Chapter fifteen: Aster takes her worried self to the ferry and sails to Mayne Island.
Chapter sixteen
Aster followed a white-haired couple with bikes, a teenager with a backpack, and a woman with a small dog from the ferry to the ramp. She pushed two suitcases forward and returned for the third—forward, back, forward, back. Her progress was made a little easier because the suitcases had wheels but it could have been a lot easier if—.
The woman with the dog was greeted by a man with a peaked cap who gave her a hug and a kiss. The dog jumped into the man's arms and the three of them carried on together.
Where was Kenneth James?
“Please keep to your right.” A navy-uniformed woman directed the group.
All compiled but Aster. She didn’t budge. She just stared up the steep hill that was her next challenge after she had gained victory over the ramp. A challenge Aster refused to accept.
“Please keep to your right,” the woman repeated.
Still, Aster didn’t move.
So the woman rolled two of the trunk-sized suitcases to a corner of the covered walkway.
Aster followed with the third.
“Thank you. I—?” Before Aster could finish her sentence the woman returned to direct the ferry traffic up the hill.
It was pleasant enough under the covered walkway for Aster to be content to remain there until Kenneth James came to collect her. She looked from the cloudless sky to the rippling sea. She watched cars and trucks drive off the ferry and others drive on. Soon those passengers would sail away. She watched cars and trucks drive up the steep hill and out of the terminal. Soon only the BC Ferries workers would be left behind and then they would end their shifts and go home. Soon Aster would be alone. She didn’t mind. But—. What if—? Wild animals? Drug addicts? Vagrants? Soon Aster would be alone. And she did mind, in fact. It unnerved her. But with those trunk-sized suitcases, she couldn’t move. She was stuck which made her vulnerable. And what if—? She grew more and more concerned.
The uniformed woman came back. “Come with me,” she told Aster. “I’ll take you up the hill.” She wheeled two of Aster’s suitcases to a white truck with ‘BC Ferries’ on the door.
“My husband was supposed to be here to collect me.” Aster pulled the other suitcase behind her.
“He may be waiting for you in the parking lot.”
“The...parking...lot?”
What if Kenneth James had been waiting but because she hadn’t walked up the hill he had thought...? And now he was... What if she were...? Now...
No, for her, he would have waited. He would have. He was waiting. He was in the parking lot.
“Yes, that’s where he must be. He’s waiting in the parking lot,” Aster told the woman and climbed into the truck.
The woman loaded Aster’s suitcases into the truck bed and drove Aster to a row of three trucks and two cars parked in front of a fence—the parking lot. Kenneth James’ truck wasn’t waiting there.
The woman unloaded Aster’s luggage and carried them across the street and up a small grassy hill to a bench under a tree. “There’s no way your husband can miss you. And if he does, I’ll tell him where you are. Don’t worry.”
“Worry? Why would I worry?” Aster pulled a hanky from a side pocket of her oversized purse and dusted a corner of the bench.
photo by ldyck
