AN UNKNOWN ROAD

          The summer afternoon was too much of a furnace for Kate to feel like going out. But one of her old coworkers, Claudia, was hosting a potluck at her new house in the Hudson Valley. She had said, “Come! You’ll have fun!” With the lemon cake already baked, it was too late for Kate to back out.
          She was only ever planning to go by car – a two-hour trip. But doubts set in. Claudia spoke of the recent rain, the dirt road leading to her house, and the need to go slowly if going by car. So Kate asked if Claudia recommended the train. Kate thought it might be worth lugging the cake onto the Long Island Railroad to Grand Central, then onto the Metro North. Claudia asked what Kate was driving. Hearing it was an SUV, Claudia said, “I think you’ll be fine. Besides, the rain isn’t expected until evening.”
          Kate grabbed the Tupperware with the cake and headed out the door. The sooner she got to Claudia’s, the sooner she could come home, beating the rain, which included flash flood warnings. She buckled the Tupperware into the passenger seat, put on calming music and let the GPS get her out of her overcrowded part of Long Island and pointed upstate for the four o’clock party.
         The unfamiliar drive on the highway went better than expected until slowing to a crawl. Much later when the traffic let up, Kate was treated to a view of emergency vehicles lining the median. On the opposite side of the highway, the downstate traffic was being diverted into Kate’s lane to merge and continue upstate in Kate’s direction.
          Kate had no idea what was going on. But she thought this weird traffic pattern could be related to the heavy floods last week across the river, which washed homes away. Whatever it was, Kate was thankful the slowdown was over, allowing her to eventually reach a traffic light and turn onto a small country road. From there, the roads became even smaller and went uphill. Kate saw what Claudia meant about the need to go slowly. The doglegged turns, some puddled, were scary. When at last she reached Claudia’s house she herself was a puddle – of perspiration.
          Claudia’s husband was out front, ready to direct guests where to park. To avoid making a bad impression Kate resisted thinking of the trip home. She had the urge to put her head down on the steering wheel and cry. At least the circular driveway was completely clear, so she would be able to be the first car out.
          Awkwardly she got out, putting on her broad-rimmed sunhat. She went around and unbuckled the Tupperware. It was four sharp and she realized she was the first one there. Most of the setup for the outdoor gathering had been accomplished, but Claudia in her bright summer dress hastened to do finishing touches like draping a baby blue tablecloth on the table for entrees. Kate offered assistance but the husband handed Kate a cold glass of water, and she felt her face flush with the understanding that she must look exactly what she was: a sweaty fifty–nine–year–old motorist who just survived a trip to the country.
         Two separate guests driving to the party phoned Claudia to say their car batteries had died. “It’s the extreme heat,” Claudia reported to Kate. “Everyone thinks it’s just the cold that kills batteries, not so.”
          “Oh,” Kate said, feeling lucky her battery held out. 
          “I’m sending someone to give them a jump. Then there’s the people who took Metro North, whose train just got to the station and need to be picked up. No Ubers out here,” Claudia said, making Kate feel relieved that she didn’t come by train. “Well, we are a bit remote,” Claudia added lightly.
          You think? Kate thought with an inward shake of the head. The view of mountains in the distance was breathtaking, but she hadn’t realized what it meant to live in the Hudson Valley. The nearest store had to be at least a five-mile drive. That said, the homes were stately; Claudia’s, a lovely sea green Colonial. Kate’s own pitched-roof, pigeon-gray saltbox house seemed smaller and uglier.
          As more guests arrived, Kate met Claudia’s friends from the country club. Friends from Cornell. Friends from the neighborhood. John’s day job was singing for the Metropolitan Opera but his heart was in landscape painting. His partner owned a real estate agency in the city, and the house here was a second home. James was a voiceover actor. Sherre was a podcaster and milliner. Kate felt out of her league.
          So it was refreshing to meet Ellen and David who seemed to be retired – or at least happy to keep the conversation off of work. They were empty nesters like Kate, though unlike Kate, their son was still in college. When a couple that Ellen and David knew joined them, the topic shifted to the Catskills sleepover camp that the couple’s son was attending. Ellen and David’s son had gone there, as had Kate’s son. Kate relaxed, having a topic in common, reminiscing about the barn-style mess hall meals and bug juice that her camper had written her about in letters mailed home. She was glad to hear that none of this had changed: there were still things that year to year could be counted on.

          After the couple moved on, Kate stayed with Ellen, David a pace away. Ellen spoke of their returning last night from hiking in the Adirondacks. She offered this to explain why she looked such a mess. 
          Kate had thought nothing of Ellen being underdressed in a pale tee-shirt and jeans, her hair maybe a bit unruly sticking out from her hat, but she gave Ellen a commiserating smile. “Well I didn’t come back from any hike and look at me! Where’d you go?”
         “Lake Placid.”
          “I love that area! I used to take my son there,” Kate said. She thought it was true what they said about becoming an empty nester – it never got any easier.
          “How long did you hike?” Kate asked, curious because she had gone recently and lasted just a couple of hours. Though she exercised regularly and was in decent shape, the heat wiped her out.
          “Twelve hours,” Ellen said, falling silent. David said nothing.
          Kate asked a few polite questions and learned the scenery was beautiful and they had plenty of food – KIND bars and chocolate. But they ran out of water. 
         “Oh gosh.”
         “About an hour before we reached the car,” Ellen added.
          Delicately Kate asked, “Did you get lost?”
          Ellen’s gaze went briefly to David, who shut his eyes. Out of kindness Kate searched for a way to change the subject, but Ellen removed her sunglasses. The way she sought Kate’s gaze made Kate say, “That must have been scary.” 
          Ellen rubbed her jaw, then put her sunglasses back on. Kate turned slightly to David so he could engage if he wanted to. Shortly he nodded in response. Ellen did too.
          “It was really hot. We hadn’t expected that – in the mountains! Makes it hard to think,” Ellen said.
          Kate bit her lip, imagining what the two hikers had experienced wandering, hot, alone. It was probably not so different from the feeling Kate had driving today. Even if she hadn’t gotten lost, she had felt isolated in the car, on an unknown road. “Well, you made it. You’re here!” she said.
          They all got food. Quiche. Quinoa. Quesadillas. Ellen confessed to picking up a rhubarb pie at a farmstand, not having had time to make anything. Kate said she too brought dessert – a lemon bundt she learned to make when her son was a baby and she stayed home from work for a minute. She noticed how profusely Ellen was perspiring, a drop about to fall from her chin, and thought the weather couldn’t get any hotter, then realized that yes, of course it could. 
          Kate admitted, “I was stressing over what to bring. Then I thought, geez, what to bring to a potluck is not the world’s biggest problem.”
          Smiling grimly, Ellen wiped her chin. “The problem is the heat.”
          Despite being surrounded by trees, none offered shade. Kate was glad she remembered a hat. She guzzled water, then circulated among the other guests. She talked to Sherre the milliner about the rain expected later, speculating on how bad it might get. Sherre spoke of plans to go tomorrow to an outdoor concert and the quandary over whether she would be safer cancelling, even if she had really looked forward to it. Another guest, Lorraine, joined them. Hearing the topic was the weather, she spoke of the flooding last week. Her office, which was across the river, phoned her to do a safety check. Hearing that Lorraine and her family were okay, they told her not to try reporting to work. Lorraine already knew not to try after seeing the news: the road to her office was washed out. 
          “Yikes,” Kate said. “I saw police activity on the way here. Cars being diverted. Wondered if that was because of the floods.”
          “Yup. It’s a big mess. The road is still closed.”
          Lorraine took out her phone and showed Kate a news clip of a house crumbling. “Most of my coworkers lost their homes. I was lucky to be on this side of the river.”
          Wide-eyed, Kate blinked. It was hard to know what to say. “That’s horrible. Vermont got hit hard too,” she blurted, then wondered if saying that diminished this local tragedy.
          “Vermont, yeah,” Lorraine said. They all shook their heads.
          The sun bore down harder, as if scolding them all for their sloppy stewardship. Then before Kate knew it, the sky darkened and a wild whooshing sound swept ever closer. 
          Scrambling, they each picked up a dish from the table and rushed indoors.
          Kate tried not to think of the ride home. Would the shower end by then? Or was the rain here for good? Or would this shower stop, only to start suddenly while she was on the highway, trapping her alone in the car in rising water? As these thoughts raced through her head, she looked around the kitchen at the other guests eating and drinking and enjoying each other’s company. No one else was panicking. She told herself, Follow them.
          But instead, she appraised the remaining entrees, helter-skelter on the table, then she looked at the vast array of fresh desserts covering the kitchen island. Her bundt with the drizzled glaze, which she had hoped would be the star, was just another baked good. It crossed her mind that if she hadn’t come, no one would have missed her cake. Or had any less fun. As she leaned her hand on Claudia’s smooth countertop, she looked from one face to another among the guests to see if anyone was noticing a physical change in her to match her new thoughts. Maybe she looked taller? Or smaller? Something. The revelation was this: She had just spent two hours on the road, spewing greenhouse gases in her SUV, ensuring temperatures would climb further. And now she was going to spend two more hours on the road. Wasn’t coming here in the first place – acting as if everything was fine – effed up?
          Denise, another old coworker of Kate’s, said hello. She had just gotten to the potluck after being caught in terrible traffic.
          “Oh gosh,” Kate said and when she asked where Denise was coming from, she learned it was the same direction that Kate had come from, though a different road.
          “Police activity,” Denise said. “I heard it was from the floods last week.”
          “You saw it on your route too?” Kate asked.
          “I think they were dredging the river. Along the bank, we saw body bags.”
          Kate gave a gasp. Before she could process any of this, Claudia called, “The rain stopped! Everyone, back outside!” 
          Grabbing her purse, Kate went to say goodbye. 
          “You’re not leaving already, are you? Stay! You’ll have fun!” Claudia said, but Kate’s mind was on nothing but the long ride home.

The End