Page 14 of Blue Umbrella Sky
He barely heard Billy leave. Ruby hopped up on the bed, circled, and then lay down between his legs, which barely registered.
Milt was asleep in no time.
HE ANDCorky were driving one of Summitville’s winding hilly roads. Trees, their leaves green, lined the roadway, and Milt was comfortable in the passenger seat but alert, watching the road as Corky maneuvered the hairpin turns and the rises and descents of their journey.
Corky looked sure of himself—vision clear, gaze only leaving the road for a second or two here and there to look over at Milt and smile.
“You’re back?” Milt asked.
“Back from where?”
“I don’t know, wherever it was you went.”
“Never really left. It was you who checked out.”
Milt bristled a bit in spite of his happiness at being reunited with Corky. “Honey, I never went anywhere. I was with you until the very last second.”
Corky glanced over. “There is no last second.”
Milt thought that one over. He watched as the car floated a bit as they rounded a particularly tight downhill curve. The out-of-control sensation, the car’s wheels leaving the road, caused a feeling of giddy delight to rise up in Milt rather than panic.
Corky looked unconcerned, a small lopsided smile creasing his features.
And then they were crashing through brush at the side of the road.
And then they were flying off the edge of a cliff.
Airborne.
But Milt felt no worries, no fears about crashing down onto solid ground below, the impact more than jarring and most likely fatal.
There was freedom in this flight. Faith in knowing that Corky was driving.
And all would be well.
MILT DIDN’Tcome awake with a start. It was simply this—one moment he slept, dreaming, and the next he was wide-awake. He reached up to feel tears on his face. Despite them, he didn’t feel sad.
For a moment he was a little disoriented, looking first toward where a window should be and now where there was only a smooth wall. He shook his head a little, turned over on his back. The reality of the day before swept in, the flood, the kindness of Billy, practically passing out here on Billy’s bed.
The trailer was still, save for the easy snores of not one, but two creatures nearby. Milt smiled. The symphony of snores and whimpers wasn’t annoying. Instead, it was oddly comforting, nearly lulling him back to sleep.
But his dream was still there, in his consciousness. Still vivid. That sensation of flying over land and a body of water—maybe the Ohio River—in a vehicle he now recognized as the Kia Optima they’d once owned before they got the Mazda SUV. What should have been terrifying, because as Milt knew, what went up must come down, was not. No, he felt a certain comfort with his dead husband at the wheel, a certain feeling he could lean into and rely on—all would be well.
He smiled. There was no need to ponder the meaning of the dream.
Ruby snuggled closer, and he lifted his arm to accommodate her.
From the floor there was the sound of a long and hornlike fart. Milt laughed; he couldn’t help himself.
A disembodied voice floated up. “Sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Milt said.
“You awake?”
“Clearly.”
“I recommend no deep breathing for a couple of minutes.”
