by Nathan Adams
“You were talking to your mother, weren’t you?” Rachel asked gently.
“Yes,” Jane admitted.
“Well there’s nothing wrong with talking to people who aren’t there,” Rachel told her. “You should be able to talk to your mother whenever you want. But just know that, if you ever want to, you can talk to me as well.”
Jane looked up at her with those bright blue eyes and then slowly, like some sort of miracle, a smile appeared on her face, transforming it completely. It was a small smile but it was a smile nonetheless. They sat there a while longer, silently testing the boundaries of a newfound peace between them.
Chapter Seven
Rachel did not see Cole for the rest of the day. She stayed in the house and when night fell, she retired to her room earlier than necessary. Yet, when morning came, she resumed the usual routine. She put on her borrowed clothes, tied her golden hair up, grabbed her hat and set off down the path toward the stables.
She moved toward Canter’s stall and stroked the horse gently as she offered him some hay. “We got off to a bad start yesterday,” Rachel said soothingly. “We’ll have to do better today yes?”
The horse bobbed his large head almost as though he was replying to her and Rachel felt a little spasm of optimism that she had not felt before. She led the horse outside and after brushing him down, seeing to his feed and harnessing him, she led him to the large fields that they had been working on the previous day. She stood close to the horse, with an arm draped under his neck, whispering softly into his ear.
“We’ll do it together,” she said without realizing what she was saying.
Filled with newfound optimism, Rachel began the day’s work and when, two hours later, she raised her head and cast a critical eye over their progress, she was proud to discover that they had covered more ground than she had expected. She stroked the horse gently and allowed him a few moments rest. They covered a little more ground before she brought Canter in for lunch.
She removed his saddle and bridle, and let him loose in one of the enclosures where Silver was already grazing. She watched the horse trot about happily for a few moments before she walked down to the river for fresh water to boil for midday meal. The water was boiling and her vegetable stew was almost done, when Cole and Jane walked into the kitchen together. Their faces were covered with dirt and sweat, and she could tell that they had had a hard morning.
“Why don’t you both go and wash your faces before lunch?” Rachel suggested.
She expected Cole to ignore her, but he went outside with Jane and when they reappeared, their faces were fresh and clean. They sat down together and Rachel ladled out generous portions of the stew. They ate mainly in silence, with Rachel and Cole avoiding each other’s gaze at every turn. Halfway through the meal Jane seemed to realize this.
“Did you all have a row?” she asked bluntly, like only a nine year old could, looking between the two of them with interest.
“No,” Cole replied at the same time that Rachel said ‘yes’.
Jane smiled. “Which is it?”
Rachel took a deep breath. “Just eat your food.”
The rest of the day followed the same pattern but Rachel no longer felt as consumed by it as she previously had. She realized slowly that her body wasn’t in nearly so much pain as it had been the first week she had spent on the ranch. Her horse riding skills were improving steadily and so was her cooking. Cole was right about one thing, there was nothing to like or dislike about the life. It was just hard work and the need to survive.
Still, Rachel’s progress on the ranch had not distracted her from the fact that she was still unmarried. She wondered now if she ever would be, or if she would just go on being an unpaid ranch hand. It was clear that she and Cole were two completely different people. He was silent and reserved; she was more open and affectionate. For Rachel, marriage was about sharing your hopes, dreams, and fears with someone. It was about having someone by you for guidance and support.
But she was not sure that Cole had the same view of marriage. He had told her as much himself. He needed help around the ranch, he needed someone to cook, clean, do the laundry, and boil the water. He didn’t require a wife for company, he required a wife for practicality’s sake. There was no emotion or romance involved in the decision. Rachel wondered if she was the type of woman who could live her life in a loveless marriage. She had never thought so, but now she was forced to consider the possibility that she had no choice but to adapt.
Cole was a handsome man and he was a good father, and Rachel imagined that she might, under the best of circumstances come to love him one day, but she would never be able to achieve that if he remained distant and indifferent. She was thinking these things as she retired back to the house at the close of the say. The sun had long since set and her stomach was growling with hunger. She moved to the kitchen and found some stale bread in the larder.
She had just sat down at the table to eat it when Cole walked into the kitchen from the opposite side. He seemed to have come in a while ago. He regarded her with a questioning look as he moved further into the room.
“Did you just come in?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“What were you doing?” Cole asked as he sat down opposite her.
“Tending the horses,” Rachel replied.
“For so long?” he regarded her with surprise.
“I never understood why people spent so much time in stables with their horses,” Rachel said. “It seemed to me you’d want to get out of there as soon as possible and avoid the smell. But I understand it now. There’s a comfort in being there, brushing them down, talking to them.”
Cole was looking at her in a strange way. His blue eyes were brighter than she had ever seen them but they looked conflicted.
“What is it?” she asked.
“Nothing,” he said dismissively. “I just never expected to hear you say something like that.”
“Why?” Rachel asked defensively. “Because you thought me to be an empty- headed young girl from the city?”
“I never said that,” Cole answered.
“But you imply it,” Rachel said. “Every time you look at me.”
“I thought you were spoiled,” Cole said evenly. “I thought you were pampered. But I never thought you were empty-headed. That’s an assumption you imposed on yourself.”
“I think I’ve proven in the last month that I am capable,” Rachel said. “I’m capable of living this life, I’m capable of surviving it.”
“Can I ask you a question?” Cole asked regarding her carefully.
“Of course,” Rachel said, welcoming the possibility of real conversation.
“Why would you choose this life when you had no cause to?” Cole asked her.
Rachel paused for a moment, trying to find a way to explain it to him. “I don’t know what exactly I wanted,” she started. “I just knew that I wanted out of the life I was living. I just wanted to be somewhere different. Somewhere I would be doing something, instead of sitting in pretty rooms making small talk with people I didn’t even like. I wanted more.”
“And this is the more you were searching for?” Cole asked sounding skeptical.
“Isn’t it enough for you?” Rachel asked him.
“We’re different, you and I,” Cole said immediately. “I was born to this life. I wouldn’t know what to do in fancy clothes in a fancy ballroom surrounded by fancy people. But you’re different. You were bred to talk right and walk right and follow a certain set of rules.”
“That’s just it,” Rachel said passionately. “I don’t want to follow their meaningless rules anymore. I want to forge my own path, away from that kind of society and all their narrow-minded ideas.”
Cole stared at her silently for a while, and then he inclined his head somewhat. “Jane told me about your conversation,” he said.
“Oh,” Rachel said. “I only wanted her to know that it was alright to keep talking to her mother, even thou
gh she was not here anymore.”
“Is it true that you lost your sister?” he asked gently.
“Yes,” Rachel nodded.
“Do you think that’s why you wanted to leave?”
Rachel smiled sadly. “Perhaps.”
Cole nodded. “Jane felt better after you talked to her,” he said at last. “It was a nice thing you did.”
“I didn’t do anything,” Rachel said. “I just told her what I would have wanted to hear.”
Cole sighed deeply. “She’s been too long without the company of people. She doesn’t have friends, no one to talk to.”
“Doesn’t she go to school?” Rachel asked.
“She’s needed here,” Cole said with finality.
Rachel struggled to be diplomatic, but she could not stop herself from speaking. “She’s a little girl Cole. She’s only a child. She shouldn’t be working so hard on this ranch.”
“She wants to help,” Cole replied.
“She’s a child, she doesn’t know what’s best for her,” Rachel continued trying to soften her tone. “You’re her father, it’s up to you to make sure she’s alright.”
“She is alright,” Cole said as his tone became instantly harsher.
Rachel could sense his mood shifting but she could not stand down, not with this. “She’s got bruises along her whole body, her palms are cracked with wear and her feet are bleeding more often than not. She shouldn’t be in the fields doing hard labour. She should be in a school, studying with children her own age.”
“Who are you to tell me what’s best for my own daughter?” Cole asked with cold eyes.
“Your wife could not have wanted this for her daughter,” Rachel said desperately in the heat of the moment. Instantly, she knew she had gone too far. Cole rose from the table. He did not shout or raise his voice, his was the kind of anger that was quiet and restrained and all the more terrifying for it.
“You didn’t know my wife,” Cole said slowly. “Don’t act like you know what she would have wanted, because you don’t. You don’t know anything at all. Maybe I was wrong about you. Maybe you are just another empty-headed little city girl.”
He walked away, leaving Rachel sitting in the darkness and shadow of the kitchen.
Chapter Eight
Rachel sat on her bed holding the one book she had brought with her to Montana. It was a children’s storybook that Alice had loved when they were young. Rachel scanned through the pages feeling nostalgia and loss overwhelm her.
All the ranch hands were working today, which gave her a small respite from the constant strain of work that had to be done. She was turning through the pages when she noticed a small shadow lingering just outside her door.
“Jane?” Rachel called.
She stuck her head in. “You’re not in the fields today?”
“Not today,” Rachel replied.
“What are you doing?”
“Reading an old story book,” Rachel replied. “Would you like to read it with me?”
Jane slipped into the room cautiously; her eyes flitted about like a thief. “I can’t read so well.”
“That’s alright,” Rachel said with a smile. “I can help you.”
Hesitantly, Jane edged closer until she was sitting on the very corner of Rachel’s bed. She peered at the book with feigned disinterest but Rachel saw the light spark in her eyes at the sight of the bright pictures.
Rachel started reading until her voice had taken a lyrical quality and it sounded almost as though she were singing a song rather than reading a story. She could see how invested Jane was in the tale, and it struck her again how fast the child had been forced to grow up in this rough world. She was still just a little girl who had lost her mother too young.
“Did you like the story?” Rachel asked when she had finished.
“Yes,” Jane nodded enthusiastically. “Do you have others?
“I didn’t bring any other books with me,” Rachel said. “But I have a hundred more stories in my head and I can tell you all of them.”
Jane smiled and then she nodded shyly. She felt her spirits rise, but then she remembered the coldness that stood between Rachel and Cole and her happiness melted away. She wondered what she would do if Cole turned Rachel away, they were not married yet and he could easily do so. Once that thought had entered Jane’s mind, it would not leave, it clung to her like a bad smell and no matter how hard she tried to bury it, it came back up again.
Days passed and Cole conversed with Rachel in grunts and nods. It seemed as though what little progress they had made had been forgotten in the wake of their last conversation. Rachel took to the stables more and more often, finding comfort in the company of the horses. She tended their needs, and spoke to them in steady whispers. She was in the stables one night after all the work had been finished and the horses had been fed and watered.
“I never thought I would like riding so much,” Rachel whispered to Silver. “But now, I think I might actually love it.”
She stroked the animal’s great head, wishing the horse could talk back.
“You’ve started talking to the horses,” Cole’s voice came from just behind her.
Rachel whirled around, taken by surprise. “I thought you were in the house.”
“I was,” Cole nodded as he moved forward. “I came here to talk to you.”
Rachel felt her palms start to sweat. “About what?”
“Our situation…” Cole said before trailing off.
Rachel swallowed and took a deep breath. She believed everything she had told Cole and she wasn’t about to take anything back simply because she was scared of where that may lead.
“Cole,” she started shakily. “I know I said some things that upset you, and you were right. I didn’t know your wife and I had no right to presume that I knew anything about what she would have wanted. I should have just told you how I felt about it. I believe that Jane should go to school and have friends her own age, and enjoy her childhood. It doesn’t last forever, and there will come a time for her to work until her back is sore and her hands are blistered.”
Cole said nothing, he was looking at her, but his eyes were far away.
“I understand that you might disagree with me, and as Jane’s father you have the final say. But if I am to be her stepmother, I will want a say as well and I suppose that knowledge might affect your decision.”
Cole looked up at those words. “My decision?” he repeated as though he didn’t understand.
“I’m sure you’re reluctance to marry me has been motivated by doubt,” Rachel said as calmly as she could manage. “Perhaps you wanted to see how Jane would take to me. Perhaps you were not sure you wanted to marry again. Perhaps you simply did not think I was right for this life or your family. Whatever your reasons for delay, I think it best for both of us that a decision be made sooner rather than later.”
She stood there a moment longer and then she turned from him, ready to make her way back to the house.
“That’s not it,” Cole said, stopping Rachel in her tracks.
“What?” she asked turning around.
“That’s not why I delayed marrying you,” Cole said softly.
Rachel waited patiently until he was ready to explain himself.
“You said yourself, you didn’t know what you wanted, you just wanted out of the life you were living,” Cole said.
“Yes, I did say that.”
“I wanted to make sure you knew what you were getting yourself into,” Cole went on. “This life is not easy, even to those born into it. I have a child to think of and I needed to make sure you were gonna stick around before things were made official.”
“I’m still here Cole,” Rachel pointed out.
“Are you here because you have nowhere else to go, or because you really wanna be here?”
Rachel stepped toward Cole until they were only inches apart. “I’ve had a lot of time to think about things. And I’ll admit, I have wondered if I made a
mistake in coming here. But I’ve come to realize that as hard as this life is, and as all-consuming as it might be, this is the first place I have felt truly free.”
“You’re sure?” Cole asked. “A few weeks are very different to a lifetime.”
“I understand,” Rachel nodded. “I think I can take on the challenge. This will be my life’s adventure.”
Cole looked at her as though he couldn’t understand her at all. “We have very different ideas of what an adventure looks like.”
Rachel smiled. “Well maybe our differences will be a boon to us.”
“I thought about what you said about Jane,” Cole said quietly. “I think you may be right.”
Rachel raised her eyebrows. “I didn’t expect that.”
Cole sighed. “I’m a stubborn man and I’m set in my ways, but I can be made to see reason if you’re patient enough.”
Rachel smiled. “I can be patient.”
One corner of Cole’s mouth went up in a tilted smile that Rachel had never seen before. It was subtle but all the more beautiful for it.
“When shall we be married Cole?” Rachel asked.
“Tomorrow,” Cole replied.
Then slowly, almost nervously, he bent his head down and gently pressed his lips against hers.
The End
Return to the TOC
Eliza’s Baby Dilemma
Clean Western Mail Order Bride Romance
By: Richard Christian
The day offered promises of spiritual power and healing for those who found themselves astray from God’s enlightening path, and somehow, young Eliza Hutchins considered herself one of those people. Although her youthful purity, chastity, kindness, generosity and overall sincerity in all of her relationships potentially made her the perfect wife for anyone who had ever wished for one, it somehow didn’t happen for her.
And now, being almost 24 years of age, Eliza was starting to worry. Humbler and gentler than many other young, married women of her age, she knew that her pious, Christian behavior was the key to what she considered to be a happy, healthy marriage. After all, that was exactly what her parents had. What they tried, and what they managed to do successfully, was to imitate the humble behavior of their Savior in their every endeavor, and somehow, everything else seemed to magically take care of itself. That was what Eliza was brought up to believe: All you need to be is a good girl who obeys Christ, and you shall be rewarded greatly for your devotion.