RaeAnne Thayne - Coming Home For Christmas

“Where are we?”

“About a hundred or so miles past Portland. You slept a few hours. I need to pull off at the next town for gas.”

He was driving slowly through the storm, she could tell by the trees inching past the window. She could see few other cars on the road.

“Something’s wrong,” she said, panic surging again. “There’s no...traffic coming from the other direction.”

“I know.” He kept his gaze focused on the road. Now she noticed his knuckles were white on the steering wheel. Was that from her presence or from the storm? Or both?

“Maybe...maybe it’s an accident or something else has closed the freeway.”

“Maybe.”

“You don’t think so.”

“Don’t know. I’ve been trying to get news on the radio but can’t find any local stations.”

He pointed to a sign on the shoulder indicating an exit two miles ahead with services. “Maybe we can find out more when we fill up.”

A lifetime crawled by in the time it took him to cover those few miles. He drove silently, the only sounds in the vehicle the hum of the heater and the beat of the wipers. By the time he took the exit, she felt wrung dry from the tension. The gas station was part of a cluster of rural houses, maybe six or seven. She was struck by the Christmas lights gleaming a welcome through the snow. Elizabeth had almost forgotten Christmas was only a week away.

Luke drove up to a gas pump, then finally shifted toward her. “Do you need to go in?”

Mostly, she wanted a minute away from him and this tension. If nothing else, moving might help ease the muscle cramp in her leg.

“Yes. I’ll only be...a moment.”

Blowing snow hit her as she opened the vehicle door. She shivered but gripped the door frame and lowered herself out gingerly. For one horrifying moment, she was afraid her leg would not support her weight, but she willed all the strength she had into it and was able to make her painstaking way inside the convenience store.

“Hello,” the clerk greeted her.

Elizabeth forced a smile and made her way straight to the restroom. There, she looked at herself in the mirror, struck as she always was when she looked at her reflection by the woman there who was her but wasn’t her.

When she emerged from the restroom, she found Luke walking through the empty snack aisle with a basket over his arm. He had a deli sandwich, a bag of chips, a couple of protein bars and a banana that looked a few days past its prime.

“Would you like anything?” he asked.

She shook her head. “I’m good.”

“You need to eat. Grab something. This is dinner.”

She wanted to argue that she wasn’t hungry and wasn’t sure she could eat as long as she was with him, but that would simply be foolish. She had to eat to maintain her strength, something she was quite certain she would need over the next few days.

She grabbed a bag of nuts and some dried apple slices. Luke gave her a look and deliberately picked up a second premade sandwich and added it to his collection.

The cashier set down her magazine when they approached the checkout. She was in her sixties, her skin weathered, and she sported red hair in a shade that couldn’t possibly be natural. “Where you folks heading?”

“A town east of Boise. Haven Point.”

She squinted at them. “Haven’t you been listening to the weather report? It’s nasty out there. This storm is hitting hard. They’re telling people to stay off the freeway tonight.”

“It’s never as bad as they say it will be,” Luke said.

“Usually I’d agree with you but this one is a doozy. About an hour east of here, you’re going to be fighting black ice and blizzard conditions. There was a big pileup that’s closed all traffic coming this direction.”

“That’s why we didn’t see anyone,” Elizabeth exclaimed, her stomach muscles clenching.

“We’ll be fine. I’m in a big truck with four-wheel drive.”

“It’s always the guys with four-wheel drive who think they can get through anything and end up off the road,” the cashier said. “That won’t do you diddly if it’s icy. Four-wheel-drive vehicles slide off just as easy as front-wheel.”

“Thanks for the reminder,” Luke said. “But we’ve got to keep going. Family emergency.”

“Well, good luck to you, then,” she said, shaking her head in a pitying sort of way.

Luke paid for their supplies and the gas, and they walked back outside. Just in the short time they’d been inside, the wind had picked up. Now those snowflakes felt like tiny ice-cold missiles, and visibility had dropped to only a few hundred feet.

Elizabeth tried to fight down her panic, remembering another night, another storm.

She did not want to be out in this. She wanted to be safe at home next to her fireplace at Brambleberry House with a mug of hot cocoa and a mystery novel.

Luke was a good driver, she reminded herself as he helped her inside the truck again and she fastened her seat belt. He always had been.

He would keep her safe.

She repeated that mantra for the next half hour, with Luke driving no more than twenty miles per hour. Neither of them said anything, focused only on the increasing fury of the storm.

After what seemed a lifetime, he released a frustrated sigh.

“We’re not going to make it any farther tonight. Might as well catch a few hours of sleep while the storm blows over and then take off again in the morning when the roads are clear. Look online and see if you can find us a couple of rooms in the next town.”

This sparsely populated and remote part of Oregon wasn’t exactly overflowing with towns that boasted four-star hotels. Add in the storm that was basically crippling transportation and she wasn’t optimistic about their chances. Still, she was grateful she still had cell service and something to do to take her mind off the weather conditions and the fear that hovered just on the edge of her mind.

Sure enough, she searched on her phone for hotels in the next town and found only two. When she called, neither had vacancies. Not so much as a broom closet.

She had more luck with the town after that, about ten more miles along the interstate.

“Looks like there’s one room with two beds in a motel in the next town,” she said, looking at the hotel app she used to book her trips to Haven Point.

“Call them and book it. I’m afraid it might take us a half an hour or more to get there and I would hate for it to be sold out when we show up. You can take a credit card out of my wallet.”

He lifted a hip to pull it out, then handed it over, still warm from being in his pocket.

She took it quickly so he could return both hands to the wheel. Using the light from her phone, she opened it and started to search for a credit card. Before she could find one, she stopped on a snapshot inside the wallet, in a little pocket with a clear cover.

Their children.

Cassie and Bridger were hugging each other, faces turned to the camera with matching smiles.

Next to them was another picture. Older. This one was of a much younger Luke with his arm around a woman with blond hair and blue eyes. They looked at each other with a love that was as plain as if hearts and flowers suddenly floated off the image.

She felt as if all the oxygen had been sucked out of the vehicle, as if her lungs couldn’t expand enough to take in the necessary air.

She missed them, this couple who had been so in love. She missed the evenings they would spend snuggled together, sharing secrets and dreams; she missed the pure contentment she felt in his arms; she missed the serenity of knowing someone loved her completely.

She missed that woman, too.

It had been seven years since she’d seen a picture of herself the way she used to be.