Brother Willy's Traveling Salvation Show (35 page)

Any sense of guilt
over the accident Scott had managed to hide in the attic of his mind had now been reborn with a new unrelenting intensity. It was as though she had erased any sense of healing he experienced in the past four years. Every faded memory was now crystal clear in his mind.

Scott
sat for the next thirty minutes with his mind racing from one thought to another until Beth began to stir. She opened her eyes slowly and blinked a few times as she looked up at his face. “What time is it?”

Scott
glanced at the wall clock before he responded. “It’s one-thirty. You’ve been asleep for a while.”

Beth
stretched as she stood up before making her way to the kitchen to fix them a drink. When she returned, her comments would leave Scott in a state of near amazement. She placed their drinks on the coffee table as she sat down. “I had the strangest dream. I thought the ghost had come back and was talking to us.”

Making a deliberate effort to hide any sense of surprise,
Scott questioned her. “What did the ghost tell us?”

Beth
shrugged off his question. “I don’t remember but I think she was talking to you.”

Scott
did not intend to let Beth know the truth about what had happened. He assumed she was better off not knowing as it would be difficult to explain and impossible for her to believe. “Well, dreams can be strange sometimes.”

Beth
smiled as she looked over her shoulder at him. “I’m glad you came here with me tonight. I have been feeling a little uneasy for the past few weeks. I also have that feeling people get when they think something bad is going to happen. It’s silly but I still feel better with you here.”

Still very distracted by his experience
, Scott put his hand on Beth’s shoulder to reassure her before he got up and walked to the door. Staring out at the ocean, he asked a question in a soft voice. “What do you think happens to a person after they die?”

Beth
replied, recognizing the serious tone to his voice. “I don’t know. I want to believe we all go to heaven and that we live forever in peace and without fear.”

Her use of the word fear caught his attention. Without turning to look at
Beth, he asked a follow up question. “Are you still afraid of me?”

“That’s an interesting question. To be honest, I
was afraid of you, but I’m getting over it. It’s odd that I would be afraid of you while at the same time feeling safe knowing you are here with me. My brain tells me you won’t hurt me but something in the back of my mind makes me feel like I need to be cautious.”

Scott
was being somewhat cryptic in his reply. “Beth, sometimes it’s the things you can’t see that hurt you the most. You have nothing to fear from me.”

Beth
rose from the sofa and stood behind Scott for several minutes with her arms around his waist. “You look distracted and very tired. If I have nothing to fear from you, then come to bed with me.”

CHAPTER XX
V

Early Saturday morning,
Scott received a call from his mother saying Ashley had slipped into a coma. Feeling a sense of urgency, he was on his way to the rehabilitation center within minutes. His mind was racing while trying to anticipate every possible implication of her condition as he drove across the bridge into Swansboro.

When
Scott entered Ashley’s room, her mother gave him a long hug but he received no acknowledgement from her father. After hugging Ashley’s sister, he went to the bed and looked down at Ashley for what seemed like an eternity as he held her hand.

Ashley
’s mother suggested her family leave the room for a few minutes in order to give Scott time alone with Ashley. Her father was the last to leave, but he made sure Scott saw the incriminating expression on his face. Her father made no effort to hide the fact that he thought Scott was responsible for Ashley’s accident. Even during the time Scott and Ashley were dating, there were few times when the two of them shared a respectful relationship. It was more as if they tolerated each other for Ashley’s benefit.

While the family was out of the room,
Scott leaned over the bed rails and gave her a soft kiss. He whispered in her ear after she took a gasp for breath. “I promise you that we’ll get there together. You just hang on and wait for me. Everything is going to be just like I told you it would be. We’ll watch the sunrise and take long walks on the beach. We’ll sit in the sand and talk about anything you want. You’ll be free at last.”

Scott stood up as he heard the door to her room open and the family returning. They were followed in the room by several medical technicians who were going to transfer Ashley to the hospital in Morehead City. Scott and her father left the room together while the technicians were getting Ashley ready to transfer. 

There was only a moment of civility as they stood alone in the hallway. In a quiet voice, her father looked directly at
Scott. “She wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you. You killed my daughter.”

Scott
turned to face her father. “She was safe and sober when I brought her home and you know it. You aren’t going to put this on my shoulders.”

The anger on her father’s face was growing. “You killed my daughter. If you want to take this outside and settle it, then let’s go.”

Every emotion, every ounce of guilt, and every sense of loss Scott had been hiding for years all came out in one powerful burst of energy. In a moment of pure anger, Scott lost his sense of self-control. He lunged towards her father, grabbing him by the shirt collar and slamming him into the wall. “You started killing Ashley years before I came along. I’ve seen your drunk driving convictions and you get so drunk at bars that somebody has to carry your sorry ass out and dump you on the street. Where in the hell were you the night she was hurt? Drunk again. Hell yes! You sorry sac of shit She learned how to get drunk from you. Take that piece of information to your grave and then straight to hell.”

When
Scott released his grip, Ashley’s father slid down the wall before he came to rest on the floor. He then called out, “I’ll have you arrested you little son of a bitch.”

Scott
walked back over to her father and looked down at him. After he spat in her father’s face, Scott replied in a calm tone of voice. “You better hurry. Time is running out.”

The door to
Ashley’s room opened when Scott was halfway up the hall. Scott stood to the side as the paramedics pushed the stretcher past him. Ashley’s family walked past Scott, but only her mother stopped for a moment and spoke. “She loves you so much Scott. I’ll call you and let you know how she’s doing.”

As
Scott left the rehab center, he called Beth to tell her there had been an emergency and he would try to call her later the next week. He would not know until he reached home that Ashley had been pronounced dead on arrival at the hospital. From that moment forward, Scott knew his life would never be the same.

Throughout the funeral,
Scott sat with his eyes fixed on her casket while remembering every moment they ever spent together. In an almost methodical approach, his mind went back to the day they first met. The first time they took a small boat and went sailing in the Bouge Sound, the bicycle trips they took in the countryside, the days spent in algebra class, and their very first date were all memories etched clearly in his mind.

Over her father’s objections,
Ashley’s mother insisted that Scott be one of the six pallbearers that would carry her coffin from the hearse to the gravesite. While he felt a sense of duty and honor to carry out his assignment, each step he took only intensified his sense of loss. It was as though he was being forced to accept that which he refused to accept. Ashley was gone and there was nothing Scott could do to change history.

The longer he stared at her coffin, the greater his resentment grew knowing her free spirit had been captured and would now be confined forever. For the past four years, everything she dreamed of and wished for had been taken away. He knew he could have done something differently the night she was hurt and he knew he had failed. Her cowboy had let her down.

When the family was leaving the gravesite after the service on Tuesday afternoon, Ashley’s mom came over to Scott before extending her arm to hand him something. As he reached out, she dropped Ashley’s bracelet into his hands. “Her father refused to let her be buried with this bracelet and I thought you might like to have it back.”

Scott
reached out to hug her mother as he slipped the bracelet into his coat pocket. “If she can’t have it then I would like to keep it. Thank you.”

Scott
remained by the graveside after everyone else had left. He had a sense that he should remain there for some indefinite period to ensure Ashley would be protected. It was only after Mark came and stood beside him that he realized he was standing alone. After his father gave him a gentle prod on the shoulder, Scott realized he was the last person remaining at the gravesite. “It’s time to leave Scott.”

Scott
looked up to see a seagull flying above. He watched the bird moving through the sky with little effort as she was gliding on the wind. The bird circled the cemetery twice before heading back in the direction of the river. Scott then turned to his father. “Yea, it is time to leave.”

Late on Thursday afternoon, Scott left home alone headed for Cape Lookout. After taking the ferry to Cape Lookout, he walked past the lighthouse and sat in the sand close to the water. He paused only long enough to let his depressing memories overtake his sense of better judgment. In his mind, Michelle had made the decision not to carry their relationship forward when she left for Washington. He had heard nothing from his string of job interviews, his new friend Beth was afraid of him and now Ashley had died.

The idea of taking his own life became a consideration only because of his belief that he and
Ashley could be together in some other world. Life was easy for them during their year together in school when the realities of the world had not set in. His memories were colored by those things he wanted to value and forgetting those things that did not fit into the tapestry of peaceful existence. Scott reluctantly concluded he was unwilling to accept the realities of life and that the cost of reality was too high a price. In so many words, Scott was trying to justify his plan to take his life. 

Scott
was a reasonably strong swimmer and knew that if he was going to take his own life, he wanted to make it look like an accident. Once satisfied that his plan was foolproof, he stood up and started for the water’s edge dragging his canvas raft behind him. He left his keys and wallet lying on his towel, but carried a small knife with him. When he was far enough out into the ocean, he would prick the raft with his knife and drop the knife into the ocean. Once the raft deflated, he would be so far from shore that he would be unable to swim back safely. Scott also knew he would reach a point of no return should he lose his nerve or conviction. 

He then pulled the raft past the breaking waves before climbing aboard. Slowly
, but with a sense of determination, he paddled his raft with his arms and hands pushing the raft further away from the shoreline. He had picked this time of day and this very hour knowing the outgoing tide would help carry him further from the shore. The further he went from the shoreline, the more content he became with his decision. 

Once he was beyond the point where he
could swim back to shore, Scott stopped and rested for only a moment before reaching in his pocket and removing the small knife. To his surprise and frustration, he noticed a small sunfish sailboat headed in his direction.

The S
unfish was a boat slightly larger than a kayak and equipped with a single sail. Scott watched the boat for several minutes thinking it would soon tack in a different direction as the boat was sailing into the wind. He continued to wait for several more minutes, but the boat continued its course directly for him.

As the boat drew nearer, he soon realized there was no one on board controlling the sails or steering the small craft. He had to halt his plan long enough to decide if this would change his plan to make his death look accidental. When the boat was twenty feet away from him, the sail shifted as the rudder also turned causing the boat to come directly
to him.”

Scott
placed his face down on the raft while trying to decide if he were the recipient of Divine intervention or if he was just very incompetent in committing suicide. The sound of a female voice caused him to raise his head and look in the direction of the boat.

“So just what exactly do you think you are doing?”
Ashley asked in a calm voice.

She was wearing the evening gown she had worn to the prom. He looked at her as a smile came to his face. “
I told you we would get there together and I guess this is the moment of truth. For some strange reason, I am not surprised to see you.”

“There is no question but that
this is a moment of truth but I’m not sure you and I are talking about the same definition of truth.” Ashley replied as she lowered the sail.

Scott
took hold of the boat keeping his raft close to her. “I don’t know how this is possible, but this is like my best dream ever coming true.”

Ashley
smiled as she watched his face. “Tie your little raft to the boat and climb on board. I’ve waited four years for you to take me sailing again, just like we used to do.”

Scott
climbed aboard the small boat and sat across from Ashley choosing to stare at her without speaking for several minutes. After a long embrace, she looked down at the water. “You don’t know how long I have waited for you to do that. Now you can take me away on our magic ship to some romantic island.”

Scott
started smiling. “I see there’s nothing wrong with your memory. I remember the little game we used to play in high school when you and I would go sailing and try find an island where we could be alone. Once we got to an island, you became the princess of the island and I was your loyal prince.”

She started smiling. “We used to take our little boat and land on some of the small islands between
Harkers Island and Cape Lookout. We would take our lunch and spend the whole day together.”

The smile slowly left her face as she continued. “It was the best of times and the worst of times.”

Scott watched her expression. “I cannot imagine the hell you have been trough for the last four years.”

“I want you to know that you helped me make it through it all. Every time you came to see me it helped me remember a time when our life was perfect.”

Scott offered his confession. “I came to the point where I didn’t want to come see you anymore. I couldn’t stand seeing you become something you would never want to be. I would look at you knowing you wanted to be out on the sea sailing in our boat and not confined like some caged animal.”

Ashley
looked away for a moment. “You had no way of knowing this, but when you were holding my hand and telling me some story, in my mind we were on this boat sailing for some distant place. You gave me peace of mind to enjoy my memories. You kept me going.”

Scott
looked into her eyes for several minutes without speaking. Finally, he had to ask the question she knew was coming. “How is it possible that you’re here with me now? Are you my escort to the other side of existence?”

Ashley
looked up at the mast as she thought about how to answer his questions. “When you came to my room in June, you told me all about the Universal Mind in such a way that let me know it was alright for me to give up the fight to survive. You let me know there was a time for all things and my time to leave would be at my choosing. I wasn’t going to give up until I knew you would be alright without me.”

Scott
replied as he looked away from Ashley. “It should be obvious that I’m not going to be alright without you which might explain what I’m doing out here on a raft.”

She leaned forward and kissed him. “Among a thousand other reasons
, I came here to tell you that you were right. There is a time for all things, and this is not your time to call it quits.”