A Journey Within

3

During the eight and a half hour overnight flight, Lisa had plenty of time to think. She'd planned on sleeping most of the way, but as luck would have it, fifteen minutes after take-off the man behind her produced a consistent snore so loud that there was no way possible to block him out even when she turned to put one ear against the back of the seat and cover the other ear with her small, airline pillow plus her balled up coat on top of that. She exchanged a grimace with her seat partner who had the same problem. She would have to suffer the auditory assault for what she knew they all hoped was not the entire remainder of the flight.

Closing her eyes trying to drum out the noise she thought back. The week had gone by quickly. In the span of six days, she had contacted the lawyer, arranged for her mail to be held, and had to fill out paperwork for her vacation time. The district manager had given her a bit of trouble, however when Lisa proved to him that she had not taken a vacation in the last four years, he had no other choice but to let her take the next couple weeks off in order to take care of family business.

 Lisa also had time to remember her Aunt Meri and all the fun she had with her when she was a little girl. She remembered the creek behind the house and wading in it to catch minnows. When Meri went with her, she always managed somehow to lose her hat and the two of them would have to try to catch it as it flowed downstream. What a site they must have been, splashing around in the water, yelling and laughing at the hat to come back to them, though of course it never did. Lisa also remembered picking berries in the woods beyond the stream and how when she pricked her finger, her aunt would wrap it in the handkerchief she always carried, wave her hand over it back and forth and back and forth until the blood was gone. Aunt Meri would say that a little blood on the stem was what made the berry so sweet.

 A tear slid down Lisa's cheek and her nose started to run. She dug in her purse and found one of the handkerchiefs that found it's way back home in Lisa's purse on her last visit. She and her aunt had gone to an auction and as Meri was paying for her carload of purchases, she had to dig through her purse to find her checkbook. She always carried one of those purses that looked more like a suitcase so every time she had to look for something, inevitably it was at the bottom of the purse and on this one occasion, Meri started grabbing handfuls of things from her purse and plopping them on the counter. Several things fell off and on to the floor and Lisa had to retrieve them from the quickly as a line formed behind them. Meri who was busy writing the check by this time, told her to just stuff them in her pockets then she could give them back to her when they got home. The handkerchief with her aunt's embroidered initials got lost in Lisa's own purse and never returned to Meri. Lisa cherished it dearly.

By the time the plane touched down in St. Louis, Lisa had time to take a short nap, people watch and her least favorite of all, ponder her sad excuse for a life once again. It wasn't any surprise that when she departed the plane, her face wore the expression of a woman much older and sadder than the determined one she had when she boarded the plane over eight hours before. It wasn't any wonder the clerk at the rental car desk eyed at her with pity. At least that's how Lisa viewed felt.

Directions at hand and a GPS in the car helped Lisa feel more confident on this leg of her journey. She had a vague recollection of how to get to Tonnelsville from where she was now. Usually when she drove from home, she came from a different direction. She'd been a youngster when her family first took this route, but reassured herself that when she got closer, the geography would look more familiar and she'd make it there just fine. By her estimation, she would arrive in Tonnelsville around noon. Hopefully her aunt's attorney wouldn't be at lunch then. Lisa wanted to get the keys to the house as soon as possible and find a comfortable, fluffy surface to take a short nap.

Though it was a mid-February morning, the roads and surrounding rural scenery for the trip, appeared as if it hadn't snowed in quite awhile. One fear alleviated. She'd thought she'd have to fight the snowy Missouri climate on the two-lane roads toward Tonnelsville. Hopefully the rest of her short visit would be as problem free as this part of the journey.

Tonnelsville was exactly as she remembered it. Exactly how she still saw it in dreams when her life was floundering and her subconscious brought her back to the only place where happiness seemed more the norm than the exception. She drove around the town square a couple of times just to check it out. There were a couple store names she didn't recognize and one or two she realized that were no longer there. "That's what happens because of these big box stores now- adays. Little stores can't survive any more." She could hear her aunt Meri's voice in her head. Aunt Meri said that to her in many of her phone conversations when they spoke about the her little antique store and the women's store where Lisa herself worked. On the south end of the square, before it registered what she was looking for, her eyes found it, her aunt's antique store and for a reason she didn't comprehend at the moment, she smiled.

"What the?" Her aunts store was still where it had always sat and the lights were on. The sign was turned to declare the store open. "Maybe she sold it, but, it still says Meri's Treasures. I don't understand."

Before her mind registered what it was doing, the car pulled right in front of the two story brick building and into a space. All she knew was that she had to find out what was going on. All thoughts of lawyers, houses and wills left her. All she wanted to know was if this was still Aunt Meri's store and if so, what was going on in it.

"It still looks the same," she said as she cupped her hands around her eyes and peered in through the front glass. She couldn't tell because of the way the sun was glittering off the glass and clouding her eyesight, but it looked like there was a small group of people at the register standing around laughing. Lisa walked in through the antique shop door which clanged the bell that echoed throughout the store that told of a customer's entrance. For a split second, Lisa thought she heard her aunts hearty laugh in her ear and for the first time since getting the news, felt her aunt was with her.

"Welcome Lisa," a voice called to her. Just as her eyes started to become adjusted to the inside light, she felt a pair of small but strong arms envelope her in a hug. "We've been waiting for you."