Travelers Rest by Ann Tatlock

all. I never thought about it that way. I guess I’ve always taken the body’s ability to heal for granted.”
    “Most of us do, I think,” Jon-Paul said. “We don’t know how blessed we are to be given multiple chances to go on living.”
    They were quiet a moment. Jane waited. At length she said, “So then what happened?”
    “Oh.” Jon-Paul raised his brows momentarily as Jane nudged him back to his story. “So I went to college, and during my freshman year, things got worse. By the end of the first semester, I couldn’t see the blackboard at all. I finally admitted to myself something was wrong. I guess it was handy I was right there at Duke, because my parents arranged for me to be seen at the Duke Eye Center. The doctor there put me through a battery of tests, and when he was done, he told me I had Stargardt’s Disease. I didn’t even know what it was. I’d never heard of it. My parents asked him what the plan of action was, and he said there wasn’t one. I was going blind, and there was nothing anyone could do about it.”
    Jane sat in stunned silence a moment, trying to imagine how he must have felt. Finally she whispered, “How awful.”
    “Yeah,” Jon-Paul said. “It was pretty awful. His announcement signaled the end of life as I knew it. Ironically, the body is able to heal itself in so many ways, but not with this disease. So there I was, eighteen years old, just kind of watching my sight slip away and wondering where I was going to end up when it was gone.”
    She had to stop herself from reaching out to take his hand. Words tumbled through her mind as she searched for the right ones to say. Not I’m sorry, but something else. Something reassuring. “And yet,” she ventured, “you’ve done so well. You must have come to accept it.”
    He frowned in thought. “I wouldn’t say I’ve ever come to accept it, but I’m coping with it. I still get frustrated. Some days I even feel the same sense of loss I felt when I first heard the name Stargardt’s. I miss things like being independent and driving myself around. I miss reading a book that I’m holding in my hands. I miss looking out over the mountains in the fall when the leaves are changing. There’s so much I miss even now, but at the same time I have to believe that there’s a purpose for all of this.” He paused again, took another long sip from the can of Dr. Pepper. “I believe I told you I specialize in disability law, so I have a lot of dealings with disabled folks. Also, I do volunteer work on behalf of the blind. So I think I’ve done some good for others who are disabled or who have gone through a loss of some kind. I hope so, anyway.”
    Jane took a deep breath. “I’m sure you have.”
    Jon-Paul gave a small nod. “So now, about your fiancé. You say he was shot?”
    “Yes. In the neck. It left him a quadriplegic.”
    “I see. And now he thinks his life is over.”
    “Well, yes. And I guess in some ways it is. I mean, the life we’d planned . . . well, see, he’s a carpenter. Or was a carpenter. His whole career revolved around working with his hands. Now . . .” Jane’s voice trailed off as she gave a shrug.
    “Not much hope of that at this point, I suppose.”
    “No. None. You were able to go into a different field. I’m sure it wasn’t easy to make the change, especially since your interest was medicine. And yet you did make the change, and you’ve been successful. But for Seth, the options seem so limited. I don’t know what he’ll do with his life now.”
    Jon-Paul didn’t respond. He appeared deep in thought.
    Jane said, “Do you think Seth can come to terms with what happened to him?”
    “Well, I’ll tell you, Jane, it’s never easy, but it’s always possible. What I’ve seen in my experience is this: After the initial shock and grief, people start taking inventory of what they have left, and they begin to concentrate on what they can do rather than what they can’t. It seems to be