old before your time. I’ve got things covered,” she said throwing me a winning smile. “I’ll be just fine, and Margot’s going to come as soon as I’m out of here. Don’t you worry. Go and find the life you want. Paint that beauty you find and I’ll be right here when you get back. Please…promise me you’ll go?”
I gave her a tiny nod, gripped by the unknown. I always tried to hold myself together for Mom’s sake, but the promise had me close to breaking. Dread coursed through me at the thought of leaving Mom, the overwhelming worry something would happen to her while I was gone.
But getting back on the open road, a new start, a new city, just like we used to do, did excite some small part of me. We used to flatten a map and hold it fast against a brick wall. I’d close my eyes and point, the pad of my finger deciding our fate, the place we’d visit next. That kind of buzz, a new beginning, had been addictive, but would it feel the same without my mom?
The bus careered with a squeal and skidded off the road, startling me from slumber. Instinctively, I clutched hands with the woman beside me. Before shock fully registered the driver hit the brakes hard and we pitched forward in our seats. A shriek caught in my throat as we slid sideways toward a metal fence. I dropped the woman’s hand and braced myself as the bus leaned so far to the left dusty-colored ground screamed into view.
“Glory be!” the woman beside me said, her voice edged with worry.
The bus driver swerved and stopped dead just before we hit the shiny gleam of the fence. The commuters let out a collective sigh of relief. My heartbeat thrummed in my ears, as I surveyed the pitch-black night, wondering where we were, and if our journey would stop here, on some lonely forgotten road. I took a gulp of air deep into my lungs, trying to gather myself.
“Sorry, folks,” the bus driver said sheepishly, making eye contact with me in the rearview mirror. “Damn deer trotted on past without a care in the world. Everyone OK?”
I turned in my seat to check. People sat, eyes wide, mouths in an O, but no one seemed hurt in any way, just stunned awake by fright.
Commuters nodded. I rubbed my neck, and mumbled, “Yes.”
The plump, brown-skinned woman beside me gave my knee a reassuring pat. “You’ll be OK,” she said, gazing at me with kind eyes. “Jimmy here’s the best driver round. Deer be bad on this patch of road come night-time.” She spoke with a rich southern accent.
“Thanks,” I said speaking on autopilot as fear collected me. “He did well to keep it from rolling over.” A seasick sensation sat heavy in my belly and I shook my head in a kind of astonishment—wouldn’t that be the worst kind of irony, promising Mom I’d leave on this impromptu adventure and not making it there because of a bus crash? The thought alone was enough to make me stiffen. I’d never considered something bad happening to me—Mom was always at the forefront of my mind—but what if it did? Then who would look after her? Aunt Margot wouldn’t stay forever. I’d have to be careful, and not take risks if I could avoid them.
“Sure as God made little green apples Jimmy’ll have a few more gray hairs by the time we reach Ashford.”
The woman brought a sense of peace with her no-nonsense attitude.
“He just might,” I said, my mouth dry. “I think my first gray might sprout up of its own accord too.”
She tutted, giving my hair a cursory glance. “Nothing gonna dim that blonde mane o’ yours.”
The young woman in front of me rested her head on her friend’s shoulder. Across the aisle a spotty-faced teenage boy wiggled in his seat, balled up his sweater, pushed it hard up against the window as a pillow. Everyone was settling back down, but I was too keyed up to do anything other than sit there, mildly panicked at how close we’d come to crashing.
Was it a sign that I was choosing the wrong path? It felt like a warning somehow. Even though I’d promised Mom I’d explore for twelve long months, a half-day into the journey, I was regretting the decision with every ounce of me. The excitement of not having to pull double shifts at the shabby diner had dimmed the further away from Mom I got. When I’d quit work, the manager had barely raised an eyebrow. The other waitresses gave me small smiles, some heavy with envy, some full of hope that maybe one day they’d get out of there too. Right this instant, I’d swap with them in a heartbeat, and pretend this journey never happened.
It was hard to forget Mom’s dazzling smile when I went to say my goodbyes. She’d radiated happiness. It was almost palpable, like she’d been cured, or something miraculous, but it was all because of me. She was overjoyed my travels were beginning in earnest, though in actuality, I’d have to stay in one place half the year to save for the rest of the trip, if I found a decent job. When it was almost time to leave it took all my might not to clutch her and sob, telling her I didn’t want to. Instead, I’d held myself tight like a coil, and said I’d do my very best to enjoy myself. In an effort to lighten up a somber situation we played the “Remember When” game.
Remember when we slept in the lighthouse that night? Remember when we swapped our homemade dream catchers for a crate of apples? Remember when…
After that the Van Gogh Institute Scholarship came up about a hundred times, but I shrugged her off. I needed time. At this stage I didn’t know if I’d make it without her.
“Where you from?” the woman asked, bringing me back to the present. She crossed her arms over her midsection, as we bounced softly along.
With a smile, I said, “Detroit.” I pivoted a fraction to face her. She looked like the type who would chatter on regardless.
“Ah,” she said, “the birthplace of Motown? Ain’t that something?”
“It is.” I missed it already. It was home. Where my heart was.
She studied my face intently. “Why the long face?”
I shrugged. I wasn’t about to share my story with a stranger. Besides, there was no way I could say Mom’s name. I held on to the promise I made as though it was something tangible, my secret. “Just saying goodbye.” I tried hard to make it sound breezy and bit the inside of my cheek, willing myself to stay focused and not well up. Honestly, I was like a child going off to camp the first time. I knew Mom wanted me to “find myself” but I didn’t think I was lost. She did.
With a raise of her eyebrows she said, “Goodbyes…surely are difficult. But sometimes, you gotta take the plunge. Life is for living.”
“Yeah,” I mumbled. My mom had said something eerily similar when I’d visited the hospital to say my goodbyes.
Snatching her purse from under the seat, she rifled around in it, before brandishing a brown paper bag full of something spicy-scented. “Here, eat. You as skinny as a rake.” She handed me a chocolate-dipped gingerbread man. “Ashford—where we goin’—is about the nicest place on earth. Problem is, once you visit it’s kinda hard to leave.”
“That so?” I took a bite of the cookie, ravenous now I’d awoken. “I’m not staying for good,” I said. “Just stopping by for a while.”
She hemmed and hawed. “That’s what they all say.”
I
