With just a few hundred yards left on the trail and sensing they were near the end of their journey, Mike spoke up, “Is Phoebe going to be home?”

Kenny said, “When we got back to where there’s cell service I saw I had a text message from her saying she and the boys are going to be home tonight. I’ll get there in enough time to pick up before they get back.”

“Be good to her. It can go wrong fast. I know.”

“I will, man.”

“I think you married up with her, so don’t give her any reasons to find something better.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, but I’ll do my best. At least I’m married, though.”

“ Well, touché, but I guess that’s true,” Mike said with a smile. They dropped their backpacks by their cars. Mike asked, “So if I find another treasure trail, are you up for the hunt?”

“Only if it’s with you, Mike.” They clasped hands and then Mike pulled Kenny in for a sweaty hug.

The next morning Kenny stood in the pulpit at Elm Avenue Presbyterian Church. He looked out at those gathered for the early service. It was mostly older people who came early, those who remembered the days when his grandfather stood in the same pulpit. Kenny grabbed the edges of the pulpit and looked at the church. He paused and then spoke, “You can tell who a person is by what they do when they think no one is looking. My grandpa, Rev. Robert Long, who preached from this pulpit for 30 years, used to say the same is true for churches. A church shows who it truly is when no one is looking. I wonder, though, if we became too concerned with how we look to the town. Our impressive building here on Elm Avenue, the expensive stained-glass, the fancy pipe organ--what we spend in brass polish in a year would support my pizza budget for a decade. All of these things, nice as they are, say ‘Look at us. Isn’t this impressive?’ I wonder if we’ve lost sight, though, of quietly doing the right things. I wonder if we forgot who God asks us to be. I learned this week one my predecessors did the right thing when no one else would know. I wonder if maybe it’s time for us to do that, to do what’s right and to care less about how impressive we may seem to the town. I’ve resolved to take a new focus in my ministry, to lead us in doing what is right. Will you follow me down this path?”

Meanwhile Mike, who didn’t have an early service to lead at his church, looked at his watch and saw it would be another 45 minutes until people started arriving for Sunday morning. He checked that everything was ready and then locked the door and walked down Elm Avenue. He passed Kenny’s church where he heard the muffled tones of his friend’s preaching coming through the loudspeakers inside. Two more blocks brought him to the front door of McFly’s Mocha. He gave his hair a quick comb with his fingers, took a breath, and walked inside. He saw Karen putting muffins in the glass case by the register. Karen smiled and said, “Hi Mike. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen you in here without your friend.”

“He’s already on the job, but I’ve got a few minutes yet. No Mikala this morning?”

“She usually doesn’t work on Sunday mornings. Sunday mornings are usually too close to Saturday night for her to be ready for work.”

“I understand,” Mike said. “I guess everyone was in their early 20’s once.”

“Your regular cup of coffee?”

“I think I might go for something new. How about a flat white? Is that any good?”

“Well, you won’t know until you try it. I like them, though.”

“Ok, one flat white.”

Karen stepped behind the espresso machine. Over the sound of the steam from her frothing milk Mike spoke, “So I’ve always been curious: why did you name this place McFly’s Mocha?”

“You’ve seen the Back to the Future movies?”

“Sure. I imagine we grew up about the same time. I saw them in the theater back in the 80’s.”

“I always liked how Marty and Doc and Jennifer, for them the past was never the past. They could go back and make things right. I always loved the idea of nothing had to be set it stone; they could change things. I had some failures earlier in my life. Maybe it’s wrong to call them failures. It’s just some things didn’t work out how I’d planned. I wanted to start over. I thought about how much I loved coffee. Thomasville really didn’t have a coffee place then, so I thought why couldn’t I start one? It seemed like a chance to remake things, to have a fresh start. I said I wasn’t going to let what was in the past control my future; it reminded me of those movies. This was my chance, like Marty McFly does, to set my life right. And, so far I think it’s worked.”

“Karen, that’s as good as anything you’ll hear in any church this morning.”

“Well thanks, Mike. Not many ask, so it means a lot to me that you’re curious.”

Mike paused, looked down, and then looked up. “You know, Karen, I’d love to hear more. This is the point where I’d probably invite you out for coffee, but I’m guessing maybe you don’t want to be invited to your own business.”

Karen said, “It doesn’t have to be coffee. It could be anything.”

“Would you like to, then, maybe do something with me sometime?”

Karen slid the coffee over to Mike. “Sure, Mike.” She smiled. “I thought you’d never ask.”

THE END