The Brooch

The Long Way Home

By the time Maple left that room and Mrs. Crowder's estate entirely, she had nothing left in her...

She was numb. No tears had fallen. The only thing she knew and she wanted more than anything, was to get home. Even if it took all night...

Moreover, Maple knew telling the sheriff about Mrs. Crowder, Andrew, and the brooch, would resolve absolutely nothing. But only further open an unwanted Pandora's box and bring up dead bones that needed to remain kept and buried. For her and the towns sake...

Maple felt Josephine walking out on Andrew and her, following in her footsteps, was punishment enough for him. As for Mrs. Crowder, well you can just about say her own thoughts, aka the voices, not to mention a possible life without one of her grandchildren, namely Malcolm aka Tator Tot, would be severe as a punishment to last her a lifetime... And twice over. For her, and her alone. With that, Maple felt justice was served.

But it still didn't fair, that her heart was broken in a million unfixable pieces! The brooch was one thing. But Andrew's confession that destroyed a friendship, and a marriage all because of her, destroyed her completely...

Maple did not know if she could ever recover...

On the tips of her toes, Maple began to run like the wind, down that long and winding road. By the time she reached the main street, it was now in the late hours. Most of the town folk in Ponchas Avenue Row, were now in Slumbersville having a nice long talk with the Sandman. In short, the town was sleep. All but some late birds and a poor soul in a undoubtedly downcast, Maple on the road to nowhere... but home.

Maple ran and ran till her face was blue. On the back street, no where near home, when she finally became winded, she stood alone. Catching her breath, Maple Joelle Woods, let out a blood curdling scream, to chill the bones of just about all the living and the dead.

And if you thought things could get any worse? Welcome the cliche. Why standing on that open desolate, and endless road in the middle of nowhere, nothing but her and the trees that surrounded her, on that cement road... the downpour of rain suddenly and uninvitedly came...

Poor Maple... Alone and broken, and now drenched to the core, from the torrential rain, took off her cardigan, to protect her newly returned brooch from the downpour....

Yet as you all may know by now, heroes come in all kinds of shapes and sizes. Yes sir they do! While Maple was doing nothing but trying to get home on that long and winding road, a bright and blinding lights suddenly came from behind her. It was almost as if it had her in the spotlight! It was a vehicle that had suddenly stopped beside her. Why it was none other than Mr. Cleaver Jones in the flesh.

With a hop and a kick and the sound of a click, Cleaver, jumped out of the vehicle as he did hours earlier, when he first saw Maple on that long road home. Still dressed in his work attire garbs, he said not a word. He just opened the backdoor of Rolls for Maple. A tired, defeated and worn out Maple, barely on her last legs... got in.

As the night went on, with nearly an hour's drive away, the entire ride home was nothing but silence...

The clock, in all the homes of the dream birds of Ponchas Avenue Row, now tolled a half an hour past one. And by the time Cleaver pulled up into that quiet, sleeping little neighborhood on Appleton road... the rain had finally stopped.

Maple and Cleaver sat in the Rolls, still entertaining the sounds of silence...

In fact, as if it was understood in an unspoken agreement, both just sat, unmoved and in no particular hurry, in Mrs. Crowder's rolls. If only just for a little while longer.