Song of the Brokenhearted

by Sheila Walsh

  Her heart pounded and her face burned with heat, but all thoughts of what could have happened were interrupted as Emma released a wail, letting Ava know exactly what she expected.

  They’d been cooped up in the van for long enough, so Ava made use of the bathroom inside Dairy Queen to change the baby. Then she ordered herself a breakfast sandwich, made a bottle, and somehow got both of them fed inside the restaurant.

  After getting Emma strapped back into the car seat, Ava searched for her phone. It had fallen beneath the seat and it beeped as the battery was dying. Dane had called back and left a voice mail saying he was worried. Sienna had called, stunned by the news of Bethany’s baby at their doorstep and the vanishing act of her predictable mother.

  “I’m both excited and worried about you. Giving me a taste of my own medicine, huh? Call!”

  Corrine’s message said, “Ava, I gathered with a few gals from the church. We prayed together for you. We are in agreement in our concern for you. Please return my call so that we can join you in prayer and seeking what God is trying to show you. I called Kayanne and she said you were on a road trip. But you can’t run from your troubles. God will find you. Now I know you don’t like me, but I want to be there for you. I am here for you.”

  Ava smiled at the message as she got back on the road, unwilling to let any more aggravation inch its way inside of her. Corrine was trying to help her. She didn’t know that Ava had been running from a portion of her life and self since she was seventeen. This was the first journey back to that place.

  What do I believe? What is true?

  There was a difference between the two. What she believed and what Corrine believed were quite different despite their joint professed love of Christ. But what was true had no bearing on what was believed. Truth was truth, and she prayed as she drove that what she believed was in line with Truth.

  I have hidden Your word in my heart, so that I won’t sin against You, Lord.

  That was the best she could do. Pray, infuse her life with God’s word, and trust Him to guide her in the ultimate Truth.

  They rumbled along the rural highways with Ava feeling less and less equipped for the journey. Emma slept or rode along agreeably, and they stopped every few hours for snacks and restroom visits. The wind whipped dust devils across the open fields and occasionally tumbleweeds rolled along the highway, so big that she had to swerve out of the way.

  God, what am I doing? Tell me to go back or go forward. Show me the way.

  There was no answer. No still, soft voice in her head, only loud doubts crowding each other out to be heard. There was no bulletin board on the highway that gave some direction like, “This Way! You’ve Almost Made It.”

  God, am I doing the right thing?

  The engine light on the old VW fluttered on and off on the dashboard, and the gas gauge had made a sudden plunge toward E. The baby would need food soon and a diaper change. It was Sunday afternoon and only small towns dotted the landscape with long intervals between, and most shops closed down for the day.

  Glancing back at the baby, Ava could see that Emma’s eyes were still closed. Ahead, Ava could see a tall flashing sign.

  “Please let us make it,” she whispered. The engine light was on continuously now, and there was a distinct sound in the engine that didn’t sound right at all.

  She stopped at an intersection. The traffic light rocked on the line, and a dreary fog permeated the surroundings, casting a hazy shroud around a gas station, diner, and motel.

  Ava pulled into the deserted gas station and auto shop. A few lights were on, but there was no one around. She kept the engine running and stepped out, feeling the bite in the wind at the edges of her clothing. Through the window, Ava could see Emma stir in her car seat. She wouldn’t leave the car with Emma inside, yet she didn’t want to wake her if no one was here. Finally Ava saw a young dingy-looking man sauntering slowly toward her.

  “Can I help you, ma’am?”

  “Are you open?”

  “For gas is all.”

  “Is there another mechanic’s shop somewhere in town?”

  The guy spit out a wad of chew, sending a line of black juice across the dirt. Ava raised her eyebrows and he looked apologetic.

  “Sorry ’bout that,” he muttered and wiped his hands on a grease-stained rag he pulled from the back pocket of his blue dungarees. “None’s open on Sunday. Charlie is our best man, but he’s gone fishing in Alaska for a week. I got a bit of an eye when it comes to fixing cars or knowing when they’ve gone to the happy home.”

  Ava wiped the cold sweat that gathered at the back of her neck, shivering in the chilly weather. At least it wasn’t a Texas summer with her off on this odyssey. For that, she could thank God. The rest of her situation didn’t fill her with gratitude.

  “Would you have time this afternoon?”

  “It’ll cost you.”

  Ava bit the edge of her lip. “I don’t have a lot.”

  He studied her a moment, then stuck out his hand.

  “M’ name’s Duffy, and we’ll figure somethun out.”

  “All right,” Ava said, glancing back at Emma. She caught a neon sign flickering against the dusk.

  Lonesome Café and Motel.

  “That place any good?” she asked Duffy, slipping into a stronger accent without meaning to.

  “It’s all we’ve got, so guess it be good enough.”

  Ava nodded and opened the door to the backseat, where Emma was moving her head from side to side.

  Duffy peered into the engine, making enough noises as he perused the parts to make Ava wonder if he’d ever seen a VW before.

  She told him she needed an estimate before he fixed anything. He frowned, looking her over, before she hurried to the motel with Emma in the car seat and her purse, baby bag, and overnight bag weighing down her shoulders. Ava got a key and room number, and after dumping the things in the motel room, her grumbling stomach led her to the café.

  The café was nearly as empty as the town.

  The muscles in her back, neck, and arms seemed to moan in protest as she stood at the front counter waiting to be seated. Her hands stung beneath the Band-Aids from the blisters. Driving all day and carrying the car seat hadn’t hastened her healing.

  “Sit wherever you like,” a woman’s voice called. Emma blinked in the lights and yawned with her pink mouth making a large oval.

  “You’ve got your pick of the place,” the friendly voice called from the back. Ava noticed the empty seats.

  “Thank you,” she called back, moving between a row of red

  vinyl booths and the counter bar. She found a booth away from the draft of the front door and set Emma down. The baby gave her a large smile and kicked her feet as Ava sat down next to her.

  Ava folded her manicured nails together and noticed how they were well past the time for a fill. She’d never gone this long, not even when she’d given birth to her children. Ava didn’t look the menu over—she wanted a grilled cheese sandwich, fries, and a Diet Coke. Anyone could make that.

  Outside the window, the vacancy sign shown in neon against the gray early-evening sky. The letter C fluttered off and on as if ready to blink out at any moment, making it read “Ya ancy.” Ava wondered about the people who slept in the rooms in the two-story building with a parking lot as a front yard. Probably mostly people passing through. The name Lonesome made it all the more depressing.

  The highway stretched out across the desolate plains like an endless ribbon cast off an opened gift. Someone had taken that gift and left the ribbon as trash, just like the shabby little towns in this part of the state.

  Ava knew these kinds of towns and these kinds of people. Many of them were honest and hard working. Then there were the others—the meth cookers, the deep-seated racists, and probably some who were hiding from the law.

  Ava’s uncle was as racist as they came. He showed it through his jokes and his bar fights when drunk. Uncle Stan would narrow in on any person he could
guess had some Hispanic blood, and would walk up unprovoked, with barrel-chest stuck out and fist clenched. Most Texans had their own way of thinking, their own ideals, and their own way. They were Texans first, and then Americans.

  “Well, what a cutie,” a woman called as she carried a menu and glass of water to the table.

  “Yes, she is,” Ava replied as she unlatched Emma from the seat and gave her a rattle.

  The waitress leaned close to Emma, cooing to her, and Ava felt a protective instinct to pull her away.

  “You are a beautiful little girl,” the waitress said, and Emma responded with a huge smile.

  “What can I get you?”

  “I’ll just take a grilled cheese and fries . . . and I see your special today is chili. Do you recommend it?”

  “Best chili around,” the waitress said. “And to drink?”

  “Diet Coke?” Ava glanced at the car seat where Emma grabbed at her feet, trying to pull them toward her mouth.

  “Got it. You aren’t from around here.” The waitress said it as a statement instead of a question.

  “No, not really.” Ava wasn’t about to explain her history to this woman. She was close enough to home that Ava didn’t want to chance someone knowing her father or some other friend or family member.

  “Let me guess. Dallas-Fort Worth or Austin . . . probably Dallas.”

  Ava chuckled. “Why do you say that?”

  “It don’t take Sherlock Holmes to figure it out. Accent, hair, accessories, nails. The car nearly threw a wrench in my guess.”

  The woman looked like she’d worked the diner for decades. Her buttons were undone low enough to show an aging bosom that was most likely her pride as a younger woman—perhaps it still was.

  “It also don’t take Sherlock to know that there baby isn’t yours.”

  “You think I’m too old?”

  “Nope, not at all. In fact, I gots me a kid who just started kindergarten, so you ain’t too old for that there baby. All the movie stars are having kids in their forties now, so you’re just in vogue if you do. But you aren’t real comfortable with that baby. She’s not even your grandbaby, is she?”

  “No, she isn’t.”

  “You didn’t steal her, did you? I’d really hate to see you in prison . . . you seem nice enough.”

  Ava laughed, surprising Emma, who burst into tears.

  “Oh, sweetie, I’m sorry.” She pulled the baby up, cradling her against her chest, rocking and patting her back. The feel of Emma’s small warm body coursed through her with a soothing energy and melted her heart.

  “That looks a bit more natural,” the waitress said.

  “She’s my cousin’s baby, so I guess she’s my cousin as well.

  I’m taking care of her for a while.”

  The woman studied her thoughtfully.

  “Let me see that little muffin.” She set down her pad and pen on the table and reached for Emma. Ava immediately wanted her back, not in the arms of a stranger, though the waitress quieted Emma down with her bouncing and cooing noises that caused the baby to pull back and study her face.

  “I’m Jackie,” she said.

  “Ava. Nice to meet you.”

  “Let me get your order in.” Jackie moved around to the counter, bouncing Emma as she did. She stuck the order into a metal rack that the cook spun around. He nodded Ava’s way as he pulled it off and disappeared into the kitchen.

  “We’re slow tonight. Big rodeo drains the town out until near midnight, then we’ll see things hopping as everyone comes back to town with their stomachs aching for some grub after that drive home.”

  “Sounds exhausting.” Ava reached out her hands for Emma. The baby stared at her, then seemed to lean toward her.

  “Looky there, she’s reaching for you,” the waitress said, but hung on to Emma. “You staying at the motel tonight?”

  “Yep.”

  “Watch out for this little one. Keep her close to you.”

  “Why?”

  “Just saying. I’m sure it ain’t as clean as you’re used to.”

  Ava held a teething ring out for Emma to grasp. “Beggars can’t be choosers.”

  “Why are you a beggar? Don’t seem like it should be so.”

  “Circumstances. And I’m bringing the baby back to her mama.”

  “Does her mama want her back?”

  Ava thought about lying and keeping this from getting too personal. But then she thought, what the heck.

  “Not sure. You’ve lived around here a long time?” she asked Jackie.

  “’Bout twenty-three years, I guess. Raised my kids in this town, though the first three got out as fast as they could say eighteen. My second husband dragged me out here. He’s buried down the road, next to my third husband. Guess I should’ve learned to marry younger, not older.”

  Ava wasn’t sure how to respond to that.

  A ding on the counter sounded and Jackie handed Emma back to Ava. “Your order’s up.”

  Ava pulled a bottle out from the baby bag. She still worried that she was doing the formula thing all wrong. Her babies had nursed their entire first year with food coming along at five months. She felt completely inept at this formula feeding.

  Jackie reappeared and placed the food on the table. “You got kids of your own?”

  Ava nodded. “Two.” She nibbled on her grilled cheese, enjoying the soft crunch of butter on the bread and gooey cheese that stretched into long strings with every bite.

  “I better get back to work before I get fired . . . Isn’t that right, Barney!” Jackie called to the cook behind the small window. He stuck out his head and cupped his ear.

  “What?” he yelled over the sound of the fryer.

  “Nothing, nothing,” Jackie said with a laugh, waving him away. She cleared the dishes from the table in the next booth, and Ava focused on getting herself and Emma fed.

  “It was nice meeting you,” Ava said after she’d paid the bill.

  “If you need anything, you give me a holler.”

  “I just might do that,” Ava tossed out as she carried bags, car seat, and baby out of the diner.

  Ava stripped back the bedspreads right away. Even in the five-star hotels where they usually stayed, she was meticulous about the bedspread habit. She’d seen one too many news investigation programs were they took a black light to the bedspreads, floors, and walls.

  Next Ava checked the sheets, which passed her inspection, though who knew what frightful things were hidden from the human eye. At this moment, she cared less than usual. They had a room, that’s what mattered. Her exhaustion and relief that they weren’t stranded somewhere in the car or sleeping in it once again outweighed her germ phobia, which normally would’ve been heightened with the baby in tow. She laid Emma down in the middle of the sheets.

  Emma wiggled around, putting her feet in the air and rolling over to one side. Then she tried rolling to her stomach, grunting and struggling with one arm stuck beneath her.

  “You can do it,” Ava said, kneeling next to the bed. She laughed at the determination, and finally gave Emma a little nudge to help her over.

  “You did it!”

  Emma’s focused expressions transformed into a huge smile and a giggle that filled Ava’s heart with a joy she hadn’t felt in years. She’d forgotten the maternal delight of tiny accomplishments like this and wondered why it was suddenly so strong for this little one.

  After feeding Emma and rocking her to sleep with her back muscles burning, she placed Emma back on the bed, ever so carefully. The baby opened her eyes a moment, then she settled back to sleep. Ava felt like doing a cheer as she lined the pillows along the edge of the bed.

  “We’re getting the hang of this,” she whispered with a yawn.

  Ava fell back upon the bed with her arms outstretched across the width of it. She closed her eyes and could visualize the road stretched in front of her. Her nerves longed for a luxurious bath with bubbles, a glass of Pinot, and the thick down comforter of h
er favorite hotel. Instead they had a dank motel with suspicious carpeting, crooked curtains, and a neon light flickering outside.

  “We’ll be back home tomorrow night,” Ava muttered to herself and to Emma, who made a soft sigh in her sleep.

  Ava wondered what tomorrow would hold. The goal was clear. Find Bethany. Could that be accomplished without seeing too much of her family? Should she take time to visit her brother while she was in town?

  She drifted in and out of sleep as she went over different scenarios. Then she heard it. Not noise from the other rooms or big rigs on the highway or a clock ticking obnoxiously keeping her awake. No, this was much more detrimental to her chances of getting a good night’s sleep.

  Ava smiled wearily as Emma giggled beside her.

  Despite her exhaustion, it wasn’t that late, so Ava called Dane again. The call went directly into voice mail. He was obviously out of a service area. Loneliness swept over her, as if she were much too small to be alone in this dank motel room with a little baby to care for. She longed for Dane and the strength he always offered her.

  She called Kayanne.

  “My phone is going to die pretty soon, and I can’t find my charger. I’d forgotten how frazzled I get with a baby. And I can’t reach Dane either, so if you have a chance, will you call and tell him that I’m all right and what’s going on?”

  “Of course, but go get a new phone charger,” Kayanne said.

  “I’ll look for a store, but there’s not much out here.”

  “Everyone has a cell phone. And by the way, I really hate praying aloud,” Kayanne said with a grumble that made Ava laugh.

  “That was random. And using hate and prayer in the same sentence might be sacrilegious, so be careful. But I’ll admit, I don’t like it either.”

  “You don’t? But you pray out loud at Bible study every week.”

  “Doesn’t mean I like it. It’s my responsibility.”

  “I think Corrine enjoys it. I think she practices her prayer during the week before Bible study so that she’ll sound pious. Don’t you notice how she volunteers every week?”

  “You are so bad,” Ava said, sitting in a chair near the bed. She’d had the same thought herself, especially since she’d seen Corrine with a small cheat sheet in hand.