Elderberry Croft: The Complete Collection

by Becky Doughty

  “Sounds like a bunch of hogwash to me. What’s wrong with wanting things, especially good things? I want my baby back. Are you telling me that’s wrong? That I shouldn’t want my son in my arms, right now?”

  Willow didn’t respond, but when Andrea glanced over at her, she didn’t seem upset, either. Silence fell between them again, and deflated, Andrea decided it was time for bed. She didn’t know how she was going to manage staying with Willow for several days, but right now, she just needed to lie down.

  Andrea’s legs were a little unsteady beneath her, so Willow braced the chair while she stood,. They entered the one room cottage together and Andrea felt the corners of her mouth draw up in a tiny smile. It was like stepping into a dream world, with fabric draped from a hook on the ceiling, forming a bohemian-style canopy over the head of the iron-framed bed, the mismatched quilts on the bed and the trundle, pieced together from swatches of every color and pattern imaginable. Twinkle lights draped window toppers, candles flickered in votive cups all over the room. A beautiful, Venetian-style globe light hung on a tarnished brass chain from another hook, hovering over the low, Queen Anne style slipper chair and its matching ottoman, spilling a warm glow down on whoever might sit there.

  While Andrea waited on the edge of the trundle with a glass of water, Willow hurried back across the way to get Andrea’s toiletries and clean clothes for the morning.

  She returned quickly—George had left a packed bag on the landing for her—and made sure Andrea had everything she needed to prepare for bed. Then she went back outside to sit by the fire a little longer.

  It was late when Willow finally came tiptoeing in, but Andrea wasn’t asleep. She didn’t say anything to her hostess, but with eyes lidded, she watched the red-haired woman make her way around the room, snuffing out any candles that were still burning, turning off the light over the kitchen sink, then dropping into the reading chair. The globe above Willow’s head was like a spotlight on her features, and it left Andrea and the two beds in shadows on the other side of the room.

  She’d been crying. Her face, so beautiful with her creamy skin and high cheekbones, was blotchy, her nose red, and her shoulders seemed to sag, as though under the weight of a heavy burden. Andrea closed her eyes tightly, feeling like an intruder.

  When she opened them again, Willow had a book in her hand, something that looked like a Bible. She wasn’t reading it, but just held it against her chest, her lips forming around silent words. Her eyes weren’t closed—she was peering out the huge window toward the stream—but Andrea was pretty sure she was praying.

  She closed her own eyes again, terribly curious about Willow’s suffering, but suddenly terribly weary, too.

  ~ ~ ~

  At around four in the morning, Andrea woke herself up sobbing. It was the first time she’d cried since coming home, and it was like a spigot had been turned on. The tears flowed out of her, and she did nothing to stop them, her pillow becoming drenched. She tried to stay quiet, so as not to wake Willow in the other bed beside Andrea’s roll-out trundle, but to no avail. In the darkness, Andrea felt Willow’s hand cover her own, and hold fast. They lay like that for a while, Andrea sobbing, Willow holding on.

  The tears ebbed, then the words began to pour out of her. “I’m a drug addict, Willow. I’m a terrible person. I didn’t deserve this baby; that’s why God took him.”

  Willow didn’t speak, but she murmured wordlessly, soothing sounds in the darkness.

  “My father came home early one day—he’d been sick with a flu bug but had tried to go to work anyway—and found me rifling through their drawers, looking for something I could sell to make a little money. I was desperate for a fix, and I’d already sold everything of mine that had value.” Andrea tried to blow her nose, but it was so clogged, it just made her head hurt. She shoved a corner of a tissue into each nostril to keep the mess at bay.

  “It wasn’t the first time they’d caught me stealing from them. My mom knew I was getting into her purse, and she had discovered her jewelry missing, too. When she confronted me, I was always quick with an alibi or some ridiculous story about why she was crazy, not me. But she knew. I saw it in her eyes. They started hiding stuff, but I was good at unearthing their secret stashes.

  “I had my great-grandfather’s antique pocket watch in my hand when he walked in on me, and I had every intention of selling it to the first person who would take it. I had a few people who bought stuff from me, and a few more who would trade meth straight across for goods. Well, that was the last straw. That pocket watch had been passed down from father to son for four generations, and it was intended to go to my brother as a wedding gift one day. I didn’t care. All I cared about was getting a fix, and getting it quick.”

  “Of course.” Willow squeezed her hand encouragingly, even though her voice seemed to float somewhere in the darkness.

  “They told me I had to leave,” Andrea continued, her chest squeezing around the memory. “I was so out of my mind that I didn’t even put up a fight. I just went to my room, threw an odd assortment of clothes in my backpack, and walked out the front door. I didn’t even have a phone; Dad made me give it to him as I left.

  “I was walking down the sidewalk when Mom drove by, and when she asked where I was going, she had this look in her eyes like she already knew. I’m pretty sure Dad had already called her, and that’s why she happened to come home at that exact time, but she acted like she didn’t know.

  “I don’t remember where I slept that night. Under a bridge? In the SmartMart parking lot? I don’t know. The next few weeks were terrible; the worst of my life. Without money, without stuff, I couldn’t get anyone to set me up, so I started—I started offering—favors for drugs.”

  “Oh Andrea. Oh honey. I’m so sorry.” Willow sounded like she might be crying again, too.

  “There was about a two week period where I hid out at night behind a big trashcan at the back of a restaurant. I had landed a fairly good-sized stash, so I was able to keep to myself during the days, then sneak back there right around the time they closed up for the night. Their food scraps were better than most, and one guy who worked there saw me and took pity on me. Sometimes, he’d leave a bag of carefully-wrapped bread and soup within my reach, but we never spoke. A manager finally caught me back there and sent me on my way. I just hope that poor guy didn’t get fired for being nice to me. I keep thinking I should go back and thank him, but I always chicken out.” She exchanged the tissue plugs in her nose for new ones and went on.

  “For two more months, I lived on the streets, hiding at night, and trying to look normal during the day. I got dirtier and smellier, and people paid less and less for whatever I had to offer them. Somewhere along the way, I’d lost my backpack, so all I had was the clothes on my back.

  “One night, I couldn’t stand it any longer, and I hopped a fence into a yard with a pool, desperate to get clean. It was August and hot and the water felt so good, and I wasn’t paying attention until the lights went on and an officer came out through the back door, telling me to get out of the pool with my hands up.

  “I was given a choice that night, not by the officer, but by the couple whose yard I’d trespassed in. I could go to rehab, and nothing would go on record, or they’d press charges and I’d go to jail.

  “For some reason, I had this morbid fear of jail. As a little girl, I thought if you went to jail, you were automatically sentenced to the electric chair. Don’t ask me where that came from—maybe one of my brother’s creepy movies he watched. But even though I knew better by then, the thought of jail made me panic, and it took me all of about thirty seconds to choose rehab.”

  “Wow. Sounds like you dove into the right pool that night.”

  “Yes, you could say that. The next few weeks at rehab ran a close second in the Worst-Weeks-of-My-Life competition, but somehow, I made it. I got all the way through the system, I stuck around for the work program they offered, and against all odds, I landed that post office job where
I met George.”

  She sniffed, hard, and things loosened up a little. “Gross,” she muttered. “Sorry.”

  Willow didn’t seem to notice. “Have you seen your parents or your brother since then?”

  “No. Not in almost five years now. For a long time, I didn’t want to ever see them again. I felt like they could’ve done what that couple did for me, given me an ultimatum instead of just removing me from their lives, and I wanted to be angry at them. It helped motivate me to stay clean, like I was proving them wrong about me, even if they weren’t around to know it.”

  “Did they ever try to contact you?”

  “How? I had no phone, no address, nothing. I essentially ceased to exist until I went to rehab, and at that point, I wasn’t about to call them for their love and support. But in the last few years,” she paused to swallow the lump in her throat. “Especially since getting pregnant, I’ve thought more and more about going back. I’ve even dialed their number a few times, but hung up as soon as the phone started ringing.”

  “Why are you afraid? You’re clean, right? And that’s what they wanted, isn’t it?”

  Andrea shrugged in the darkness, even though she knew Willow couldn’t see it. “I just am. What if they still reject me? What if they’ve written me off for good? What if they’ve gone on with their lives and I’m just a rotten reminder of a rotten past?”

  “What a terrible position to be in, Andrea. I’m so sorry you went through all that alone.”

  “I haven’t been alone since rehab. I’ve had George.”

  “George Graham. He’s a good husband, isn’t he?” Willow whispered.

  “George is everything to me,” Andrea said. “But he isn’t my husband. Not according to the law, anyway.”

  “What does that mean?” Willow squeezed her hand again, the one on which Andrea wore the narrow wedding band George had given her.

  “We never made it legal. We had a tiny ceremony with just the two of us, right before I moved in with him. We even exchanged rings,” she explained. “We had every intention of going to the Justice of the Peace and getting it on paper, but we never did. Life just kept going, and we went along with it.”

  “I think George sounds like your knight in shining armor.”

  “George is my home, Willow. Wherever he is, that’s where I need to be. He’s my home.” As she said the words, she knew she wasn’t just spewing out pat phrases. “I don’t want to live anywhere without George.”

  “I know,” Willow whispered, and Andrea decided that maybe, just maybe, Willow did know.

  Chapter 7

  They lay in the dark in silence for a long time. Andrea’s sinuses slowly unstuffed enough for her to be able to blow her nose, and her headache eased. Finally, she spoke again. “It’s times like these that I really miss my mom. I miss my dad and brother, too, but it’s not the same. My mom and I were once really close, you know. Before the drugs turned me into a freak.”

  “It’s times like these when you need a mom, Andrea. I know that, too. I’ve cried myself to sleep many a night here, wishing I could talk to mine again, wishing I could ask her for advice on how to make tomorrow a little less messy, a little less painful.” Willow sounded exhausted, and Andrea felt guilty about keeping her awake.

  “You’re a good person, Willow.” She wasn’t used to speaking her thoughts to anyone besides George. “I’m sorry I unloaded on you like this. You should get some sleep.”

  “I can sleep anytime, Andrea. I want to be here for you.”

  Andrea hesitated, biting her lip, but the words worked themselves out of her mouth anyway. “Who’s here for you, Willow? Who’s going to help you get through…whatever it is you’re going through?”

  Willow was quiet for such a long time, Andrea was sure she’d fallen asleep. She shifted on her trundle, turning on her side to try to get more comfortable, preparing to try to sleep herself, but Willow surprised her when she sat up and pushed back the covers.

  “I want to show you something,” Willow said, and headed into the bathroom. Andrea could hear the cupboard doors open and close, then Willow returned, holding something in her hand. “I need to turn on a light, okay?”

  She flipped the switch on a lamp near the bed and the room flooded with light, muted slightly by the colorful stained glass lampshade. Andrea squinted in the sudden brightness, but her eyes adjusted quickly, and she sat up on the edge of her bed. Willow handed her a framed photograph of a young child, probably two or three years old, a little girl—no, a little boy in blue jeans, with curly red hair just like Willow’s, in the arms of a handsome, laughing man.

  “That’s Christian, my husband. You’ve might’ve seen him over at Al’s.” Willow dropped down to sit beside her.

  Andrea nodded, frowning a little. The well-groomed, all-business lawyer she’d seen climbing in and out of his silver car had little in common with this laughing man whose eyes were full of emotion, but she thought there might be a resemblance.

  The child, though. She raised questioning eyes to Willow.

  “That’s Julian Alexander Goodhope. Our son. He’s been gone eleven months, one week, and three days.” Willow seemed to shrink a little right before Andrea’s eyes. “Julian is why I’m here.

  NOVEMBER AWAKENING

  Chapter 1

  Dueling M-16s and AK-47s crack and pop, bullets hitting the dirt all around him. Mortars fly in from every direction, artillery shells exploding one right after the other, barked orders and screaming men. The ground quakes and shifts beneath him. Lying flat out, his back pressed against the shallow wall of the ditch he’s dug into, his arms over his head, he’s on his left side, keeping his heart as close to the ground as possible. If he takes a hit, maybe he’ll survive if his heart can still pump his blood long enough for Medevac to get him out of here.

  The cries of his wounded and dying men rise and fall with each round of automatic gunfire, but his own weapon lies useless at his side. He ran out of ammo twenty minutes ago. Now he’s just waiting it out…waiting…for whatever it is coming for him.

  Silence falls, eerie after the roaring cacophony of battle—one-one-thousand-two-one-thousand-three-one-thousand-four-one-thousand, all the way to ten-one-thousand—and he lowers his arms, lifting his head just two inches so he can see over the bloody, twisted form of the downed soldier in front of him. As far as he can see, the broken bodies of his brothers lay, eyes staring lifelessly toward heaven, arms reaching…for him? For freedom? For home?

  “Doc…help me, man.” The voice, just a whisper, sweeps across the sea of human remains, and he surges up, mindless of his own safety, his eyes searching frantically. “Help me! I’m hurt real bad.” The moan is joined by another. “Doc…over here.” And another. “Help me, Doc. I’m dying.”

  He scrambles to his feet, no longer caring about enemy fire. Tripping over limbs and helmets, empty casings, he scans the carnage for any signs of life. The whispers and moans come faster now, louder, growing, crying out to him, “Doc! Doc! Help me! Save me!”

  ~ ~ ~

  He came out of his sleep like a drowning man, gasping for breath, his body drenched in sweat. He lay on his left side on the bare wood floor of his loft in the narrow space between his bed and the east wall, his back pressed against the plaster. His legs still twitched; fists clenched against his ears, the sound of his molars grinding against one another loud inside his head. When would it end? He could still hear the cries of his buddies, the moans—no, that was just the wind tearing it up outside.

  Doc reached for the flask he kept on the floor by his bed and unscrewed the cap. Empty. He lay there, panting, his tongue dry, swollen. He needed a drink, bad, but he couldn’t get up off the floor; not just yet. He didn’t know if his legs would hold him. He scrubbed his face with his hands, grimacing at the moisture on his cheeks.

  He only cried in his sleep.

  The ticking of the mechanical alarm clock on his bedside table was loud and solid and real in the stuffy stillness of his room. He hon
ed in on it the way he always did, slowing his breathing to match its rhythm as it marched across time, bringing him with it, back to the present.

  Out of the jungle.

  Out of the trenches.

  Out of the arms of the terror that gripped him in the dead of night.

  He needed air. The crisp November wind that tossed the mulberry leaves around outside would help. There was never any wind in Nam. Rain, yes. Sweaty, mosquito-infested humidity. Movement in the 8-foot tall bamboo and razor-sharp elephant grass wasn’t wind; it was death, armed with Russian M-16s tipped with bayonets.

  Raising himself up an incremental inch at a time, he lifted his head above the barricade of his mattress, panic still rattling against his will. He had to get outside, out in the open, out where he could breathe without the nightmare filling his lungs.

  Leaning against the rail of his landing, Doc surveyed the moonlit steps down to the driveway below. Eyes peeled for any suspicious movement, ears tuned to snapping twigs or unfamiliar chittering; without turning his head, he scoped the neighborhood. All was as it should be, except for the low murmur of female voices carrying across the gurgle of the shallow stream that ran adjacent to his lot, separating the front half of the Coach House Trailer Park from the back. But over the last few weeks, he’d grown accustomed to listening for Willow Goodhope and the little girl from the main building who’d recently lost the baby she was carrying. They often talked late into the night, bundled up, huddled close to the blaze in the fire pit on Willow’s river rock patio.

  He never eavesdropped—what they rambled on about for hours on end, he couldn’t imagine—but he knew Willow was talking the girl through some dark places. Doc thought he might be in a better place, too, if he had someone like the red-haired angel whispering to him in the dark.