Sunshine Valley

Getting close to…

     Dillon and Evie were sitting on a little hill beside a dirt road, watching the lumber mill. It was a peaceful day. 

     “Do you think we should have tried to keep the baby?” He finally asked, staring at the ground. 

     “What do you think?”

     He pulled at a piece of road side straw. “Sometimes I think it would be amazin’ bein’ a parent. But the overall fear that I will be the kind of parents mine were, freezes me in my tracks.”

     “Havin’ a girl would be the worst.” Evie smiled. “I still have flash backs of my mom lordin’ over me tellin’ me that ‘you’re not pretty enough. Sit up straight. Beauty is pain. If you eat dessert every night with dinner, you’ll get fat as a hog and no man will want you’. I can see me spewin’ that filth. All it does is destroy your self esteem. And create hard feelings toward that parent.  Life is so fragile.”

     She scooted closer to him, angling her body toward his, wrapping her arms around his knee. “Are you okay?”

     “Since the box,” he paused. How was he gonna say this? “I’ve been dreamin’. The same type of dream. I’m in my uniform and a child and I are walkin’ hand in hand up the driveway. The child has on a backpack so I assume he just got off the bus.”

     “A boy?” Evie asked sweetly. 

     “I think so.”

     “Is this why you’ve been wakin’ with a start some nights?”

     He was a little stunned, ‘she felt that’? “Yeah.”

     “Is a child something you want?”

     He looked at her face for a long moment. “I think I’m just feelin’ my age.”

     “Pray about it.” 

     “I thought,”

     She gently continued, “if this is a path God wants us to walk down, I will need for you not to live at work. Even though I work from home, it’s not fair that everything be on my shoulders. I understand that you have a stressful job with massive amounts of responsibility. Your priorities will have to shift in a major way.”

     She was right on all counts. “Pray,” he smiled, then sighed, “I did something I wasn’t supposed to do. ‘Cause of the comment you made, I asked Patty to do a DNA test on the baby.”

     “Deek was the dad,” Evie answered.

     “Yelp, I will end up deputizing you yet.” He sighed then smiled.

     “So Calvin found out he wasn’t the father, discovered who the real father was and did a little private justice?”

     “That is how it appears on the surface.”

     “Where is the mom?”

     “I’m guessing Coal Town. We have been camped out at her mother’s and her grandma’s, hoping she will surface.”

     “Why not go to Coal Town if you think that’s where she’s at?”

     “That is very complicated.” He sighed, “you have such insights on this, do you feel like you know who has been harassing you?”

     “It’s not Doug.” She answered flatly. 

     “Then who?”

     “I haven’t worked that out yet.”

     “Haven’t been here in a while. Sometimes I just come here and sit. Think. Close my eyes and listen to the sounds of the mill.” He smiled a sad smile, “have even fallen asleep.” He trailed his thumb across her cheek, “To answer your question, I’m okay, happier than I’ve ever been in my life.”

     She was about to speak, when the ground shook violently. Her gut reaction was the squeeze his knee tighter. “What?”

     Off to his left, thick black smoke boiled up. It looked like an angry monster against the peace of the bright blue sky. 

     Dillon hissed, “Coal Town.” They ran to his truck as he drove at a high rate of speed toward Coal Town. Panicked voices flowed from the c.b. He picked up the receiver, telling the dispatcher he was on his way. 

     To get to Coal Town, you had to drive across a bridge.  Once across, the bridge was surrounded by shrubs and litter. Overflowing trash cans covered with graffiti. The smell was overwhelming. 

     Dillon slammed the truck to a stop, slightly out of the way. More help would be arriving as he told the dispatcher what he saw. “Send in the calvary.”

     Coal Town had once been a busy hub for the largest mine in Sunshine Valley. At its height, it had employed thousands of people. Many lived right here. They lived in company housing. Saw the company doctor. Got paid with script issued by the company. And shopped in the company store. It was a separate economy all on its own.

     Over time as the mine stopped producing. The old timers called it ‘dried up’. People moved away. Many to big cities like Detroit to work in the car plants. They would come home driving their big shiny trucks. Some waggin’ boats to show off to their families. Some, like Dillon’s dad, couldn’t make it. Came home with his tail between his legs and crawled into a bottle. His dad never made it to Coal Town. But his mom did. 

     When Dillon came to Coal Town, he never made it past where his truck was parked. This disaster was going to force him back into the belly of the beast. The image of his mother flashed across his mind as people started limping from the smoke. Some carting wounded people. Others, holding hurting body parts on their own frames. 

     Dillon and Evie started helping those they could with what they had. He knew better than to run head long into the smoke. He would only be creating one more victim.