved calling for the paramedics and they were mandated by State law to seek appropriate help for us then.”

  “You tried to kill yourself?” Trey scooted his log stool just a bit closer, “Jenna, why would you do that?”

  “Don’t look so shocked, Trey! It was pretty much commonplace in that facility. As to the why…Because I couldn’t live with what I’d become. If it’s any consolation, I only tried killing myself once while I was in the juvie facility.”

  “And after you turned eighteen? What happened then?” Trey asked.

  Jenna sh
rugged, “Things got more real. I struggled along for the first eighteen months, working as a hotel room cleaner in one of the truck stops along I-25. That wasn’t so bad, until I started drawing unwanted attention from some of the drivers.

  “I quit that job, and found another one soon after that. I either slept at the shelter, or sometimes I’d find other girls like myself and we’d pool our resources together and rent some run-down place for a few months.”

  “It doesn’t sound like a very good way to live,” Trey commented, hoping she didn’t take his comment as a judgmental one.

  “It wasn’t living, it was existing! That’s all any of those girls and boys do when they’re put in that situation. Luckily, I read that the private facility was shut down by the State several months after I left, and the owners are doing time.”

  “That must have made you happy.”

  “Not really. At that time, I was too busy trying to keep myself alive to care about anyone else.” Jenna trailed off as the hopelessness of those days came back, but instead of overwhelming her, she was proud of the fact that she could now remember those bleak days, and realize she had risen above them.

  “One day, a few years ago, I was walking through one of the city parks, drugged up and feeling pretty good about myself because I’d made a few extra bucks the night before. I remember the sun was shining, and the grass was all green.

  “I saw this group of teenagers having a picnic and stopped to watch them. They were all laughing and joking with one another, and they reminded me of myself before. They kept teasing each other, and after a little while, a group of boys joined them, and they set up a net and played some volleyball. They were having so much fun, and they weren’t that much younger than I was.

  “A passerby saw me watching them from behind a tree and yelled at the kids they needed to keep an eye on their stuff so it didn’t get stolen. She was referring to me as being the potential thief, and it hurt. I watched as the fun and laughter faded from the kids’ faces and they packed up their stuff and went away.

  “I remember sliding down the trunk of the tree as I looked at myself and what I’d become, and it just all became too much. When it started to get dark, I dried my tears and headed for the closest busy street. I didn’t even stop to think about what I was doing, I just walked right out into traffic.”

  “Oh, Jenna, I’m so sorry…,” Trey began, tears filling his own eyes for the young girl who’d thought so little of herself.

  “I didn’t get hit, but a local police officer saw me and intervened. When he found out I’d been in the state hospital, he arranged for me to go back there. My favorite counselor was still working there, and arranged for me to go to a private facility for young women in Denver. I’ve been there off and on for the last several years as I tried to get my life and my thoughts back together.”

  Jenna looked up at Trey, not liking the look in his eyes, which she attributed to pity. “I don’t need or want your pity…”

  Trey reached out a hand and took her arm, stopping her from storming away, “Jenna, it’s not pity. It’s admiration, if it’s anything. You’ve been through so much, most of which should have never happened to you in the first place. But look at you now; you’re a survivor. And you’ve still got so much of your life in front of you. You didn’t give up.”

  “Now you sound like my counselor,” Jenna told him, shrugging away from his touch. It felt too good. Can’t dwell on those types of things, they only lead to disaster! I can’t let my guard down, because letting people get close to you only leads to more heartache and my heart has enough scars for this lifetime.

  “Well, did you ever stop to think that maybe your counselor was right?”

  * * *

  Chapter 7

  “I know Teresa was right. That’s the only reason I’m even in Cathedral Hills today.” It grew silent on the bridge as Jenna looked around her at the mountains and trees. She had always loved nature and even though she’d been stuck in the city for the last several years, that love had never died!

  “I forgot how beautiful and peaceful it is here,” she commented softly, closing her eyes and listening to the call of the birds in the trees.

  Trey watched her face relax as the serene surroundings worked their magic. He didn’t break the silence; instead, he watched her and offered up a silent prayer for wisdom going forward.

  After fifteen minutes, Jenna opened her eyes and looked at Trey, “Sorry. I’m probably keeping you from work.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Trey told her. “About you going back into Ridgway…”

  Jenna immediately felt tension invade her shoulders as she sat up straighter and looked at the sun, which had already risen high in the sky and was on its way downward. I’ll never make it to Ridgway before dark now!

  Trey didn’t wait for her to speak, but forged ahead, “Listen, I can understand why you might not want to sleep in your old house, especially right now. But I really wish you would reconsider staying here, at least for tonight. Michelle will want to see you, I know she will.”

  Jenna watched him and part of her longed to stick around and let him prove to her that her friends hadn’t abandoned her all those years ago. Her entire thought process about that time was tied to the feelings of abandonment and being alone. If that wasn’t the truth…who knew what good things might come of that in her healing process!

  “…stay at the house. Michelle will be back in a few days…”

  “What?! Where’s Michelle?” Jenna asked, only having heard the last bits of his ongoing conversation.

  “She’s up at Camp Red Bird. She’ll be back Saturday afternoon.”

  “But that’s two days away. I hadn’t planned on staying here that long.”

  “Well, I seriously doubt I’m going to get the paperwork necessary to finalize your father’s mortgage and the excess life insurance before Monday or Tuesday anyway. Even if they sent it out tomorrow, the overnight services don’t deliver up here on the weekends. I won’t get it till Monday at the earliest.”

  Jenna hid her dismay as the reality of his words sunk in. This was one of the things that went along with small mountain towns, but was rather inconvenient at the moment! “Where were you suggesting I stay?”

  “At the house. I realize that you don’t want to sleep in your father’s place right now. Maybe after you have a chance to look through things you’ll change your mind, but for now, you’re welcome to use the guest bedroom at the house.”

  Jenna assumed he was talking about his childhood home and wondered why someone like him was still living at home, but she held her question inside, not wanting to embarrass him. And Michelle still lives at home? I guess that answers my question about whether or not she ever got married!

  Trey was watching her closely, and was debating with himself over whether or not he should tell her that he was offering her the spare bedroom in his own home. His parents’ home had been one of the many in town to be destroyed in an avalanche several years back. While no lives had been lost during the natural disaster, a half dozen homes situated at the base of the mountains had been demolished.

  Rescue crews, working side-by-side with the residents of Cathedral Hills, had managed to salvage quite of bit of stuff from each of the homes, but the structures themselves had been knocked off their foundations and had been completely ruined. Insurance money had paid to rebuild them, and his aging parents had decided to purchase property right next to the church and build a small retirement home there.

  Trey had, in turn, purchased the now vacant land from his parents and build his own log cabin on the property. It was a large A-frame structure with a huge loft area that included two bedrooms, a full bath, and a large open area that looked out over the great room below.

  A floor to ceiling fireplace occupied the southern wall, covered in pieces of moss covered sandstone that Trey had collected himself from the nearby mountains. Hard wood floors, covered by large area rugs, and big comfy pieces of furniture sat around the g
reat room, and on the opposite wall from the fireplace was a huge television. Trey loved living in the mountains, but the new technology and electronic gadgets were some of his favorite and he had incorporated as many of them into his home as possible.

  Due to the difficulty in getting internet and television service year round in the area, he had opted for having a satellite dish installed on the roof, providing both television access, and satellite internet. During the harsh winter months, there were many days where he would conduct his banking business from the privacy of his own home, as the internet connection at his house was more reliable than the one at the bank!

  The main floor included two additional bedrooms, each with their own private bath, a large gourmet kitchen, a mudroom that included the laundry, and the great room. A wrap-around porch, complete with dueling porch swings finished the structure and every time Trey arrived home, he was reminded of how blessed he truly was. I wonder if Jenna will like my home? It’s a lot different than the single-level country house my parents’ raised us in!

  Jenna thought about Trey’s offer and, having no other options, she finally nodded her head. “I guess I don’t have any other choice. Are you sure Michelle won’t be upset if she arrives home and finds me there?”

  “She’d be mad if she got back to town and found you’d left again without seeing her. Your other friends will most likely feel the same way as well.”

  Jenna gave him a small smile, “Don’t worry about that! Missy is planning a get together tonight over at the Diner.”

  “And you were going to stand her up by leaving?” Trey asked, not even bothering to hide the note of accusation in his voice. She needs to remember her actions have consequences and do affect others!