by Clare Revell
“Then I ask again, Olwyn,” Da said. “What’s he like?”
She sighed, avoiding looking at him in the driving mirror. “He’s six-foot-two, short, brown, wavy hair, blue eyes, clean shaven, wears a spicy aftershave type thingy, and he knows how to grill steaks. But then he’s half-American so he would.”
“Mae hi'n fwy na hoffi ef.”
“Mam, please, enough of the teasing.” Jess sighed. “I haven’t seen you in weeks and all you’ve done since you got off the plane is wind me up over some bloke I’ve known a few weeks and probably will never see again once he goes home.”
Her mother laughed. “That’s why, Olwyn bach. I assume you’re moving back home now?”
Jess hesitated. “I don’t know. With Josh living there it’s hardly appropriate.”
“Rubbish,” Da said firmly. “We’ve had plenty of male lodgers before, and your mam and I are here to chaperone the pair of you now. Besides, you just said there is absolutely nothing going on between either of you, so there won’t be a problem.”
Jess groaned. But I never cared about your male lodgers like this before. “There is nothing going on. At least not in the way you two mean.”
“That’s not what Mrs. Hughes says.” Her mother wouldn’t let it drop.
“And are you going to believe Mrs. Hughes or your own flesh and blood?” She caught the grin her parents exchanged in the driving mirror and shook her head. “Don’t answer that one. Anyway, Josh is only here on a six-week contract. Most of which has gone. Unless Dai offers him more work or he gets his head screwed on, depending which happens first.”
Her mother fired off another comment in Welsh.
“OK, fine. I give in. I’ll move back home.” She pulled into the drive and yanked up the parking brake. Times like this she wished she didn’t have to listen to her parents. But being a Christian woman and because both Old and New Testaments spoke of how a child was to treat their parents, she would.
Her parents headed inside the house as another car swung onto the drive. Jess smiled as Josh climbed out. “Hi, Josh.”
“Hi. Are your parents back?”
“Yes and desperate to meet you. Oh, and they are insisting I move back in.”
He glanced at her. “Are you going to?”
“I always do as I’m told,” she said. “I’m a good girl. You do remember the commandments about obeying your parents, right?”
Josh snorted. “Think I just about do.”
She took the cases from the boot. “I’ll just bring these in.”
“Sure.” He stood there and watched her as she tried to move all three of them. “Do you want a hand?”
Jess didn’t answer.
Josh rolled his eyes. “You can be a right stubborn Sassenach at times, you know that.”
Jess shoved her hands on her hips and looked as indignant as she could. “I am not English.”
“You’re still south of the border so the insult counts.”
“Insult? How dare you?”
Josh winked and kissed her soundly, leaving her breathless.
As he grabbed two of the cases, she shook herself. “How very dare you?”
He winked and chuckled. “Insult you or kiss you?”
“Both,” she managed.
“It’s easy.” He kissed her forehead and headed inside with the cases.
Jess groaned in frustration. How could he do this to her every single time? She closed the boot and picked up the rest of the luggage. Laughter floated into the hall from the kitchen. It sounded as if Josh had already made friends with her parents. She put the bags in the hall and turned to leave.
“Where are you going, Olwyn?”
She didn’t pause. “Afternoon surgery, Mam. Dinner should be ready to dish up in an hour or so. It’s in the slow cooker.”
“Aren’t you staying?”
“I have to work. I’m on call tonight as well.”
“Then we’ll eat when you get back. Meanwhile, it gives us time to get to know Josh.”
“OK. Later.” She headed out into the sunshine. She just wished she didn’t feel so conflicted about Josh, herself. It’d make things so much easier.
****
Two hours later, Josh looked up as the front door opened. “Hello?”
Jess peeked into the lounge. “Hi. Have you eaten yet?”
“No. Your parents went upstairs to unpack ages ago. I was considering going for takeout.”
“Don’t do that. I put dinner in what you’d call the crock pot this morning. We’ll eat and save theirs for later. I’m on call tonight and need to eat while I can.” She headed out of the room.
Josh pushed to his feet and stretched as he followed her. Was she still mad at him? What was it about her that made him act like a hormonal teenager?
Footsteps clattered down the stairs, and Jess took two more plates from the cupboard. “Or we’ll all eat together now.”
Josh winked. “If I’d known that was all it took to bring them downstairs, I’d have done that ages ago.”
She laughed. “It always works, especially when we were little, and I’ll tell you for why.”
He looked at her. “I think it’s my turn to apologize.”
“Oh?”
“For insulting you earlier.”
“It’s fine.”
“What did he say?” Dr. Thomas asked from the doorway.
“He called me English,” she replied as she put the plates on the table.
Her father chuckled. “That’s one way to do it. The other is…”
“Da, don’t. He needs no more ammunition than he already has.”
Josh grinned. “Don’t stop now…I’m curious.”
“Well, you can stay curious, look you.” She shoved a plate of food at him. “Here, get this down your neck.”
Mrs. Thomas came in as they sat and Dr. Thomas gave the blessing. “Am yr hyn a dderbyniwn, O Dad, gwna ni'n wir ddiolchgar. Amen.”
Josh looked up. “What does that mean?”
“For what we are about to receive, Oh Father, make us truly thankful,” he said. He looked at Jess. “I did a lot of thinking on the cruise, Olwyn. It’s time to retire. I’m not getting any younger and the patients like you. How would you feel about buying my share of the practice?”
Jess’s jaw dropped. “What…what about the others?”
“I spoke to them already. They’re in favor of you taking my place.” He smiled. “You look shocked, bach. Think about it, pray about it, and let me know in a week.”
“OK.” She turned her attention to her plate.
Josh wondered what she would do. She’d already told him being here forever wasn’t part of her career plan. But then career paths change. He was a prime example of that.
Her father turned to Josh. “What do you do for a living?”
“That’s a bit of a story. I started out in college as an art student. Most of my peers played football, but I never really wanted to. Besides, Matt didn’t play and I tended to stick with him. I love doing creative stuff and found I had a talent for making something out of nothing. As a result, I’m a qualified stone mason. I did that for years, and because I like helping others I’ve worked as a fireman…”
“He’s a pastor,” Jess interrupted.
Josh scowled. “Thanks a bunch. I wasn’t going to mention that.”
“Pastor?” Dr. Thomas asked.
Josh pushed the food around his plate, no longer hungry. Why did she have to bring that up? “Aye, a pastor,” he said quietly.
“Which church?”
“None. I haven’t set foot in a church for coming up on two months.” He sucked in a deep breath. “God and I aren’t on speaking terms right now.”
“May I ask why?”
Josh set his fork down, the food turning in his stomach. “It’s another long story. And one I’d rather not get into.”
“We have time, and this is important.”
“No, it isn’t,” he whispered, wishing he had the courage ju
st to stand up and walk away.
Tell him.
Josh jolted as the Voice he hadn’t heard for so long resounded within him.
“It is,” Dr. Thomas insisted.
Tell him.
Josh looked down at his hands as he spoke. He could see the images before him, as he had every day since fourteen people died. “I got to my office in the church, I guess you’d call it the vestry, earlier than usual. I wanted to go over my notes one last time. My grandparents were going to be there. Grandad was a great preacher, so I had a lot to live up to that morning. It was the fourth of July and Dad wanted to be there, but as always some crisis had blown up in some tiny corner of the world, and as president he had to stay in Washington to fix it, despite the fact it was a holiday. Mom came with her Secret Service personnel.”
He came out of his office to find the church packed. The warehouse auditorium seated almost fifteen hundred and from the platform where his pulpit stood, it didn’t look as if there was an empty seat. His heart burned with God’s goodness in bringing all those people—all those lost sheep—into his fold that morning. He prayed that he could do something useful, be of some good, and somehow be a blessing to all those souls before him; that God would speak through him and above all that God would lead His people to their eternal home.
“God was really there,” he said quietly. He studied his fingers. “I could feel Him filling the room with His Awesome Presence. Other people felt it too. The singing was incredible, all those voices united in worship. It was like nothing I’d experienced up to that point—most weeks the only people who sang were the choir and myself. I opened my Bible and began to preach. But it wasn’t me speaking. The words I spoke weren’t the ones I had written on the paper in front of me. It wasn’t the sermon I’d prepared. I was preaching on stilling the storm from Luke’s gospel.”
The light from outside vanished, a dark, almost greenish glow replacing it. The building shook and the wind sounded like a chugging train. The tornado siren began to sound, but at the same instant the roof lifted, tossed away into a huge, spinning vortex. The great swirling mass was just there, ripping the building apart and snatching people in front of him from their seats and away.
“There was noise, debris, and fourteen dead in an instant.” Josh wiped the back of his hand over his face and found it wet. Was he crying? “I found a young girl trapped under a roof beam. She was sobbing and wanting her mother. I tried to get her out, but couldn’t lift the beam before her cries stopped. All around me was total devastation. There was nothing left, despite the fact they said the tornado just side swiped us. My church had gone. There was a teenage boy. I managed to free him and carried him out. But he died in the hospital.”
Josh glanced up and saw tears on the faces of Jess and her parents.
“I had no idea,” she whispered. “The news report was so clinical…”
“We buried so many that next week—not just from my church, but the surrounding neighborhoods as well. Including my grandmother. My grandfather’s body was never found.”
Dr. Thomas looked at him. “The storm was not your fault,” he said, his Welsh lilt a different timbre to Jess’s. “And you can’t hide forever.”
“I’m not hiding,” Josh said fiercely. “I’m running, there’s a difference.”
“Yeah, right. You’ll have to explain that one to me. Of course you’re not hiding,” Jess told him. “‘As for those of you who are left, I will make their hearts so fearful in the lands of their enemies that the sound of a windblown leaf will put them to flight. They will run as though fleeing from the sword, and they will fall, even though no one is pursuing them.’ Leviticus 26:37.”
Josh scowled. “God was in that building during the entire service, and He did nothing to stop that storm. Nothing.” His finger stabbed the table as he spoke. “He could have stopped it, just like He saved His disciples from that storm on the Sea of Galilee.”
Dr. Thomas looked at him. “Let me quote a few verses to you, young man. Then I’ll pray and we’ll change the subject. First, from 1 Kings 19. ‘The Lord said, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.” Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake came a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave. Then a voice said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” He replied, “I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty.’”
Josh’s stomach twisted and sank. Elijah was hiding because things had gotten tough and people were trying to kill him.
Dr. Thomas continued. “And from Lamentations 3. I called on your name, Lord, from the depths of the pit. You heard my plea: “Do not close your ears to my cry for relief.” You came near when I called You, and You said, “Do not fear.” God is listening, Josh. He may not have answered your prayers in the way you wanted Him to do, but He is working this situation for good, I promise you that.”
A phone rang. Jess groaned and reached into her pocket, pulling out her handset.
“Olwyn-Jessica Thomas, phones at the table? Really?” her father said.
“I’m on call.” She flipped up the phone. “Hello, Dr. Thomas speaking.” She rose as she listened. “OK, I’m on my way.” She hung up. “Angharad’s in labor and the midwife needs me because the baby is breech.” She shoved her phone in her pocket.
Josh’s pager bleeped. He didn’t know whether to be relieved or not. “That’s me.”
Dr. Thomas looked at him. “We’ll finish this conversation when you get back. In the meantime, we’ll pray while you’re gone. And we’ll keep your dinners as well.”
Josh hurried from the house, hot on Jess’s heels. Smoke rose on the horizon, the sky already turning orange.
“It’s going to be bad,” she said, turning to him. “Take care out there. You’ll be one short tonight as Sam won’t be there.”
He looked at her and leaned in, kissing her quickly. Jess turned into him and he slid his arms around her waist, kissing her again. Then he pulled back, leaving his hands resting gently against her. “Sorry.”
Her eyes glistened. She blinked rapidly. “Don’t you dare…”
He backed away and raised his hands in an attempt to deflect her anger. When would he ever learn? “I’m sorry.”
“And don’t interrupt me either, look you. Let me finish. Don’t you dare ever, ever apologize for kissing me again, got it?”
He nodded, dumbfounded. It was all he could do to close his jaw and watch as she jumped into her car and drove off.
9
Josh climbed down the scaffolding in search of a bottle of water. The sun blazed, and he could feel the skin on his shirtless back beginning to blister. It was ten in the morning, but it promised to be a scorcher of a day. He rubbed an arm over his brow. Lack of sleep wasn’t going to help, either. It’d taken until midnight before the fire was out and damped down.
A small hand held out a bottle of juice to him.
Josh smiled and knelt so he was at her level. “Thank you,” he replied, signing as he spoke. He took the bottle and chugged half of it down.
“How are you?” Bryony signed.
“I’m fine. How are you?”
She grinned. “I have a baby…” She paused.
Josh showed her the sign for brother and pointed to him. Then he made the sign for sister and pointed to her. He made sure to speak at the same time, convinced the little girl wasn’t deaf.
“Brother,” she replied.
“That’s great,” he said. “I have a brother too. He’s my twin. You know what twins are, right?”
She held up two fingers.
“That’s right. Double trouble according to my mom, but we think it’s more double the fun.”
Bryony pointed to the woods. “Is the fire out?”
“Yes, but you need to keep out of there. It isn’t safe.”
Her face fell. “I didn’t do it.”
“I know, honey,” he replied. “But the woods aren’t the best place to play. Nor is a building site. Off you go.” He watched her skip away and then nodded as Dai came across. “Hey, boss.”
“Josh, this job is almost over and I have another if you’re interested. Unless you’re really planning on leaving.”
Josh frowned as he stood. “Huh?”
“You said you weren’t here for long when I originally gave you six weeks’ work.”
“I don’t know, yet,” Josh said honestly.
“Well, think about the work and let me know. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen someone with your zeal and talent for seeing things in the stone that others don’t.” Dai paused. “And you can’t stay mad at God for long, look you.”
“How did—” Josh broke off as his pager bleeped.
“Go,” Dai told him. “We’ll talk later.”
Relieved and not entirely sure where Dai was getting his information, Josh ran to the fire station.
“Smoke reported about five miles inside the National Park. It looks like a camper called it in. It could be real, might not be. Either way, we’re not taking the chance,” Sam said as Josh arrived.
He nodded, changing quickly. “I saw Bryony in town. She was telling me about the baby. Are you sure you should be here today?”
Sam grinned. “Mother in law is over.”
Josh laughed. “A time-honored tactic of leave-the-women-to-it, eh? Congratulations, though.”
He climbed into the fire truck and shut the door. Would he ever know what it was like to hold his own child in his arms? And why could he only picture Jess as the mother? She wouldn’t have him. No matter what he wanted.
****
Jess picked up the two coffees from the open air booth by the fountain and turned as the fire engine charged past, sirens blazing and lights flashing.
She took a mouthful of the hot amber liquid from one cup and handed Da the other one. “The thing is,” she said slowly, “I don’t know if I want to be a GP the rest of my life.” She waited for the hammer to fall.