One night she said, very softly, “I wish we’d had one more chance.”
Neither of us slept afterward.
A week later, Margaret mailed me her address.
Her handwriting had changed, though not completely.
The capital M still leaned the same way.
I stared at the envelope for almost an hour before opening it, as though waiting might make the hope inside easier to endure.
Then I sold my old truck, packed one suitcase, and bought a one-way bus ticket.
At seventy-six, it felt equally absurd and courageous.
This was not simply a trip.
The ride lasted almost twelve hours.
I spent every mile imagining the instant I would see her again.
Would she recognize me immediately?
Would she still tilt her head when she laughed?
Would fifty years vanish in a second, or would we stand before each other like courteous strangers wearing the faces of people we once loved?
Halfway through the journey, the driver slowed and pulled into a roadside station.
“We’ll be here for about 15 minutes,” he announced.
I stayed in my seat, holding the envelope with Margaret’s address.
For Complete Cooking STEPS Please Head On Over To Next Page Or Open button (>) and don’t forget to SHARE with your Facebook friends.I had already taken it out three times that morning, afraid the ink might disappear whenever I stopped looking at it.
Then my phone rang.
The number was unfamiliar.
I almost ignored it.
Something told me not to.
So I answered.
An unknown woman asked, “Are you, Harrison?”
“Yes.”
She drew a trembling breath.
“Please tell me you haven’t arrived yet.”
I stood so quickly that the envelope slipped from my hand.
I picked it up while my heart raced.
“What happened?”
There was a pause.
Then she said, “I’m Margaret’s daughter. My name is Ellen. My mother had a heart attack this morning.”
“Is she…”
I could not finish the question.
“She’s alive,” Ellen said quickly. “She’s in the hospital. They stabilized her, but they’re worried. She kept asking whether you’d already arrived. I found your number in her address book.”
I dropped into the nearest seat.
“What hospital?”
She told me.
In one of those moments that seems too perfectly arranged to be coincidence, the hospital was not far from the bus route.
