Cross Roads (28 page)

“But Gabriel, I don’t know how!” The lament came from the innermost deep, and it was the most honest cry of his heart. “How do I do that? How do I let you go? I don’t want to, I don’t…”

“Daddy, listen.” And now Gabriel dropped to his own knees so he could look straight into the face of his father. “Listen, I don’t exist here. You’re the one who is stuck here, and it breaks my heart. It’s time for you to leave, to be free, to let yourself feel again. It’s okay, you know, to really laugh and enjoy life. It’s okay.”

“But how can I, Gabriel, without you? I don’t know how to let go of you.”

“Daddy, I can’t explain it to you, but you are already with me; we are together. We aren’t separated in the life-after. You are stuck in the broken part of the world, and it’s time to be free.”

“Then Gabriel,” Tony said, pleading, “then why are you here? How come I can see you?”

“Because I asked Papa God for this gift, Daddy. I asked to be given the gift of coming here to help you put your
pieces back together. I am here, Daddy, because I love you with all my heart, and I want you to be whole and be free.”

“Oh, Gabriel, I am so sorry, to cause you more pain…”

“Stop, Daddy. Don’t you understand? I am not sorry. I wanted to be here. This isn’t about me, this is about you.”

“So what am I supposed to do?” Tony could barely get the words out.

“You walk out of here, right through the walls you built, and you don’t look back. You let yourself go, Daddy. Don’t worry about me. I am better than you can imagine. I am a melody, too.”

At that Tony laughed and wept. “Can I tell you,” he said, struggling with the words, “that it’s really good to see you? Is that okay if I tell you?”

“It’s good to tell me, Daddy.”

“And can I tell you that I love you and miss you terribly and there are times when all I can think about is you?”

“Yeah, that’s good, too, but now it’s time to tell me good-bye. It’s good to tell me good-bye, too. It’s time for you to go.”

Tony climbed to his feet, tears still streaming. “You sound like Grandmother.” He laughed in gasps.

Gabriel grinned and said, “I’ll take that as a compliment.” He shook his head. “If you only knew. It’s okay, Daddy. I am good.”

Tony stood looking at his five-year-old son for a minute. Finally, he took a deep breath and said, “Okay, good-bye, my son! I love you. Good-bye, my Gabriel.”

“Good-bye, Daddy. I’ll see you soon!”

Tony turned away, took a deep breath, and began walking toward the wall near where he had entered. With each step, the floor began to crack like stone striking crystal. He dared not look back, certain he would lose all resolve. The
barrier in front of him shimmered, then turned translucent and then vanished altogether. He heard a rumble behind him and knew without looking that the temple was caving in on itself, that his soul was heaving with transformation. His steps were now sure and certain.

Tony looked up and saw a monstrous wall of water descending on him. It towered above him and he could do nothing except face it and wait for it to sweep him away. He stood and opened his arms wide. The river had returned.

M
aggie?”

“Hey!” squealed Maggie, dropping a cup of flour onto the kitchen counter. “Don’t sneak up on me like that! You know you’ve been gone almost two days since you left me at the hospital with your daughter? Now look at the mess you made, scaring me half to death.”

“Maggie?”

“What?”

“I’m really glad to see you. Maggie, have I told you lately how much I appreciate you? I am so grateful…”

“Tony, you okay? I don’t know where you’ve been, but you’re sounding a little sick, you know, not like yourself.”

He laughed and it felt good. “Maybe, but it’s the best I’ve ever been.”

“Well, just so you know, the doctors might disagree with you. You are not doing so good. We need to talk. I’m going to make this apple pie while we figure things out. Lots has
happened in the two days since you went AWOL, and we need to put together a plan.”

“Apple pie? I love homemade apple pie. What’s the occasion?”

Tony could tell that Maggie was trying not to grin, a unique combination of emotions rising inside her. “Oh, don’t tell me. You’re baking for the policeman, aren’t you?”

She waved her hand and laughed. “Yup, he’s heading over here after shift for a little dessert. We’ve been talking on the phone a lot since you left. He finds me”—she waved her hands like a debutante—“rather mysterious. Just so you know, if I end up kissing him, it will be by accident, and in the moment I will have forgotten about you. Just sayin’. I will truly try not to, but… you know.”

“Great!” sighed Tony, wondering what it would be like to exist as a Ping-Pong ball bouncing between souls.

Maggie talked as she scraped the flour into the sink and then moved from place to place gathering essentials for her mother’s apple pie. “I learned more about you in twenty minutes at the hospital than you told me in all the time you were around inside my head. I was really mad at you for a while, hurting your family like that. Your wife, your ex-wife, is a doll; and that daughter of yours, she’s remarkable and despite everything she still loves you, behind all that fury. And Tony, I’m sorry about Gabriel, really sorry.” She paused. “And what’s with you and Jake? That’s one piece I don’t understand yet.”

“Maggie, slow down,” interrupted Tony. “I’ll answer your questions at some point, but we need to talk about some other things first.”

Maggie stopped her work and looked out the window. “You mean, like being able to heal someone? Tony, that burned me good, getting me to go up there, watching me
love on my Lindsay just so you could get me to lay hands on your sorry…”

“Please forgive me for that, Maggie,” entreated Tony. “But I didn’t know what else to do, and I thought that if I could just get well I could help a lot of people and maybe even rebuild some of the damage I’ve caused. I know it was totally selfish—”

“Tony, stop!” She held up her hand. “It was me that was being selfish, thinking only about what was hurting in my life, what I wanted to have fixed. Not many years ago I lost some precious people in my life, and I just didn’t want to lose another one. I have no right to expect you to use your gift to heal Lindsay. I was wrong, so please forgive me?”

“Uh, forgive you?” Tony was surprised and strangely comforted by her request.

“Yeah, we need to get up there, Tony, and pray the healing prayer over you before those machines run outta gas, and we need to do it sooner than later. Like I said, in the last couple days you’ve been slipping deeper and the doctors don’t think you’re coming back.”

“I’ve been thinking a lot about this healing gift, Maggie—”

“Well, I’m sure you have. But you cannot leave your estate to cats!” She stopped fork-mixing her pie dough and picked up a wooden spoon. “Cats! Now that is one of the nuttiest things I have ever heard. A zebra maybe or a whale or those cute baby seals, but cats?” She shook her head. “Lord have mercy, givin’ away hard-earned cash to cats.”

“Yeah, pretty dumb,” he agreed.

“Well, let’s get you healed so you can fix that little dumbness.” She was waving her spoon in the direction of the window as she spoke.

“I’ve been thinking, Maggie—”

“Tony, you have every right to heal yourself. God gave you that gift so God must trust you with it, and if you decide that healing yourself is the best way to go, I am here to support you 100 percent. Not my place to tell people how to run their lives. I already spend more than my share of energy just judging them… which,” she continued as she waved her spoon again, now covered in flour and butter, “I am trying not to do so much, but it’s a process, I know, and sometimes, I confess, I probably enjoy judging a little too much. I get feeling all superior and think there are certain people who could use a little judging and I just happen to be the one who might can do it best. See, Tony? We are all messes of one sort or another. I’m done with my preaching. What do you think?”

“You make me grin, that’s what I think,” answered Tony.

“Well, then my life is complete.” Maggie chuckled. “Seriously, getting a wedding band from Clarence, then maybe my life would be complete, no offense.”

“None taken.” Tony laughed. “Maggie, I have an idea about how to fix the cat dumbness, but we’re going to need some help. The fewer people the better, and I’m thinking Jake because I don’t think we have a choice, and Clarence because he’s a cop and he’ll make sure we do it right.”

“Tony, you’re scaring me a bit. We pulling a heist or something? Those things never seem to go very well. I watch the movies.”

“It’s not a heist exactly.”

“Exactly? I’m not feeling much better. Is it illegal?”

“Good question. Not sure, sorta gray I think. If I’m not dead yet, I don’t think it’s illegal.”

“And you want to get my Clarence involved in all this?”

“It’s the only way, Maggie.”

“Honey, I don’t want to get Clarence mixed up in this. I’d rather let the cats win.”

“Maggie, we have to.”

“You know I can walk outside and kiss some stray dog, or maybe a cat would be preferable, since you are so stupid for them.”

“It’s never really been about the cats, Maggie. It’s about me. Please trust me on this. We need Clarence’s help.”

“Oh, Lord.” Maggie lifted her face to the ceiling.

“Thanks, Maggie.” Tony continued, “I have a couple issues that I still need to work out. The place we need to get into belongs to me, but no one knows it exists. I set it up for all my private stuff and the security is about as good as it gets. Problem is when the police tried to backtrace the cameras from my condo, my security logged everything off and reset the entry codes, and I can’t get in without them.”

“And why are you expecting any of this to make sense to me?” asked Maggie.

“Sorry. Just thinking out loud.”

“Well, just don’t forget, you thinking out loud is me thinking out loud, and right now what I’m thinking is that I’m confused.”

“Okay, I have a secret place down by the river off Macadam Avenue, but the codes are all reset and there are only three places that I can get the new codes.”

“So get them from one of those,” suggested Maggie.

“It’s a little more complicated than that. A letter with the new code goes to a bank for automatic deposit into a special holding account. That account can only be opened by authorization that is in a safety-deposit box. That box can only be opened if they have a certificate of death.”

“Bummer!” she pointed out. “Not exactly a good option.”

“Option two,” he continued, “isn’t much better. When a code resets like that, it generates automatically an express-mail letter that goes to Loree. She has no idea what it is or why it arrives; it just shows up with no explanation at all. It’s sort of a backup of a backup. No one would think my ex-wife would have anything that mattered to me anyway.”

“Wait!” Maggie interjected. “What does this code look like?”

“It’s just a series of six one- or two-digit numbers, between one and ninety-nine, that are randomly generated,” he explained.

“Like lottery numbers?” asked Maggie, washing her hands quickly in the sink.

“Yeah, I suppose so.”

“Like these?” Maggie reached for her purse on the hallway hook and rummaged through it. Triumphantly, she produced an express-mail envelope and withdrew its contents. It was a single piece of paper containing six numbers, each in a different color.

“Maggie,” Tony exclaimed, “that’s it! How in the world did you…”

“From Loree! I went back up to the hospital to try and help her and Jake with potential arrangements, God rest your soul, and she handed this to me. She said it came just before they left to come here to see you and she stuffed it into her purse on the way out the door. The return address is for your office downtown, she said, but she thought it might mean something to me. I told her I had no idea, but she told me to keep it anyway. I was going to ask you about it, but it totally slipped my mind until you just mentioned it.”

“Maggie, I could kiss you!” Tony yelled.

“Now that would be a little weird,” she responded. “I wonder what would happen? So this is what you needed?”

“Yes! This is the entry code. Let me see the date stamp on the front. Yup, that’s it. Wow, this’ll save us a ton of time.”

“You said there was a third way to get the codes?”

“Won’t need that now. The code is sent electronically to a special keypad that is in my downtown office. Only I know the access code for that keypad, and I thought we might have to go visit the folks where I work under some pretense to sit at my desk. Given he’s my brother, I was thinking that Jake might be allowed to be alone in there.”

“Yeah, but that would have meant…”

“I know, you would have had to kiss him, and this all is pretty complicated already. Now we won’t even have to involve Jake.” He felt a rush of relief. “Which brings me to my second issue.” He paused before asking, “What is your take on Jake?”

“Oh, you mean Jacob Aden Xavier Spencer, your brother?”

Tony was surprised, again. “How did you find out his full name?”

“Clarence pulled a sheet on him. He has a record, you know, not anything major, mostly breaking and entering to support a drug habit a bunch of years ago. Served a nickel in Texas…”

“Nickel? Who says ‘nickel’?”

“Honey, you don’t know my history either or my family heritage, so mind your p’s and q’s.”

“My apologies. Please, go on,” he encouraged, grinning again.

“Yesterday I spent a couple hours with Jake up at the hospital. He talked a lot about you. Don’t know if you know this, but he worships the ground you walk on. He told me you were the only reason he’s alive. You protected him growing up when everything went crazy. Then you got
separated and he got in with a bad crowd, got hooked, and was too ashamed to contact you until he got clean. You are as close to any sense of father that he’s ever known, and he is the loser brother, the failure, the addict.”