The Passenger by Jacqueline Druga (the giving tree read aloud TXT) 📗

me your day to day didn’t change all that much, rather your outlook.”

“I had amnesia,” Jonas said.

“You did.”

“I have to go back. Isn’t that the right thing to do?”

“The correct thing is what feels accurate to you. I can imagine a part of you thinks you need to pack up and head back to your old life because you know who you are now.”

Jonas nodded. “I feel that.”

“When you arrived in our little town and you didn’t know who you were, you had an adjustment period, correct? Just like you didn’t jump right into being a, hardworking, fun loving, cookie baking nice guy Chip, you don’t need to jump right back into being, partying, living on the edge, never happy, jerk of a guy Jonas.”

“Wow.” Jonas laughed.

“You need an adjustment period. Take it. That’s my advice. You know what you want more than you care to admit. I promise. You’ll figure it out. Now ...” He clapped his hands once. “Let’s hear your opus?”

Jonas smiled and just to have fun, he ripped into a hard core, hard rock riff. Then after saying ‘just kidding’, he returned to the song he was working on when Pastor Rick came in.

His memory returned and with it came a lot of good advice from everyone who had gotten to know him. But what of the two people in town who knew him his whole life. Talking to them would have to start with an apology long overdue.

TWENTY-SIX

It wasn’t the first time she had heard an apology from Jonas, but it was the first time Cate actually felt it was believable.

The night before he called her at the hotel and said, “I’m sorry, Mom. Can we talk? Maybe over a milkshake?.”

She and Grant met him at the milkshake shop and Jonas apologized again, not only for the outburst hours earlier at the hospital but for many things.

“I’m sorry for all the sleepless nights. I’m sorry I was mean and hurtful. I’m sorry for destroying my body, for not being the son you raised me to be. I can make a list, I can say I’m sorry, but I don’t know what I can do to make it right.”

Cate and Grant held him.

“You don’t need to make it up to us, Jonas,” Grant told him. “We want what’s best for you. We want you happy. That life you led, it didn’t make you happy. You were searching. And I pray, yes, I pray you don’t ever go back.”

“But that is your choice,” Cate added. “We can’t tell you what to do.”

He had come to them for answers and advice, and Cate didn’t want to tell him what she thought he should do, because it ultimately had to be what he wanted to do, what was in his heart.

One thing was clear, Jonas hadn’t left his job at the market bakery. He had done his morning shift, asking Cate and Grant to not leave town yet. If one of them could stay at least, until he made up his mind on what he needed to do.

Grant was still on sabbatical and Cate had to get back to work. One more day and she had to leave. However, she planned on enjoying her time in the quaint town.

“You should stay until Wednesday,” Grant told Cate as they sat on the patio of Baker’s Market Café. “It’s meatball sub day and they are awesome.”

“I wish I could. But you know, I think Jonas is going to be ready to leave here in a few days. He knows who he is. Right now, he’s getting his phone back.”

“We should have cancelled his number,” Grant told her.

“Cancelling his number isn’t going to cancel his old life.”

“Speaking of Jonas.” Grant lifted his chin to nod.

The phone store bag seat on the table. “Hey.” Jonas pulled up a chair and sat down. “You got the chicken wraps. They’re pretty good, huh?”

“You hungry?” Grant pushed his sandwich to him. “There is still half.”

“No, Maw-Maw made me eat one about an hour ago.”

Cate smiled gently. “She is very good to you.”

“Yes, she is. Has been since day one,” Jonas stated. “Even when I wasn’t easy to be nice to. And I told her I didn’t want her help. She didn’t listen because she wasn’t doing it for me. She was doing it for you, Mom.”

“Me?” Cate asked.

Jonas nodded. “Yeah. She never looked at me as trouble or John Doe, she looked at me as somebody’s child. Your child. Little did I know at the time,” Jonas paused and looked down. “About Mathew.”

Eyes feeling, Cate choked up. “I am so grateful for her and Joe. More than I can ever say.”

“She knows.”

Grant’s hand rested on the bag. “I see you got a new phone.”

“Number is activated. I … I haven’t turned it on yet,” Jonas said. “I know I’m going to get bombarded with old texts and voicemails. I don’t really know if I’m ready to see them yet or visit that life yet.”

“Yet?” Grant asked. “So, you think you’ll eventually go back?”

Jonas nodded. “I do. I have to, right? I mean, that’s my life. My apartment. People I know. I can promise you both, I am going to do everything in my power not to get drawn back into the way I was. I learned a lot. But this here in William’s Peak is Chip Doe’s life.”

“Aren’t you one and the same?” Grant asked.

“Dad, I don’t know anything. I just know it feels like I am fooling these people if I stay because I am not who they thought I was. I just still feel this pulling, like I’m searching for an answer and don’t know the question.”

Cate reached over and grabbed his hand. “You’ll find it. I believe you’ll find it.” She glanced up when she saw Marge approach.

“I’m not interrupting, am I?” Marge asked.

“No, not at all,” Grant answered.

“Chip, you have an hour free?” Marge asked. “I need to run to Fremont to that wine and spirits, they’re the only place