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Silver Alert!

Darrell Petska

    Comfy in her favorite sweatsuit and lugging a purse, Meryl Davies bustles from her house to the carport, wriggles behind the wheel of an old tan Prius, and after studying the levers and instruments, brings the vehicle to life.
    “Let’s get going before the kids show up with the movers! Take Farnham to frontage road...”
    Meryl frowns: he needn’t tell her the route.
    “...and follow I-94 toward Eau Claire.”
    She cranks the steering wheel north toward their cabin, which will be home now. The kids can dispose of the house however they wish.
    “You can go faster than 50.”
    How many times has she said, “So, do you want to drive?” Of course, he seldom does, always preferring to read his westerns.
    Meryl squints to decipher passing road signs. She touches her glasses—the black clamshells, reading glasses! She slows the car while stuffing them in her purse.
    “Speed up! We’ll get hit from behind.”
    Once arrived, she’ll fry crappie and bluegill they’ll catch off the pier, then sip some of his elderberry wine beside a bonfire.
    “How much gas do we have?”
    Meryl sneers at the car’s baffling indicators, shrugs. She’d wanted a Ford.
    “Never mind. You’ve got me.”
    The fragrance of the pine needles always eases her mind. They’ll lounge in their lawn chairs as the sky fills with stars, then hold each other close in bed.
    “There’s a McDonald’s ahead, breakfast till 11! Let’s get an Egg McMuffin.”
    Meryl takes the exit, pulls into the drive-thru lane, orders two Egg McMuffins, and moments later reenters the Interstate—no cell phone, no kids, just the two of them, fulfilling their cabin’s name: “Northwoods Dream.”
    “If you speed up a bit, we can eat these muffins on the deck.”
    “Would you rather drive?”
    The mile markers plodding by, Meryl’s thoughts turn to her children. Not an adventurous soul among them. Boundary Waters canoeing, whitewater rafting, skiing—nothing stuck.
    “Faster! There’s a cop parked ahead.”
    Meryl punches it to 55, holding her tongue at his backseat driving.
    Visualizing her cabinets, her pantry, the groceries they’ll purchase in town, she lets up on the gas pedal, then notices the cop following closely, lights flashing.
    “Time to turn on your charm. Flash those gray curls!”
    She stops on the shoulder, lowers her window, clutches her purse and waits.
    “Ma’am, I’m Officer Fields. May I see your driver’s license?”
    He studies it, then her. “Ma’am, what’s your destination?”
    “We’re heading to our cabin,” she answers.
    The cop bends low, peers into her window. “You and who, ma’am?”
    She looks to the McDonald’s bag beside her, then glances about the car.
    “Ma’am, do you know people are looking for you?”
    Those meddling kids! “No no, everything will be fine.”
    “I need you to stay right here, ma’am. Please hand me your keys.”
    Meryl watches the cop stride back to his cruiser, then braces for the inevitable—
    “We’d already be there if I’d been driving.”

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