Nowhere for Christmas

by Heather Gray

  “Did you already eat something?” Avery asked Gavin.

  He shook his head and said, “I wanted to tell you about the mechanic first. And I think I’m still feeling the effects of last night’s dinner.” Taking quick note of Eli’s burrito, he averted his gaze.

  Nodding in the direction of the cash register, he said, “The cashier’s brother’s father-in-law owns a small auto shop. She put a call in to her brother. He wasn’t too happy about being woken up, but he called his father-in-law, who’s always up early and has a soft spot for wayward travelers stranded at the gas station where his son-in-law’s sister works.”

  Avery lifted an eyebrow as she took a bite of her doughnut.

  “Or something along that line,” Gavin added with a wink.

  Eli swallowed the last bite of his burrito and said, “So I was kind of in and out of sleep last night. Totally missed the part where Mom took her pants off.”

  Could he say it any louder?

  “But I heard you say your mom passed away. I’m real sorry to hear that. How long has it been?”

  Avery’s mouth dropped open. Leave it to a teenager to ask the questions we adults are too sensitive to voice.

  Gavin paused for a minute. He stared at his hands. His shoulders drooped and curved forward almost imperceptibly. This is hard for him to talk about. She’d figured as much last night in the cover of darkness, but, somehow, seeing his reaction in the light of day made his pain all the more tangible.

  “She passed away in February.”

  “Oh.” Avery and Eli said the single word together.

  “This is your first Christmas without her, and you got stuck spending it with us? I am so, so sorry.” Flustered, she rushed to add, “I mean, I’m sorry for your loss, not that you’re here with us. Although I’m sorry this trip has turned into such a disaster, too. I mean… I’m just…”

  Gavin tried to smile, but it came across as a wince. With a sigh, Avery reached out and rested her hand on his forearm. “Gavin, I’m sorry. I had no idea.”

  He shrugged and stood up. Pushing his chair in, he said, “I think I’ll go get something to eat now.”

  Eli’s eyes were wide. “I’m sorry, Mom. I didn’t know.”

  “It’s okay, kiddo.” How true the words. In that moment, her son did look a lot more like a kid than the young man he’d come to resemble more and more lately. “You couldn’t have known.”

  ****

  Gavin stood in front of the pre-packaged pastries. Cinnamon rolls. Pound cake. The more he ogled the food choices, the more his stomach rebelled. Last night’s dinner, however, was not causing the problem. An as yet unnamed emotion he’d become familiar with in the past months was the culprit. He wanted to run. He wanted to hop on a motorcycle and get out of this place, leave Avery, Eli, and their familial happiness behind. Instead, he stood there in front of the artery-hardening pastry offerings and breathed deeply.

  “I’m sorry, Gavin.” Eli’s voice came from his left. He nodded his acknowledgement to the teen. As soon as he did, Eli gazed down at his feet. Then he said, “I—I didn’t know. And I’m an idiot.”

  Gavin grinned, hearing uncertainly in the boy’s voice for the first time since he’d met him yesterday afternoon. “It’s okay, Eli. You didn’t say anything wrong. The Christmas season is proving to be kind of hard for me. That’s nobody’s fault.”

  Eli shuffled his feet, picked up a roll of coconut-covered mini doughnuts, put them back, reached for some pink concoction, then let his hand drop to his side. Without looking at Gavin, he asked, “Does being around me and my mom make it harder? I don’t know what I’d do if I lost her, except probably avoid everyone who still had a mother.”

  A sigh escaped Gavin. “You’re wise for your years, Eli,” he said. He resisted the urge to rub at the ache in the center of his chest. His eyes burned, and he looked away as he tried to keep the tears in check. “I’m sad.” With a derisive snort he said, “Sad doesn’t even scratch the surface of how I feel about losing my mom.” The back of his throat felt scratchy and raw, but he continued, “Yeah, sometimes it’s hard to see you and your mom happy, healthy, and together, but I’m not a monster. I’d never begrudge you the time you have with her or wish you the same pain I’ve been dealing with these past months.”

  “What about your dad?” the boy asked.

  Gavin offered a half-smile, swallowing down the strong emotions that threatened to spill over. “He’s not a part of my life. My mom raised me by herself.”

  Eli didn’t look as if he was going anywhere. Gavin suspected the boy had questions he didn’t know how to ask, or maybe didn’t know if he should. By focusing on what Eli needed, Gavin was able to keep his own feelings from overwhelming him. He pictured himself putting his grief and sadness back into a little wooden box and placing the lid on it. The grief would come again, but now wasn’t the time or place.

  The ache in his chest abated, and he was no longer fighting tears. “If you have questions, you can ask me.”

  The teen glanced up and studied him for a minute before saying, “I don’t know what I’ll do if I ever lose my mom.” Looking uncomfortable, he added, “I suppose it’ll happen someday, but…” Eli’s words trailed off as though the thought itself were too difficult to voice.

  Gavin put his hand on the boy’s shoulder, gave him a firm squeeze, and said, “You’ll man-up and find a way to deal with it. You’ll rely on God to see you through the dark days.” He wondered how honest he should be with the boy. “And in those moments when none of that works, you will grab onto the memory of your mother and all she ever hoped, wanted, and dreamed for you. You will dig deep and, and no matter how much it hurts, you will do everything you can to honor her memory and all she ever taught you.”

  Gavin took a deep breath before forging ahead. “You will find a way to be happy and to celebrate the life you have because anything less would shame your mom’s memory and everything she sacrificed so you could have a chance. And the thought – no matter how unlikely – of shaming her will be more than you can bear. So on those days when the pain of losing her makes you feel alone, on those days when you start to pick up the phone to call her only to remember she’s not there anymore… Those will be the days you find out what kind of man you are. And if you don’t care for what you see when you look in the mirror on the bad days, you’ll always know that you have the chance to change, that you can make choices to be a better man than you think you are.”

  Eli nodded and made eye contact. Gavin half-expected him to skitter away. If he wasn’t mistaken, though, the boy stood a little taller as he walked toward the soda fountain. He could remember how it felt to be in that place between child and man with no one to guide you but your mother and friends. Gavin hoped Eli made better choices than he had at that age. Friends at school weren’t always the best models for how a man ought to live his life.

  ****

  Avery watched her son and Gavin speaking and wondered what they were talking about. Okay, so I want to eavesdrop, and if this convenience store were at all built for stealth, that’s exactly what I’d be doing right now, too. She shook her head. While tempting, eavesdropping would go against everything she was trying to teach her son about how to live his life. Yeah, but I still want to.

  As she took another sip of her coffee, the front door opened and a trim man in his mid-forties entered, accompanied by a woman, presumably his wife, who, if appearance could be trusted, had been woken and dragged out of bed. The woman caught a glimpse of Avery and strolled over to her. “You must be the one whose car broke down.” Holding out her hand, she said, “I’m Mavis Mueller. My husband,” she said, hooking a thumb over her shoulder, “is going to take a look at the engine for you.”

  “Oh,” Avery said, the fatigue of the night catching up with her.

  Mavis sat down and said, “Don’t you worry about a thing! I’m a talker. Everyone says so. You look plumb beat. No wonder you can’t think of anything to say. Do you need more coffee? I can
get you some more if that would make you happy.”

  Avery shook her head as her eyes followed Gavin and Eli. They were heading outside with Mavis’ husband. Battling the fatigue that now felt mind-numbing, she forced her eyes back to the woman sitting with her.

  “You poor, poor people. Stranded with a bad rental car on Christmas Eve. I hope you file a complaint with the rental agency whenever you get where you’re going. The way people conduct business these days is just disgraceful. They had to know there was a whiteout coming, and here in Texas of all places. I mean, we get a dusting of snow most years, sure, but this kind of weather? It’s been ages since I’ve seen anything as bad as this is supposed to get.”

  Mavis stopped talking long enough to take a sip of her own coffee, which she’d brought into the station with her in a travel mug. She didn’t seen the sign that said “No outside food or beverage,” did she?

  “My husband, his name’s Leon by the way, will get you fixed up right as rain. He runs a small garage on the outskirts of town. Don’t get a lot of business, but that’s okay with him. It’s enough to pay the bills. He used to be an Air Force mechanic. Loved it. Would have stayed in the service forever if he hadn’t felt God calling him into the ministry.”

  Mavis paused long enough to breathe before continuing. “I kind of miss being an Air Force wife. Meeting new people has always been fun, so moving around from base to base never bothered me. I wasn’t all-fired crazy about it when he got deployed. I’d get mighty lonesome without him. The kids kept me company, though, and they were my kids, so they got stuck listening to me when I wanted to talk. Until they got older. Then they got real good at not listening to me.” Mavis laughed at her own joke, and Avery took another drink. “In the long run, I think being stuck with me for a mom served them well. Each of them has grown up to be a great listener.”

  Avery’s eyes wandered to where the men and Eli were clustered around the front of their pathetic little travel car. Leon was using hand gestures, and Gavin was nodding. Eli stood there, hands tucked into his pockets, huddled into his jacket. If she had to wager a guess, she’d say he was out there not because he wanted to learn about engines. but rather because he’d seen Mavis and decided the cold outside would be preferable.

  The quiet caught her attention, and Avery spun back to the woman in question. Mavis had a content expression on her face as she sat quietly. Avery’s surprise must have shown on her face. Mavis leaned in and said, “I know I can overwhelm people sometimes. It’s okay. I do know how to be quiet when it’s called for. Sometimes I need a reminder is all.”

  Avery smiled. She’d not even noticed the kindness in the woman’s eyes. When Mavis had sat down and started talking, Avery had shut her out, not giving her a chance.

  “Not much of a talker, are you?” Mavis asked.

  “I’m a journalist,” she said. “I tend to communicate better with writing. I can be pushy and blunt when I talk to people. Not everyone likes that.”

  Mavis chortled. “Well, then, I guess I should be thankful you opted for silence when I started in.”

  Avery chuckled.

  “So where y’all headed, if you don’t mind me askin’?”

  “We have an assignment in Nowhere, Oklahoma.”

  “Nowhere?”

  “Nowhere,” Avery confirmed.

  “We went through there once years ago. Not much there unless something’s changed.”

  “Our editor made all the arrangements. Supposed to be a hotel for us to stay at and everything.”

  Mavis nodded, “Must have grown a lot since we were there.”

  Avery had to ask. “So, God called your husband out of the Air Force, and now he fixes cars for a living. What happened?”

  A musical laugh erupted from the petite Mavis. She had the kind of laugh that was always on the verge of surfacing. “He pastors a small church here in Amarillo. It’s not very big, so he has the mechanic shop, too, to supplement his income. We’ll never be wealthy, but we do okay.”

  Avery nodded and said. “I’m sure the congregation will grow.”

  Shrugging, the older woman said, “People come and go. The economy has moved a lot of families away from us and brought some new ones to us. Leon, he’s a great pastor, don’t get me wrong. He preaches a good message, and he loves his people. You’ll find him at the hospital anytime someone’s sick. It’s an honor for him to officiate at funerals and weddings or give counsel when people need it. He’ll never be the pastor of a large church, though, and he’s fine with that.”

  Tilting her head to the side, Avery asked, “Why do you say that?”

  “He likes to have a personal connection with everyone in his congregation. Leon wants to know what’s going on in people’s lives, and he wants everybody who comes into our church to know he cares about them personally. The way he sees it, God made some to be shepherds of large flocks and some to be shepherds of small flocks. He kind of likes that God has given him a small flock. If you ever saw him behind the pulpit, you’d know that’s what he was born to do. People can’t help but be drawn closer to God when my Leon delivers a message.”

  “Huh,” Avery said. “I never heard it put quite that way before. I suppose some people are fond of big churches and some prefer small, too.”

  Mavis nodded. “What about you? Do you have a church back where you come from?”

  “We have a medium-sized church, I think. Not too big, not too small.”

  “With pews that are not too hard and not too soft,” Mavis said with another laugh. This time Avery joined in.

  The men shuffled back into the convenience store and headed straight for the coffeepot, Eli included. Avery had to smile. Her son had to be desperately cold in order to consider coffee a viable beverage. Then she saw him shift to the left and realized there was a hot cocoa machine there, too. One of these days he’s going to decide he likes coffee. I just know it.

  Gavin led the way as the men all came to join her and Mavis. They sat down at the other table and Leon declared, “I replaced the thermostat for you. It’s easy enough to get to on this model. There’s no good way to know for sure whether or not that’s the problem without running the car and getting your engine heated up.”

  The lanky man with thinning sandy hair took a long draw on his coffee. “I gave Gavin here my number. You shouldn’t be able to get more than thirty, maybe forty-five, minutes out of town before you’ll know whether or not you’ve still got yourselves a problem. If you’re going to do any driving in town, like stopping somewhere to get a new spare tire, then you’ll know sooner. Give me a holler if the problem persists. I might not be able to fix it, but I can at least give you a ride to somewhere warm until someone can get it taken care of for you.”

  Avery, surprised, said, “That’s nice of you, especially on Christmas Eve.”

  The man shrugged. “This is Texas. We do everything big. Including snowstorms and hospitality.”

  ****

  Fortified by coffee and the smell of a pecan pie Mavis had insisted on giving them, Avery took over the driving so Gavin could rest. She followed the directions Leon had given her, landing them at a large automotive warehouse. They were able to buy a replacement doughnut. Once they had it tucked securely under the floor mat in the trunk of their little white hatchback, they got back on the road.

  Gavin quickly nodded off as Avery worked to navigate the unfamiliar city streets and find her way back to the freeway. The sun had started to climb, but with the cast-over sky reflecting dimly off the snow-covered street, it still felt like night.

  All of a sudden, lights started flashing behind Avery. As if that wasn’t enough to start her heart racing and her palms sweating, the officer flipped his siren on as well. Gavin woke with such a start that he banged his head against the ceiling of the car. No idea what she’d done wrong, Avery pulled over to the side of the road and waited for the officer to approach. She pulled out her license and ordered Gavin to dig in the glove box for the vehicle registration.
/>   “What did you do?” he demanded, no doubt irritable from his rude awakening.

  “I didn’t do anything. I have no idea why he pulled me over.”

  “Mom.”

  “Not now, Eli. Do you have the registration yet?”

  “I can’t find it,” Gavin answered. His tone and face tightening, he said, “You have to have done something, Avery. Police don’t pull you over because you’re driving an ugly car.”

  “Uh, Mom.”

  “Not now, Eli.” She reached in front of Gavin and began rifling through the glove box. “What did you do with the registration?”

  “What? What did I do with the registration? You have got to be kidding me.”

  The tension in the small car quickly escalated. Avery’s heart raced, and her arms and legs ached with how tense they were. She felt jumpy from the adrenaline rush, and, to make matters worse, her bladder again told her it was time to stop.

  The officer remained in his car, no doubt calling in their license plate to make sure they weren’t mass murderers on the run from the gaol.

  “Mom!” Eli yelled. Avery bit back her irritated response when she saw him pointing to something. Her eyes followed his finger.

  “Well, that explains a lot,” Gavin said.

  Avery stared in disbelief.

  The officer finally approached the driver’s side window and tapped lightly before stepping back. Avery pushed the button to lower the window and said, “Hello, Officer. I didn’t see the sign when I pulled onto the road here. I’m so sorry. I was trying to get back to I-40.”

  “License and registration, please.”

  “Aha!” Gavin shouted, waving a piece of paper through the air. “I found it!”

  He handed the registration over to Avery, who handed it and her license out the window. The officer, whose nameplate said Delaney, reviewed both and called something in using the two-way radio strapped to his shoulder. Still standing away from the car, he asked, “Where you folks from?”