Travel to Gravelton

                                                                       I

It’s autumn here in the town of Sharkall, and a beautiful one at that. Labor Day was a couple of weeks ago, and you can feel the weather starting to change. Temperatures dropping ever so slightly, and the green in the cherry trees on my lawn were starting to wash away as they began their metamorphosis to a more vibrant orange or red

My lawn is where I am this morning. It’s where I like to be. I’ve got a rake in my hand and I’m raking up the leaves that have already begun to fall. Very Zen. Very peaceful. I’m in my own little world of contentment right now.

Beep

The sound of the horn of my neighbors Beetle rips me out of my content world. I look over my shoulder, and there she is, Jasmine Malloy, the green-eyed ginger chatterbox waving at me energetically from the driver’s seat with a huge grin on her face. Just to be polite, I smile and nod at her, before I turn my attention back to my lawn.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

I take a deep breath. I know what she’s doing. She wants me to go to her, probably to rope me into helping her with one of her errands. Well, tough crap, because I’m not moving from this spot.

BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP.

The battery on that bug can die for all I care…

BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP.

Oh for God’s sake!

I sigh in resignation as I drag myself and my rake over to her, dreading the conversation that’s going to start.

 “What?” I ask.

“Are you doing anything right now?” she asks.

Is that a serious question is she just blind? I point to my rake and shrug my shoulders in astonishment.

“Good!” she said, flashing that million-watt smile of hers. “Let’s take a ride.”

And there it is. That’s the phrase she uses whenever she wants to tug me along as a pack mule because she’s too annoying to keep a man and too cheap to have things delivered.

“Naw, I’m good. You go on ahead.”

I turn around to go back to my lawn without even giving her a chance to respond. Hopefully she got the message. But my hop was dashed when I hear her car door open.

“Aw, come on!” she exclaims as she follows me. “It’s just a quick run to Gravelton! No big deal.”

She’s barely five feet two, so I have to look down at her. I almost flinch at her outfit because it’s as loud as her personality. Wearing a pink t-shirt with multicolored polka dots and white pajama pants with yellow smiley faces with matching socks and brown Birkenstocks, you can’t convince me that she didn’t just roll out of bed and out the front door. 

“En, Oh. Spells ‘Forget it’” I say. I normally wouldn’t talk to her like that, but she’s a bit of an oddball. Sometimes I have to speak oddball language.

She looks at me with her green eyes, and they were getting a little glassy. “Look, I just have to pick up something. Something real important. But the lady said she’d only hold it for a couple of hours so I have to get it now.”

I’m slightly curious now. “What is it?”

“It’s...personal. I’d rather not say.”

I turn and start walking. She instantly grabs my arm.

“Okay! Okay! Okay!” She pulls her phone out of her pocket and shows me a picture. “It’s this.”

“It’s a doll,” I say.

“Uh-huh.”

“It’s a Raggedy Ann doll.”

“Uh-huh.”

“It looks pretty old.”

“It is old,” Jasmine said as she puts the phone back in her pocket. “My grandmother had one exactly like this. She was going to give it to me before she died, but then, the fire happened.”

“Right,” I sigh. Jasmine had told me about the fire at her grandparent’s home once. It was a freak accident, apparently lighting truck a nearby tree and caused it to ignite and fall on their house. Fortunately nobody was there, but her grandparents lost everything in the ensuing fire.

“I’ve been searching for years for this doll…it’s so rare. And this woman in Gravelton has one but said she’d only hold it for a while before she ships it off.” She clasps her hands together and bows her head. “Matt, I’m begging you, can you please come with me?”

“That doll doesn’t look particularly heavy,” I reply. Usually when she drags me on these trips, it’s because she needs someone to carry stuff. 

“Things…seem to go better when you’re around,” she says as she twiddles her thumbs.

Oh, this little charmer. I hand her my rake. “Can you at least run this through your hair? I gotta go get my bookbag.”

She smiles again. She knows me well enough to know that she just saddled a mule for the day.

                                                           II

Gravelton is 90 minutes away from Sharkall and is a straight shot on the highway. We’re about 75 minutes into this trip, well past the point of no return, but it feels like an eon. Even with the seat pushed all the way back I felt like Shaq crammed into a clown car.

I try to concentrate on pretending to sleep, cradling my bookbag like a teddy bear, mainly to avoid Jasmine’s chatter. I tend to get drowsy on car trips anyway, and probably would have nodded off for real by now if the stiffness in my knees wasn’t keeping me up.

I feel the car slowing down. I turn to Jasmine.

“What are you doing?” I ask.

 “It’s not me,” Jasmine says as she guides the car to the side of the highway. “The car is sick.”

“I glance over at the gauges. The car’s not sick…it’s starving.

“Seriously?” I say to her. “You didn’t fill up the gas tank?”

“I was in a rush!”

I throw up my hands in frustration. “Oh for God’s sake!” I exclaim. “Well I guess we can call Triple A for a tow.”

“I have a better idea,” Jasmine says, craning her neck out of the window. 

I just glare at her. “I know you’re not thinking about…”

She popped open the door and stepped out and threw up her thumb.

This chick is out of her mind. Hitchhiking is dangerous as hell, and besides, she looks like a diminutive clown who forgot her makeup, and I look like a vagabond with my bag, beard, and ripped clothes. Nobody with a brain in their head is gonna pick us up.

I barely finish my thought when a silver Mercedes slows to a stop about 20 feet in front of the Beetle. Jasmine runs to the passenger side window, I trail behind her as he long bearded shadow, just to make sure some psycho doesn’t hook her in the mouth like a trout and drag her off to Hell. After talking with the driver for a few more seconds, she turns to me.

“This guy knows the address where we’re going,” she said. “He even knew the seller’s name before I even mentioned it. I think he’s a local to Gravelton.”

I peek inside the window. He’s a local alright. He’s a local I know.

“Greg?” I ask.

“What’s up Matt?” Greg replies. “I thought I recognized you!”

I break out in a huge grin. Greg is an old buddy from way back. I didn’t think he’d be back this soon though, he normally spent summers in Maine, and takes his sweet time coming back.

“Aw dude, am I glad to see you!” I exclaim. “Think you can give us a lift to this place we’re trying to get to?”

“Sure thing fella, get in.”

I get into the passenger seat while Jasmine get into the backseat. Jasmine taps me in the shoulder.

“See?” she says. “I told you things go better when you’re around.”

“What’s she talking about?” Greg asks.

“Nothing,” I reply.

And with that, we get to ride the rest of the way to Gravelton in luxury.

                                                                       III

Greg drops us off in front of an old mansion that looks like something out of an Evil Dead movie. At least he left us with an open invite to crash at his place if we can’t get the car taken care of today. I’d be surprised if it was still there after we just left it on the highway like that.

 Jasmine knocks on the door, and the door is answered by a ginormous human being, who looked like he could have been Frankenstein’s twin brother.

“Yes?” he said.

“Hi!” Jasmine says, flashing that smile of hers again. “I’m here to see Mrs. Lucas. I’m supposed to pick up a doll.”

“Oh, yes, please come in,” says the man.

For the outside of the house to look so old and decrepit, the inside of the house looked, relatively normal. Old rustic furniture. Antiques everywhere. Everything looked clean and in shape, but just old. The man guides us to the master bedroom where we meet a frail old lady sitting in a rocking chair, looking at an old photo album.

“Excuse me,” Jasmine says. “But are you Mrs. Lucas?”

The lady looks up and smiles sweetly. “Yes I am Jasmine,” she says. “You look just like you grandmother. Were you named after her too?

Jasmine flinches. “Yes, actually. You…knew my grandmother?”

“Oh yes, quite well. We were childhood friends back in California.” She waves her over to her look at her pictures. “See, you look just like her!”

Jasmine’s eyes widen. She definitely knew that was her grandmother, even though those pictures are old and grainy.

When I heard that someone with that name was looking for this doll, I figured that it must be fate. Your grandmother and I each won a doll at a fair back in 1938. We promised each other that we would never let these go.” Mrs. Lucas’s face fell. “When I heard about the fire I reached out. We spoke, and reminisced, but I wished I could do more to help her.”

“It was a total loss,” Jasmine says, wiping a tear from her eye. “Nobody could do anything but help with rebuild.”

“And that’s what I want to do,” Mrs. Lucas says. “Take the doll. And see those albums on the bed? Take those off my hands too.”

“Ma’am, I couldn’t…”

“No, I insist. I know some of those pictures are duplicates of what your grandmother had. I’m sure you’ll appreciate them.”

“Thank you,” she says solemnly.

Me and Frankenbro are standing in the doorway listening to all of this. I can’t help but smile a little. It looks like Jasmine got her treasure, and maybe even a little more. Maybe she even got a little closure.  As for me, I’m just glad I thought enough to stick a couple of disposable shopping bags in my bookbag. Looks like I’ll be doing some schlepping today after all. But I’m sure it can wait until these ladies finish their visit.

                                                           IV

Three weeks have passed since that trip to Gravelton. I’m out on my front yard raking leaves, when I see Jasmine pull into her driveway. I smile and nod at her.

She stepped out wearing a black pants suit. She only dresses that way when someone dies.

“Hey,” I say. “How was the meeting?”

“It was fine, I suppose.” She replies as she gets out of the car. I guess not even she could be a ball of energy all the time. She doesn’t even walk on my lawn this time, and opts to just lean against the driver door.

The meeting was in regards to the reading of Mrs. Lucas’s will. She had passed on a few days after meeting with Jasmine, and Frankenbro, the executor of her estate, had informed her that apparently Mrs. Lucas had decided to leave her something. Apparently there was no funeral or memorial service to speak of.

“So what happened?” I ask as I walk over to her car.

“So get this,” she says. “Apparently, she left me a few collectibles at her house, and I have to pick them up by the end of the week.”

“I guess you made quite the impression on her,” I say.

“She said I would appreciate them, because I appreciated my grandmother.”  She sniffles and wipes a tear away from her face with her jacket sleeve.

“Want some help picking them up?” I ask.

Jasmine looks me right in the eye. “You really want to?’

“I’d be willing to,” I say.

Jasmine let out a choked chuckle and leans her head on my arm. “Things go better when you’re around,” she says.

I lean back and awkwardly pat her on her head. “Likewise,” was all I can say.