The playground called to me. It echoed with silent laughter and ghostly twins chasing each other through the trees and down the slide. It made me ache for moments lost and the little girls Minnie and I had been together. Those little girls were both gone. And I missed them so much that I held my breath, gripping the wrought iron bars of the decorative fence, waiting for the wave of painful longing to abate. When the sorrow ebbed enough for me to breathe again, I moved to the gate, hoping it wasn’t locked, hoping I wouldn’t have to risk impalement trying to scale the spiky fence. I smiled when the latch lifted easily. Feeling a bit like Goldilocks entering unknown territory, I pushed through the gate and let myself in.
FINN WAS ONLY blocks from his dad’s house when he passed a little park and saw a familiar orange Blazer snuggled up to the curb, not another vehicle in sight. He slammed on his brakes and slid in front of his old Chevy, relieved that Bonnie was actually in St. Louis, mystified that she had stopped at a park in an unknown city after midnight, and still pissed about what she’d pulled in Cincinnati.
He could see that Bonnie wasn’t in the Blazer as he approached, but he peered into the back windows to make sure she hadn’t crawled into the backseat and fallen asleep again. He couldn’t make out anything but a few of his boxes, Bonnie’s duffle bags, and a lumpy blanket, but as he pulled back and turned away, he noticed the dark streaks on the driver’s side window. In the half-light of the tall street lamps, the streaks looked like blood. Finn grabbed at the door handle, suddenly afraid of what he’d find slumped across the front seat, but the door was locked.
His stomach filled with ice and his hands shook as he framed them around his face to see inside the dark interior. He couldn’t make out a shape or a form, but the light made strange patterns against the seat and camouflaged the floor in shades of black.
“Bonnie?” he yelled, and looked under and around the Blazer. There was no trail of blood outside the vehicle, no macabre footprints walking away. He wished he could open the damn door! He tried to see in again from another angle, looking this time through the passenger window, and felt a measure of relief when he confirmed that Bonnie wasn’t unconscious in the front seat.
“Bonnie?”
He set out through the park at a brisk pace, his eyes scanning benches and quiet corners until after about five minutes, the path curved around and he saw, among the trees, a small play area. He rushed toward it, knowing intuitively that she was there. A girl like Bonnie would be drawn to the playground. Sure enough, standing tall on the top of a steep, metal slide was Bonnie Rae Shelby, feet planted on the platform, hands in her pockets, face to the sky. Was it the bridge all over again? It felt like a loop of the first time he saw her, and the relief he felt at finding her was immediately overpowered by the same dread he’d felt when he’d seen the blood on the car window.
The gate was hanging open, evidence that she’d passed through it. He slipped through it too, grateful that he wouldn’t have to make a sound. He wanted to call out to her, to tell her to come down, or to at least sit down, but he was afraid he would startle her and cause her to fall. So he froze, her name on his lips, his heart at his feet. She didn’t seem upset. She didn’t seem to be crying. He moved a few steps closer, but her face was angled away, the curve of her cheekbone the only thing visible from the angle he approached. There were no dark streaks on the pale pink of her coat, so no obvious bleeding. She seemed entranced by the view from the top of the slide and completely at ease with the height.
I’m just a poor wayfarin’ stranger
Travelin’ through this world of woe
There’s no sickness, toil or danger
In that bright land to which I go
Her voice rang out like bells across the park, and Finn took a step back, the sound as shocking as it was sweet.
I’m goin’ there to see my Father
And all my loved ones who have gone on.
Just a poor wayfarin’ stranger
Travelin’ through this world of woe.
He didn’t recognize the song. He’d never been to church, and the only song his mother had ever sung was the theme song to Cheers. And she’d sung it badly. This was something different, so different as to be incomparable. And Bonnie, singing for no one but the stars and the hovering trees, sang the words like a broken hallelujah, a heartsick hosanna, and the song echoed in his chest as if he hummed along with her.
I know dark clouds will gather ‘round me
I know my way is hard and steep
But wide fields arise before me
Where God’s redeemed, their vigil’s keep.
I’m goin’ there to see my brother.
He said he’d meet me when I come
Just a poor wayfarin’ stranger
Travelin’ through this world of woe.
The last note hung in the air for a full five seconds and Finn realized he was holding his breath. He told himself that was the reason for the tightness in his chest and the moisture at the corner of his eyes. He wanted her to sing again. But she had clearly finished the only number she was going to perform. She dropped her chin to her chest and sank to the little metal platform, her legs stretched out in front of her, positioned for a turn down the slide.
Relatively safe from being startled into a fall, her arms wrapped around the bars at the top of the slide, Bonnie didn’t even turn as Finn approached, and she seemed oblivious that anyone might have heard her concert in the park. He circled the slide and stood at the bottom, looking up at her.
She blinked and then gasped a little, as if she thought for a moment he wasn’t real. Then she smiled. It was a smile that said she was thrilled to see him and overjoyed by his presence. She’d smiled like that when he’d promised her he would wait for her outside of the Quik Clips. She had smiled at him like that when he’d told her they were going to have to spend the night in the Blazer in the middle of a blizzard. She’d smiled that way when he told Shayna and her girls he would get them home. Now she smiled at him, sitting there on top of the slide as if it made perfect sense for her to be there, like she hadn’t just stolen his vehicle and led him on a chase across two states. She smiled at him, her whole face infused with light, and he forgave her. Instantly. No longer furious. No longer scared. No longer ready to strangle her, tie her up, and call the police. All of that was gone—evaporated like snowflakes on his tongue.