Grassy Creek

By Jill Burleson

Luke Sparks is a pediatric oncologist determined to find the cure for leukemia. However, this dream is elusive, and he fears he has lost his passion for medicine, his purpose for living, and has failed every patient he has not been able to save. He even contemplates if his own life is worth living. But that thought is thwarted by Joe, the eight-year-old patient he is taking with him for some time away from the cancer treatments, as Luke is returning to his childhood home of Grassy Creek, in the mountain town of Spruce Pine, North Carolina. He is seeking a respite and hopes of rekindling his passion, his purpose, and his life. Back home, Grassy Creek and rain, perhaps healing rain, stir his memory, and he returns to the summer of 1962, when he was fifteen and his dream began. The summer of 1962 starts as planned, with Luke and his best friend, Raisin, and nothing but time. However, when Raisin’s girl cousin, Joey shows up for the summer, Luke’s plans and his life are changed. Joey learns of the joys and dangers of the mountains, dragging Luke and Raisin willingly along for the ride. They find adventure around every corner, and end up in the midst of a murder mystery the likes of none that has ever been witnessed in that town before. Then when one of them reveals a secret, the three then have to face reality and the hard questions of trust, faith, love, and death. Can the mountains, the memories, and healing rains rinse off the dust of the years and bring Luke the answers he has been seeking? Joey is a free spirit—adventuresome yet contemplative, compassionate yet reckless—and Luke is completely enamored. Joey learns that summer of the joys and dangers of the mountain, dragging Luke and Raisin willingly along for the ride. They find themselves in the midst of many adventures, including a murder mystery, the likes of which have never been witnessed in that town before. As the seasons change, so do the three. Summer’s first loves fade into autumn. Joey becomes ingrained in the town’s culture and begins an internship with Dr. Peterson, learning all she can about medicine. Autumn gives way to winter, and with winter comes a new coldness. A snowstorm blows in while the three are manning Dr. Peterson’s office as he is out of town and a pregnant Mavis stumbles into the office with the baby on the way. Successfully, Hope is born that night. However, hope is nowhere to be found as Thanksgiving approaches and Joey becomes distant. The three then have to face reality and face the hard questions of trust, faith, love, and ultimately death. As Luke remembers, can the mountains, memories, and rain become healing and hope, thus rekindling Luke’s passion for the dream that began so many years ago?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Aug 22, 2017
• ISBN: 9781640820586

Book preview

Chapter 1

Daddy always told me, Keep your chin up and your nose clean. I took that as great advice, both literally and figuratively. It was just one of the many axioms of wisdom I obtained from my parents over the years. It ranked way above the age-old question about jumping off bridges if my friends did and just slightly above You can do anything you put your mind to—never give up.

But as I reached my teens and began my journey through adulthood, I created my own motto, my own worldview so to speak, and, in essence, my own dream. Thirty years later, I’m still trying to make the dream I had come to own a reality.

The green Honda van, usually accustomed to the stop-and-go traffic of city life, whines as it shifts gears while snaking up the four miles of steep-grade switchbacks along 226 in western North Carolina. This is the portion of the journey referred to as simply the mountain. You have to leave wherever you are visiting in time to make it down the mountain by dark. And you have to go up the mountain to reach home, which is the small mountain town of Spruce Pine, just beyond the Blue Ridge Parkway.

My brows are locked in a fight to see how close they can get to touching, and my jaw is clenched. The bottom-line conversation I had with my boss earlier that day still replays in my mind, and my innermost being lurches in disgust at the sheer audacity that monetary value should be placed on life and the use of resources to save said life. I am a doctor, a pediatric oncologist, and a researcher, charged with caring for young cancer patients and seeking a cure for that cancer. I am supposed to save lives, not worry about how many patients I see or how much the resources cost.

What the hell am I even doing? Humph. Hell is exactly where I’m living. And working. What does it even matter? What is the point? Everyone just dies. Fifty years from now, all new people and nothing I do will even matter. It will all just fade away, like memories cast into the abyss. No one can really make a difference. It’s all just gone in a heartbeat. I am muttering to myself, of course. Tears prick at my corneas as I fight depression and desperate sadness, battling them into the submission of anger, for isn’t that what we do? Never let the weakness show. Don’t let them see you bleed. Don’t feel too much.

But I do feel.

I feel everything. I wish to God I didn’t. I wish I were numb. I wish I could just find a solution, a cure. I wish I weren’t a failure. I wish I could fix cancer. I wish I could save a life. I wish I didn’t have to give bad news and watch every one of my patients die. I wish I could erase all the hurt. I wish I didn’t have so many regrets. I wish this miserable life weren’t mine. I wish it could all disappear.

My driving is erratic. I know the road well, but even in sanity, the road is dangerous. I know this, and I don’t care. I swing the wheel recklessly, and the van leans hard, banking into the curve. I cross the yellow line. I don’t care. I am almost daring a semitruck to meet me in the middle, hoping for a quick end to this wretched life. The inward pain begs to be acknowledged and felt even as outward pain. My heart feels like it is bleeding on the inside, and my mind begs for an outward expression of that pain. My eyes blur, and my soul begs for release.

Damn it all to hell!

The curses erupt in a guttural exclamation, and I throw my hands up, off the wheel, allowing the van to glide almost gracefully toward the edge of the mountain.

"Damn and hell are bad words. You shouldn’t say bad words."

The trusting, calm small voice breaks through my pain and slams my consciousness back into sanity. I grab the wheel and awkwardly swerve back into my own lane. My breaths are tight and short, my hands shaking. I glance into the rearview mirror, ashamed. Ashamed that I had cursed within earshot of young ears, ashamed at my selfishness, ashamed that I had allowed my own pain to root out the fact that I had a precious child in the backseat, ashamed that I had disengaged so much I had forgotten I wasn’t alone.

You’re right, Joe. Sorry. I shouldn’t have said those things.

Joe continues to color, as if nothing had happened. But I think I see a slight smile, almost a smirk, tugging at his lips. Joe is eight, and his time is running out. I sigh deeply with that reality, letting the thought sink into my psyche. He is one of my young patients, and he had begged me to take him along. And for his sake, I shake my depression down into the depths of my heart, roll down the window, and take a long, deep breath. I can smell the earthy aroma of the mountain, and somehow, my soul shifts, a little light enters, and my spirit sighs. I breathe out the stress of my everyday life and allow it to become less encumbering and molt from my soul as used feathers from a bird’s back. And it is, at least momentarily, replaced with just a shred of hope.

Perhaps the answer to regaining my focus and making my dream a reality awaits me here. I allow a weak but anticipatory excitement to replace the searing pain in my gut as the minivan slowly jostles and bumps up the dirt road coated with river rocks to my childhood home along the banks of Grassy Creek.

The air is sweet with summer honeysuckle as I prop against the wall of my old white clapboard house in a green straight-backed chair perched on two legs on the front porch. Over the mountain I can see a dark thunderhead begin to form. No surprise. It seems the rains have come frequently over the recent years. At one point in my life, I loved the rains—healing rains. But now, more often than not, they seem to embody the storms in my life instead of the chance for a sweet moment or a tender memory. I grimace.

I am returning to this place, this haven I hold so dear in my heart—this, the home of my youth—in one last and desperate attempt to find some absolution, some peace, some resolution of my purpose in life, my dream.

Completing medical school, doing a residency at Duke University Medical Center, and finally reaching attending physician status at Duke should have been a dream come true in and of itself. However, I have viewed it as only a step in the right direction. I have dedicated all my education, my entire career, to finding a cure for childhood leukemia. That is my dream. And as lofty as it sounds, I have been determined to make it come true. Seeking this reality has been my focus for so long that sometimes I believe my heart will cease to beat if my mind stops thinking about the next step, the next test to run, the next drug to try.

Keeping my chin up and my nose clean is becoming harder with every false positive test I devise, every failed experiment, every patient lost. Accomplishing anything I put my mind to has failed me. Never give up seems trite and frivolous. Tell that to my young patients, who look in my eyes every day and search them for the words they want to hear: cure and normalcy. And yet for many, I haven’t been able to give that to them. Every lost battle is another failure and another reason to do the very thing I try to tell my patients not to do—give up. I visibly wince, remembering the drive up and the mental gnashing that could have ended not only my life, which seemingly wouldn’t have been a loss, but also the life of Joe, my young patient, who is just beginning his. And whose life I am trying to save. And whom I am failing. I cover my face with my hands, as if to shield my eyes from the inevitable pain that seems to follow me these days. It is why I am here.

I am taking a rare break, a needed sabbatical, a suggested vacation, hoping to extract myself from the daily battle I do with the enemy of cancer. I am praying to maybe shake off some of the not-good-enough feel of my own skin and realign my heart with my dream. I am hoping the mountain air will regenerate the brain cells and give me a fresh outlook. Maybe I’ll stumble on a natural herb or suddenly wake up in the cool mountain air with an aha moment and the final answer. I smile ruefully at this magical thinking. I feel as if my life’s work has been a struggle to attain this thing that is just beyond my reach. If I cannot gain some peace, make some headway, I fear I may lose my dream, this purpose in life, and if the truth be told, my very being.

I have with me my journals, my pen, my paper, and my patient, Joe. He is just one of the many I have failed over the years. He has leukemia, and no chemotherapy I have thrown at it or even created in my lab has been able to tame his disease.

I can almost visualize the war raging deep within his bone marrow. Outwardly he appears quite well, with almost as much spirit as any eight-year-old boy. Other than the absence of his once-curly dark hair, he can pass for any towheaded rascal on the mountain. He begged me to take him to this mountain, and I hope it will provide some healing for us both. So here I am again, back at the homestead where I grew up, the place where life once seemed so safe and sacred. The place where the dream began.

I close my eyes, allowing the mountain breeze to caress the furrows from my brow and transport me back to my youth. Even as the breeze tickles my cheek, I hear the gentle pinging of the raindrops on the tin roof above me, and it lulls my mind back to a softer day.

Chapter 2

It was the summer of 1962. I had just turned fifteen. Not yet old enough to be considered trustworthy yet too old for coddling, as my aunt Betsy May would put it. That was the year that changed my life, or maybe I should say, gave it meaning.

Home was a wooden-planked white farmhouse on Sparks Mountain, on the banks of Grassy Creek, just inside the township of Spruce Pine, a laid-back Southern town nestled in the bosom of the Blue Ridge Mountains. My plans for that summer were simple: eat, sleep, eat some more, swim, fish, and generally goof off with my best friend. Not a bad outline for a summer.

My constant companion was to be my best buddy, Raisin. His real name was Raymond Ray Dula (for his great-granddaddy) Washburn. But his nickname, born from his ability to raise so much cane, as his mama called it, fit much better.

Raisin! C’mon, go up the mountain with me.

I reached the twenty-third of the mica-laden steps to my porch out of breath after finishing my chores and found a very still Ray propped against the wall of my house in a green straight-backed chair on two legs. His eyes were closed, and he did not stir at my arrival.

D’you hear me? I demanded, only slightly annoyed at his obvious ignoring of me.

Yet stir or respond he did not. I stared a moment, squinting my eyes, assessing the situation. A cool mountain breeze picked up his sandy bangs and tousled them as a mother fondly rubbing her child’s head. Ray seemed not even to be breathing.

Raisin! Cut it out and c’mon! I snapped. Ain’t got all day. Though that was exactly what I had, I was trying the anger approach, which usually worked.

Again, I got no response. My eyes narrowed more as I surveyed my friend.

I took a step forward, fear mounting within despite testosterone fighting it back. Suddenly, a thousand thoughts swirled in my brain, causing a wave of dizziness to override my manliness. Was he playing possum, or was something really wrong? Slowly I reached out my suddenly clammy hand to poke him.

Yahhhh!

The yell and jolt of Ray bolting upright just inches from my face were enough to cause palpitations and created a jarring leap of uncontrolled body parts that sent me reeling perilously close to the edge of the porch. Just as my foot slipped backward off the boards and the realization of the situation connected with my brain, Ray deftly grabbed the bib of my overalls and steadied me back on solid ground.

Oughta thank me, he began. Dern sure ’bout met your maker that time. If’n I hadn’t a-been here, you’d fallen for sure. Ought not get that close to the edge again. He winked and flashed me a most mischievous grin that showed most of his teeth, and his ice-blue eyes sparkled with the good-natured merriment of a job well done. I gave him a halfhearted shove, as that was all I could muster, and noticed I was still shaking.

Race you to the orchard! he challenged.

I leaped down the steps, taking three or four at a time, determined to beat him and reestablish my manhood. Off we went over the hills, hurdling tobacco plants and narrowly missing Mama’s prize squash as we cut through the field.

We pulled up, sucking wind, at the summit of one hill that marked the beginning of the apple orchard. A pair of crab apple trees had been our destination. Boys of the mountains know there is nothing more inspiring than a crab apple–throwing contest, but one must be cautious not to eat too many of the apples, for a stomachache will be sure to follow.

What’re we gonna do today? I asked as I tossed an apple through the air.

Don’t know.

Maybe go catch some fish? I asked.

Well, Raisin drawled back lazily, gotta take someone with us.

Huh? I asked inquisitively.

Cousin Joey’s comin’ to stay with us this summer. Comin’ up from Raleigh. Be here directly.

I stared at Ray in disbelief. He hadn’t told me we would have another player in our summer plans, particularly a citified boy. I wasn’t even sure I had ever heard Ray mention a cousin Joey before. But hey, the more, the merrier, and instinctively, I gave a little shrug of my shoulders.

So you reckon Joey can fish? I asked, hurling another apple through the air, pretending to be a major-league pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals.

Reckon I can the answer came from behind us, causing us both to jump several feet upward. We whirled around and came face-to-face with a girl, who appeared to be our age, in overalls and tank top, with two rows of black braids cascading down her shoulders, sporting a wide grin. When are we going?

I looked at Ray, who was rolling his eyes, and realized my mouth was hanging open. I shut it sharply.

"I thought you said your cousin Joey was coming," I hissed at Ray through clenched teeth under my breath.

He did, she said, grinning back at me. Joey Adams. Pleased to meet you. The girl advanced toward me, hand extended. My mouth was dry as cotton. I gingerly took her hand, afraid to squeeze too hard, but I was shocked with the grip I received in return.

I wasn’t sure what to make of this creature before me. I was angry at Raisin for not telling me his cousin was a girl, disappointed at the prospect that we probably wouldn’t get to do all the fun stuff we had planned if she was hanging around, and yet strangely enamored by her smile. I cut a shy glance back in her direction while feigning indifference.

So you got a name? she asked with a slightly crooked smile.

I came to my senses. Uh, yeah, I’m Luke . . . uh, Luke Sparks, I managed to stutter.

What are y’all doin’?

Havin’ a crab apple–throwing contest, Ray replied. Bet you cain’t throw farther’n us, he challenged, cocking his head almost arrogantly to one side and raising an eyebrow in Joey’s direction.

Bet you I can, she replied, stepping forward toward us and up to the challenge. I noted she had almost the identical head tilt and lopsided half-smirk Ray did.

Almost annoyed with her confident attitude, Ray tossed her an apple. She examined it closely, turning it over in her hands. Ray raised his chin defiantly, cut his eyes toward me, and gave me a knowing smile.

Ain’t never throwed an apple fore, huh?

Nope. She shook her head slightly, still examining the apple in her hand.

Then suddenly, she reared back in perfect baseball form and let the apple rip through the air like a bullet. For the second time since she had entered my life, my mouth gaped open. Her apple soared through the air and landed with a clean plop several yards from mine, surpassing even Ray’s.

Just baseballs, Joey said, finishing her answer to Ray’s question with a smile and dusting off her palms. Now, when’s our fishing trip?

Chapter 3

The three of us met early one morning just as the sun was beginning to peek over the horizon, casting a bronze haze on the morning fog that had settled into the valley below Sparks Mountain. The fog hung there silently and stealthily gliding just beneath the ridge, gently kissing the homes that rested there in light slumber.

The mountain itself was tinted in blue, thus the name of the region, the Blue Ridge. When the fall came, the mountains would shift almost magically as the leaves would change color, painting the mountain in a patchwork of fiery reds, canary yellows, and pumpkin oranges. Not a living soul had been part of that awesome season without giving thanks to God for His being such an artist.

The dew was heavy on the grass as we made our way, carrying three cane poles and a Folgers Coffee can full of dirt and worms. We headed just beyond my house and across the narrow gravel street that was Dula Road to Grassy Creek, so named because the banks were strewn with rich, plush grass.

The breeze had picked up, and the black-eyed Susans were dancing a jig beside the Queen Anne’s lace while the Johnny-jump-ups were just beginning to dot the mountain with their royal purple buds. The rhododendron swayed in time to the rhythm of the wind, and their fuchsia blooms waltzed along, dipping and bobbing. The mountain laurels were sporting their white blooms and playing hostess to several honeybees.

I noticed Joey had been fairly quiet during our trek to the creek. She seemed almost lost in her surroundings. I eyed her frequently, as I still had not quite figured out what to make of this new female who had entered my life in a whirlwind just a few days before.

She was my height, with dancing blue eyes that made me look at my feet whenever she trained them on me. She had Ray’s same good-natured, authentic laugh that flowed easily from her mouth. She was fifteen and a half, she said, a sophomore in high school in Raleigh, the state capital and big city four hours away.

She had talked easily with us and told us of the high school sports and the downtown activities along Fayetteville Street in Raleigh. She spoke of the universities of higher learning, three that were within ten miles of one another. I nearly drooled with envy as she told us about going to football and basketball games at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill and being there to see the rivalry games between the Tar Heels and the NC State Wolfpack. She spoke of Duke University, which was home to an incredible medical school and hospital.

I listened in awe. I had never been farther than Asheville, and never to the coast, which she informed me was only two hours from her house. When she saw my interest regarding the beach, she described the sound of the surf as it ebbed and flowed, rocking you to sleep on the coarse sand. She talked of walking along the sand, allowing its soggy wetness to squish up between her toes, dancing around fiddler crabs running sideways away from the surf, and searching for starfish, drying after being washed up out of the foam.

She didn’t have the same old King’s English way of talking that we did, though she frequently used some of our colloquial slang. Her words came out crisp and not slurred, but she seemed to understand the mountain drawl well. And despite her city upbringing, she did not look down on her country cousin or me. She seemed excited to share about her home with us and even suggested that we come to visit. I wasn’t sure if the invite was genuine or a product of the Southern hospitality we were all taught so well, but I suspected it was from the heart.

Today, however, she remained silent as we traversed the land and ended up at the creek. She sat down in the wet grass, tilted her face to the sun, and closed her eyes, breathing deeply.

What’re you doin’? Ray asked, putting words to the question circling my own mind.

Living life, she replied with eyes still closed and smiled. I’m feeling the sun on my face, breathing the mountain air, and seeing how the flowers dance in the breeze. She straightened her head and glanced back at us. Sorry, she said, shrugging, and grinned, just being in the moment.

It sounded strange, and both Ray and I paused, looked at each other, shrugged our shoulders, but still smiled at the whimsical spirit of a soul before us who seemed to shine and dance like the flowers she was describing.

Y’all are so lucky, she continued. Just look around. Everything is alive here. The grass is do-si-doing with the flowers. And then there’s the smell. It’s—she paused, searching for the right words to do justice to the smell that tickled her nose—earthy. Almost musty, green, and like soil that’s fresh but ancient all at the same time. And listen.

We did.

Can’t you just hear it? The wind is tickling our ears, talking to our souls, whispering answers to our unasked questions.

She was so convincing and passionate about it that I could almost hear a whisper.

Then Ray leaned in close. Luke, it’s the ghost of Old Man Nawley come back to get my head, he hissed in a sinister voice.

Our trills of laughter tinkled over the terrain then. Joey playfully slung a fitful of grass and weeds in Ray’s direction, and he in turn flicked an insect back at her. Giggling, she swatted the bug off. I lay back for a moment in the plush grass along the bank.

C’mon, bait the hook and let’s get fishin’, Ray chuckled.

I reached for my cane pole and headed for the bait can. Joey was on my heels.

Can you show me how? she asked.

I turned to look at her. There was no fear in her eyes, no moment of disgust, just a sincere desire to learn.

Sure.

I dug two fingers down into the can, pulled out a long juicy worm, and held it out to her. Without batting an eye, she secured the bait between her thumb and index finger and held it up close to her face to inspect it, much like she had the crab apple.

You just squish it on to the hook ’bout halfway so it’ll still wiggle but not fall off, I instructed.

She watched closely as I placed my bait on the hook. Then she did likewise, sticking her