The End of The Road

by Sue Henry

  Linda came flying across the room to give me a hug.

  “We were about to start without you,” she teased, stepping back with a grin.

  “Ahh, well—I knew you wouldn’t start without me. I had a phone call from my son, Joe, in Seattle, that took a rather long time,” I told them, setting the sack with two bottles of the wine I had promised on the kitchen counter and removing my coat to hang on a hook by the door.

  “Problems?” Becky asked from the kitchen, where she was cutting cherry tomatoes in half and adding them to a salad.

  “Nothing I can solve. You’ve both met his lady, Sharon, and know that she has her own travel agency in Seattle. At a conference a week or so ago she had an attractive offer of space in a downtown location to start a second office in Portland. The drawback is that she would have to move to Oregon for the next year or so to get it going.”

  “Portland’s not too far away,” Linda said. “About two hundred miles, I think. That’s about the same as driving from here to Anchorage—a little less, actually.”

  Leaving one bottle of wine in the kitchen, I brought the other and Becky’s corkscrew to the table, uncorked it and poured us each a glass.

  “I know,” I told her. “But with both of them working full-time—for Sharon that would probably mean six days a week to start with—how often are they really going to make that three- or four-hour trip? Joe’s afraid it would break up their relationship.”

  “Oh, for Pete’s sake!” Becky came from the kitchen to the table and set a bowl of spaghetti down on it with a thump. “Why doesn’t he just marry the woman? She’s a honey!”

  “I like her a lot, too. I didn’t suggest it, but maybe that’s what he’s sort of getting around to. It came up so suddenly that they’re both adjusting to the idea of a big change. They’ve been living together for the last four years. He said she’s pretty excited by the idea of expanding her business. I think he’s afraid she might say no if it meant she would have to give that up. He’s going to fly up tomorrow for the weekend, so I’ll know more by the time he goes back.”

  “Well, keep us posted,” Linda requested.

  “I will,” I promised as we sat down to eat.

  It was close to midnight when I got home. We had enjoyed apple pie for dessert, cleared the table to play three rounds of Farkel and two of chicken foot with the dominoes, and fin ished both bottles of wine. Altogether it had been a most satisfactory evening, as usual, with much laughter and conversation.

  In the second half of my sixties, I am the oldest, with both Becky and Linda significantly younger, but the age difference has never mattered to any of us. Both of them are nurses—Becky at the Homer hospital and Linda at Alaska Regional in Anchorage. I always feel particularly safe with them around, just in case I should have a sudden heart attack or stroke, especially as Becky works nights in the emergency room and knows her stuff. Linda claims that when we’re together I’m much more likely to die laughing than as a result of any serious medical condition.

  Stretch knows the familiar sound of my car pulling into the driveway and was at the door to meet me with wags and wiggles, as if I had been gone a week and not just a few hours.

  “You’re a good and patient bitser, you are,” I told him, dropping my coat over the back of a dining room chair, my purse on the seat of it, and leaning to give him the attention he was expecting. “You need to go out, I suppose.”

  He did. And, given the temperature, he made quick work of it.

  I opened my eyes to the dark at just after seven the next morning. That time of year this far north the sun doesn’t come up over the Kenai Mountains until around eight thirty, so there wasn’t a hint of light outside. By Christmas it wouldn’t rise until approximately nine o’clock and would set at three in the afternoon. Having been in the Southwest for the previous two winters, I found myself noticing and readjusting to the seasonal darkness I had accepted as normal all my life. It was an odd feeling—almost learning to be at home again.

  After a quick wake-up shower, I ate a leisurely breakfast as I enjoyed watching the light grow over the mountains to the south through the sliding glass doors that lead onto the deck, which would soon be covered with snow. Then I washed up the few dishes before assembling the ingredients for the stew I intended to simmer slowly through the day.

  Before putting it together, I called the Driftwood Inn and asked for John Walker, having made up my mind about asking him for supper that evening.

  “Just a minute,” the woman who answered told me. “He’s right here having coffee. I’ll put him on.”

  “Yes?” he said a few seconds later, sounding a bit hesitant and oddly cautious.

  “Good morning, John. This is Maxie,” I told him. “The woman you met on the spit yesterday.”

  “Oh, yes—my savior from the storm. Hello, Maxie.”

  “I’m having a few friends for supper tonight and wondered if you’d like to join us,” I told him.

  “I must assume you don’t mean that literally,” he said with a chuckle. “That they are to be served supper, not served up for it.”

  This bit of humor assured me that he would fit right in with the group I intended to invite.

  “Well . . . ,” I teased back. “Not being a cannibalistic sort, I hadn’t considered the latter, but have beef for the stew I’m about to make.”

  “With that assurance, I’d be pleased to come, and thank you for the invitation.”

  “Good. My son, Joe, is fly ing in from Seattle about noon for the weekend. I’ll send him to pick you up about five thirty, if that works for you.”

  “It does, but I can take a taxi if you’ll give me the address.”

  “Not necessary. Joe’ll be glad to come.”

  “I’ll look forward to meeting him,” John said. “And thanks again, Maxie.”

  Joyce Berman was also happy to accept my invitation and to hear that Joe was arriving from Seattle. She was originally from Helena, Montana, and had met her husband, Marty, when they both attended the University of Montana in Missoula. He had been a grade school and high school classmate of Joe’s. They had been fast friends then and still were, so I knew Joe would be pleased to have them at my table.

  I reached my friend Harriet Christianson at the library and was pleased to add her name to my list before making the last phone call, to retired fireman Lew Joiner.

  Lew was a respected local character who had always been an avid fis herman and now spent the summers ferrying halibut hunters on his small charter boat. He was a cheerful soul and loved books about the sea almost as much as he loved fishing, so I thought he and John would probably get along fine.

  My list of guests complete, I went to make the stew, after which I buttered and wrapped the French bread in foil so it was ready to warm in the oven later. With the stew simmering gently on the stove, I took Stretch for a quick walk up the road and back, then settled comfortably in my big chair near the fir eplace to, as John had suggested the afternoon before, read the rest of the morning away—or, at least, until it was time to head for the airport to meet Joe’s flight from Anchorage.

  Leaving the edges brightly gilded, the sun was already slipping behind a bank of clouds on the western horizon when Grant Aviation’s compact Cessna Caravan arrived on time at five minutes after one that afternoon. Son Joe got off with six other passengers and came striding into the airport waiting room with one small carry-on bag, already looking for me.

  He crossed the room with an eager grin and gave an enthusiastic hug to his mother.

  “Hey, Mom, I’m home,” he said in my ear.

  “So you are. And right on time, too,” I told him as he released me.

  “Trust Grant Aviation—they’re seldom late,” he said, glancing over his shoulder toward the ticket counter and lifting his free hand in a wave to the ticket agent, a girl he had known and dated in high school.

  There are times that, with a turn of the head or a tone of voice, Joe reminds me so much of his late father that it
makes me catch my breath and takes me back all those years to the time when I fell in love with and married Joe senior. What lovely and precious gifts our children give us when, all unknowing, just by being themselves, they remind us of times and people that have mattered most in our lives.

  By shortly after six the gathering was completed when Lew Joiner arrived last, handing me a bottle wrapped in a brown paper bag as he came in the door.

  “Here’s one for your wine cellar,” he said. “And here,” he continued, pulling two fat paperbacks from a pocket of the coat he had hung on one of the hooks by the door, “are a couple I hope you haven’t read yet.”

  “I’ve not,” I told him, examining the titles: Rise to Rebellion and The Glorious Cause by Jeff Shaara—both labeled as novels of the American Revolution. “But the author’s name is familiar.”

  “His father, Michael Shaara, wrote a Civil War book I know you’ve read.”

  “Oh, yes. The Killer Angels.”

  “That’s the one. Jeff’s written these two like fiction and you won’t be able to put them down,” Lew told me. “They’re the whole war from the viewpoints of key figures like Washington, Adams, Frank lin, Revere, Cornwallis, Lafayette—you get the idea.”

  “Sounds good. I’ll read them right away. Just finished the book I was on and was in need of another. Thanks, Lew.”

  We had moved to the counter that separates my kitchen from the dining area, where I laid the books down and handed him a glass of Merlot.

  “Yes, thank you, Maxie,” he said. “Now, where’s that son of yours?”

  I was not surprised that Lew had brought me books, for we have shared a love of reading for years and often trade books back and forth, knowing each other’s preferences well. It’s an addiction we share with many others, for there are a lot of readers in Homer. When winter sets in seriously, probably close to half the town is reading on any given evening, if they aren’t watching television.

  I stood for a minute, looking around the large room that contains both living and dining areas—fireplace and comfortable seating at one end, table and chairs at the other. There is little I enjoy more than having friends and family gather for a meal at the house that was built by my first husband, Joe senior. Except for John Walker, everyone in this particular group had been guests of mine many times in the past and took pleasure in one another’s company.

  Lew had gone directly across the room to where Joe stood talking to John, and, introductions made, the three of them turned to examining the books that filled the shelves that rose on either side of the fireplace, in which a cheerful fire glowed.

  Marty and Joyce were seated on the plump sofa that faced the fir e, talking with Harriet, who occupied an easy chair at right angles to them. She had been a friend of Marty’s mother, now deceased. Always a sort of adopted aunt to him, I knew she would be catching up on the welfare of his two small children and his job with the Sea Life Center in town.

  Stretch, I noticed, was in his element, curled up on the middle cushion of the sofa, his chin on Joyce’s lap to make it easy for her to give him pats and rub his favorite spots—ears and under the chin.

  He switched to Marty when Joyce, noticing me looking in their direction, stood up and came across the room to join me.

  “What can I do to help get food on the table, Maxie?” she asked. “If you’re ready to ring the dinner bell, that is.”

  She was not kidding about the bell. Above the counter between the kitchen and dining area is a ship’s bell that I hung up back in the day when I grew weary of calling my always scattered family to dinner. It still gets regular use, even to summon Stretch, who has learned it often means food and is no dummy when it comes to mealtimes.

  “You can light the candles on the table while I retrieve the bread from the oven and put it in a basket,” I told her. “Then you can ring it. Everyone can fill their own bowls with stew from the kettle on the stove.”

  In just a few minutes all were settled at the table, where, irrepressible, Lew glanced around with a twinkle in his eye.

  “Good friends, good meat . . . ,” he began, then hesitated, noticing the warning frown that Harriet, a dedicated churchgoer, was aiming at him, and concluded with, “. . . good . . . ah . . . oh, good grief . . . let’s eat.”

  FOUR

  MUCH LATER JOE AND I SAID GOOD-BYE to our company at the door as they left. It had been a good evening, full of spirited conversation and laughter, reminding me why I like living where I do and miss it often when I’m gone. I very much like traveling to new places in my motor home and the last couple of years had mostly been full of the pleasures of discovery, meeting new people and visiting old friends. But there had been a trade-off in leaving behind the place and people I know and love that left me a little lonely at times.

  “Many thanks, Maxie,” Lew said, turning to me as he zipped up his coat.

  “You’re more than welcome anytime,” I told him. “And thank you for the books.”

  “Let me know what you think of them.”

  He had volunteered to give John a ride back to the Driftwood Inn, so they went out the door together after John added his gratitude as well.

  “It was kind of you to include me,” he said as I took the hand he offered. “You have a fine collection of friends and I enjoyed meeting them.”

  Harriet gave me a hug and hesitated long enough to remind me of a quilters’ gathering at her house the following Thursday.

  “Bring along that pattern book you found in Hawaii,” she requested as she wrapped a woolly red scarf around her neck. “And that beautiful fabric you brought home as well, yes? The girls would like to see it.”

  Girls! Having met in grade school, most of us would always be girls to Harriet.

  Smiling, I promised I would, and she was the last to go, closing the door fir mly behind her after instructing us to stay inside where it was warm. “You’ll freeze for sure if you wait on the step to wave us off this time of year.”

  Taking her advice, Joe and I settled at opposite ends of the sofa with the last of the wine half filling our glasses.

  “Great evening, Mom,” Joe said, kicking off his shoes and stretching his long legs out onto a stool to toast his toes in the warmth of the fire that was slowly becoming a heap of ashes and glowing coals. “It was good to see Marty and Joyce. Thanks for asking them.”

  “You’re welcome, dear. I enjoyed them, too.”

  A thoughtful look took the place of his smile.

  “Now,” he said, “tell me about John Walker. He said you met and rescued him out on the spit yesterday.”

  “Not much to tell. I took Stretch for a walk and we met him as we came off the beach. He’d walked all the way out there and it was about to pour rain. He would have been soaked hiking back, so I gave him a ride to town. Seemed the friendly thing to do for a visitor.”

  “Oh, I’m sure it was. He’s a quiet sort—listens more than he talks—but I liked him. Doesn’t say much about himself though, does he?”

  “I guess not, but I didn’t ask a lot of questions. I imagine that in a group of strangers—especially those that were here tonight and know all about each other—almost anyone new would mostly listen. When people get acquainted and comfortable they tend to loosen up, but some are more reticent than others.”

  “He was vague when I asked where he was from. Told me he was born in the South, but that his parents lived in several places when he was growing up. He doesn’t have a hint of a Southern accent—or any accent at all that I could tell. Said he’d moved around a lot the last few years, doing mostly construction jobs. Mentioned New Orleans after the hurricane.”

  “Does it matter?” I asked, remembering my impression of John’s callused hands.

  “Not really—made me wonder, is all. Most folks are pretty forthcoming with information like that—unless they have some reason to hide it. Maybe he has one.”

  “Joe!” I said, shaking my head. “You’re in forensics, and too used to looking for clues to
the identity and behavior of criminals. Give John the benefit of the doubt. There are a lot of personal and perfectly legal reasons he might not want to be more specific—or interrogated, for that matter.”

  He stared at me for a long moment, eyes wide as he considered it.

  “You’re right, I guess,” he fin ally agreed. “Sorry, Mom. I probably am allowing the job to creep into my thinking—and shouldn’t.”

  “Good. Now, tell me all about you and Sharon—the Portland travel agency she’s contemplating, and how you see it impacting your relationship. That’s what you came up here for, isn’t it?”

  He gave me a long troubled look with a frown hovering in it before he answered, “Yes—I guess so. Partly I came just to get away and consider it. I thought it might be easier if I could get some perspective from a distance.”

  “What seems to be the source of the problem?”

  “Well, obviously, it’s going to split us up if Sharon decides to move to Portland. It’s too far away to commute more than a couple of times a month, and that would mostly be up to me if Sharon’s working six days a week at first.”

  “Be about like driving from here to Anchorage. That’s not too far.”

  “Seems like it. I just can’t make it work in my head.”

  “Does she really want to do this?”

  “Yes, dammit! Or says she does.”

  His fla sh of anger so startled me that I sat silently staring at him for a long minute. He glared into the dying fire and wouldn’t meet my eyes.

  “You sound as if you think she’s doing this on purpose just to rattle your world,” I said slowly. “Is that what’s bothering you? It doesn’t sound much like Sharon to me.”

  He shrugged and shook his head ruefully, closely examining the level of the wine in the glass he was holding.

  “No—I guess not,” he admitted.

  “But there’s a piece of that mixed into your feelings somehow?”