Diane Chamberlain - The Courage Tree

“It is Janine’s fault,” Joe interrupted as he passed the car ahead of him, pulling up behind Janine again. “Sophie should never have gone on this trip. She’s never been away from us. Even during all her hospital stays, she’s had one of us with her. Janine completely disregarded my wishes. I don’t get it, either. For the past few years, we’ve agreed on how to handle things with Sophie. And now…”

“You mean, she’s gone along with everything you wanted to do.”

He glanced at her. “What are you saying?” he asked.

“I’m saying that Janine hasn’t dared to think for herself since Sophie got sick, when you and her parents pinned the blame on her.”

“I never overtly blamed her for it,” he said, although he knew the argument was weak and that Paula could see through him. “Even though I do think there’s a good chance that Sophie’s problem was the result of Janine’s stint as GI Jane.”

“Oh, Joe, there’s no record of other Desert Storm soldiers producing kids with kidney disease. Just because Janine—”

“Let’s not talk about this, okay?”

“You always say that when you’re about to lose an argument, you know that?”

He barely heard her. They were parked at a too long stoplight on Route 7, and he could see the back of Janine’s head in the car in front of him. She was brushing the hair from her face…or maybe wiping tears from her eyes, and he softened. If he was in her car right now, he would touch her. Hold her hand, perhaps. It had been a long time since they’d had any physical contact. But that didn’t mean he didn’t want it.

“How can I be so angry with her and want to jump her bones at the same time?” Joe asked.

Paula was quiet for a moment. “You’re still in love with her,” she stated.

He kept his eyes on the road. How did Paula know that? He’d never told her. Except for this last comment, which he knew to be inappropriate in both content and timing, he’d said nothing positive about Janine in months. How did women always manage to know what you were thinking?

“What makes you say that?” He turned off Route 7 onto Beulah Road, following closely on Janine’s bumper.

“Jumping her bones is just guy talk for the fact that you love her.”

“I can’t love her. I’m too angry with her.”

“Love and anger can exist at the same time,” Paula said. “I should know.” Paula had been divorced for five years from a man who had swindled her out of her savings. Only recently had she stopped talking about him with longing.

“I don’t know how I feel about her anymore,” he said. “I just think…we used to be a team. We used to be in sync—at least when it came to Sophie.”

He knew it was his fault that their marriage ended. He’d been stupid and angry, and if he could make it up to Janine somehow, he would. He wanted her back. The three of them were meant to be a family.

“Look, Joe,” Paula interrupted his thoughts. “Janine needs support right now. You guys need each other. So put the anger aside and just be a dad for now. Okay?”

She was right, and he nodded. “I’ll try,” he said.

The parking lot at Meadowlark Gardens was nearly empty, except for the bustle of activity in the corner nearest the road. Joe followed Janine’s car across the lot and parked between the white van and a police car. Scanning the small group of people, he tried to find a skinny, little red-haired girl among them, hoping Sophie had arrived safely during Janine’s trip to Reston.

But Sophie was not there, and Joe and Paula got out of the car and followed Janine into the circle of people.

“Any news?” Janine asked a tall woman, who shook her head, then looked at Joe.

“You’re Sophie’s dad?” The woman reached her hand toward him and he shook it quickly, as if he didn’t want to touch her for too long. He was angry with her, too. Angry with anyone even remotely responsible for putting Sophie in harm’s way.

“Yes,” he said.

“I’m Gloria Moss. Sophie’s troop leader.”

“What’s going on?” He heard the impatient, officious tone to his voice and felt Paula’s steadying hand on his arm once again.

“Sergeant Loomis just arrived,” Gloria said, pointing in the direction of a large black man in uniform. He was talking with a young male officer, who used his hands as he spoke, cutting the air with them, while the big man listened.

Gloria introduced Joe, Paula and Janine to Holly’s parents, Rebecca and Steve Kraft, who had apparently arrived only minutes earlier in a large, midnight-blue Suburban. Everyone had questions for one another, but no one had the answers, and they stood waiting uncertainly by the white van, while the sergeant spoke to someone on the phone. Joe wanted to walk over to him and tell him to hurry up and do something, but he knew that was not going to help.

A Honda sped into the parking lot, giving all of them a hope-filled start until they realized that the car was silver. It came to a stop near the fence, and a young woman jumped out.

“I’m Charlotte,” she called as she ran toward them. “Alison’s roommate. Did anyone hear from her yet?

“No,” Janine said. “You haven’t heard anything, either?”

Charlotte shook her head. She looked about twenty years old, with shoulder-length blond hair and tiny glasses perched atop her button nose. Within seconds, Joe knew she was the sort of young woman who could make any event into a disaster.

“This is terrible,” she said repeatedly. “Alison would never be this late without a good reason. We’re supposed to go out tonight.”

“Well, the police are working on it,” Gloria said, although she looked uncertain as she glanced in the direction of the sergeant and young officer. Gloria wore her tension and worry in her face. She couldn’t have been more than his and Janine’s age, thirty-five, Joe thought, yet her forehead was creased with deep horizontal lines and her mouth was tight, her lips narrow.

Janine, on the other hand, carried her worry as she always did, with a calm resolve that made her face impassive and hard to read. How often he’d seen that face across Sophie’s hospital bed or while waiting for news from one doctor or another. She would fall apart later, he knew, when she was alone. But for now, there was little outward sign of the anguish he knew she was feeling.

Holly’s parents were another matter altogether. Steve and Rebecca Kraft wore wide, optimistic smiles, as though they dealt with this sort of thing all the time and refused to let it get them down. They were an older couple, somewhere in their mid-forties, he guessed, with the look of well-aged hippies. Steve wore his graying hair in a pony tail; Rebecca’s mousy-brown hair fell to her shoulders from a center part. Two of their seven children were with them—one a young boy, barely a toddler, the other a sour-looking six-year-old named Treat. “Everything will work out all right,” Rebecca said to Joe and Janine as she bounced the toddler in her arms. “It always does. We’ve been through this sort of thing so many times, we’re used to it.”

Their optimism was catching. Or at least Joe tried to catch it as he listened to them tell tales about their older children’s misadventures. He felt like the young, green father next to Steve’s and Rebecca’s soothing voices of experience.

Finally, Sergeant Loomis approached them, gathering them together with a sweep of his big arms. Joe stood between Janine and Paula in front of the white van, listening to Loomis’s deep, booming voice.

“The police agencies between here and the Scout camp have been alerted to notify us of any accidents along that route,” he said. “So far, there are no reports of any accidents involving a car like Ms. Dunn’s. Of course, it’s possible that they are simply lost.”