Proceed With Caution
"So you're the lil Miss."
That was the first ever utterance from his lips as he stood in our dusty driveway just beneath our scrawny apple tree. We both took our time sizing one another up. I think every inch of my ten year old self was in love with him, even then.
He never had much to say, and he would mostly keep to himself. But to my precocious young self, he was ever indulgent, always patient in the face of my neverending questions. He used to carry a tiny, worn scrap of parchment in a pouch he kept near his heart. One night after sup, I snuck out through my bedroom window and shimmied down the iron bougainvillea trellis, snagging my linen night shift in the process. I made my way to the barn across the crisp summertime lawn, made silver in the moonlight like an old black and white movie.
He had not settled in yet for the night, instead staring up at the moon as he absentmindedly twined a new length of rope. Lulu, my old mare, snickered softly in her stall at my approach, rousing him from whatever demons claimed his thoughts that evening.
"Ain't cha s'pposed to be tucked away safe in bed, lil Miss?" he spared me just a glance before resuming his quiet work.
I was a bold little scrap back in those days. "What is it that's so special, Charlie Davies, that you always have it hidden in your breast pocket?"
The corner of his lip lifted just a bit. "You been spyin' up on me, lil one?"
"No! Is just a question, is all! I seen ya, after all the otha boys take off to town, you never join 'em just always hole yourself up in here, all pensive like, brooding over that old raggedy paper. "
I had become all of a sudden abashed and indignant at being found out in my rapt observation. Still, curiosity got the better of my childish fancies. I picked at a loose thread on my nightgown, eyeing him shyly, until my questions about burst forth from me.
"What is on the paper? Is it a love letter from your sweetheart? Can I see it?"
"NO!" His face was a shadow as he hurried me out of the side passage of the barn, pushing me firmly by my shoulders and closing the door behind me. Through the wood I heard the tortured tone in his muffled voice, "Go away, Gracie Anne."
The next morning Paw said he had left without even a goodbye, leaving all his belonging behind save for the clothes on his back. "And that dumb parchment he loved so much," I muttered to myself, kicking the duffel full of his discarded things, my innocent heart broken.
_._._._._
Grace attempted to shake last night's drinking out of her still hazy mind as she navigated the traffic that Monday morning. She was at the last long bend of slightly cliff hugging highway before she arrived at the town proper. She heaved another heavy sigh as the mostly tourist traffic inched gingerly past the requisite "Proceed with Caution" sign. For chrissakes people! It's a road, a fairly wide one at that, not a friggin' trapeze act! Grace took a couple more quick breaths to calm herself. She was already running late with this errand as it was, and Mike, her boss, would be expecting her in the office in two hours. 'Don't take me out for drinks late on a Sunday, then,' she fretted listlessly in her muddled brain. 'Don't invite yourself over for sex at my place and then leave only a curt note behind in the morning." She thrummed a frenetic beat on the steering wheel as the traffic inched along until she finally made it to her destination.
Mike's vague instructions only indicated that she were to pick up a file from a friend of his at the local library who curated oddities and tidbits from throughout rural U.S. history. Nevermind telling Grace that the "local" library was about a two hour drive away from the city proper. What a dick. For all she knew, this could be a ploy to avoid her. All she knew for certain was that they were planning on running a piece at the magazine on obscure urban legends and their supposed origins.
File in hand, she hurriedly got in her car, zooming past novelty shops and signs. Soon she was back on the highway, elated that she may actually make it on time. Damn, traffic! Still?! At this hour? Up the queue a little further, she finally saw the reason for the delay: another "Proceed with Caution" sign. What was up with those in this area? She honked her horn a few times at the nervous drivers ahead of her, gritting her teeth at her predicament. Looks like they would be at a near standstill for quite awhile. 'Might as well take a look at what was so important to drive out of the city limits for!' Still flustered from last night's extracurricular activities, Grace cranks open the windows a bit as she peeks at the file. The brisk ocean air enters the car and fans the file before she could hurriedly shut the windows again.
There on the freshly exposed page is a sketch of Charlie Davies.
A honk behind her lifts her from her initial shock. At each frequent stop of the traffic, she pieces together fragments. Widower. Suspicion of foul play. The Lovesick Murderer. A trail of victims with a telltale similarity. Two unrequited loves of his life. Grace arrives at his confession as the line of cars begin to slow down again.
"I loved Maybelle with all my heart, even after she gone left me. I always told her she should never try to leave me. We were meant to be. I loved my wife, I really did, but I wasn't so heartbroken for very long after I met little Gracie Anne. I think I may have loved Gracie even more than I had my wife after a point! She was too young to understand the depth of my feelings, so I had to be patient and wait for her. I saw her in every pretty face, but none of them ever measured up.
Another impatient honk from behind and Grace steps hard on the gas without thinking.
She swears the bright yellow caution sign was mocking as she slid past it, down, down towards the teasing blue expanse of the Pacific.
Originally written for @Soaring_Skylark 's #skylarkchallenge at Lettrs.com for its anniversary competition. Required words: parchment, passage, pensive, thread, apple, rope. Required phrase: proceed with caution.