The Road Between

It was just before dusk as I wiped the sweat from my brow, my heart pounding from the heat as I plodded forward just a mile from the next town. The road was dusty gravel and my feet kept sliding against the rocks as I tried to keep a decent pace. My clothes wet and sticking to me as the wind would dry away the beads of salty sweat with each gust. I took another step forward with force and as I did, I realized there was something shining a few steps ahead. I stopped, my body trembling with exhaustion as I bent down to pick up the shimmering item to find a key with a coin on the key chain. The coin had two crossed bones on it and read "Cross Roads Cafe". I couldn't help but be intrigued by the imagery on the coin and the idea of being at a crossroads wasn't far from my mind as I had been walking from my most recent disaster and certainly in need of deciding which direction I would take once I found the next town.

I stepped a little quicker and before I knew it, I had come to an intersection. Now this was no ordinary intersection because it was 6 directional and I could see the two main roads very clearly, but there was a path that continued the direction that I was headed right through the x creating more of an asterisk in the road. My curiosity had the best of me, I could see clearly there was a town 2 miles down the road that was just to my right and another just down another road, but I felt an urgent need to continue ahead. As I stepped past the intersection, the road began to grow dark as the sun began to disappear in the horizon. A thick fog began to rise as I kept walking. I felt refreshed as I kept moving, as if the fog was energizing me, or maybe that was just my adrenaline pumping from my anticipation of what might be through the fog. My mind raced and all I could focus on was keeping my eyes open and aware of my surroundings. I took a deep breath of relief when I came upon a lamp post and I could see another just up ahead so my stride quickened again as I made my way to the next lamp. I could feel myself begin to buzz with anticipation again, feeling my blood pumping through my body as my heart was pounding in my chest. I hadn't even noticed that it was significantly cooler as I continued down this path.

As I walked over a small hill, I could see smoke rising through the fog and a small lantern waving in the wind. The closer I got, I could see it was a small building seemingly all alone in the middle of this dusty road. My stomach growled, my heart beating irregularly, realizing my body is crying for food and water. Joyfully, I realized that the building is a small diner hidden away on this lonely road and as I approached the building I started smelling the delicious scents of country home cooking.

The cool, humid air brushed my face as I walked through the double doors and looked around. I could see there were only a few patrons, and they seemed to be so preoccupied by their food they didn't really notice my arrival. My eyes found a sign just to the right of me that said, "Please Seat Yourself". I saw a booth by the window open, so I took a seat in the corner so as to observe the other patrons as I cooled off. As I sat down I realized that I hadn't seen a server or employee when I walked in, so I hoped someone would see me soon. I could hear nothing but the clinking of forks as the other people were eating. After looking around for a while, I noticed that the menus were resting in a shelf on the wall next to me, so I grabbed on and took a look. All of the meals were called quirky versions of familiar dishes, some bordering vulgar, but none the less a little funny. "Heh, someone has a sense of humor", I thought as I continued to search for something that I might like to eat. A voice chimed in, "Have ya found what you want dear?" startling me as I had never even heard a foot step or felt her approach. I looked up and I saw no one. I looked around and there was no one there but the same people that had been eating when I first came in. I feared being rude, but looked again, then looked in the booth in front of me, and still no one. I sat back down, completely puzzled. I looked some more and decided that I was going to settle on the chicken finger salad sandwich with crispy tater babies. It seemed like the least creepy thing on the menu. The voice chimed in again, "have you figured yourself out yet? Is there anything I can get ya to drink?" Without looking up, I asked for a water and ordered the sandwich. "That it hun? Ya want some blood sauce with your chicken fingers and tater babies?", she asked. I looked up expecting to see her, I could feel her shadow over me, but still I could see no one. None the less, I dismissed the notion that there had been no one there, how could that be, right? As I waited for my food, I realized the people eating were still eating, just facing their plates shoveling food into their faces as the time slipped by, no conversations, no smoke filling any of the corners of the small cafe, just the rhythmic clinking of forks and the occasional sound of a cup being plunked down on the table nearest me.

I leaned against the wall and enjoyed the cool air, putting my feet up on the seat in front of me. I felt something blocking me from moving my foot to the right, but there was nothing there, that I could see. Baffled, I felt as though I was losing my mind, as I gave in and rested my head against the wall. My eyes closed, only for a moment, and when they opened again, I found a red goblet of ice water in front of me. I took a sip from the beautiful glass goblet and the cold water, so refreshingly flowed down, cooling me sending shivers through my body. I felt tingly and so very tired and still wishing for more water as I had easily finished the first glass. I rested my head against the wall and a few moments later reached for the glass without thinking and took a sip, realizing my glass was full again. "How was this happening?" I thought, as I put my face in my hands and stressed as I heard her again. "You enjoy as much of the water as you like, your food should be here in just a moment. Ya did say you wanted some blood sauce, right?" I shook my head, as if to motion "yes", but honestly don't remember if I had even responded to her before. I felt for sure I was losing it, going flat out crazy. I reached my hand across the table to grab the water again and as I took a sip, something was different, the sounds had gone silent, as if everyone had stopped eating all at once. There wasn't a sound in the room. I looked up and it was as if I was in a time loop or something, everyone was sitting straight up staring forward. I slipped out of the booth and ran to the restroom and splashed some water on my face and decided to go ahead and wash up a little bit. I figured maybe I needed to wake up a little bit or something, surely I was suffering from delusions. As I finished up, I walked out and heard the juke box playing "Lonely Teardrops" and there were more people in the cafe, just sitting down as the others still sat there silently.I saw the people seat themselves as if they were familiar with the place. The others, still and silent and I still didn't see any employees. I took my place back at my seat and decided to keep my eyes on the doors where the server would come from with my food. There she was, I thought, "how about that, she is a real person, I haven't gone completely mad" as I watched her go to the table where the other people had just sat down. She brought them drinks and something that looked like fried cheese sticks. I could hear them chatting but not loud enough to hear what they were saying. There were four of them, two men and two women, it looked like they were on a double date. The ladies were wearing dresses with a rockabilly flare and the guys wearing high waist suites with white socks and snazzy shoes. They almost looked like they had fallen in from the past or something. They seemed to be so comfortable, like they didn't even notice the bizarre nature of the other patrons just staring off in space. I looked down at the table and there was my food, with some type of red sauce, I thought might be ketchup, but was definitely not. The song skipped to the next song, a true blast from the past, "Angel Eyes". I recognized it as it started to play and started to feel as if I had slipped into another time for sure. "Who was playing these songs?", I thought to myself. I took a bite of my sandwich, ti wasn't at all what I expected. I thought it would be some form of chicken salad sandwich but instead it was more like a fried chicken sandwich with a blue cheese salad on it. It tasted good, but I couldn't for the life of me figure out what the "blood sauce" was for if it wasn't for the sandwich, it couldn't be for the tater babies, which were just tater tots. I tasted the sauce and it was sweet, like a woody cherry sauce with a little spice to it. I was so hungry I was digging into my food as the world went on around me. When I looked up again, I could see the patrons that were just staring off into space all begin to get up and leave together, none actually realizing each other as they left. I tried not to think too much about it, as strange as it was. It was just me and the other group of people with the 50s clothes left in the diner and now the only sound I could hear was the buzzing of the neon light in the window over my table. My server came back while I had my mouth full and asked how everything was, and I looked up, but still could see no one around. I looked all around, but there was no one. I just spoke out to myself and said, I wish I could see you!! The voice responded, oh, I'm sorry, is this better, and in the blink of an eye she appeared as if she had been hiding in plain sight. I felt my eyes pop right out of my head. I felt myself getting woozy as I looked into her eyes. She looked down and asked again, "did ya want anything else Hun?" I thought for a moment, pie sounded nice, "Do you have vanilla ice cream? If you do I would like a piece of pie with ice cream." She winked, and when she did I could swear she had two sets of eyelids, like a cat. She twirled away and was back in a flash with a piece of chocolate pie with ice cream. She smiled at me and asked where I was headed, and for a moment I felt like this was becoming more normal. I told her that I was not even sure where I was going but I had decided to follow the trail to see where it took me, and that's how I ended up at the cafe. She smiled and walked away for a moment to check on the other group, so I began to eat my pie.

As I finished the pie and ice cream, I looked at the table where the group of couples were sitting and realized they had disappeared. I didn't see them leave, but they were gone. Their table was cleared away and it was like they had never been there. I looked around, there was no one in sight, I could see the wind was picking up outside and I could smell the rain in the air from outside creeping into the building. I started gathering my things, full as could be and took another drink of water, which was magically full with fresh ice all over again. I looked around, I couldn't see anyone, so I placed $20.00 on the table and got up to leave. The server who had been helping me caught me at the door and slipped a note into my pocket as I left and the key with the coin on the key chain fell out of my pocket. As I went to pick it up, she gasped, her eyes met mine again and for that moment I could see myself in her eyes. I picked the key up and she took my hand and just like that I saw myself, like I was looking into a mirror. With my hand in hers she looked right into my soul and told me that I had a moment to make a decision about the direction I was going, and with that, she took the key and pushed me through the double doors and with a flash of light, I found myself on the corner of my childhood street. I realized everything seemed much taller and the trees were just as I remembered when I was a small child. I looked around and saw my mother's old blue Oldsmobile station wagon in our old driveway. I ran with all the energy of a child and saw my mother in the doorway of our house, just as I remember her when I was small. I could see my reflection in the glass door and there I was, standing all of 3 and 1/2 feet tall. My heart sank, I was a child again. I feared repeating my life again and at that very moment my mother came and took my hand leading me to my room and in her very familiar voice she scolded me for being late back to the house and told me it was time for a nap. My mother tucked me into my bed and left the room. I stared at the ceiling and saw the faces that appeared in the popcorn ceiling and found myself dozing off.

When I woke up, I breathed a deep breath, my heart in a panic, hoping that it was all a nightmare. I got up from my bed and felt the fluffy rug under my feet, I looked down and there were my size 9 feet that I was so used to, but they weren't mine, they were different somehow. I stretched and walked into the bathroom, but it wasn't the bathroom from my childhood, it was a new bathroom, I had never been here before, I thought to myself. I looked in the mirror, I didn't recognize the person in the reflection. I closed my eyes again, hoping maybe I was still in my nightmare, but when I opened my eyes again, it was all the same, the reflection of a person I had never seen in a home that was not my own. I fell to my knees and began to pray, tears flowing from my eyes because no matter how unhappy or confused I might have been, I wanted my old life back, not my childhood, but my adult life. As I got up from the floor, I put my hand on my hip and could feel there was something in my pocket, and I remembered the note the server had slipped in my pocket. I pulled it from my pocket and the writing was like nothing I had ever seen before. I couldn't even try to read it, the language looked like symbols or wingdings. I closed my eyes again, and put the letter back in my pocket and as my hand went deeper into my pocket I found the key with the coin on the key chain. I never looked at the back of the coin, but it said, "In the blink of an eye, your life can change, all you have to do is believe it"

I looked down at the coin, the key, and the note, which I had pulled out of my pocket again and I just stared at them.

I closed my eyes, begged for my uncertainty, because at least it was my own, and I wished and focused on my old life. I felt dizzy and nauseous; I felt like I was spinning, I fell to my knees again and closed my eyes tightly as I started to panic. There was a loud "pop" that crackled as it faded out and I opened my eyes.

There I was standing at the crossroads again, but this time there were only 4 directions, the road in between had disappeared altogether along with the key and the coin, but there in my pocket was the note that the server had slipped in my pocket along with my $25.00.