Long Road from Annan Springs

At 5:45 pm Clay left the church. He carelessly stuffed his unfinished work into his briefcase and went directly to his apartment. He decided he wasn't going to do anything when he got home, and maybe not anything the rest of the evening.

When he put his key in the lock, he saw something unusual. There was a letter in his mailbox. He never got mail at his apartment. He had given everyone he thought would ever write him the church address as the place to reach him with correspondence. Quickly, he pulled out the envelope.

It was a long envelope . . . business size. The paper was high-quality cream-colored linen-finish. In classy understated type the return address said: "Schaffer, Redwine & Pace, Attorneys-at-Law." It was neatly addressed in elegant script to "The Reverend Clayton W. Bartlett, #10 El Rancho Court, Sherwindale, Texas."

The handwriting was unmistakably Joanna's.

Clay's hands trembled. He dropped the envelope on the step as he fumbled for his key to open the apartment door. He stooped down to pick it up and dropped his keys. Finally he set everything down, briefcase and all, and managed to unlock the door. He picked it up again and haltingly stepped inside. The room was cold. The fear that made his heart pound and his hands rubbery now made him shiver. He decided he didn't want to be both upset AND cold as he read whatever was in this letter so he turned the gas log in the fireplace from pilot light to high. He knew, as he removed his coat and cap, that he was also stalling. He went into the bedroom and turned up the space heater, too. He carefully hung his wraps in the closet, although there was no real need; almost everything he had was already out of its place, ready to be packed for his departure from Sherwindale.

The little apartment warmed quickly. Clay could not put off opening his unexpected missive from Annan Springs much longer. He was sure he knew what it was. Job had said, "That which I greatly feared has come upon me." I've known it was coming, he thought. This will just be confirmation. He remembered the third, and actually, most relevant philosophical question which college students posed to one another in late night bull sessions in dormitories and frat houses. The first was always, "Can God make a rock so big that He can't move it?" The second was "If God knows everything that's going to happen in advance, how can anybody have a free will?" The third . . . it hasn't crossed my mind in years, he thought . . . was, "If you think your girlfriend is losing interest in you . . . doesn't love you anymore . . . would your rather go ahead and find out about it or wait and not talk about it and hope things get better?" Almost everyone had insisted it was better to take your medicine and know the truth right now so you could deal with it. "Dragging it out and wondering and worrying is like cutting your dog's tail off a piece at a time so it won't hurt so bad." Patsy Cline had sung: "If you've got leaving on your mind, tell me now; get it over. Hurt me now, get it over."

Another old country song reverberated like a rock song between Clay's pounding temples. "Am I losing you?" Well, the answer was very near. It was bent between his sweaty fingers like Pauline's portrait had been in George Hibbert's cold, dry ones the day he had died. His anxiety so intense he felt he would burst, Clay decided he had been right on the issue when he was a college student. Go ahead and find out. Get it over. I'm with Patsy Cline. Deliberately methodical, he slowly opened his pocketknife and cut the envelope open.

He had only read two sentences when he changed his mind. It's NOT better to know, his tortured spirit wailed. I should have waited. I should have waited the rest of my life