Promises to Keep

by Shirley Hailstock

  “I can’t stay here alone. Would you mind if I stayed in your room?”

  He moved then. He went over and closed her small bag, then lifted it from the floor. “Do you have everything?”

  She scanned the small room. The space was orderly again, except for the bed. The sheets and blanket had been ripped from the mattress, which lay askew over the box spring.

  She nodded and they went out the door. A small crowd had gathered when the police cars had arrived. The motel manager and his wife were also there.

  “Ms. Wellington, my wife and I apologize. I assure you nothing like this has ever happened before.”

  McKenna nodded and Parker put his arm around her waist and guided her away from the prying eyes.

  “We’ll move you to different cabins,” the manager’s wife offered.

  “That won’t be necessary,” McKenna assured her. “We’ll be fine. Thank you.” She offered her a weak smile and Parker applied pressure to her back.

  “Are you sure?” the woman asked again.

  McKenna nodded.

  “Then I’ll have a maid come over and restore the rooms.”

  “We’ll be all right,” Parker said. “No need to arouse anyone else.”

  “At least, we can change the lock,” the manager said. Together he and his wife moved toward the motel office.

  McKenna headed for Parker’s cabin.

  “Do you think they’ll come back?” she asked when he closed the door on the curious onlookers.

  “No,” he said decisively. He really didn’t know, but she was already worried enough. He didn’t want to upset her any more than she was already.

  McKenna studied the two beds. She chose the one he had not decided to sleep in and began restoring it to order.

  “Let me help you?” He moved toward her, but she turned and stopped him, her hands on his arms. He felt the slight tremor in her fingers.

  “Parker, I’m all right.” She dropped her hands. “I admit I’m a little upset, but it will pass.”

  He stepped back, going to make up his own bed and restoring his belongings to order.

  A soft knock on the door produced the locksmith. He introduced himself and made quick work of changing the lock and checking its security.

  “I’ll change the other one,” he said. Extending his hand toward McKenna with two keycards in it, he said, “These will work, ma’am.”

  McKenna took the electronic keys.

  “I’m real sorry about the break in,” he said.

  She nodded, but said nothing. Her face was pale and her eyes looked large. Parker recognized shock.

  “Your keys, sir.” He passed a separate set of keycards to Parker and left them alone. Parker went to the bathroom and filled two plastic cups with water.

  “Drink this,” he told McKenna.

  She looked up at him.

  “It’s water,” he told her. “I wish it was vodka, but it’s only water.”

  Taking the first cup, she drank it all. He passed her the second one and she drained it. When she handed the cup back to him, he checked her temperature with the back of his hand. It felt normal. Her skin wasn’t cold or clammy.

  “Do you feel dizzy?”

  She shook her head.

  “Weak?”

  Again she shook her head.

  He breathed a little easier. His body relaxed, although he was unaware of the tension within himself.

  “I didn’t realize you’d had medical training,” McKenna said.

  “I haven’t, but I’ve handled an emergency or two.”

  McKenna frowned, but eventually her face relaxed. For twenty minutes she was quiet, then went to the sink and brushed her teeth. From there she moved into the tiny bathroom, which held a toilet and shower stall. There was hardly room enough to turn around. He heard the shower squeal and wondered if it was masking tears which she was surely entitled to.

  Later, when the door opened, a rush of hot fragrant steam came out. McKenna stood there. She’d pulled her hair back into a ponytail. It was partially wet from her shower. She wore a long T-shirt that stopped at her knees.

  Parker had his computer on his lap and was trying to concentrate on his edits. Her appearance ended that.

  “I’m done,” she said. She moved to the bed next to his and sat down on it. “I’m sorry this happened. Lydia and I planned to share sleeping quarters. I’m sorry to intrude on you.”

  “McKenna.” Parker closed the computer, knowing he wasn’t going to do any more work tonight. “If you hadn’t asked to come here, I would have asked to stay in your cabin. You’re not an intrusion. Just try to get the robbery out of your head and sleep.”

  He went into the bathroom and took his own shower. Only the water he turned on was much cooler than the hot fragrance that had accompanied her.

  * * *

  IT FELT STRANGE to have a man in the room with her who wasn’t Marshall. Parker’s sounds were different. Marshall’s became white noise after a while. And she hadn’t thought of the way he moved around, rolled over, grunted in his sleep, in a year. But now she reluctantly had a comparison.

  She listened to the rhythm of Parker’s breathing. It didn’t reflect that of her husband. The sound was soft and systematic. Unlike Marshall, Parker didn’t snore. She rather liked all the noise. More the solidarity of knowing he was there. Tears filled McKenna’s eyes, but she brushed them aside. She missed Marshall, missed him holding her in the night, missed his laugh and the wonderful way he used to surprise her with love notes he’d slip inside a desk drawer or even a box of tools he was sure she would open.

  She hadn’t thought about his sounds or his wistful antics in a long while. When he first died and she slept alone, she missed cuddling up to his warmth in the bed. But now she realized there was so much more that had gone with his death.

  Turning over, she faced away from Parker’s side of the room. She closed her eyes, wondering if sleep would come in this new environment. She doubted it would.

  “McKenna?”

  She thought Parker was asleep.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  She flipped onto her back and looked over in his direction. He was propped up on an elbow, staring at her.

  “I knew you weren’t asleep.”

  She wondered how that was the case. She was quiet, breathing evenly. As was he. “I was thinking,” she said, buying herself a moment to answer his question.

  “About what?”

  “Our trip,” she lied.

  “What about it?”

  McKenna pushed herself up and squinted across the darkness. “I was thinking we might want to do some of those things that you mentioned you wished you’d done.”

  He laughed.

  “I’m serious.”

  “I doubt we have time for me to pull out my saxophone and brush up on today’s music so that I can either join or form a rock band.”

  She heard both the sarcasm and joking in his voice. McKenna was surprised she could distinguish between the two when it came to Parker. Maybe it was due to their proximity over the past few days. Like any observant person, she’d picked up on the many habits and methods of non-verbal communication that folks unknowingly share. Parker kept most of his reserved, yet McKenna was discovering them one by one.

  “I’m sure we could find a comedy club or a place where they’d let you play your instrument.” He started to say something, but she anticipated it and cut him off. “And we can rent an instrument.”

  “Are you forgetting we’re tight on money?” he asked.

  “Don’t be so practical. For once in your life, let go.” Her voice was stronger than she’d expected. In a more normal tone, she said. “We’ll find a couple of jobs and work to pay the rental fee. And any other expenses
we’ll have.”

  “Go to sleep, McKenna.”

  * * *

  THE MORNING SUNLIGHT was warm and bright. Parker could almost forget the trauma of the night before if it wasn’t for the silence in the room. McKenna moved about gathering her belongings, packing her toiletries, while not a word passed her lips.

  She’d pretended to be asleep when he returned from his shower, but he knew she was awake. He’d broached the subject of them returning to Chicago. She’d shut him down faster than she’d spun the Corvette around that track the night she tested its performance.

  This morning her silence spoke for her.

  Parker took their bags and loaded them in the car. McKenna came out and headed for the driver’s side.

  “McKenna, you’re being unreasonable.” Parker faced her across the expanse of the Corvette. With her hands leaning on the low hood and the width of the car only a smidgen over six feet, he could reach across and touch her, shake some sense into her.

  “Get this through your head, I am not going back.” She spoke each word distinctly. “If you want to return to Chicago, that’s your right. I’m perfectly willing to drop you at the nearest bus or train station. If you wish, I can drive you to the airport or even a rental car company. Your choice. But I am going to California.” She took a deep breath.

  Parker walked to her side of the car and took her arm. “Be reasonable, McKenna. We’re not that far from home. Going back is the logical thing to do.”

  McKenna jerked away from him. “Don’t tell me to be reasonable. Why do you think I’m being unreasonable? This is what I want to do. And I am going to do it.”

  “When did you become so obstinate?” Parker asked.

  “I believe you once told me it was one of my best qualities.”

  She glared at him. After a moment, Parker shook his head. He was defeated. McKenna wasn’t going to be turned around on this question. He knew part of her argument was bravado. The theft had rattled her. He could tell by the ashen nature of her face last night and it hadn’t completely disappeared this morning.

  “I’m not ending my trip over some small setback.”

  “Small setback! You’ve lost all your money. I have credit cards, which you refuse to use. If we’d come back any earlier, we might have been killed.”

  He deliberately watched her for a reaction. Fear flickered in her eyes, but she quickly doused it.

  “We have one other recourse,” he said.

  “What?”

  “There’s an ATM in the lobby.”

  “They didn’t have ATMs in the ’60s.”

  “We’re not in the 1960s. And even if they didn’t have ATMs, they had banks. We have accounts. We can go and get more money.”

  McKenna waved off the idea. “Buz, we don’t have a bank account. We only have cash.”

  “And little of that,” he replied.

  “We can’t.”

  “Why?” Parker spread his hands, looking at her as if she’d lost her mind. No doubt Buz and Tod heard it on the radio in the Corvette.

  “They had no bank account.”

  She couldn’t be serious. “McKenna, that is a fantasy. Open your eyes.”

  McKenna moved a step closer to Parker. With a low menacing voice, she said. “We will not have this argument all the way to California. We take what happens. We deal with it. Only in dire emergencies do we revert to the way things are now.”

  “So what happens next? What recourse do we have?”

  “I have six hundred dollars. We can make do with that for a while,” McKenna replied.

  “Six hundred is nothing. It’s going to cost us a couple thousand just for gas. Then there’s lodging, tolls, food and emergencies. Even if we live like paupers, we won’t make it on that.”

  “Well, when it’s gone, we’ll get jobs and work until we have enough to go on. That was the deal, Parker. Take it or leave it.”

  He glared at her, but she wouldn’t back down. Her hair was still in last night’s ponytail, although it was freshly brushed and redone. She wore little makeup, yet her face glowed with an aliveness he’d rarely seen in a woman. The vulnerability that had shaken her last night, forcing her to toss and turn in bed, crawling from one position to another for an hour, had been eradicated with the morning sun.

  She was determined. They would go on or she would go without him. He couldn’t allow that.

  “All right,” he conceded. “But I’ll drive the first leg.”

  She handed over the keys without argument. After a short stop at the office to return the cabin keys and receive another apology and a return of their lodging payment, compliments of the motel, they were off again.

  After a few miles, Parker had to bring up the subject of finances. He was an economist by profession, but a pragmatist by necessity.

  “In order to make this money last as long as possible, we have to make some decisions.”

  “I know,” McKenna said. “Please don’t take this the wrong way, Parker, but sleeping in the same room last night proved to me that we can cut our living expenses in half if we share a room. Is that going to be fine with you? You can say no, and I won’t take it as an insult.”

  He swallowed, keeping his eyes on the road while his hands gripped the steering wheel. He’d been aware of her presence. The way she stood in the open doorway with her nightshirt on. The trail of scent she’d left when she came out of the bathroom. And the way she’d lain in the bed next to his. Sleeping next to her night after night was going to be a test, but she was right in her logic. With their funds being so low, and lodging being a huge amount of their daily expenditure, only having one room versus two was a vast savings.

  “I sometimes snore in my sleep,” Parker warned.

  “If I could live with Marshall’s snoring, I can do with yours,” she said. “So we agree on that, sharing a room, I mean.”

  “I estimate that six hundred dollars can get us as far as Oklahoma. With the five hundred I have we could make it to Arizona or New Mexico, depending on gas prices. But that will only cover the gas.”

  “It leaves us nothing in the way of incidentals. Things we might find in a village or town that we’d love to have and can ship home.”

  “Not to mention sleeping in places clear of spiders and other crawling creatures,” Parker commented, as he nodded at her in agreement.

  “I guess you’re right. That’s not how I want to travel. We might need to get hired somewhere just to make sure we’re not worried about every dime,” McKenna told him. “And eating is...obviously a necessity.”

  The way she said it made him think she was looking forward to the adventure as if it was a sixty-minute television episode in which everything is neatly tied up by the last commercial.

  “What can you do?” he asked.

  McKenna stared at him, her eyes as hard as rocks.

  “I mean besides being president of an auto parts company and Corvette restorer. I doubt you’ll find a vacancy in either job area.”

  “I doubt there’ll be a call for an economics professor to stand in for a few days, either.” She matched his sarcasm.

  He laughed and after a long moment her mouth turned into a smile and then she laughed, too. It seemed they battled over almost everything. But he admired her stamina. She stood up to his arguments and he knew nothing was going to keep her from this trip. From now on he wanted to make sure the experience was a happy one, even if they only had eleven hundred dollars between them and several unavailable and for-emergency-use-only credit cards. But they had a lot of guts and a sense of adventure. Don Quixote and Sancho couldn’t have been better equipped.

  * * *

  THEY COULD DRIVE until the money ran out, McKenna thought when they were once again on the road. She knew neither of them would choose that option. Glancing at Pa
rker, who was driving, she saw he stared at the road ahead. She considered what he must be thinking of her. For a while last night she believed she’d chipped that square that he boxed everyone, including himself, in. But their recent discussion had shown she was wrong.

  He drove easily and with confidence. Keeping to the lower speed limit meant they were using less gas than if they were on the highway, but it also meant more slowing down and speeding up was necessary. If the Corvette was a hybrid of today, that kind of driving would be advantageous, but this car had a 283-HP engine and she could feel that Parker wanted to open it up the way she had on the race track.

  McKenna felt she should apologize, but she wasn’t going to. She was only sorry about the strength of her voice, not her words. They would cope, adapt, survive. She had to know if she could do this. Why, she wouldn’t even tell herself, but it was important. She’d had an easy life after the business took off. They had a fine home, with a staff to take care of the details, vacations in the best places and all the luxuries money could buy, but there was something missing in her life. McKenna felt it was the struggle, the need to accomplish something just for herself.

  She’d told no one about her trip except her four close friends. She didn’t want the press to know, didn’t want her vice presidents to know. She wanted to complete this adventure as an anonymous citizen, not as a publicity stunt to garner more sales for the business.

  Again she glanced at Parker. His attention was still on the road, although at forty-five miles an hour he could look away for an instant. She wondered if he thought she was making this journey for some other reason. She’d told him it was something she and Marshall were planning to do, but that wasn’t the whole of it. It was more her idea than Marshall’s. After he died, the idea returned to her and took root. Now something she couldn’t define drove her to find whatever had been missing. Maybe that something was inside of her, but she had to find it.

  “What are you thinking?” Parker asked, breaking into her thoughts. “You’re not still angry that I told you returning was better than going on, are you?”

  “I wasn’t thinking about that at all,” she skirted his question.

  “Then from the expression on your face, it must have had something to do with Marshall.”