A son grows up in a hurry and a mother gets still more lessons in the way a 16 year old mind works.
Missouri is a beautiful state inundated with rolling hills filled with wonders of nature. It is worth a day's pay to play hooky from work just to drive around during mid-October and let your eyes and mind enjoys nature. The magnificent coloring she can do with trees and scrubs is worthy of the best from Claude Monet or Vincent van Gogh. October 19th was that kind of day. It is a clear, crisp morning, with only the haze hanging just about the ground as Dixie was making plans to take her new car and just 'be lazy.'
"Mom can I use your car today?"
"No, Mike. Dad just brought the car home last night and I have plans today. No. I'm sorry."
"Mom. Please. It's really important."
"Mike, you just got your license last week. It's too soon." Dixie looked to be thinking as hard as she could to come with a reason other than 'no'.
Mike is a good kid. Young, but a good kid to the bone and had never given his mother any reason to doubt or worry about him. She had seen as he grew and matured if he said something it was locked into concrete.
Try as she might the only answer was still the same. "Mike, no. I'm sorry. Dad bought that brand new car for me for my birthday and I'm taking off for the afternoon today to enjoy it. I'm sorry son, but the answer has to be no.
That said, Mike hugged his mothers neck and threw his backpack on his arm and ran for the school bus. This was going to be embarrassing. He had anticipated his mother wrongly so his normal ride did not come by to pick him up.
The school bus had just turned the corner when Dixie's phone rang.
"May I speak with Mike?" The voice on the other end sounded strained.
"No. I'm sorry he just left for school. Can I take a message?"
"Is this his mother?" The strained voice honestly queued.
"Yes, may I ask who is calling?" There was a long 30 seconds of dead phone time before the voice said almost in tears, "Mrs. Piggy, Imma's mother. Did you let him use your car today?" The two women had never met and this conversation was on the verge of getting uncomfortable.
That question seemed out of place but Dixie was civil, as she answered a flat "No. He took the bus to school." There was another long pause before Dixie asked, "Why? Why is it important to you he drive my car today?"
Before the conversation could get any more uncomfortable, Mrs. Piggy took a deep breath and said, "I guess he hasn't told you yet." There was that long dead air phone air again before Mrs. Piggy told the whole story, or as much as she thought necessary at this time. "My daughter, Emma was to have her first chemotherapy this morning and Mike had said he would pick her up during his lunch hour and see to it she got home OK." She continued with, "I thought you knew they were friends."
After hearing the cancer word Dixie felt bad about the car and quickly finished the conversation with Ms. Piggy and called Mike on his cell.
"Mike. Why didn't you tell me THE REASON you wanted the car today?"
He tried to answer but his signal was weak and being inside the schools sturdy brick study hall's walls did not help. He did say, "Mom, I'm hearing another voice on the line. It's like a whisper."
"Whisper?" Mom was confused.
Mike tried to help by saying, "I've been hearing ghost voices for a few days and think my batteries need replacing."
She let that pass as she was busy telling him Dad would drop off the car to him so he could keep his promise. She emphasized her point of making sure he was not to go anywhere other then the hospital. "Mike, this is a wonderful thing you're doing, but you have to make sure I have the car, at work, as soon as possible after your last class."
"Yes, Ma'am!"
"Hello Dad?"
"Mike? Hi son. What's that sound in the background? It sounds like 'clicking'"
"Dad… not sure. Ooh… It might be the wrecker. I must have taken a wrong turn on the river road after I dropped Imma off at her house. The pavement stopped. There was nowhere to turn around… and… and… my foot slipped off the brake pedal." The raw nerves could be sensed, as this was a 16-year-old man on the phone now, not the kid that went to school this morning.
"Mike, are you hurt? Are you OK? You're starting to break up. Do you need for me to come get you?"
"Dad… can you hear me now?"
"Mike... Mike…" He was speaking into a dead phone and did not hear his son tell him he was OK but wet and cold.
Today had not been a fun time for Mike and it was not getting any better as he asked the wrecker driver to stop and unload the car just outside his mother's work window. She was standing, looking out at a clear crisp fall afternoon. Her serene expression went from happy to wide-eyed disbelief to anger to wonderment to motherly love as she saw her son safe and in one-piece standing before her new car still hoisted high by its front wheels as water and mud still drained from the trunk.
A wicked Cajun Fairy named Robes Pierre entered the impenetrable Magical doll land of Sha Bebe. Queen Faustina, the ruler of the doll land, thought she had destroyed him, but he's back! Will the doll land survive his evil ways?
It's almost Christmas. Lynn Basil is writing her last book about a secret entrance into the magical doll land of Sha Bebe that she loves so much. Bagannos have taken over the world! Lynn finally meets her dolls in real life. Can she write in a Secret
