The Perfect Picture

Deidre continued down the road for just a short time. It was an old two-lane road.

André was in the backseat and was quiet for some time. Then she started looking around. “Hey, Grandma, do you know where you’re going? We’re not going to get lost, are we?”

Deidre smiled as she looked in the rearview mirror. “I’ll know where I’m going when I get there. And if we do get lost, it won’t be for long.” She thought André would think that was funny, but she didn’t even smile. She just kept looking out the window.

Deidre stopped rather suddenly. Both girls looked at her and at what they thought she might be looking at. André didn’t like what she thought her grandmother might be thinking.

“What are you looking at, Grandma? That’s just some old road that’s overgrown. Besides there’s an old mailbox with half of a name on it, which means its private property.” Deidra didn’t say anything at first. She got out of the car and took a couple of pictures of the mailbox with the road next to it. She got back into the car and backed it up and started down the old road. André didn’t like this one bit.

“Grandma, what are you doing? This scares me. What if someone shoots us for being on their property or kidnaps us?”

Deidre had no idea why she wanted to go down this road, but she knew for some strange reason, they would be safe. “Trust me, hon. I know we’ll be all right. I wouldn’t do anything that I thought would bring you any harm. Just think of it as an adventure.”

André softly said under her breath, “I don’t like adventures.”

The road was narrow and very rough. There were tree branches and rocks covering the road, some of them rather large. There wasn’t a lot of sunlight because of the amount of trees, and everything was overgrown.

Carissa was more concerned about how nervous André was than their whereabouts. She was curious about what they may find. “Grandma, maybe we should think about leaving. It’s really not right to be on someone’s property that we don’t know.”

Deidre knew Carissa was right, but something was driving her to go on. “Let’s just go a little farther so that I can find an area wide enough to turn around.”

Right at that moment, Deidre spotted something. She stopped the car and stared for a moment. Then she opened the door slowly. “Let’s go take a look over there where the sun is beaming through the trees. I think I see something.”

André couldn’t believe what she was hearing, let alone what she was seeing. Carissa was getting out too. “Are you guy’s nuts? We can’t just start roaming around on someone’s property. This is crazy. I’m staying in the car.”

But when she saw they were going without her, she decided she didn’t want to stay in the car alone, so she got out and started catching up with them. “You guys weren’t really going to leave me in the car by myself, were you? Wait for me. Come on, guys. I’m a little scared.”

At that moment she tripped over a large limb and fell in a pile of leaves. Both Deidre and Carissa came running to her. When they helped her up, they could see how upset she was, so Deidre hugged her tightly. “You’re okay, sweetheart.”

André wasn’t crying, but she was really shaken up. “I don’t like it here. Can we go back to the car? We’re supposed to be taking pictures, not trespassing on somebody’s scary property.”

Deidre took her hand and gently started leading her. “I think there is something here. Don’t ask me why, but I really feel we need to be here. And I sense that we are totally safe. Let’s just go a little farther where the sun is shining through the trees.”