Just Beyond the Curve (19 page)

The customers began throwing their napkins, cutlery
and enough money on the tables to cover the cost of their meals,
then stood and began walking out the door. Before John turned and
left, the restaurant was empty.

At the pickup again he was surprised to see Pam come
out the door with her face in her hands. She was crying
hysterically, her heart and emotions finally reaching the breaking
point. Judy slammed out the passenger door and went to her. She
took Pam in her arms and began comforting her. "What is it, Pam?
What's wrong?" Judy asked, holding the other woman and patting her
back tenderly.

"He fired me!" Pam lamented. "Now what will I do? I
really need this job. How will I pay my bills?"

"John, did you hear that? That jerk in there fired
her!" Judy said angrily. "We got to do something for her!"

"Pam, could you run this restaurant?" he asked
thoughtfully.

"Yeah," she said, nodding her head, her eyes red
rimmed and streaming.

"Good," John said. He walked to a pay phone on the
wall between the restaurant and the truck stop, dropped some coins
in it, then began talking for a few minutes while looking all
around the area, then hung up and came back to the pickup.

"I just instructed my lawyer to get with our banker
and buy this place for you. You can pay us back when you can,
okay?" John said closing the door and reaching for the ignition.
"Now, let's go see that sick boy of yours. The guys are on the way,
too. Here in a week you'll have that restaurant to operate. You'll
be responsible. Can you handle it, Pam," he asked, then smiled over
at her like a big brother.

She could only nod her head, unable to speak, she was
so choked up. "I don't have car," she managed to whisper.

"Don't worry," Judy said, patting Pam's thigh, "we'll
take care of it."

Pam cried the rest of the way to the hospital. As
they went up to the pediatric ward she managed to get her emotions
under control. She was smiling as she led John and Judy onto the
children's ward.

Josh lay bald and pale against the Batman pillow case
under his tiny face. He appeared to be about nine years old. His
eyes were a bright beautiful blue, they were large and round. He
was a good looking kid. His eyes grew larger when John stepped into
the room behind Judy.

"No way!" Josh exclaimed excitedly, but weakly,
seeing John's face. "John Travis!" he exclaimed, then his eyes
became glassy. "Maybe I already died!"

"No Sir, Josh," John said, coming over to his bed.
"You ain't died yet, Little Man. I'm John Travis. This is my wife
Judy and my son, Billy. Your mom told me you'd like to have an
autograph from me. I convinced her, quite easily in fact, that a
personal visit would mean a lot more to a boy your age, right?"

"Shoot yeah!" Josh said, wiping his eyes on the back
of his wrists. "Will you sing some of your songs for me?"

"I sure will," John said patting Josh gently on his
narrow, bird like chest. "In fact the boys are on the way with the
guitars and drumsticks. We're going to sing all of you some
songs..."

"There's a guitar over there in the closet. It's my
size, but maybe you can use it," Josh said hopefully.

John looked in the closet and found the small child's
guitar. It was small, but it would do. He returned to the bed and
took a seat in the chair. In a few minutes he had the guitar in
relatively good tune and began to play and sing. Josh beamed, as
did John, seeing he was making the dying child happy.

While he sang, John wished he could take the child's
illness into himself and defeat it so the child could live a full
life.

Unbeknownst to John, Judy, Pam, or Josh, within half
an hour news of the concert at the children's hospital was being
broadcast across the nation on every news station and paper. Even
by word of mouth. John Travis had become a sensation.

When the band arrived there was a huge crowd outside
the hospital. Jake, Ross and Dempsey eased their way through to the
door, then inside and up to the pediatric ward. They found Josh's
room and entered quietly and introduced themselves. Jake
immediately started teasing him about staring at his slightly
crossed eyes, then emphasized the misalignment sending Josh into
gales of childish laughter.

Ross was so big, Josh believed him to be a giant.
Ross told him he was actually the smallest of four brothers and had
gotten beat up all the time when he was little. Josh looked up at
him in awe of the tales he told of his childhood.

Dempsey sat on the floor and leaned back against the
wall. Seeing his intent, Jake began to tap out the drum score on
various surfaces within reach. Ross began to strum the rhythm
guitar, John the lead guitar and Dempsey thumped out the bass line.
They were quickly into full swing of some of John's songs.

While this was going on the hospital staff was
setting up a makeshift concert hall for the children. Within half
an hour the children were seated, or in their bed listening to John
Travis and the Travelers in a live concert, just for them. They
were beyond ecstatic.

Sometime later the children were fast asleep in their
beds. John sat beside Josh, who was also fast asleep. The children
had been quickly exhausted by the excitement of the concert; their
frail little bodies fighting desperately for life and losing.

Outside the hospital the crowd waited for John and
the Travelers to come out. They wanted to thank them personally for
bringing such happiness to these dying children free of charge. It
seemed to the nation his humanity knew no bounds.

"John, we'd better go," Judy said softly. "It's
getting late. Honey."

"I'm afraid to leave him, Judy," he replied, looking
up at her. "What if it was one of our Billys laying there?"

"He'll be fine, John," Judy assured him, glancing
over at Pam.

"No he won't," John argued, reminding them that these
children were dying.

John shook his head and stood. He leaned over the bed
and kissed Josh gently on the forehead. "I won't forget you, Josh
Jenkins. I promise!" he said, then stood and turned away.

"John, you'll never know how much this has meant to
Josh and the other kids. They're such strong troopers! How can I
ever repay you?" Pam asked, her tears beginning to fall once
again.

"You already have, Pam," John replied, taking her
gently into his arms and kissing her cheek. "If there is anything
more I can do. Don't hesitate to call. Maybe you will allow me and
the boys to come back, sometime?"

"Oh, you're much too busy traveling all over the
world with your music. You don't have time for these kinds of
troubles," Pam said seriously.

“These are the kind of troubles that are everyone's
concern," John said seriously. "I promise I will bring this to the
attention of the country music industry and see if we can help end
cancer in children."

"Can I give you a kiss, John Travis?" Pam asked, her
eyes brimming.

"You'll have to ask my wife about that," John said
shyly. A friendly kiss was just natural, but when it became
something more serious it was a whole different story.

Judy spread her arms in invitation for Pam to hug and
kiss her husband. When they parted John asked, "Can we drop you
someplace?"

"I'll be fine," Pam replied. "I have no place to be
in the morning."

"You have our card. Don't hesitate to use it, Pam,"
John said. "We'll have good news in a few more days."

Pam impulsively tiptoed and kissed John softly on the
lips, then turned to Judy and hugged her tightly around her big
belly, then kissed her on the cheek as well. "I will never forget
you two!"

"We won't let you," Judy laughed, kissing Pam's
cheek.

John was glad to be leaving the hospital. He and Judy
walked down the hall to a bank of elevators. John pushed the call
button and they stood and waited for the car to arrive.

"Pam sure cries a lot," he said. "But, she has a good
reason, too."

"Maybe she'll be alright when we get the restaurant
for her."

"What we need to do is save her child," John said
staring at Judy seriously. "That would make her smile again."

"We're not Gods, John," Judy said as the doors
opened. "We're just two normal people trying to get by. We have
problems, too."

"I spent my life sad and mostly poor," he said,
holding the door open. It nudged him several times while he waited.
He kind of liked the feeling of the insistent door butting into
him. "I know what it’s like," he said with a grin.

"What changed?" Judy smiled, watching him play with
the door like a child.

"I met you and fell in love," he said seriously. "Now
that I know what love is I want to share it with the whole
world."

"Well, let's invite Pam and Josh to the Awards
Ceremony, then," Judy said, then tugged John from the elevator and
back down the hallway toward Josh's room.

"But, I may not win, Judy!" John protested.

"So what? Not everyone gets a chance to be invited to
the Country Music Awards!"

"True," John agreed, then gave up fighting Judy's
insistent pull.

CHAPTER TWENTY

The weeks passed quickly for John. He and his band
made their engagements to sold out crowds. His songs were topping
the charts one after the other. It seemed he could record nothing
that didn’t go to number one. Still, he had stiff competition every
step of the way. Janice was his number one contender for the
coveted Entertainer of the Year Award. John secretly hoped she won.
To him she had overcome nearly insurmountable obstacles to make her
mark in the Country Music business.

Pam had turned the restaurant/truck stop into a
sensation. Every trucker and country western fan stopped hoping for
a chance to see someone, anyone, famous. It was a popular dining
place for the ‘stars’ traveling through on their tours thanks to
John’s constant bragging on the quality of the food and the
friendliness of the staff there. Pam was already planning an
addition on the restaurant to accommodate the growing crowd.

Josh and several of his fellow patients had received
engraved invitations to the Country Music Awards in Nashville,
Tennessee and they were eager to accept. John, Judy, Pam and Janice
made all the arrangements to make this dream come true for
them.

At the Travis house bags were packed and waiting to
be loaded in one of the three tour busses that transported the band
and all the support staff for John’s shows on the tours. They had
decided to take the busses to Nashville since they were built to
accommodate comfortable living for months at a time on the
road.

‘Old Billy,’ as he had come to be known since the
birth of lil’ Billy was a package of released excitement and
impatience. His mouth ran a mile a minute and he seemed to have an
endless number of questions that had to be asked right now! The day
they were scheduled to leave for Nashville was no exception. He
followed John around like a puppy and fired every question that
came to mind. They stood beside the bus, waiting.

“John,” he asked for the tenth time, “do you think
you’ll win Entertainer Of The Year?”

“No,” he answered for the tenth time. “I think Janice
will. She deserves it. Plus, she’s real talented, too!”

“Yeah, but so are you,” Billy argued. “And if it
wasn’t for you, she wouldn’t be there at all! She had given up,
remember?”

“Just the same,” John replied patiently. “She should
win--It’s really hard to tell, Old Billy. We’ll just have to see
which way the fans vote.”

Their conversation was interrupted by the arrival of
a new car rolling down the driveway. It stopped beside John’s truck
and the driver’s door opened. Pam pushed the door open and climbed
out of the vehicle. She waved and yelled her hellos, then walked
around to the passenger side in time to meet John and Billy. She
opened the door and John reached in and lifted Josh out.

“Is this where you live, Mister Travis?” Josh asked,
his eyes as big as silver dollars.

“I thought we were past that Mister Travis thing,
Josh,” John chided him gently.

“But you’re famous,” Josh replied, holding to John’s
neck tightly.

“I’m just a person, like you, Josh. That’s all. I
just sing pretty good and folks want to play my recordings on the
radio. It’s just what I do to make money to live on.”

“Them your busses?” Josh asked, looking at the tour
busses, accepting what John had said as gospel.

“Yeah,” John replied. “You want to have a look around
inside one of them?”

“Yeah,” Josh replied. “I can walk, you know. I’m not
dead, yet.”

“Well, from what I’ve been hearing it’s gonna be a
long time before that happens. I hear the cancer’s in
remission.”

“Yeah, it’s goin’ away,” Josh said, standing on his
own two feet, but clinging tightly to John’s hand.

“I’m glad ya’ll could make it, Pam. Old Billy said he
would take care of Josh during the trip.”

“That’ll be good, John,” Pam said. “Josh is so
excited he couldn’t sleep. Maybe he will on the bus.”

John kneeled in front of Josh and looked him in his
large blue eyes, “Josh is it alright with you for Old Billy to help
you along during this trip? It’ll be quite a long ride to
Nashville.”

“Yeah,” Josh said, reaching over for Billy’s hand.
“I’m okay, Mister Travis.”

“Josh, just call me John, please. I’m no body
important.”

“You are to me and my mom,” Josh assured him, staring
him straight in the eyes.

“We’re family, Josh,” John said with watery eyes.
“That’s what family is supposed to do; help each other.”

“I love you, John,” Josh said, then stepped into
John’s arms and hugged him tightly.

A tear slid from both of John’s eyes and down his
cheek. He looked up at Pam and grinned wryly. “And I love you, too,
Josh. More than I can explain in words,” he added.