Love Finds You in Snowball, Arkansas

by Sandra D. Bricker

  Rob burst into cackling laughter at that, and so did Matt and Justin.

  “I won’t forget that, Frazier.”

  “Oh, don’t worry your pretty little head, Gerard.”

  Justin landed a firm punch right at the center of Matt’s bicep, and their laughter echoed out over the moonlit landscape.

  Hay??

  A beautiful moon, a romantic hayride through the hills with Justin right there next to me, and I’m allergic to HAY?!

  Oh, Lord. What next?

  I just realized what’s next. Underground caverns.

  I had to ask.

  L.

  Chapter Ten

  THE FLOOR WAS SO COLD BENEATH LUCY’S BARE FEET THAT SHE TOOK off at a full run toward the carpeted part of the living room. Wishing she’d thought to put on slippers, she rubbed her feet into the thick pile before crossing the next portion of uncovered hardwood.

  Standing on her tiptoes, she creaked open the door to Cyndi’s bedroom and stepped inside. When her eyes began to adjust to the dark, she crossed to the bed and knelt down beside it.

  “Cyndi?” she whispered.

  The uninterrupted rhythm of steady, raspy breathing told her she hadn’t pierced the confines of her friend’s deep sleep.

  “Hey. Cyn?” This time, she added a gentle nudge to the side of the mattress. “Cyndi?”

  “Hmmm.”

  “Cyndi? Are you awake?”

  “Huh?” Cyndi nuzzled against the pillow and then pushed her eyes open. “Whaddya want? Are you okay? Is it the hay?”

  “What? No. I’m sorry to wake you,” Lucy told her. “But did I hear you say the other day that you’d brought your laptop with you?”

  “Yeah,” she grunted.

  “Would you mind if I borrowed it for a few minutes?”

  The groan that followed was indecipherable, but Lucy decided to take it as permission.

  “Great. Thank you.”

  “Uh-huh.” Cyndi nuzzled the pillow again and closed her eyes.

  “Wait,” Lucy whispered. “I mean, could you tell me where it is?”

  “I dunno,” she replied with an irritable snarl. “On the dresser.”

  Lucy jumped to her feet and leaned over Cyndi, pulling the blanket up to her chin and tucking it in. “Thanks, Cyn.”

  On her way toward the dresser, Lucy banged her toe on the corner of the bed and let out a bark before slapping her hand across her mouth. When she found the laptop and picked it up, she didn’t notice that it was plugged in, and she groaned as it yanked her backward.

  “Lucy!” Cyndi howled. “Get out of here, would you?”

  “Sorry, Cyn. Going now,” she stammered as she wrapped the cord around her hand and backed up toward the door. “Sweet dreams.”

  Lucy was pulling the bedroom door closed when she heard Cyndi’s muffled voice behind her.

  “It doesn’t work, by the way.”

  Lucy threw the door open again. “What?”

  “There’s no Internet connection except down in the lodge.”

  “Oh. Well, okay. Thanks.”

  Lucy flipped on the lamp in the living room and squinted to read the clock in the corner.

  5:43 a.m.

  Betty Sue had said she was always in the kitchen by six. Lucy crossed the cold floor again and let herself back into her bedroom long enough to feel around for a pair of jeans, a sweater, shoes, and socks. Fifteen minutes later, she was dressed and lugging Cyndi’s laptop under her arm as she headed down the hill and toward the yellow light in the kitchen window.

  “Can I come in?” she asked, and Betty Sue jumped in surprise.

  “Sweet pea, you just about scared me silly.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Are you feeling all right?”

  “Yeah, the Benadryl really helped. I just couldn’t sleep, and Cyndi said you have an Internet connection down here.”

  “Sure do,” she said, pointing to the desk in the corner. “Help yourself.”

  By the time the laptop was set up and Lucy had logged on, Betty Sue passed her a steaming cup of hot water and a tea bag.

  “Thank you.”

  She typed in “Blanchard Springs Caverns,” and the first ten of more than nineteen thousand possibilities came up on the screen. Lucy clicked on the first one and began to read about the living cave they would be visiting later that day.

  “Is this why you couldn’t sleep?” Betty Sue asked her, and Lucy tilted her head back to look at the woman standing behind her.

  “Kinda.”

  “Claustrophobic?” she asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Just be sure to take the Dripstone Trail and not the Wild Cave Tour.”

  Lucy clicked on the Dripstone Trail link and read about the elevator ride that would take them two hundred feet down into the earth. The entire tour would only last an hour; she was pretty sure she could face just about anything for an hour.

  She clicked on the Wild Cave Tour link, and she gasped as she read that visitors were expected to wear sturdy shoes and crawl on their hands and knees.

  “Oh, man,” she whimpered. “No thank you.”

  Lucy hurried to pack up the laptop, and she took another sip of tea before heading for the door.

  “Thanks, Betty Sue. I’ll see you at breakfast in a couple of hours.”

  “Get some sleep, sugar.”

  Lucy nodded, but she knew there was very little chance of that.

  The sun was barely poking out its head for the day. The thermometer on the side of the lodge registered thirty-nine degrees, and several feet of mist hovered over the ground. Lucy pulled her sweater in around her as she jogged up the hill toward the cabin.

  Just before she rounded the corner, a noise caught her attention, stopping Lucy in her tracks. She felt very much like a cartoon coyote, burning up the ground beneath her as she put on the brakes. If she weren’t too terrified to look away, she’d have checked for the big black tire marks.

  “Uh, okay, uh, stay. Stay right there.”

  A massive creature with tree-sized antlers raised its attention from the grass and looked back at her.

  “I, uh, come in peace. Don’t be startled, Mister Moose. Let’s not make any sudden moves, either one of us.”

  Her heart was pounding so hard that all she could hear was the drumbeat in her ears. In slow motion, Lucy took one tiny step toward the cabin. When the creature didn’t react, she ventured a second one.

  But this time, the beast turned straight toward her, facing her head-on. He didn’t make a move toward her, but the eye contact was intense and ominous, and Lucy couldn’t help herself. In one swift motion, she tossed the laptop into the air, let out a long and bouncy shriek and ran for the cabin. Up the stairs and through the front door she scurried, still screaming as she slammed the door and bolted the lock.

  “What is it?” Wendy shouted as she dashed out of the bedroom. “What happened?”

  “M–m–moose,” Lucy stuttered. “I was chased b–by a moose.”

  “A moose,” Wendy repeated and then hurried to the window to look out. “Oh my goodness, it’s an elk. Look at that!”

  “Elk. Moose. Same thing. Scary and big.”

  “Are you sure it was chasing you? It looks pretty tame right now. It’s just grazing.”

  “It looked me right in the eye,” Lucy told her. “Threateningly.”

  Wendy giggled and then covered her mouth when Lucy shot her a betrayed frown.

  “I’m sorry. I’m sure it was terrifying.”

  “It was.”

  Lucy took her first real look at Wendy, and she frowned.

  No one looks this good straight out of bed. It’s just not possible.

  Wendy’s silky blond tresses bounced upon her shoulders, and her skin was clear and radiant without makeup. She was dressed in a cropped pink sweatshirt and the cutest pink-and-gray-plaid flannel pajama bottoms that tied at the waist.

  For crying out loud, her toenails even match, Lucy inwardly groaned when she
noticed the iced pink polish on smooth, pedicured feet.

  “What is that at the bottom of the steps?” Wendy asked, peering out the window again.

  Lucy stepped up beside her at the window and gasped.

  “Cyndi’s laptop! I must have dropped it when I ran away.”

  “Oooooh, Lucy.”

  There it was on the ground, in three different chunks of plastic, glass, and connector cord.

  “She’s gonna hurt you bad,” Wendy warned her.

  “Oh yeah, she is,” Lucy concurred with a groan.

  She rushed into the bedroom and pulled her BlackBerry out of the pocket of her purse. Tossing herself to the bed, she began to enter a text.

  SOS. Moose trouble. Broke C’s laptop. Come right away.

  “Mattie will know what to do,” she announced.

  A few moments later, the orange light in the corner of her BlackBerry illuminated, and a tone sounded to let her know a reply text had been received.

  You need to stop using so much moose. Be right there.

  The elk had wandered off by the time Matt arrived at the front door, several pieces of the laptop in his arms, and the connector cord draped around his neck. Lucy flung the door open, grabbed him by the arm, yanked him inside, slammed the door shut again, and set about bolting it.

  “Were your hands slippery from putting mousse in your hair or something?” he asked, and Wendy burst into laughter.

  “It was a moose, Mattie,” she explained, raising her hands to either side of her head and spreading her fingers to demonstrate antlers.

  Matt looked to Wendy, who stated, “It was an elk.”

  “A huge one!” Lucy exclaimed. “I was coming up the hill, and there he was. Blocking the door and staring at me, with those big, strange eyes.”

  “Luce, when was this?”

  “This morning.”

  “What time?”

  “I don’t know. Six thirty?”

  “What were you doing outside at six thirty this morning?”

  “I went down to the lodge to use the internet connection.”

  Matt looked to Wendy, and she shrugged.

  “I borrowed Cyndi’s laptop so I could look something up. And when I came back, there he was, just standing there.” She raised her hands again to create antlers, and she stared Matt down with dark, elk-like intensity. “I froze. I told him I didn’t mean any harm and tried to take one step toward the cabin, and he looked like he was going to charge me.”

  “So he basically…flinched.”

  “Right.”

  “And that’s when you threw the laptop at him to protect yourself.”

  “No, Mattie. I was scared, and I ran, and the laptop just…sort of… crashed to the ground. Can you fix it?”

  Matt looked down at the broken computer and sighed. “No, Luce. I can’t fix it.”

  “You have to.”

  They all appeared to have been placed on Pause as the door to the far bedroom creaked open and Cyndi stepped out into the room.

  “What’s going on?” she asked them, pulling her robe tightly shut when her sleepy eyes landed on Matt.

  “Lucy was confronted by an elk,” Wendy told her.

  “It was terrifying,” Lucy added.

  Cyndi blinked several times and then squinted at Matt, tucking a wisp of short hair behind her ear.

  “Is that—Hey! Is that my laptop?!”

  Matt piled his plate with eggs, sausage, bacon, and two biscuits. Lucy was behind him in line, and he noticed a more demure approach on her part as she took scrambled eggs and fruit from the breakfast buffet before doubling back for a bagel and a cup of coffee.

  “Sit with me,” he said to her, and Lucy followed him to a vacant table and sat down beside him. “Are you okay?”

  “I feel terrible about Cyndi’s laptop,” she admitted.

  “She was pretty great about it, though.”

  “After the first twenty minutes of yelling at me.”

  “You’ll replace it, and you’ve apologized. That’s all you can do, Luce.”

  “I know. But I think I’ll get her something additional to make up for it, too. Like maybe one of those great carrying bags.”

  “Nice. So tell me, what was so important that you were looking up this morning anyway?”

  “I googled the caverns,” she said and then raised her eyes from her plate. “They’re pretty intense.”

  “Oh.”

  Matt had forgotten all about Lucy’s penchant for oxygen.

  Leaning in toward him, she whispered, “Betty Sue says there’s a tour they offer in such a small space that you have to crawl on your hands and knees. We won’t be taking that one, will we, Mattie?”

  “Are there others?”

  “Yeah, there’s a more universal one called the Dripstone Trail where the walkways are wide, and it has hand railings and everything. I mean, you still have to go a couple of hundred feet into the ground, but it only lasts an hour, so I think I could—”

  Lucy fell silent the moment that Alison and Tony appeared, plates in hand.

  “Can we join you?” Tony asked them.

  “Of course. Sit down,” Matt replied. “We were just talking about the caverns.”

  “It’s going to be a trip, isn’t it?” Tony said.

  “I heard there’s more than one tour that you can choose from,” Matt said with a casual tone. “Which one are we taking?”

  Wendy, Cyndi, and Justin joined the conversation just then, scraping back chairs and setting their plates on the table.

  “There’s a general tour,” Alison said, “and then there’s a far more intense one available where you crawl around and get dirty.”

  “Let’s crawl around and get dirty,” Wendy piped up, and Matt felt Lucy deflate in the chair next to him.

  “Oh yeah, let’s go intense,” Justin said on a chuckle, and he and Wendy shared a high-five.

  “I’m not really up for a cavern crawl,” Matt told them and then popped a chunk of biscuit into his mouth. “I think I’d like to take the general tour, if no one minds.”

  “We can split up then,” Alison decided. “Let me find out how many want the Wild Cave Tour and how many want the Dripstone Trail, and I’ll call and confirm the reservation with the changes.”

  “I’m with Mattie,” Lucy said, and Justin groaned.

  “No way, Lucy. Come with us. It’ll be an adventure.”

  “I don’t want Matt to go alone,” she said, and her eyes met Matt’s as she smiled. “He wouldn’t let me go alone, if the shoe was on the other foot.”

  “Cowards, both of you,” Justin teased, but by the time the final count was taken, only four opted for the wilder version, and cowards were in the majority.

  “Wendy, Justin, Jeff, and Tony,” Alison recapped. “And the rest of us will embark on the bunny slope tour.”

  Justin raised an eyebrow at Lucy. “Last chance, girl. Come with us.”

  Matt waited, wondering if she would give in and face one of her deepest fears just to impress him.

  “Nope. I don’t think so,” she replied, and Matt’s faith in her was restored for the moment.

  Justin sighed and draped his arm loosely around Wendy’s shoulder.

  “Looks like it’s just you and me, Wen,” he said.

  Matt noticed that Lucy’s face was as unreadable as a china plate, but her private disappointment was palpable to him.

  “Okay, then,” Alison announced. “We have the morning free, and we’ll meet back here to pick up our box lunches at noon. We’ll head out to the caverns after that. Any questions?”

  When they dispersed, Matt followed Lucy out the door and touched her arm. “Want to go for a hike or something?”

  “Nah,” she replied. “I think I’m going to grab my journal and my Bible and take some time for myself that doesn’t involve movement.”

  They walked on in silence until they reached the first cabin.

  “This is my stop,” Lucy said with a halfhearted smile. “I’ll
see you later.”

  Matt thought of a dozen things he wanted to say, but something in his spirit drew it all back. Instead, he nodded and cuffed Lucy’s arm playfully before he headed up the hill toward his own cabin.

  “Hey, Mattie,” she called, and he turned to face her. “Thanks for coming so quickly this morning.”

  “No worries.”

  She lifted one shoulder in half a shrug and graced him with a fraction of a smile before climbing the stairs and disappearing inside.

  Oh, Lord.

  I feel like such a fool right now. My heart just aches, and I’m about as unsure and out of my element as I ever remember being.

  Am I crazy? Have I latched on to the first hot guy to cross my path just because there’s no one else on my horizon at the moment? Did You send Justin as an answer to my prayers, or did I grab him and force him into that role just because I like the way he looks?

  I am the exact opposite of everything he says he wants in a woman. I’m not at home on a campground or in the river or on top of a horse. He’s an adventurer, a risk-taker—and the biggest risk I take is wearing flats with evening wear.

  But if Justin’s not The One, what hope do I have for meeting someone to make a life with? Am I going to be alone for the rest of my life?

  I came to Snowball so certain, so sure. All I had to do was put myself into situations that Justin enjoyed and You would do the rest. But so far I’ve been terrorized by a demon fish, bitten by flesh-eating insects, tortured by a freakishly wide horse, stalked by an elk, and tormented by hay. Now I’m being sent to an underground death trap, and Justin isn’t even going to be there! Instead, he’ll be crawling around in small spaces with the fair-haired, perfect-footed Wendy. Are you trying to tell me something here?

  Certainly, not every woman was born excited about dangling a worm on a hook or being buried alive, but eventually they do it. I have to believe it’s because they try it and learn to love it. Like me and basketball. I never thought I could enjoy watching sports, but I went to one Razorbacks game with Mattie and George and I was hooked. That can happen with something Justin loves, right?

  If Justin and I have a future, I hope You’ll begin to let me know. Because so far I’ve been just about as grossed-out, muscle-worn, and terrified as I can handle.