Unfolding

Unfolding

A Novel

S. Rodger Bock

Copyright 2016 S. Roger Bock

Smashwords Edition

All rights reserved.

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Cover Photo: Hillary Colvin.

Model: Aly Jo Raymond.

Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright ©1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Speak To My Heart Lyrics by Chris Roina. Used by permission of the author. Copyright ©2010 Christopher Roina, all rights reserved.

My Sin is Washed Away Lyrics by Pablo Bonilla. Used by permission of the author. Copyright ©2015 Paul Bonilla, all rights reserved.

Dedication

In memory of my Aunt Pat who took me in for three summers when I was an arrogant young man.

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to God, for giving me a second chance in life when my whole world was out-of-control. If Jesus hadn’t rescued me, I’d still be in the pit. There are lots of people to thank, but let me hit the highlights:

My editor, Tara Brown, as usual. You are a remarkable young woman with so much on your plate: mother of two, worshipper, full-time co-worker, and fellow dreamer. I remain grateful for each project you consent to work on with me. I am indebted to you once again for fixing what you could of the mess I handed you. Any mistakes that slipped through are mine.

My family. You are my backbone.

My gratitude to my friend Misty Cruz, certified Emergency Medical Technician, for her valuable insight.

Thanks to Pastor Chris Roina for lending me his lyrics. His creativity speaks to my heart.

My appreciation to Pablo Bonilla for sharing fresh worship lyrics. He lets my characters sing.

My hat’s off to my photographer, Hillary Colvin and my joyous cover model, Aly Raymond—we finally got a shot where you weren’t smiling.

My friends, Cori Engman and Rhonda Martinez, who helped with the origami flower and setting up the photo of it.

Thanks to all of my pastors—there are many—for their wide and deep support.

To my beta-readers, Jeff, Trudy, and Cindy, whose feedback is as precious as gold to me.

To my devoted fans: I am so grateful for you!

Soundtrack

Music is an important part of this story. Please feel free to listen along to the playlist that accompanies this book on my srodgerbock Spotify account.

Advisory

A word about this book. It’s not for kids. It’s not for the faint of heart. You’re about to take a journey with a woman who will bravely take on the worst enemies she’s ever faced. If you’re offended by the compassionate, gripping truth of the gospel of Jesus, you might as well pick up another book. We’re going there. If you’re a believer and offended by the alluring draw of sin or a few of the words you hear on network television—and for that matter, might have even said once or twice yourself, go read something else. This book is for people like me who have seen far more trouble in our lives than we care to admit and yet still seek the truth of His face.

On the other hand, if you’re open minded enough to co-exist and are not afraid to walk with someone who is facing real trials, I dare you to join Edeanna on her quest. As always, enjoy the read.

‡ ‡ ‡

Fiero

Monday, 11:38 P.M., December 7th

Paradoxically, it was unseasonably warm that December night. Maybe that’s why I tapped my hand against the steering wheel as I barreled down the fairly empty freeway. My reckless speed contradicted the slow, hypnotically rhythmic song Phil Collins was singing. It reminded me of the opening scene from Miami Vice which I’d caught on some syndicated rerun years ago. It was even the right song. I was easily moving past the mostly law abiding commuters in the other lanes of traffic. My high speed interposed with the cadenced passing lights overhead almost sent me into a trance.

Between the stale remnants of my perfume, the lingering smell of alcohol from the drinks I’d had a few hours before, and the haunting scent of the man in the bar I’d been flirting with, I was almost transported from the reality I was breaking the law to return to. The incongruities of my life made me mad. I had no interest in returning home quickly. The hot wind blasting through my window added to the simultaneous thrill and dread of the night. I couldn’t imagine running the AC in the winter—even if it were a sweltering 85 degrees.

The song went on as the stripes flew by in a quick clip below me. The lights over the freeway lit my dash and came in the back window, one after the next. In just a few words, Phil was encouraging me not to quit. I wondered if that were even possible. Did I have the courage? Did I have the desire? Was there enough energy left in me to eke out the next few minutes until I hit the mattress?

I was so lonely. I was hurting. My lip snarled as I was forced to slow down behind a Winnebago in the left-hand lane. I thumped on the wheel in time with Phil’s percussion. They eased right, and I slammed on the accelerator and shot passed the camper before it was even clear of the lane.

The stars above witnessed my aggressive yet controlled maneuver. With so much light in L.A. coupled with airborne grime, you could hardly ever see anything but the very brightest stars. Usually there was a canopy of orange overhead even on the darkest of nights. It was like living on a bubble…or on another world. Tonight was different.

It was very clear…and consequently, where the lights were not illuminating the wide lanes, I could see straight up into the black night. The sky seemed exceptionally dark.

I always told Carl that freeways have personalities. The 405 was a grumpy old man—constipated and mean. The 110 was like my aunt. It usually went with the flow, but sometimes, it just got snippy. The mood of the personality changed during the day. Most freeways in L.A. got a little cranky when they weren’t full of people. They pushed cars through like blood cells delivering life to the body of the city. It wasn’t an accident that they were called arteries. But when things got looser, some drivers moved as if they had all night, and others dodged around them as if they were the silver ball in a slanted arcade game from when my parents were teenagers. I was closer to the latter with typically a high level of concentration on the unbending road stretched out in front of me. My parents as teenagers…

I missed Dad.

I hated Mom.

I had a sixth sense about these things—the freeways, I mean. The tiny, blonde hairs on my slender arms rose up in anticipation of something I wasn’t even fully conscious of yet. I was holding my breath, and my pupils dilated. My hands moved from the casual one and the window to the regular ten and two before I moved my foot from the gas to hover over the brake.

With blazing speed, a fast mover zipped past my little 2015 MX-5. He was easily forty over my own insane speed. Phil entered the chorus for the second time. Something odd was definitely In the Air Tonight.

The pinhead in the pinball tried squeezing between two cars ahead of me to make his exit. My hands gripped the wheel. I checked the rearview as I decelerated quickly. Then everything happened at once. The cars were now moving in a chaotic choreography.

Brake lights flared like fireworks.

Pinball sideswiped a sedan.

The four door yellow Korean model flipped in the air.

Don’t panic, I thought.

The Kia came down on another car, which too popped up. Back on all four, the yellow one slid backward. It went off the side and hit the noise reduction wall.

I dodged one car whose driver had slammed too hard on the brakes and was slipping sideways down the freeway. In disbelief, I saw the catalyst of the reaction—a blue Mustang—regain control and speed down the ramp. I yanked my wheel to the right to avoid colliding. Then, just as my own Firestones wanted to start skidding, I corrected and regained complete control. My car’s tires squealed as I pulled near the two that had smashed into one another, locking up the brakes only at the very end and smoking my rubber on the grooved concrete.

I left Phil while he was still drumming hard. My choppy breaths matched his snare. My pulse synced with his toms. I jumped out. I spun around, taking in the whole scene. I rushed toward the first crushed vehicle—half off the road. One wheel was off the ground—still spinning. Its black rubber sibling was flat and shredded.

Are you alright? I shouted at the dazed and bloody driver strapped into his Volvo.

His airbag was deflated now, and he nodded. His injuries looked superficial. Stay in your car for a minute, I instructed and moved to the next car.

It was a Fiero—Dad had owned one. God, was that a memory! The roof—crushed. Someone screamed. The engine compartment behind the two seats belched smoke. I got to the passenger. I ducked through where the windshield had been. It was a tight squeeze. A small woman whimpered. Bloody. Pale. Trembling. I reached over her and disengaged her seat belt. A hand grabbed my arm, and I popped the driver’s belt free as well. Neither woman was thinking straight—probably they were both in shock. Get out! Now! I ordered and backed out of the cavity of metal and glass.

The driver’s door opened, and she stumbled onto the number four lane. More help was reaching for her. A man was phoning it in. Yes, the one-ten south. Harbor Freeway. South of PCH.

Someone was yanking on the passenger’s door. It was not opening. Lean forward, I commanded.

"Ayudar a las mujeres!" a man yelled.

She looked at me and stopped crying for a moment.

Get her out! another voice.

The heat from the fire in the engine compartment—contained, but maybe not for long. It was like leaning into a hot oven. I needed to get her out.

Come to me, I begged her in a whisper. Come, I repeated.

Smoke. It was not the smell of baking bread that filled my nostrils. Acrid. I coughed.

She overcame her fear, opened her arms, and I pulled her straight up. I was worried her legs would be trapped, but she was too short for that. I leaned back with her in my grip, and we scrambled free. I felt a man’s arms around me, pulling me away. Someone else had her.

I turned toward the Kia, which had flipped and tumbled through the air. More people were hurt in this catastrophe. The windscreen was shattered and detached from the car on the ground in front of me. Blood covered a portion of it. The car looked more like a crushed aluminum can of the beer Carl liked to drink. The door hung from just one point. I came around the side of it and gasped.

I gagged and threw my hand to my face and approached the mess of bloody meat still wearing a striped shirt.

Was it even possible? Could he or she still be alive?

There was severe trauma to the head. Blood covered the deflated airbag.

I cautiously approached and grabbed the wrist of her dangling left arm. Nothing.

The head rolled to the side.

I reeled back at the terrible sight.

Empty, open, dead eyes. The young Latina girl stared at me.

A blur of emotions rushed through me. It could have been me in that car instead of her, I realized.

I stumbled away and threw up by the concrete wall. The image of her face stuck with me.

I felt a ton of feelings flooding back through me as I wandered in a daze back toward the exit lane.

Dad. Why did it have to be a Fiero?

The world seemed to spin.

Help, I whispered.

A pair of strong hands steadied me from behind until I could slowly sit down on the cold concrete.

Lights.

Shouts.

Running.

Sirens.

My own breathing haggard and raw.

I blinked.

Catastrophic cacophony coalesced.

I leaned forward with my hands flat on the roadway.

I heaved out a heavy burst of air and wished I could exhale all my burdens as easily.

There was too much to think about. I was carrying too much pain. Too much worry. Too much regret.

I sat in the loose bits of gravel on the edge of the road. My life was in such disorder. It was a box puzzle strewn across the roadway with no order—no sense. I only had my daily routines to hang onto. I only had my shame to anchor me to the pavement and keep from floating away in the sea of anguish I was drowning in.

Stupid Fiero. Dad…I miss you so much. Why did it have to be a Fiero?

I thought I’d forgotten all of that! I had certainly tried to. Who wouldn’t?

Make me a better person, I prayed.

Time flowed past me as I sat staring out across the four lanes of the freeway. It lost meaning as the chaos continued around me. I was in a bubble. Isolated in the middle of the insanity.

Sharply inhaling, I blinked with purpose and turned my head.

My eyes were still burning from the smoke.

I was sitting up watching a parade of multicolored metal and glass snails ease by in the number one and two lanes—miraculously clear for the moment. Sigalert for sure, someone said within earshot.

I felt stunned. I was still overwhelmed by the mangled death I’d just seen.

Red and blue lights were flashing, and the Fiero was fully engulfed about thirty yards away. The fire blocked me from getting to my car.

As I sat on the ground fighting fresh memories, a CHP officer approached me. I saw only his black boots and khaki slacks with the double blue and gold stripe down the side. Do you require medical attention?

I looked straight at his knee. No, I pointed back to the yellow tangle that ten minutes ago had still been a fully functioning automobile. She…

He squatted beside me. Someone is attending to her, he told me.

I looked back and verified that indeed the scene had been almost overrun with officers and EMTs.

The place was well lit now between the flashing lights, spotlights from the cop cars, ambulance headlamps, and the fire, which had been hit with a pair of extinguishers and was almost out.

A fire truck was rumbling up from the exit lane.

No. I answered, looking up at him now in the face and then away. I didn’t really register anything about him besides the pressed uniform, badge, and firearm on his hip.

Were you involved in the accident? he asked with a pad and pen out now.

No. I told him. I stopped back there. I missed everyone.

What’s your name? he continued the interrogation.

R. Edeanna McKinley. I explained to him my ID was in my car.

Have you had anything to drink tonight, Ma’am? he asked, looking directly at me.

I looked back at him for a moment. It took me a while to answer. I was still being carried along by the deluge of feelings and shocking images of the past few minutes mixed with the horrors of my own past few months.

E-dee, he prodded, trying to get my complicated name right.

E-dee-an-na, I pronounced it correctly for him. He’d gotten the first half of my double first name right. Yes, two drinks. One at 7:15 and another about 8:30. I figured he might be able to smell the alcohol on my breath. No reason to lie about it. I had waited long enough before leaving the bar.

Next time, wait a little longer or keep it to just one, he lectured, disagreeing with my own diagnosis. I’ve got too many other things to worry about besides you tonight, Ms. McKinley, but you should count yourself fortunate to have avoided getting involved in the incident. I’m told you helped extricate one of the victims.

I just nodded at him and rubbed my forehead.

Whoa, he said and lifted up my left arm. Looks like you were pretty scratched up. You got this when you helped the woman get out of her car?

I guess so, I told him. I honestly didn’t remember getting hurt at all. I hoped he wouldn’t hold that as evidence of too much booze in my blood. I looked at my arm. Blood was dribbling out along a set of parallel raised pink lines on my otherwise smooth skin. It didn’t look too bad to me. It was nothing compared to the Latina.

I’d like an EMT to apply a bandage to your arm and check you for any other injuries, he said and shouted at someone before waving them toward us.

It was late. Now that I was regaining my senses, I really wanted to get home, but I let him lead me toward one of the ambulances.

A woman in a blue jumpsuit with medical patches sat me down on the bumper the vehicle.

ETOH, I heard him whisper.

What’s your name? the woman asked.

Edeanna. Edeanna McKinley.

How old are you?

Twenty-three, I answered.

Do you know where you are, Edeanna?

The 110 South, just past the PCH. Number four lane on the bumper of your ambulance, I said, being a little bit of a smartass. It was something I was good at.

Look at my nose, she instructed. Do you have any neck or head pain at all?

No. I didn’t wreck my car, I protested, pointing at it, or trying to. A patrol car was between me and my little sporty red Miata.

Okay, try to calm down. I’m just trying to help, she said in a monotone.

She slipped her blood pressure cuff on me and got my pulse at the same time.

A man in a similar suit came over. Vitals? he asked through a ridiculous looking moustache.

BP and pulse are good. Other than possible ETOH, she seems shaken up, but otherwise, just the laceration, she reported.

Okay. Make sure our hero is well taken care of, Whitney, he said to the woman.

She sprayed my arm with something cold and scrubbed it with something scratchy.

Ow! I said as I pulled it back away from her.

Sorry, but it’ll be better if I clean it first, Whitney said.

I gritted my teeth and turned my arm back toward her. The pain of having my open wound scoured was worse than the actual injury.

Whitney applied what had to be too much gauze and tape to my arm.

Moustache leaned in front of me. If it hadn’t been for you, that woman would have probably still been in the car. We saw how that ended up, he said. Even though he maintained a straight face, the caterpillar over his lip was wriggling.

Yeah, I agreed distantly.

How much did you see? Whitney asked.

I explained how I’d seen the start of the whole thing and what I’d done after the multicar collision.

A helicopter was overhead now lighting up the area with its night sun.

As I sat there looking at the passing cars all slow down long enough to look me over, the word hero echoed in my mind. I didn’t feel like a hero. I didn’t feel like much at all.

Fight

Tuesday, December 8th

It must have been an hour later when I finally annoyed the EMT enough where she relented and let me drive home.

I came to a stop as the ramp dumped me onto a familiar city street. I closed my eyes for a moment and remembered him. Not the blonde in the bar with the big biceps. He’d make for a nice distraction over the holidays if he called the secret cell phone hidden in a drawer at work. I’d opened it with my first and maiden names using the account at the bank that went back to college. I wasn’t thinking of him so much as the handsome hunk I’d met three months back. I was transported into the firm embrace of the man who had captured my heart. I took in a deep breath, seeing him in my mind’s eye. The musky, warm aroma of his cologne came back to me. The heady smell of his leather jacket was my appetizer. The touch of his rough, unshaven cheek against my own was a sense I could almost feel. The yearning I felt as we were enraptured in moments of panicky expectation, followed by an all too brief clap of breathtaking joy—

I opened my eyes and sighed as I saw the light was now green. I eased down on the gas with my cowboy-boot clad feet. How long the light had been that way didn’t matter to me. I licked my lips—I tasted lipstick and whiskey—and felt my stomach clench down in covetous desperation. I had needed him. I had wanted him. At one point, I almost hadn’t cared who found out. I had loved it.

I smacked down the part of me that hated what I’d done and forced it back into the glove box of my life. I tucked it away—down in some forgotten recess of my heart. It was out of the way—unable to escape. They should bury toxic waste so securely.

I let my free hand slide past the short black leather skirt toward my knee. I let my fingertip play at the edge of the hem along the nylons. I had torn them climbing onto the Fiero. I recalled his firm grip. His hands were so strong. I had looked into his eyes, allowing him to see right into my soul.

The name I’d given him crossed over my lips, completely inaudible, especially as Steve Tyler now blared out that power ballad while Bruce Willis flew off to save the planet.

It’d been months since I’d last seen him, but his presence was still so powerful in my heart. I longed for another suite rendezvous with him. The wordplay had been his idea—the foreplay, mine.

It wasn’t just the sizzling passion. I longed for the way he’d made me feel. I was somehow special and unique. He’d told me things I could not repeat—aloud in public anyway. It wasn’t that they were filthy—on the contrary—they were a taste of truth in a sea of death. I had repeated the phrases over and over again in my mind that autumn. I clung to them as firmly as he had held me after our first night. I held on and meditated on those words. I put my hope in their syllables. As the world around me had been shredded to bits, I needed something to grasp. It was as if his biceps were the perfect antidote to the pain deep within my soul.

Another stoplight.

Reflexively, I pulled down my visor to check my makeup in the lit mirror. I caught a reflection of my eyes before purposefully looking only at my mascara. Lipstick touched up with the dexterous skill of an artist, I sped down the street. Window still down, I hoped the cooler breeze closer to the ocean on the balmy night would refresh my energy.

Another stoplight.

Diamond ring commercial! I snapped off the radio in angry response. I looked at my naked left hand. I’d been robbed of a proper proposal. I only had the band. Carl had skipped over the engagement ring altogether. It had not been practical. I fumed in the silence.

My band was in my pocket. I only wore it at home.

I turned to my right and caught my breath as a Lexus pulled near. Was it him? But no, just another Lexus. I groaned now, missing him. I wanted him back. The signal blinked to green, and I accelerated into the intersection toward something I was clearly not ready for.

My mind was still on the Lexus and the way he sang in the car to his favorite old songs from the eighties. It was obnoxiously dumb music I was still addicted to—ridiculous songs like the one that sampled lines from a bunch of actors from some silly science fiction show he was way too excited about. Somehow, though, when my lover sang those stupid songs to me, everything about them became something more…adventurous.

It was close to midnight, and the grocery store near my home was closed for the