“We barely use it, and it’s in good shape and you can carry the gas cans on top. It should be enough to get you all the way to Colorado,” John Carter had told Chris.
They had accepted the gift gratefully, then packed the van full of paintings, items to trade, foodstuffs, and a handful of personal belongings. There was barely any room left for them in the front, and even the open space between the two front seats was piled high, every inch of space spoken for.
As the pale rays of the sun lightened the treetops, Chris scrambled some eggs and wrapped up a fair-sized bag of sandwiches for them to eat on the road. He walked outside just as Wes’s truck came rumbling around the bend. The truck had a camper shell on the back, something Wes usually only put on when he was going hunting. It wasn’t really hunting season, but perhaps the older man felt the need to kill something soft and furry in response to Chris and Carrie’s departure.
Chris grinned at the sight of his friend. He had been sick at the thought of not saying goodbye. After all, they had no idea when they would return, if ever. “Hey there, Wes, come to see us off before you go off on a hunt?”
Wes shook his head. “I’m coming with you, you damned idiot.” Typical Wes; kind and heartfelt words were not his strongest suit.
“You’re what?” Carrie asked, having just emerged from the house, with the last of their belongings in her arms.
“I’m comin’ with you. The two of you’d end up dead ’fore you got halfway there and then damned if Fenton would raise outta the grave and give me what for,” Wes said, taking the bundle of food from Chris, who stood there in shock. “Besides,” he said, “it’s high time I saw more of the world ’sides sand and them damn sand-nigg...” he glanced at Carrie’s stern look, “Yeah...lotsa sand. Figured I’d get out and see the world.”
Carrie burst out, “What about Jim Dorian? He’s still hobbled up with that broken leg.”
Wes nodded, “Yup. Dropped him off with Reverend Deeds last night. Jim’ll be right as rain in a few more weeks and then he can help out ’round the parish. ’Sides, they need some help now that little KG is in the world.”
Jeremy Deeds and his wife Grace had just welcomed their second child, a little girl named Karen Grace, or KG for short, after her mama and grandma just two months ago. They already had a very boisterous little boy, Anthony, who adored Jim Dorian. “Dorian needs to be with others; ain’t good for him to be livin’ alone in that leaky old trailer.”
The older man lifted up the back of his truck and displayed a host of items to trade or sell. “Hell, I gotta get rid of this crap, and you ain’t got any more room in that van. The way I see it, you two could use the company.” Wes had his trademark smirk plastered on his face. He had thought of everything, it seemed.
Chris felt Carrie’s eyes on him. This was far from what she might want, but the more Chris thought about it, the more he couldn’t help but like it. An extra eye, an extra gun, and, despite his gruff and taciturn ways, Wes was a good friend.
“Well, all right then. Let’s get moving.”
A few minutes later, they drove away from the tiny stone house—the van in the lead and Wes in his truck behind. Within an hour they were making time down the cracked highway heading west.
Reunion
“The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out love, and to let it come in.” – Morrie Schwartz
“Morning, Mom. Thanks so much for taking Hunter; I totally forgot about working at the food bank,” Sarah’s daughter Laura said as she gave her mother a quick kiss and hug, awkwardly balancing the sleepy toddler on one hip. “Are you sure he won’t be a problem?”
Sarah smiled at her daughter. Hunter was a little hellion, and that was for sure. But he certainly came in handy at times. The last time she had babysat her grandson he had broken two plates, burned his fingers on the stove, and then finished off the day by biting Mayor Farley on the arm after the overstuffed shirt had complained about the serving size on his plate. Considering his shirt was straining its buttons, and that Sarah had already served him a helping nearly twice that of the other diners, she hadn’t concerned herself much with his opinions. The plates were a bit of a problem—she was getting low on the larger dinner plates—and the little boy had cried so when his fingers were burned, but the mayor’s effeminate scream that followed the toddler’s bite was well worth the trouble. She would have paid good money to see the mayor leave and never darken the door of her establishment again.
“Oh, don’t you worry a bit, Hunter is a sweetheart, and I just love having him here,” Sarah said, her smile full of mischief. It was a Tuesday, after all, and the Mayor often came by for an early lunch. She wouldn’t mind a little more biting on Hunter’s part; perhaps the Mayor would catch the hint.
“We will have a great time, won’t we, Hunter?” She adored both of her grandchildren. They were the spitting image of their mother, except for the red hair, which was all her son-in-law Todd’s contribution.
She reached out and took Hunter from her daughter, and hugged him close; he nuzzled her shoulder and sighed sleepily. “Bah, Mama. ‘Unter tay wit Gamma.”
Laura laughed and gave him a kiss on the cheek, “Be good for Grandma, sweetie, and don’t touch that stove!” She headed for the front door of the café, turned and called, “I’ll be back by sundown, Mom; just let me know if you need me to come sooner!” Laura had already dropped Melody, her three-year-old, off with Allen and Gina Stevens, Todd’s father and stepmother.
Sarah hugged her grandson close and said, “We have a busy day in front of us, don’t we, sweetheart? Well, I guess we best get started.”
She fed him some pancakes, his favorite, and watched him as he ate with single-minded intensity. He looked so much like his grandfather. It startled her to see him in her grandchildren’s faces, especially Hunter’s.
Despite the long years apart she still thought about him from time to time—more now that the grandkids had come. The ‘what ifs’ came frequently to mind. If she had stayed, if he had changed back to the man she had married, what would their life have been like?
Sarah wondered about Tiptonville often. No traveler would even really remember if they had stopped in a tiny town in the middle of nowhere—but she asked anyway. It was always the same answer, a shrug, a shake of the head, or, from those who had been out on the road way too long, “Those little towns just kind of blur together after a while.” She had long given up asking. It had been a shock when the trader had mentioned it last month. Ever since she hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it, or kicking herself for not having stopped the trader to ask a hundred questions about that “little Podunk town” he had visited.
There were customers to wait on, and Hunter had shaken off the last vestiges of sleepiness and begun running up and down the length of counter, without a care for who he might run headlong into. Sarah distracted the boy by setting him up with some dough and a cookie cutter. “Will you make me some cookies, Hunter?”
“I make cooees!” the boy crowed and got to work, cutting the dough into ragged shapes with one hand, while stuffing handfuls of dough into his mouth.
The front door bell clattered as a small group of strangers walked in. The café had been busy all morning, but now at just after ten a.m., it had fallen quiet. The noon rush would start up in an hour, and with it would come the mayor. Sarah suppressed a sigh; she had hoped for a moment’s peace before having to prep for lunch. The first two to walk through the door were young and in their mid-20s.
The woman was blond with striking green eyes. She carried herself with a quiet dignity that also conveyed a sadness beyond her years. Sarah wondered what had made the girl sad, for the young man beside her was quite obviously her husband. He was tall, blond, and had beautiful crayon-blue eyes. He looked familiar to her, but Sarah was equally certain that she had never seen him before.
Then the third person came into view and Sarah’s heart stopped. Standing before her was an impossibility and she felt terror and
wonder and hope all at the same time. The man stared at her for a moment, blinked, and said wonderingly, “Sarah?”
Carrie searched her memories for the details of a woman she had not even known, one who had disappeared years ago, fleeing from her husband and taking their two young children with her. No one had ever known where she had gone, but it had been the talk of the town for years. And here she was, apparently, in Belton of all places, where Chris had insisted they stop and visit, if only to see his childhood home.
Chris had talked with Wes once about his family. Well, better to say Wes had talked to him, and Chris had simply listened. The older man had admitted he had returned from the Second Gulf War messed up, suffering from PTSD and mad at the world. He had taken it out on Sarah one too many times, and the last time had culminated in her disappearing with the kids. Never to be seen or heard from again. And here, apparently, is where she had ended up.
Sarah stood there in shock, “Wes?” She didn’t say anything, none of them did, until Hunter, tiring of the dough, covered in the remains of it, tugged on her hand, trying with his chubby little toddler hands to open her fingers and place a lump of dough inside.
“Gamma...eat!”
Wes stared at the little boy, then back at Sarah, and then back down at the boy again. He took in the boy’s features, which reminded him of Cody at that age, “Is he...?” Wes stopped and sat down heavily in the nearest chair, staring at the little boy, a look of wonder settling over his face. He had a grandson. A grandson.
There they all stood, wordless. Chris and Carrie didn’t know what to say, and quite obviously neither did Sarah or Wes. They might have stood there until sundown if Mayor Farley hadn’t chosen that time to walk in the door. He had been craving a plate of Sarah’s famous biscuits and gravy all morning. It was distracting him from his duties, these visions of the creamy gravy and fluffy biscuits, and he had headed over to the café early to avoid the rush.
He preferred to be given more preferential and individual service, which seemed impossible when other diners hogged Sarah’s attention. And although biscuits and gravy was a breakfast item, and he was a stickler for eating the proper three meals of the day, he would make an exception in this case. After all, he reasoned, it was technically still morning and certainly too early for lunch. That made it perfectly reasonable to order his second breakfast that day. The mayor was surprised to see people in the café at this late point in the morning, and even more surprised to see three strangers. Well, that was all right; it was a fine time to establish himself as the authority in town. He straightened himself, sucked in his gut as best as he could, and boomed out a greeting.
“Good morning, Sarah! I’ve come for a plate of your biscuits and gravy. Make it a double and add extra gravy to that, would you?” His voice broke through their immobility, and Chris and Carrie stared at the rotund man for a moment before slipping to a back corner and sitting down. The mayor sat in his customary seat in the center of the café.
Wes, however, didn’t move. He continued to stare at Sarah and Sarah could not take her eyes off of him. She ignored the mayor.
Wes found his voice first, “Sarah, I’m, it’s, good to see you. I’ve wondered, I mean, I’ve wondered if you were all okay. Is, I mean, are Cody and Laura, are they here too?”
Sarah relaxed, just a bit. She allowed a small smile and nod to appear. He had a right to know his children were alive, healthy, and happy.
Wes was older, visibly so. He had white sprinkled liberally through his brown hair and his face had lines where there had not been when she had last seen him. He seemed steady, not drunk, not angry, and she felt a small ray of hope. Would he forgive her for running? For taking his children?
Wes stared at his estranged wife. Wife...it felt so odd to think of her as that. But there had been no divorce, no day in court, just an empty house. She was older, the laugh lines had deepened, and her hair was streaked with wiry gray hairs that she had plucked out ruthlessly when they first arrived years back, and eventually given up and allowed to grow.
Her shape was thinner than he remembered, but then she had been a bit heavy after Laura was born. His cheeks burned at the memory of himself, drunk and angry at the world, pointing out her defects—her weight being one of the many ways he berated her. He looked into her eyes, warm and brown, but a little scared. Scared of him, he realized, scared of what he might do.
Wes tried to imagine what she must be feeling. Was she scared that he was still that man? That he still carried that war inside of him? He stared at her, wondering how he could explain, wishing he knew the right words to tell her how different he was, that time had healed him.
He wanted to tell her how sorry he was, how much he had missed her and the kids, that he hadn’t deserved to have them, that he had nearly died when they left. He stared into those brown eyes and everything else melted away. It didn’t matter how long it had been or the changes they had come through alone; he was hit by the memories of her, younger, full of laughter, heavy with child, his child, and the frenzied, tearful reunions when he would come home on leave from boot camp.
The mayor, who had at first been interested in this odd scene only because it was the chance to impress new and different people, was quickly becoming incensed at being ignored. Who was this upstart, anyway? And the two young ones, who were they? He grumbled at the thought of the militia just letting them sashay on in this way, armed to the teeth from the look of the older one, and no one to watch them.
Oh sure, sure the war was over and there was talk of a new centralized government. But that wasn’t much more than a promise of taxes and some damn bureaucrat trying to wrest control away from him.
He had built himself a nice little empire here, one that he would pass on down to his son one day, if that boy didn’t stop screwing up everything he touched. James had been a disappointment in many ways, the most recent being his loss of control of the town militia and some damned girl he had managed to knock up. The boy spent more time carousing about in one of the few working trucks and drinking moonshine than he did keeping the town safe.
And that damned Todd Stevens, who had re-assumed control of the militia, had the audacity to lock him up for two days after he accidentally sideswiped one of the town’s cattle, breaking its leg.
Mayor Farley felt his pulse increase, beating an angry rhythm in his neck, his face flushing. Why, damned if they weren’t all ignoring him! He was sitting in his regular seat waiting for Sarah to snap to and fix him up her delectable biscuits and gravy and she was just staring at this man like he was a ghost. Couldn’t she see he was waiting? It was bad enough she had that damned grandson again today. The little beast had bit him, bit him, and she had simply apologized and let the boy go without tanning his behind. His eyes traveled to where the little beast had been sitting, covered in flour and dough, but he had disappeared.
Wonderful, Mayor Farley thought, she can’t be bothered to do her job and now she’s let the little crapper wander off. What was the world coming to?
“Sarah Turner, have you gone deaf?” Farley said loudly, startling Chris and Carrie and earning a sharp look of displeasure from Wes. “I’m waiting for my biscuits and gravy here. And pour me a mug of that hot chicory as well; I’ll take it black as usual. And make sure you add some bacon and...” the rest of what he was going to say was lost in a howl of anger and pain.
Hunter had crawled under the tables, wound his way around to the table that housed the mayor’s large bulk, and bit down firmly on a fat ring-encrusted finger.
It was Wes who was able to scoop the wayward child out from under the table before the mayor got some bright idea to kick out at the child. As it was, the rotund man roared from his seat, maddened that the little beast had bit him not once, but twice, and without any kind of consequences.
“You hand over that little brat, right now, I’m of a mind to show him the back side of my hand,” the mayor panted with fury, “but I’ll settle for one good crack of my belt,” and his hand
went to loosen his belt. “Teach him once and for all not to bite honest, hard-working men, by God.”
Sarah bristled. Honest and hard-working most definitely did not describe the mayor, and she would be damned if he was going to show her grandson any kind of violence. Instead it was Wes who quelled the red-faced mayor with a look, the little boy struggling in his arms to get another chance at biting the offensive man. Wes didn’t say a thing, just stared at Mayor Farley in a manner that made it clear he would tolerate no violence toward the child.
Jonathan Farley had never been a particularly bright man. His father had quietly maneuvered him into positions of power, taught him a few tricks on how to make others look dirty while he appeared clean, and generally railroaded him into the bank president position he held for nearly two decades, until the world had been set on its ear. Through a little luck and happenstance, perhaps his daddy’s spirit guiding his steps, he had managed to convince the shell-shocked remains of the town populace that he should be mayor, and he had quickly taken control of the reins of power and held on tight.
To say that Mayor Farley was used to getting his way was an understatement. But standing there facing this grim-faced stranger—who held the toddler with such ease and showed such certainty in his ways—Farley realized for the first time the adversary before him. He had no idea what the man was capable of, but he doubted it would be anything short of violence.
Suddenly, biscuits and gravy didn’t sound appetizing at all. In fact, his appetite had plumb vanished. Mayor Farley turned silently on his heel and slipped out the door, intimidated enough to say nothing, and leaving Sarah gaping in silence at the effect her estranged husband had on the pompous, rotund old man.
Wes didn’t bother looking at the mayor’s departure. He was examining his grandson closely, damned if the kid didn’t look dead-on like Cody when he was two. The only difference was the shockingly red hair the boy had—which was a mess of sharp angles and coated on the sides in flour.
A Brave New World: War's End, #2 Page 20