Cross Country Chaos Page 13

  “Are you familiar with the area?” she asked.

  He nodded. “Yep.”

  “The road west, here—”

  “You can’t get there from here.”

  “Rainier?”

  He shook his head. “Not until they clear the slide. Unless you’ve got four-wheel drive?”

  She shook her head and pointed out the window at the Element. “I’m pulling a trailer, too. I have to stick to main roads.”

  He shook his head. “Then you can’t get there from here. 410’s closed because of the flood damage. Road’s out.”

  “How do I get to Rainier?”

  “You can go down south, to Oregon on 97, follow the river over to Portland and up through Vancouver, come in the west side. Or go back up 82 to 90, go through Seattle, and come down 5.”

  Kelly groaned. That was a day, either way. But she didn’t get this far to not see the mountains up close and personal.

  “You can make Vancouver by tonight,” he offered.

  “Really? We want to see Mount St. Helens, too.”

  “It’s not a bad drive.”

  Her mom walked up. “How bad?”

  “We get to see Oregon.”

  The boys cheered.

  Kelly went to the bathroom while her mom loaded the boys. At least she wasn’t chanting “load and unload.” Yet.

  Kelly tried Mart but got his voicemail. She wasn’t even sure if he was home yet because she didn’t know his flight schedule.

  “Change of plans, we get to see a little of Oregon. Road’s closed into Rainier from the west, so we have to go south and around to Vancouver. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  They wound through fertile valleys and hilly woods, working their way south to the Columbia River. Kelly had a heart-chilling moment driving down what felt like a vertical cliff to the bridge across the river, but all four were delighted by the sight of the lush forests on the other side, as if driving from one world into another.

  They spent the night in Vancouver and were on the road early Monday morning. At some point, Mart had called and left a voicemail.

  “Sorry I missed your call. Have fun and take lots of pictures for me. Talk to you later. Call me.” She saved the message so she could listen to it again.

  She finally realized David had yet to call and see how the boys were. And they hadn’t asked to call him.

  The boys found yet another site in their passport books, Ft.Vancouver, so they had to stop there before they could continue to Mount St. Helens.

  They didn’t have time to go all the way to the Johnston Ridge Observatory. Fortunately, Mount St. Helens was clearly visible from the SilverLakeVisitorCenter, a lucky break for them. At the visitor center, the boys enjoyed the movie, exhibits, and the walk-through model of the mountain.

  Although Denny had to get out of his wheelchair and crawl on his hands and knees to see the last one, because it wasn’t wheelchair accessible.

  They made it to Mt.Rainier later that afternoon, carefully winding their way from the west up to the ParadiseVisitorCenter. The drive was beautiful, with lush forests fulfilling their expectations of what the Pacific Northwest looked like.

  Kelly stepped away from the boys and her mom as they studied the plaque outside the visitor center. She slipped her BlackBerry out of its holster. One bar.

  Worth a shot.

  She dialed Mart’s cell, hoping it would go through. After a moment, and with some crackling static, she heard his voicemail message.

  “Hi, it’s Kelly. We’re at Mt.Rainier.” She swallowed, her mouth dry. Was it the cold mountain air or her nerves? “Feel free to call me, but we’re in the mountains and I don’t know if I’ll have reception.” She paused again. “I’m looking forward to dinner with you when we get home. I wanted to let you know.”

  She heard a beep and looked at her screen.

  Call dropped.

  So how much would he hear?

  They spent an hour at the visitor center, looking at the exhibits and 3D model of the mountain, buying more souvenirs. The boys were fascinated by the glacier on the mountain summit, which was clearly visible from the parking lot.

  Leaving Rainier was like traveling into another country. Sharon closed her eyes during the worst of the steep switchbacks. Kelly tried to ignore it when her mother stomped the passenger floorboard as if looking for an invisible brake pedal.

  The lush forests on the west side of the range that typified their imagined view of the Pacific Northwest gave way to arid, desert-like scrub. It was hard to believe this was the same state. She was used to the logical variety of the Florida landscape, beach dunes and palmetto scrub and pine prairie, with oak woods not too far behind, or hard to find. Like the weather, if you waited five minutes, the overlapping landscape changed.

  Just not this drastically.

  The vastness unsettled her too, truth be told. In Florida, you could have breakfast on St. Pete Beach while watching dolphins playing in the Gulf, and then have lunch on the Intracoastal while staring at the Atlantic.

  This was so…big.

  When they settled into their motel room at Yakima late that evening, Kelly snuck her phone into the bathroom and played her voicemail from Mart.

  “Hi, Kelly. I’m sorry I missed you. I was on a plane when you called. Your message cut off toward the end. I heard, ‘Looking forward to dinner.’” He paused. “I’m looking forward to dinner when you get back.” Another long pause. “Please call when you can. I’d love to talk to you. Even if it’s late.” One last pause. “Voicemail tag. You’re it.” She heard his soft laugh as the message ended.

  She saved it and replayed it. Several times, with her eyes closed and remembering how his lips felt on hers as they kissed by the river after their date. Just kissing him made her feel…

  Oh yeah.

  There wouldn’t be a question of him accepting Denny. But did she want a relationship right now?

  She thought about it. Why not? Didn’t she deserve a chance to be happy? Now that she knew he was interested, she entertained the possibility of taking things further.

  Slowly, of course.

  It was too late to call him back. She thought she’d fall asleep immediately, but Mart’s voice playing in her mind kept her wide awake. That, and memories of kissing him.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The boys were enjoying the trip. Now heading home, they spent their hours pouring over books and visitor’s guides of their stops, reliving the sights.

  Trip of a lifetime. And the boys were already hinting at coming back next summer.

  They spent the next night at a small motel in Big Timber, Montana, and reached the Little Bighorn National Park the following morning.

  “That’s a graveyard?” Denny asked after they unloaded him.

  Kelly looked where he pointed and nodded. “That’s part of it. That’s the NationalCemetery. This whole place is a graveyard. You need to act very respectfully here. This isn’t like the other parks we’ve visited.”

  “What do you mean?”

  They walked into the museum and took the tour of the exhibits. Kelly and Sharon explained the battle as best they could to the boys. When they finished, they watched an interpretive talk given by one of the rangers, who was of Lakota descent. The boys listened raptly as he related what had happened.

  They were sitting on a covered patio at the back of the museum with a breathtaking view of the battleground and Last Stand Hill. Try as she might, Kelly couldn’t help but wish Mart were there with them.

  After the talk, Paulie helped Denny make it all the way up to the monument at Last Stand Hill, then around to the Indian Memorial. Both boys were quiet, thoughtful, and when they saw a headstone along the pathway, they stopped to read it.

  They spent over two hours at the park. As they headed to the parking lot, four motorcycles pulled in. One, a custom trike, pulled into a designated handicapped accessible spot.

  Kelly saw the driver, an older man with a leather biker jacket, had a folding
wheelchair strapped to a rack on the side.

  Denny’s eyes bugged out. Before she could stop him, he raced over.

  “Wow! That is so cool! You can drive a motorcycle?” Denny flapped in excitement.

  The man laughed. Kelly watched as he put the wheelchair on the ground next to his trike, then lifted his paralyzed legs into position with his arms and smoothly slid into the chair. “Yep. You want to get on?”

  Kelly must have looked embarrassed, because the guy smiled. “It’s okay, he can’t hurt anything.”

  “All right. As long as you don’t mind.”

  The man’s three friends had gathered around by this time and helped Denny get on board. He could barely reach the handlebars but looked like he’d died and gone to Heaven.

  “Mom, can I have a motorcycle when I’m older?”

  The bikers laughed, and Kelly smiled. “When you can pay for one, you can drive whatever you want, sweetheart.”

  * * * *

  As with nearly every other place they’d visited, their drive from Moorcroft to DevilsTower wasn’t anything like Kelly had expected. She’d envisioned a tall rock in the middle of nothing. Like Mt.Rushmore, it played hide and seek with the hilly country around the Belle FourcheRiver.

  They arrived an hour before the visitor center closed. The boys watched Close Encounters of the Third Kind before the trip and were in awe of the real-life site.

  “This is really cool, Mom,” Paulie said, staring up at the monolith dwarfing the visitor center. “I’m glad you brought us out here. This is way better than camping.”

  She put her arm around him. “So am I, sweetheart.”

  “Where’s the aliens?” Denny asked.

  Paulie rolled his eyes. “Squirt, it was a movie.”

  “Was he the same guy in the shark movie?” Denny asked.

  Kelly glared at Paulie. “You let your little brother watch Jaws? When was this? Where was I?”

  Paulie reddened. “It was the TV version, Mom. Grandma said it was okay.”

  She turned on her mother, who took a step back.

  Sharon held up her hands defensively. “Honey, I watched it with them. They loved it. Hey, it’s a classic.”

  Kelly closed her eyes and fought the urge to scream.

  She eventually calmed down. On their way out, they stopped at the prairie dog town, and the boys were fascinated by the chirping animals. Paulie climbed out to videotape them while Kelly took pictures.

  Kelly left the suicide door open on the passenger side so Denny could watch. Truthfully, Kelly didn’t want him close enough to worry about him going after one to pet it.

  “Why don’t we have prairie dogs in Florida, Mom?” Denny asked.

  She shrugged. “I have no idea, sweetheart.”

  “Because the snowbirds ran them all over,” Sharon whispered. Kelly struggled not to laugh. Either she was more tired than she thought, or her mother’s sense of humor was improving with exhaustion.

  * * * *

  They spent the night at a vintage fifties motor court in Sundance, Wyoming. From there they went to the Crazy Horse monument and revisited Mt.Rushmore. By the time they returned to Rapid City for dinner, gas, and picked up I-90, it was three hours before sunset. Despite the time, Kelly took the Badlands loop, wanting to see a little of it before dark.

  The drive was beautiful, but Kelly gripped the wheel hard enough she wondered if she’d leave marks. It was all she could do not to lash out at her mother and the boys. She knew part of it was PMS, but she’d tied a knot at the end of her last nerve and was hanging onto it for dear life, praying she didn’t lose her grip.

  Her mother had spent the entire day finding fault with everything except her and the boys. The hotel beds were horrible. The road was bad. The weather was hot. The food was awful. The traffic was terrible…

  She knew her mother’s exhaustion mirrored her own, and getting into it with her wasn’t an option.

  But it was tempting.

  Kelly wanted to be home. Her home. In her bed. With the covers pulled over her head and the door locked and a set of earplugs glued in place and music turned up as loud as possible.

  Her mom stared out over one vista. “I don’t understand why they can’t four lane this road and make it better. It’s like being in a third-world country or something. This is America, a national park. Can’t they do better?”

  Yes, let’s pave over a piece of wild America. Great idea, Mom. Instead, she said, “It’s the Badlands, Mom. That would ruin the landscape and endanger the wildlife.”

  “It’s horrible. All these tourists come over here from other countries and think we’re a bunch of bumpkins.”

  They came upon a scenic turn-off with a trail. Kelly pulled in, unable to take it anymore.

  “Why are we stopping?” Sharon asked.

  Kelly put it in park, left it running, and grabbed her BlackBerry. “I need to stretch. I’ll be right back.

  A boardwalk curled around the rock outcroppings. She walked far enough they couldn’t see her and called Patty. Her phone went to voicemail.

  It was amazing she could even get a cell connection, but two bars were enough. She thought for a moment, then found Mart’s number. There was a long silence as the call connected. Finally, he answered.

  “Hi,” she said. “I’m sorry to call you like this, I know it’s late.” What could she say? “I feel like I’m going to lose my mind. I need to talk to someone sane for a few minutes.”

  He laughed. She closed her eyes and pictured his face. “Then you’ve called the wrong person. I’m as nutty as they come, I’ve been told.”

  She laughed, crouched on the boardwalk, out of sight of the car. “I want to go home.”

  “They’re driving you that nuts?”

  “Yes. I love my boys. But between them and my mom, I feel like I’m going to turn into an America’s Most Wanted special segment.”

  “Where are you?”

  “South Dakota. The Badlands.”

  “Really? Good place for dumping bodies. What’s it like out there?”

  “Warm. It’s close to sunset, so it’s not unbearably hot, and there’s a breeze.”

  “I’ve never been out there before. Tell me about it.” His calm voice helped soothe her frayed nerves.

  She took a moment to glance around her at the outcroppings. “It’s beautiful. In a desolate, you-might-die-without-water kind of way. The colors are gorgeous, in the rocks and the sky. There’s a lot of grassland too, which I didn’t know. I always thought it was just a desert.”

  “When do you get home?”

  “I don’t know. I want to be there as soon as possible. I’ll probably drive all night, make St. Louis tomorrow. The boys want to go through the Arch again.”

  She heard something in the background. “Hold on a second.” As the volume increased, she realized it was his TV. “I have the Weather Channel on. Be careful when you head south. There’s supposed to be bad thunderstorms in Iowa and Nebraska tonight. Don’t get caught in them.”

  “Thanks.” She felt stupid, calling him like this. “I’m sorry if I’m bothering you,” she apologized.

  “Stop that,” he firmly said. “I wouldn’t have answered if you were bothering me. By the way, I’m holding you to that date. You pick where we go.”

  “I’m looking forward to it.”

  “Where are the kids?”

  “In the car with my mom.”

  “Feeling a little better?”

  She closed her eyes. Actually, she was. “Yes. Thank you.”

  “Anytime.” He paused. “Seriously. If you need me, even if it’s in the middle of the night, call. I’ll keep my cell by the bed. I have a flight tomorrow morning, but leave me a voicemail if I don’t answer.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Be safe. Please don’t push yourself too hard.”

  “I want to get home.”

  “Get home in one piece. Stop if you need to.”

  “I don’t know if I can handle anothe
r night in a motel without peace and quiet. I’m used to having the house to myself during the day. I haven’t had a moment to think since we left. Going out alone with you was a vacation from this ‘vacation.’”

  “Just think what you have to look forward to when you get home.”

  Her heart skipped. “I’m looking forward to seeing you again.”

  He hesitated. “Kelly, I really like you. I’m not a serial killer, and I’m not seeing anyone else. Haven’t in over a year. If you’re open to it, I’d like to spend more time with you. I don’t mean a just a dinner date, either. I would like to see where this leads.”

  Kelly thought she’d crush the phone. “Yes. I’d like that.”

  Was that a sigh of relief on his end? “Good. I know that’s chickenshit on my part, to keep waiting until we’re a country apart to ask you things like that over the phone. I know you don’t need me hovering, but please drive safely. Stop if you need to. I want you back here in one piece. And the boys too, obviously.”

  “I will.”

  He paused again. “You are a beautiful, wonderful woman. I was attracted to you from the moment we met.”

  Was she going to pass out? Could a heart race this fast and not kill you? “Me too. Just—” She hunted for the words. “Don’t take it personally if I need time to adjust.”

  “Kelly, I’ll give you all the time in the world if it means I have a chance with you.”

  She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to breathe. “This means you want to have a relationship, right?”

  “If you want to, yes.”

  She let out a deep breath. “Yes. I’d like that. A lot.” She didn’t know it was possible to feel this way as an adult. She’d never gotten this far with anyone since David. Hell, she’d never gotten past dinner. And David never made her feel like this—pulse racing, short of breath, anxious and eager to see him.

  How sad was that?

  Kelly said good-bye and returned on shaky legs to the Element.

  “Where’d you go, Mom?” Denny asked.

  “I needed a little break.”

  Her mother looked at her. “Who’d you talk to?”

  “I tried to call Patty.” Kelly set her BlackBerry on the dash. Sharon grabbed it, then smiled as she held it up. The call log was displayed.