Maps

"So, what's the catch?" I looked the old woman dead in the eye, refusing to blink first. I couldn't believe it. She looked older than I remembered. Older than she should be. My grip on reality shifted from firm to slipping to, "Ah, shit, I lost it," in seconds. I wanted to walk away. I wanted to get to Maury's Bakery and Breads to enjoy a chocolate croissant and coffee like I had planned. But it was starting to look like that particular self-indulgence may have to wait.

I had taken my usual route to Maury's. There had been no reason not to. It's an eleven-minute walk, or about 1,215 steps, from my apartment building to the bakery, depending on how much pep I have in my step. When you walk the same path day in and day out, you sometimes need to find new means of entertainment. Mine was counting, it seemed. It could also be measured as a little over half a mile or five-ish minutes. Whatever, I'm sure you get the point. I'd done it at my mother's knee since I was a kid. Back then, I would count the pushpins she had stabbed into our kitchen wall. I would trace my fingers along the maps she'd pinned up, dreaming of the adventures she promised we would one day have.

There was always a steady stream of men coming and going from the house. I'd have been suspicious about their intent with my mother, but I already knew well enough. It never bothered me; some would even spend time with me, playing action figures or catch. Mom said they were there to help with research. Dad died before I knew him, so it was just mom and me growing up. She would sometimes let me play around with his things. I'd dress up like him for Halloween and wear whatever I could fit into. On my tenth birthday, she gifted me his compass. They had had a matching pair marked with an ornate compass rose on the closed cover. She told me she had been waiting for the right time to give it to me. That it was her most precious item of his. When he had surprised her with them, he had told her that as long as they have these, no matter how far the distance, he would always find his way back to her. Now, she wanted me to have it.

There was a short time when we were apart. A few other grownups had come to the house and taken me away in a car with a police escort. I wasn't old enough to know then that mom was ill. She had to spend some time away with doctors who, she said, "tried to scramble her brain." It wasn't long until we were back together, though. And mom never had to go away like that again. She moved the maps to our basement, so we spent much more time there. She would work for hours, writing who knows what and drawing different marks on the maps. I would ask about my dad every now and then. He was an explorer, like her. Well, that's what they called themselves, anyway. I think the most they ever found was a gemstone in Argentina once. But she would always end those talks quickly. She had said it was her fault he was gone and that it was too hard to talk about. That she wished she could go back and make it all right. She wished for that more than anything.

Eventually, I got older and less interested in spending my time at home. I was spending more time with friends, and she was spending more time on occasional day or weekend trips. Mom died when I was seventeen. She had decided to meet with a research team studying an ancient artifact in Botswana. It was meant to be a one-week trip. I would be staying with a buddy of mine while she was gone. We got a call four days after she left from the research team. They told me she had been killed in a fire at the facility. That, due to the facility's condition after the fire was extinguished, her body would not be recoverable. I turned eighteen one month later.

We held a service. There were eighty-nine people in attendance. Twenty-six women, forty-six men, and seventeen children. We placed pictures and items in a box that we buried at Green Pines cemetery. Only thirty-four people made it to the burial plot. The box was lowered into the ground at 2:19 pm. Afterward, I went home and ate dill pickles and vodka until I threw up.

I finished my senior year of high school and attended university, obtaining my degree and officially joining the ranks of the nine-to-five workforce. I've been at it for ten years. Well, okay, nine years, ten months, and sixteen days...ish. Architectural design. Now I get to draw my own maps. How do you like that, mom? She'd be proud, I bet. I am. I've had to do this crap all on my own. But hey, life happens. You only get one shot at this... right?

"What's the catch?" I repeated myself to the woman. Her eyes were that of a mad woman. She didn't speak, and I grew impatient.

"Who the hell are you, lady?" I already knew the answer. Though I didn't understand it.

"My father is dead. Has been for nearly thirty years, so sorry. I'm not buying whatever bullshit you're selling. Excuse me." I moved to get around her, but she grabbed my arm.

"I found him," she said. Her voice was hoarse, dry.

I looked at her again. Her eyes were the same. But she must have aged thirty years in the fifteen years since I last saw her. She gripped my hand and forced something into it. I recoiled, afraid that this woman might mean me harm. But the object felt familiar. I looked down to see my mother's compass in my hand. I reached into my pocket and took out my father's compass, its a longtime partner.

"I found him!" she repeated, catching my attention.

"But... how? How is he...? How are you...?" I couldn't get the words out of my mouth.

"I'll show you," she said. "But..." She looked into my eyes. "But I cannot go with you."

"Go where?"

"I found a way to get your father back," she said.

"You must go. Now. We will all be back together on the other end. Take the compass. Follow this." She shoved a rolled-up piece of paper in my hand.

"Take it. And follow it every step of the way. Do it now. I will see you on the other side." She leaned in and embraced me. My body pressed hard against hers, welcoming her embrace again.

"My boy. My beautiful, beautiful boy." She said. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. Now go!" She pushed me away and started screaming.

"GO!"

I stumbled back nearly falling. I turned away and started walking away from the scene. I turned back when the shouting stopped, and she was gone. As if in to thin air. I the distance back to my apartment and ungripped my hands from the items in them. Two compasses and, I unscrolled the paper, a map.