by T. K. Chapin
“Eggs?”
“Yes, please. I’m a little hungry.” She looked away from his glance and pushed a strand of hair behind her ear as she walked into the kitchen and took a seat at the table. Olivia appeared tired and worn out. He hoped that today, she’d be a little more relaxed and she’d be able to settle in more comfortably as she recovered. Standing up from the couch, he went into the kitchen and prepared the two of them breakfast. As he served the eggs onto plates on the table, she peered up at him.
“What are you thinking about, Olivia?” He wanted to get inside her mind, to spend time with her heart. He felt if he could climb over those walls she had put up, he’d be able to reach her, help her, and comfort her in this time of need.
She glanced around the cabin, then back at Tyler. “I’m thinking you deserve to love a woman who can treat you a lot better than I do, Tyler. That’s the honest truth.”
“How do you know what I deserve?” He inquired, hoping to keep the conversation moving forward with her.
She laughed as she shook her head and lifted her fork. “Where do I start?”
Tyler sat down and reached a hand over, gently touching the top of hers. “Love is a choice, Olivia, and I choose you.”
“Bad choice.” She shook her head, a blush reddening her cheeks. “I’ve done nothing but disappoint you.”
“That’s not true, and I don’t care what you’ve done. You can’t earn my affection, Olivia. You have it already.”
She was quiet for a long moment. Then, she started to eat. He stood up and retrieved two glasses from the cupboard. He poured two glasses of milk over at the counter. He turned toward her. “What do you want to do today?”
Shrugging, she set her fork down after taking a bite. “I’d like to see my daughter.”
Remembering the photo that Kora had given Tyler of Molly, he left the glasses on the counter full of milk and went into the living room for a moment. He grabbed his Bible from the coffee table and snatched the photo from inside.
He returned to the kitchen and handed the picture to Olivia.
“In time, Olivia. In time. I promise you.” Tyler watched her for a moment as she took the photo and stared at it. He could sense a wellspring of hope bloom inside her in that very moment. He smiled and then grabbed the glasses from the counter and brought them over to the table. He set one glass down in front of Olivia and one in front his plate, then took his seat.
“What made you come find me?” she asked, setting the photograph down.
“I had been thinking about you a lot. I also had something for Molly, another dress.”
“I see.” Her eyes gravitated to the picture of Molly near her plate, and Tyler could see her becoming upset the more she focused on Molly. He tried to help by changing her focus.
“I brought down a bunch of books from the house, some magazines too. The books are beside the couch in the living room, magazines under the coffee table. There is also a large variety of DVDs in the tote next to the TV.”
Olivia nodded and took a sip of her milk. “Thanks. I’ll keep that in mind. What will you be doing?”
“I need to work more on the firewood. I have none up at the house and barely anything left here.”
“Okay. Why are we out here and not at your house?”
“You’ll spend most of your recovery in this cabin, and I’ll be at my own house. I’m just here right now to help make sure you get through the first little part. It’s better this way.”
Lifting his plate off the table as he stood, Tyler walked it over to the sink.
“Hey, Tyler?”
He turned toward her.
“When can I see her?”
“You’ll want to take this slow. After you are feeling better and you’re not withdrawing, start talking with your parents and learning what has been going on for the last three months with your daughter.”
She nodded, and he came over to her at the table. He was thankful to see her more understanding and less argumentative today. He leaned his arms over the chair he had been sitting in and clasped his hands together. Noticing her thinking face, he asked, “What’s on your mind?”
“It’s my daughter. I don’t see why I have to start anywhere other than seeing her.”
He paused for a moment. “You love your daughter, Olivia, and just seeing how she is doing is where you have to begin to build trust with your parents. Your parents have sole responsibility and custody of Molly right now. It’s not up to you what happens. This is what they’ve laid out.”
“But that’s not fair, Tyler!”
Opening his hands, he shook his head. “Your actions have consequences. It’s not a matter of what’s fair or not in your mind. This is the reality you live in now.”
Olivia went quiet, the fight in her trampled down by some withdrawal symptom, Tyler suspected. She pressed a hand against her forehead. He came closer to her and bent over, kissing the side of her head.
“I’ll be outside if you need me for anything.” He wished he could spend all day with her, but since he was home from work, he really needed to work on firewood and now was as good a time as any.
Tyler went and slipped on a pair of sturdy work boots and laced them tight. Then, he put on his flannel jacket and headed outside. Once at the wood pile, he pulled the axe out of the chopping stump and set a log up to split. He chopped wood for the next hour and a half, stacking the wood neatly beneath the tin roof with the rest. When he was done, he returned the axe to the stump and peered around the property as he wiped sweat from his forehead. He hadn’t spent so much time on the land since he took ownership of it, and he felt remorseful for not doing so. He’d had hopes of notching down his workload last year after his vacation to Diamond Lake, but he hadn’t gotten around to really doing so. Tyler sat on the stump next to the axe and surveyed the white coat of snow across the land. It was magnificent. He bowed his head in prayer. He prayed for himself and for Olivia.
He felt a deep struggle in his soul as the woman he loved was fighting her way back from the Hell on earth known as addiction. He didn’t know what the lasting impacts of what had happened the last three months would be, but he prayed to God they wouldn’t be so severe that the two of them could never be together again. Your will, not mine, Lord. His desire to be with Olivia was tossed back and forth across the waves of unsure feelings. Initially, it had vanished when he saw her and Champ in bed together. He wasn’t able to dislodge the horror of what he had seen happening when he busted down the door to the bedroom. His love was still in his heart, but he didn’t like witnessing that. He prayed again for help.
Rising from the stump, he went into the cabin to get the keys to Chet’s work truck that was parked alongside the barn. He needed to repair a broken part of the fence he had spotted the night before when he had gone out searching for Olivia. When he walked into the cabin, he saw Olivia sprawled out on the couch asleep, a movie playing on the television.
He smiled. Tyler hadn’t seen her look so peaceful since he brought her to the cabin four days ago. He walked quietly up to the couch. Pulling up the blanket, he covered her and then went into the kitchen for the keys. He grabbed the keys from the small pottery bowl near the sink and then proceeded out the back door toward the barn.
Arriving at the fence a short time later in the truck, a few yards from the dirt road between the cabin and his house, he shut off the truck and got out. The snow crunched beneath his boots as he went around to the back of the truck and retrieved his toolbox. The sound of scurrying in the tall grass sticking out from the snow caught his attention nearby. Curious, he set the toolbox down near the post and went to investigate. He was surprised to find a medium-sized dog in the snow, and it barked as he approached.
“Hey, boy.” He bent a knee down and slowly reached out to pet the Border Collie.
The dog lowered its head in almost a cowering manner as it inched closer to Tyler’s hand. He went the rest of the way and patted the dog’s head, then rubbed behind its ear. Tyler’s h
eart filled with warmth as he saw the dog’s tail wag excitedly. It was refreshing to his soul to see something alive that was so happy to see him. It had been a long four days without interaction with anybody besides Olivia outside of a few brief calls with his brother.
“Come on, boy. You can help me with the fence.” Tyler stood up and walked toward his toolbox, but the dog didn’t follow. Tyler whistled and patted his jeans, and the dog skipped forward through the snow to follow. The dog stayed by Tyler’s side as he worked to repair the broken barbed-wire fence. After he was done, he bent down to the dog and gave him another rub behind the ear.
“Who do you belong to? A good dog like you must have an owner.”
He checked for a tag but found none. “Well, I’ll post some signs up in town and call the neighbors. For now, you’ll be named . . . Ace. I like that name.”
Tyler opened his driver’s-side door of the truck and then placed the toolbox into the bed. Ace jumped right into the cab and situated himself in a prone position on the bench. He for sure belongs to someone. He’s too well-behaved. Tyler turned the truck around and returned to the snowy road and to the cabin. At the cabin, he left Ace outside and went in and grabbed a bowl of water and the leftover lasagna from two nights ago. Returning outside, he surveyed the area in wonderment as the dog was gone.
“Ace,” he called out loudly. Tyler felt immediately dumb as he realized he had barely given the dog the name. Surely, he couldn’t come by hearing the name. To Tyler’s surprise, just the sound of his voice beckoned the dog back to the cabin. He came darting through the snow toward the cabin and he stopped just short of Tyler.
He lowered the food and water to the icy ground and the dog dove right into the lasagna.
“Where’d the dog come from?”
Tyler turned around to see Olivia rubbing sleep out of her eyes as she stood in the doorway of the cabin in one of Chet’s oversized jackets. She stepped out onto the porch and down the steps to the yard.
“I don’t know. I found him up the path toward the house. No tags.”
She smiled as she looked at the dog and approached. She bent her knees and patted the dog’s head and then rubbed his side. The dog stopped eating and rolled onto its back, and she rubbed his belly, her smile widening. Tyler was glad to see Olivia smile. She hadn’t done that since her arrival.
“I named him Ace, by the way.” Tyler laughed. “Obedient dog, whoever he belongs to. I’m going to head inside and call the neighbors. Here in a little bit, I’m going to go into town and put up flyers if no neighbors claim him.”
Glancing at Tyler, she nodded. “I’m sure whoever the dog belongs to misses him. He’s cute.”
Tyler agreed and headed up the steps of the porch to the cabin.
Chapter 29
CURLED UP ON THE COUCH in pain after Tyler had left for Newport to hang flyers about Ace, Olivia cried in the silence as the fire burned hot in the fireplace. Another wave of aches had filled her muscles and brought her to the edge of her sanity. She just wanted the pain to end. Earlier, she had been feeling a little better and thought the end of the withdrawals was near, but they had simply taken a short reprieve. How long would her punishment last? When she wasn’t in agony, her mind and thoughts were there to condemn her and to demonize her for all the wrong she had done to the people she loved. She had hurt Tyler, Molly, and her parents with her decision to stay with Champ like she had done. The guilt was crushing her. I could’ve left so many times, and I didn’t.
Stretching herself out on the couch to bring a fraction of comfort to the muscles in her legs, she let a hand hang over her head and off the couch. She jerked in surprise when she felt a lick on her hand. Relaxing, she put her hand down to the side of the couch and patted the dog on the head. Ace had been a welcomed addition to the cabin. She sat up on the couch and beckoned the dog to climb up. She snuggled the furry warm animal, and the warmth of him brought a measure of happiness to her spirit. The waves ended, and she spotted a pile of magazines tucked beneath the coffee table. Olivia grabbed a few and started to thumb through them.
Deciding on a gardening magazine, she tossed the rest onto the coffee table and opened it up. She flipped through page after page and stopped on an ad that showcased a woman’s hands holding a bountiful basket of brightly-colored vegetables. It made her think of the garden in Colville when she had still been married to Bruce. She had loved and tended that garden daily with her hands, and she could still taste the juices of that first tomato she’d ever harvested. She longed to have a garden again, to be able to work the soil with her hands and let the sun warm her cheeks. Most people loathed the task of pulling weeds, but not Olivia. She loved removing the bad, leaving only the good. The work made sense to her, and in a way, she felt it made her confusing world with Bruce tolerable. She always had the garden to go to when she needed it.
It only took ten minutes before more withdrawal symptoms pulled her away from the magazine. A cold sweat covered her in an instant as dull aches flashed once more in her muscles. Pulling the magazine from her lap, she placed it on the coffee table and lay down on the couch. Ace was still on the couch with her. He was right there in her arms. Covering herself and the dog with the blanket, she held the dog close and tried to think of her garden, pushing away the pain and the cold flashes.
When she woke sometime later, she noticed the magazines were put away. Tyler must’ve returned, she thought. She stood up and went over to the window that faced the front yard of the cabin, Ace by her side. He wasn’t at the wood pile. Then, Olivia and the dog went to the back of the house and she peered out the kitchen window. He wasn’t back there either. Where is he? She wondered.
Grabbing an oversized coat of Chet’s from the coat hook near the front door, she slipped it on along with her boots and then she and the dog went outside. She came around the corner of the house and found Tyler on his hands and knees in the midst of a few large pine trees.
“What are you doing down in the snow?”
He sat back on his knees and took off his pair of work gloves, smiling at her as he did. “I’m trying to see if this soil down here is good for planting.”
Tyler pulled a plastic bag from his pocket and then filled it with dirt.
“What are you going to plant? There are trees all around here.”
“I’ll clear it. I won’t be doing the planting. You will be. You like gardens, right? I envision this whole left side of the cabin can be your garden, with a white picket fence and all.”
She liked gardens, yes, but she didn’t like hearing his plans for her future. It was winter, and she wouldn’t be able to plant anything until the spring.
“How long do you plan to keep me hostage here, exactly?” Panic came through in her voice.
He laughed as he pocketed the baggie with the soil sample. Then he shook a hand in the air. “Let me back up for a moment. I figured you could live at the cabin once you get Molly back. It can be yours.”
Olivia shook her head, overwhelmed by the offer. “No, I can’t take this cabin, Tyler.”
“Why not?”
Why not? She thought inwardly. “Because I have done nothing to deserve it or any of the unwarranted favor you’ve been showing me. Plus, I don’t need handouts. I can carry my own.” She turned and started to walk away, but she felt she had been harsh with her words and she turned back to Tyler. “I’m sorry. It was a nice offer, don’t get me wrong.”
He nodded and stood up, patting off the snow from his pants. He fell into step with her and Ace on the way to the front of the cabin.
“I shouldn’t have assumed you’d take it. That was wrong on my part.”
“It’s okay. You were just being nice.” As they went up the steps and onto the porch, she stopped and turned to him. She peered into his eyes for the first time since he had brought her to the cabin, and just as she expected, it only added to the hurt she was feeling in her heart. She had wronged this perfect man in so many ways. Quickly, she turned away, but he caught her chi
n with a finger and pulled her view back to his eyes.
“Don’t look away, Olivia.”
“But it hurts, Tyler.” Olivia’s words broke apart and her eyes welled. She clenched her eyes shut.
Tyler’s voice was smooth and soothing to her as he continued. “Open your eyes.”
She did. The pain intensified in her chest, and the emotional turmoil was too much to bear. Pulling away from his hold, she went inside. He left her alone after that.
That evening, Olivia’s symptoms were less severe, and she had a desire to cook for the two of them. She wanted to give back to this generous man who gave so much and asked for nothing in return. Rising from the couch, she went into the kitchen and started to look around in the pantry and fridge. Tyler got up from Chet’s rocking chair and put another log on the fire, then walked into the kitchen just as she started a pot of water on the stove.
“What are you doing?”
She turned to him and raised an eyebrow. “What do you think I’m doing? I’m cooking us a meal.”
“You sure you feel okay to do that?”
“Yes, and don’t worry, it won’t be pudding cups this time.” She smiled. The memory caught in her mind of how their time together that day had been so pleasant.
He laughed and then raised his hands. “All right.”
As she strained the noodles through the colander in the sink, he returned to the living room. Her right hand felt a sharp pain surge through it out of nowhere, and she dropped the pot, clanking it loudly against the sink. Tyler rushed into the kitchen.
“You okay?”
Olivia was anything but okay. She didn’t respond but instead clutched her hand as the pain radiated. He slowly moved closer.
He gently placed a hand on her back, adding to the emotional turmoil inside of her, yet at the same time providing her the comfort that she needed.