Emily had to get back to Bradford unless it was really necessary for her to stay here, so after spending the evening talking about the old days and catching Dave up on everyone, she spent the night in her sleeping bag on the floor. Not long after sunrise she had JoAnne’s car pointed west; it had been decided that JoAnne would stay in New York for a while to help watch over the boys.

Emily really enjoyed taking a long drive by herself, but she rarely got to do it. The last few years she’d had a few good trips on the back of the Harley, which was always with someone but almost as good, but it had been several years since she’d made a trip this long in a car. It gave her a chance to think, sort things out, make plans, and assess where she was, as well as checking out the scenery along the way.

There was a lot to think about beyond the Pattersons. Dave seemed to be in good hands, and both JoAnne and Shae had been instructed to call if there was anything Emily could do from the Bradford end, although no one expected there would be much, other than possibly getting JoAnne back home if the airlines didn’t start up soon.

There were a number of other things on her plate right then, though. Kevin and most of the minimum staff at Macy figured the place would be closed by this time next year. Things had started to come together on getting into the knife-making business with the MacRaes. That had caused them to move ahead on buying the long-closed old Gulf station across Taney from the Chicago Inn, even though they still hadn’t incorporated the business. Just the other day they’d gone out there with Mike Austin, a Class of ’88 member who owned a small construction company. Mike said that he thought it could be rebuilt and modified into their combination factory and showroom without it costing too much, especially if he did most of the work over the winter when his construction business was otherwise slow. They would still have to carry a mortgage, but it shouldn’t be too bad. Kevin was looking forward to doing a job that he liked rather than the one he’d come to hate.

What with everything Emily hadn’t been able to keep as close an eye on the kids as she had in years past, but they were growing up and didn’t need supervision that was quite as close as it had been earlier. They seemed to be doing well. JJ wasn’t the student that Kayla was, but an over-the-counter discussion with his sixth grade teacher at the Spee-D-Mart revealed that while it would be almost two months until report cards he seemed to be off to a start that was better than expected.

Kayla also seemed to be doing fine; Emily’s morning-coffee contacts with her teachers weren’t quite as good as they’d been in elementary school but she wouldn’t be surprised at all A’s again. Marcia Halloran, the phys. ed. teacher, had told her that Kayla was doing very well in that class and was showing some leadership with the other students.

The only concern that Marcia had voiced was the same old issue with Kayla and her shoes. Try as she might, she just couldn’t keep shoes on that kid! It was nothing new, it went clear back before preschool. Kayla had grown up some in response and would wear shoes if told to, but would happily walk through snow barefoot rather than wear them voluntarily. With all that bare-footing, her feet were tough and could take walking on anything. To be honest, Emily was just as happy that the kid didn’t create a large shoe bill for the family. It could have been a lot worse – Shae had told her that even with a special oddball deal she had worked out, a set of really nice heels in her size fifteen could cost her as much as a thousand bucks!

Emily had told Mrs. Halloran that she had no problem with Kayla going barefoot in gym class so long as it was all right with her parents, and that seemed to take care of that problem. The real problem was that Mr. Beverson, the cross-country coach, didn’t seem to get the message. Kayla would go running by herself barefoot, but when she was under Mr. Beverson’s eye she had to have running shoes on. Kayla complained that they were heavy and slowed her down, and Emily, no runner, could well believe her. The middle school cross country schedule was pretty much the same as the high school schedule – the races didn’t take that long to run, so they ran several classes. Kayla was one of the faster girls on the seventh grade team and had pretty much had top five finishes, so there really wasn’t that much to be concerned about. Emily thought that Kayla was cutting herself off on a lot of good things in school, especially socially, by passing up cheerleading for running. But it was her decision in the end, and if the ongoing hassle over shoes proved anything, it was that Kayla wasn’t quite the same girl her mother had been.

There was one more upside to Kayla being on cross-country – it didn’t require as much time going to the meets that watching her go cheer would have taken. It was considerably nicer to stand around talking with the other parents at a meet than it would have been to spend all that time on the hard bleachers in all the noise. As tight as her schedule was, what with the store, the paper, the city, the new business and everything else, that was a blessing. It was going to be worse next year – it was dead certain that JJ would be playing football, which would add up to a lot of bleacher butt. Next fall she was going to have to find the time to be a good sports parent, and if that meant that she’d have to cut back on something else, that was what it meant.

Fortunately the benefit fell together easily, with only a few phone calls. People wanted to help, so about all Emily had to do was to light the fuse and get out of the way. Getting Dayna involved was the key, and it had been no great trick – all it took had been mentioning the idea and Dayna was running ahead of her. Emily was mildly curious as to how her friend had talked Cold Spring Rain into doing the concert for free, but just as glad that she’d done it. The group had had a couple of big hits back when she and Dayna were in high school and nothing much since, but they still played several dates a year. She and Kevin had caught a concert of theirs back when Emily had still been in high school, and he had been stationed down at Grissom Air Force Base a hundred miles south. It must have been when she’d been a senior, she thought – it was after they’d gotten engaged, the summer before her senior year. They’d been married shortly after she graduated, and was pregnant with Kayla soon afterwards.

Emily realized that it had cut her off from college, from adventures like some of her friends had experienced. There had been a few moments of regret, but only a few. Staying in Bradford when her friends scattered had been hard, but there were still a few left in the area. When Vicky had come home after being away in college and her marriage, it brought a close one back and they’d been close ever since. Dayna was often around too, and Sandy had become a friend in the process. Though they were still on the road six and eight months a year, they made their permanent home base in Bradford. Music was a talent that Emily wished she had, but there had been no trace of it.

It was true that most people in Bradford considered Dayna and Sandy to be a little strange, because for Bradford, they were. They never admitted to being lesbians, but there was little doubt – Emily knew from her own two eyes that they slept in the same bed, and a couple times she’d caught them in a hot lip lock when no one was looking. Whatever really was going on, they led an interesting life.

The benefit had been thrown together in a hurry, and thinking about Dayna and Sandy made Emily remember that Dayna had been talking about getting a third group for the concert, something for the country music fans, which there were a good many of around Bradford. Now, as she drove westward, she wondered if Dayna had found one. Easily solved; as far as she knew the pair was in Maryland for their last weekend at a renaissance faire, and would be heading back Monday. While Emily normally didn’t like to use her cell phone while she was driving, the traffic was light right now. She picked up the phone and punched the button to call Dayna.

Her friend answered right away, and Emily explained that Dave seemed to be doing as well as could be expected, and that she was on the road from taking JoAnne to New York.

“Well, we’re heading home, too,” Dayna replied. “What with this terrorist thing they canceled the renfaire this weekend, so there was no point in sticking around. We’re on the Pennsylvania turnpike, just coming up on Pittsburgh.”

“I’m on 80, just coming up on Youngstown,” Emily smiled, “so I’m a little ahead of you for once. Did you manage to get a country music act?”

“I’m pretty sure I’ve got the Michigan Hillbillies talked into it,” Dayna reported. “But we figured we’d better be home to nail it down, so that’s part of the reason we hit the road.”

“Good deal, we’re going to pack the gym,” Emily reported. “I’m hoping we can start selling tickets tomorrow, if Lloyd got them printed.”

“Good, we’ll be around, maybe we can do some promos,” Dayna agreed. “Since they canceled us we get two weekends off, and then it’s off to Georgia for a month. We’re solid up till December after that, and then we’re not sure for a while. We’re thinking that we might just lay over in Florida for a while, catch some rays before we have to head back to freeze our butts in a Michigan winter while we work up a couple new shows and a new album.”

Emily giggled to herself. “That’s the place down by Tampa you were talking about, I’ll bet.”

“Most likely,” Dayna laughed. “It’s really a neat place to unwind.”

Emily knew darn well what they were talking about. Dayna had told the story long before of stopping off at a big nudist resort one time back before Sandy’s marriage, and trading a free show for a couple nights parking. They’d prepared to do one of their raunchier club acts, considering the location, but when they saw the number of kids in the audience made a flying switch to one of their grade school acts – with a few minor changes since they had been dressed about like their audience. It turned out that it was really a family atmosphere, much to their surprise, and they stopped off for a week or so every now and then. Emily doubted that her friends were serious nudists, but also had little doubt that they’d run around with their clothes off if there was a good reason.

“Better you than me,” Emily shook her head. That was a story that was also pretty well known around Bradford – there were plenty of reasons that in spite of Eve and Jennlynn, Dayna was still considered to be the black sheep of the Class of ’88. But they were black sheep that Emily was proud to have as friends.

On the Thursday before the show, Emily was working at the Spee-D-Mart when she got a call from JoAnne. “Dave and Shae are going to drive in for the concert,” she reported. “They’re going to take off after Shae wraps Friday. They’ll get in early Saturday morning and drive back Sunday.”

“Good,” Emily replied. “I’m sure there are people here who will want to see him. How’s it going with him?”

“Not as well as we hoped,” JoAnne sighed. “We thought it was going pretty well, but they let him and Shae go up to his apartment to get some things, and, well, the place was so full of Julie that he couldn’t take it. We had to have Eve make a fast trip up here to talk to him. He’s better now, but it’s clear he won’t be able to live there again. Eve is even beginning to agree that it would do him well to be out of New York for a while. He said the other night that if he was back in Bradford he wouldn’t have to see the smoke of Julie’s funeral pyre every time he steps out the door.”

“He’s thinking about coming back here?” Emily said in surprise. From what they’d talked about any possibility of that the week before, he’d seemed pretty committed to staying in New York and not coming back to Bradford.

“That’s part of why he and Shae are coming,” JoAnne replied. “You remember Maude Perkins’ house, across the street from mine? It’s been empty since she died, and he’s going to take a look at renting it.”

“Well, this is a surprise,” Emily exclaimed. “I sure didn’t expect this. JoAnne, if there’s anything I can do on this end, you just let me know, all right?”

“Just try to let him know that if he does decide to come back to Bradford he’ll be welcome,” JoAnne said.

As Emily thought about it after the phone call ended, she was sure she could detect that JoAnne had been putting some pressure on Dave to make the move back. At a minimum it would bring her only grandchildren closer to her, kids she hardly ever saw.

The local slang term for kids leaving Bradford to move to jobs and lives in the city was “taking the on-ramp,” referring to the freeway out of town. Dave had taken the on-ramp harder than most, and Emily’s impression was that he was thoroughly citified. He’d spent most of the time since graduating from Bradford living on Manhattan. He’d even told Emily that he’d never even owned a car since possessing one there was a pain in the butt; he’d rented a car on the odd instances he’d needed one. If he moved back, she couldn’t help but think that Bradford would be mighty small potatoes to him. On the other hand, maybe he needed the change of pace – there was no way of telling at this distance.

While it would be nice to have Dave back in a way, she wasn’t altogether sure it was the right move for him, so she made up her mind that she’d try to be honest and not paint too rosy a picture for him. The next evening she rode the Sportster over to JoAnne’s house and left a note on the door: Give me a call when you get up, maybe we can get together. – Emily.

Sure enough, Dave called early the next morning. In a last minute inspiration, she decided to call Dayna and Sandy to see if they’d like to join in. They might not know what she had in mind but she knew they’d be likely to tell the truth as they saw it, then hopped on her Harley to go meet him.

The Chicago Inn in Bradford was a little over-named, an aging cinder block building that dated back the forty years or so to right after the freeway opened. The locals knew that the prices were better than at the busy twenty-four-hour truck stop on the far side of the freeway, the food less likely to cause heartburn, and the service was more personal. If you went there very often, the waitresses were likely to know your name and ask about your relatives.

It was a couple minutes before Emily made it inside, peeling off her leather jacket on the way. “Sorry I took so long,” she said.

“No problem, we just got here,” Dave smiled. “Nice bike. I’m sorry, Emily, but I have a problem putting Emily Jones, the cheerleader I remember from school, together with Emily Holst, the Harley-riding biker.”

“This time of year, I try to get out with it every nice day I can,” she grinned. “Another month, six weeks at the most, and it’ll have to be put up for the winter, and it’s back to the minivan. So how are you bearing up, Dave?”

“Pretty good, so long as I stay out of lower Manhattan and don’t think about it too much. That’s progress, I guess.”

They talked for a minute before Dayna walked in, wearing jeans, a denim jacket and a T-shirt advertising a renaissance faire in California. “What, no Sandy?” Emily asked.

“She decided to sleep in,” Dayna smiled. “She said that since we were probably going to spend ninety percent of the time talking about people she never heard of, she might as well spend the time productively.” She turned to Dave as she sat down next to him. “Dave, the word is that you’re hanging in there. I was damn awful sorry to hear about your wife. Your mom said she was pretty cool.”

“We were happy,” Dave said. “I’m still having trouble coming to grips with it. It still seems like a bad dream. Then, to have the surprise of Shae and Eve finding me topped it off.”

“Emily said you were camping out with Shae for a while.”

“Yeah, she’s been very generous,” Dave said.

“Have you worked out what you’re going to do yet?” Emily asked.

“Not really,” Dave said. “I can’t go back to Battery Park, that’s clear. Shae has offered to have me and the boys move in with her, and it’s an option to consider. The other one is to come back here for a while.”

“Give up your job?” Emily frowned. “Dave, I hate to tell you, there’s not a lot around here at the kind of money you make, and nothing in your line of work.”

“No, I’d keep the job. We’re exploring an idea for me to work at home, online. The logic behind it is complicated, but it’d work for a year or so. I’ve got to get the boys back in school, and I’d like to do it in a way that’s low pressure, and where I can be pretty involved. Plus, having Mom here would simplify the child-care issues. I couldn’t do it forever, but I’m thinking a year or so will put everything behind me a ways.” He let out a sigh. “As it is now, everything in the city reminds me of it. If I stay inside and keep the TV off, I can get along, but I’m thinking if I can get out of the city for a while, I can get my head back together.”

“Dave, if you decide to do it, I’ll help you in any way I can,” Emily promised. “But I’ll tell you this. Things will be very different here for you, both from what you remember, and what you’re used to.”

“Same here, at least when I’m around,” Dayna promised. “But Dave, remember what Thomas Wolfe said: ‘You can’t go home again.’ It took Sandy and me a while to get established here when we decided to not be on the road all the time, and we’re gone enough that we’re not all that plugged into the town. Sandy and I have each other and we’re used to being pretty independent, so maybe it doesn’t mean as much. It’s going to be dull, boring, and probably pretty lonely for you.”

“At the moment, I think I would welcome dull and boring,” he replied. “Lonely? In spite of everything everyone has done, Mom, Eve, and especially Shae, I’m still missing Julie so bad that I don’t think I can be lonelier. If it doesn’t work, it’s not forever. Realistically, I don’t think I can be this far from the office for much over a year without it impacting my career. It may take me that year to get my head straightened out to where I can work on Manhattan again, anyway.”

“How soon do you have to make up your mind?” Emily asked.

“Quickly,” Dave sighed. “Realistically, this weekend, which is why we came, so I can get a feeling if it would work. I don’t know yet if it will or not, but I can tell you that there aren’t any buildings downtown more than three stories tall.”

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