When You Get There You’ll Be Waiting

The move to Oregon was supposed to solve all the problems, though he had not exactly promised this.

What he said was that the move to Oregon would be good for them.

A fresh start. After all, nobody in Oregon knew them from Adam.

It wouldn’t be like it was in Atkins, where she couldn’t go to the supermarket without the whispers and stares.

Their story would stay in Iowa, he told her.

Looking out on the leaden gray sky, the wet fields soaked by continual rain, she realized now the hollowness of his promises.

It was never about what all the other people thought.

It was what she herself felt and remembered about that awful day.

There was no escaping her own memory, wherever she might go.

She walked across the sodden grass to the ancient barn on the corner of the property.

The vast space was hushed and almost holy, as though nothing terrible could ever happen here, or anywhere.

She looked up at the sturdy crossbeam above the empty hayloft.  

Dust motes swirled in soft shafts of light beaming down through chinks in the roof like a holy benediction.

The sun must have come out.