Matt set down his flatware and smiled. “You have my undivided attention now.”
“Oh, good,” she replied, but he wasn’t convinced that she meant it.
“Is something wrong?”
“No,” she answered straight out. “No. Not at all.”
“Okay.”
“Something is right, actually.”
“Well, that’s good news, isn’t it?”
“Matt.” She sighed and then looked him in the eye. “I really like you.”
“Thanks. I like you, too.”
“We have so much in common.”
“We do.”
“I have such a good time when I’m with you.”
Matt considered her words, and then he leaned back against his chair and narrowed his eyes. What in the world was she leading up to?
“And the thing is, when we get back, I would be very interested in going out with you.”
He gave his head a slight tilt.
I’m sorry, what?
“You know. If that’s something you’d be interested in, too.”
Going out.
As her offer began to sink in, a slow and curious smile crept across Matt’s whole face. It seemed to comfort Wendy somehow, and she let out a relieved laugh.
“So would you? Be interested in that?”
Matt reached across the table and touched Wendy’s hand. “Yes. I think I’d be interested in that.”
“You would?”
“I think so,” he said with a nod.
“I wasn’t sure if you were just being friendly or if you were sensing the connection, too.”
“A little of both,” he admitted. “I think of you as a great new friend.”
“Oh.”
“But I’m flattered that you’re feeling something more, Wendy.”
“I’m so glad.”
“You…well, you took me by surprise.”
“I’m sorry. I’ve just been trying to say this to you for days.”
“Well, I guess I’m pretty clueless.”
After a moment, Wendy shrugged. “Yeah. Kind of.”
They both laughed at that, and Wendy reached over, picked up Matt’s fork, and handed it to him.
“Now that we’ve got that out on the table, let’s eat our supper,” she suggested.
Matt stabbed a slice of meat with the fork and nodded at her, trying not to show her the extent of his surprise.
Wendy was a beautiful girl, there was no denying that. It made him the luckiest guy on earth that someone like her would show an interest in him.
Matt allowed his eyes to slide across the room and land on Lucy, where she sat beside Justin at one of the bigger tables. Brenda and Jeff were seated across from them, and they all burst into sudden laughter.
Lucy was getting everything she had wanted to get out of this trip. God had answered her prayers, despite Matt’s doubts about Justin being the right kind of guy for her. They looked great together, and they seemed to get along very well; Matt just didn’t like the changes Lucy had felt compelled to make in order to set it all into motion.
He looked across the table at Wendy. She pushed back her golden hair over one shoulder and beamed at him as she poked a stem of broccoli with her fork.
“You know,” he told her, “when I came on this retreat, a new relationship was really the last thing on my mind.”
“I know,” she replied. “Same here.”
“But getting to know you better has been a pleasure.”
“I feel the same way,” she said.
“I hope you’ll forgive me. I’m a little stunned.”
“I understand.”
“A gorgeous girl just told me she’s interested in dating me. You can imagine my surprise.”
“Yeah,” she replied, lifting her gaze and let it trace his features. “An unlikely guy like you, getting the girl. That’s unheard of. It’s a regular Beauty and the Beast story.”
Matt snorted and tossed his crumpled napkin at her.
“A closed mouth gathers no foot,” he said. “Give it a try.”
Her laughter rose and fell like the chorus of a song, and Matt shook his head at her as he returned to his dinner.
“Hi, Matt and Wendy.”
Annie stood before them, looking very much like a kid in the oatmeal commercial Matt had once seen. She was packaged up in a tufted pink coat and bright purple mittens, and her wayward curls popped out wherever they could from beneath a furry pink hat with flaps over her ears.
“Well, hello, Miss Annie. How are you?”
“Want to build a snowman, Matt?”
“That sounds like a good idea. But I’d like to finish my dinner. Have you eaten yet?”
“Mmm-hmm,” she said with a fervent nod. “I’m all done.”
“Tell you what,” Matt told her, glancing at his watch. “I’ll meet you right out there,” and he pointed out the window, just beyond the stone patio, “in fifteen minutes. Okay?”
“Just fifteen, right?”
“Fifteen minutes.”
Her little face brightened, and she tried to run away but could only manage a waddle.
“Daddy, I need to have your watch,” she shouted, and Wendy and Matt shared a laugh.
“Are you with us?” Matt asked her. “Care to build a snowman?”
“I think not,” she said. “I’ll watch from inside. I’m not much for the cold and snow.”
“You don’t know what you’re missing. All the creative forces will be at work.”
“In twenty-nine degrees. I’ll pass.”
As he finished up his meal, Matt watched Annie bounce around the room from table to table, rejected by her brother and cousins, hugged by her grandmother, teased by Lucy.
“You know, I think Lucy had that same hat when she was a kid,” he told Wendy. Matt wiped his mouth with a napkin, crumpled it and tossed it to his empty plate. “If you’ll excuse me, I have a date with a snowman.”
“Certainly.”
When he reached for his plate, Wendy waved him off. “I’ve got that. Go play.”
Matt took a quick look at his watch and then at Annie, who caught his eye immediately. When she saw him putting on his jacket, she let out a high-pitched squeal and scurried toward him.
“C’mon, c’mon, c’mon, let’s go,” she said, dragging him out the back door by the hand. “I got you some gloves,” she said, tugging two mismatched mittens out of the pocket of her coat. “The snow is really cold on your hands if you don’t wear gloves. My mama won’t let me in the snow at all without these because it’s just too cold.”
“I’ll bet,” he replied with a smile, yanking the small mittens over his large hands.
“If they don’t fit, I could go find you some others from the box.”
“Nah, I think these will work.”
They barely covered the palms of his hands, but she didn’t seem to notice.
“Okay. Let’s get started. Let’s make him really, really tall. Do you know how? Because I’ve made a lot of snowmans and I can tell you how.”
Matt grinned as he watched her pack up a ball of snow with both hands and roll it around on the ground.
“See? Like this. This is how you make it get big.”
“Oh. Okay.”
“Now you make one.”
Before long, they’d drawn a large crowd at the window, and a smaller contingent suited up and came outside to join in the fun.
“You make the bottom one,” Ty told Matt and Rob as he began packing his own ball of snow. “Then we can stack this one on top of it. And Annie’s will be the head.”
Matt looked at Annie. “This is your snowman. Does that sound okay to you?”
Her smile completely took over her face as she nodded at him. “I think that will work.”
In just under an hour’s time, the twosome had turned into a group of six, all of them standing back to admire the four-foot figure they’d created. While Alison and Cyndi pushed twig arms into place, Dave provided a bright c
heckered scarf and a battered Fedora. When Betty Sue arrived with various items from the kitchen, Matt lifted Annie up to create the face herself.
“Maybe the carrot would make a good nose; what do you think?” he asked her, and she nodded as she pushed it into place.
Tony and Dave were quick to catch the head from falling off as she did, and they patted it back into place as Annie dug into the basket for the other features.
She chose a couple of plump prunes for the eyes, and a deep crimson flower created a perfect rosebud mouth.
“What’s his name?” Matt asked her, and she snapped back her answer in the flick of an instant.
“Mister Kalamazoo.”
“Mister Kalamazoo,” Matt repeated, and he nodded as he appeared to think it over. “That’s a pretty great name. Where did you come up with that one?”
“It was just in my head,” she replied. “We’ll call him Mister Mattie Kalamazoo.”
Matt set Annie down so that she could fully admire her work. He happened to glance through the window at the gathering on the other side, and Lucy’s was the first eye he caught. She was sitting down, with Justin hovering just behind. She tilted her head and grinned at Matt, her nose crinkled, her eyes sparkling, and a lock of hair twisted around her finger.
Matt wasn’t sure he’d ever seen her look so beautiful—or so happy.
Broccoli & Cheese Casserole (Betty Sue)
1 pkg. frozen broccoli cuts
3 eggs
½ cup mayonnaise
1 chopped onion
½ cup grated cheddar cheese
Salt and pepper to taste
Cook the broccoli for about five minutes; drain. Mix together the broccoli, eggs, mayo, onion, and cheese. Add salt and pepper and pour into a greased casserole dish. Bake at 350 degrees for about 40 minutes.
Chapter Nineteen
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING?”
“I’m copying Betty Sue’s recipe for that wonderful broccoli casserole she served with the brisket.”
Matt lifted the cover of the leather-bound book and chuckled. “Lucy. You’re writing recipes in your prayer journal?”
“So I won’t lose them. I’ve got the Sweet Potato Bisque in here, too.”
Matt shook his head and sat down across from her as she closed her journal and hooked the pen on the outer binding.
“I think I’ve learned something new about myself here, Mattie.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah,” she said, her emerald eyes sparkling with eager excitement. “I think I actually like to cook!”
“Really,” he stated. “There’s something I never would have guessed.”
“I know. Me neither. But meeting Betty Sue has just awakened this whole interest in creating new dishes and trying new things. I mean, Mattie, I was actually thinking I might try to cook something with shrimp when I go home! You know how I love shrimp.”
“Have you ever cooked shrimp before, Lucy? You know they’re caught out in the Gulf, and they come with eyes and in a shell.”
She stuck her tongue out at him playfully and then grinned.
“I hear you can buy them already cleaned so you don’t have to look them right in the eye,” she said.
“Imagine.”
“I know. And someone else actually catches them for you.”
“What will they think of next?”
She giggled and flicked his arm with two fingers.
“I’ve learned something kind of surprising here, too,” he told her.
“Really? What is it?”
“It seems Wendy would like to go out with me.”
The smile froze on Lucy’s face for an instant, and then it melted as she tilted into a shrug.
“Now why would that be surprising?” she asked him. “She’d be crazy not to want to go out with you. Anybody would. So you asked her?”
“Not yet. She just told me that she was interested and wondered if I was, too.”
“Yeah? So what did you say?”
“I told her I was flattered and a little stunned.”
“Oh. So are you? Interested?”
“You don’t meet a woman like Wendy very often,” he replied.
“That’s true. She’s pretty extraordinary,” Lucy admitted.
“Right. And I think I’d be crazy not to pursue it and see if something’s there.”
“Are we all ready for our final devotions?” Alison called out, interrupting him. “Let’s gather over by the fireplace.”
Matt was just about to help Lucy to her feet and hand her the crutches when Justin swooped in and took over.
“Here you go,” he said, removing them from Matt’s hands and presenting them to Lucy. “Do you want anything before we head over?”
“Tea would be nice.”
“You two go,” Matt told them. “I’ll get the tea.”
“Are you sure?” Lucy asked.
“I was going for coffee anyway.”
“Thanks, Frazier.”
“You bet.”
Matt watched them walk away, Lucy on her crutches and Justin with his hand planted on the small of her back.
At the buffet table, Wendy handed him one of the two coffee cups in her hands.
“‘There is no fear in love,’” Rob read from his Bible. He pushed his wavy, dark hair off his forehead and looked up at them. “That’s in First John, chapter four. ‘There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment.’”
Lucy thought about how glad she was that Rob was presenting the devotions, because she hadn’t really had the opportunity to get to know him very well. These lessons were always a pretty good insight into people.
“Torment is a great word for it, too,” he continued. “I’m thirty-six this year, and I’ve been tormented a good bit about reaching an age where so many of my friends and colleagues have already married and started their families.”
Lucy counted forward on the calendar inside her head. Just a few more weeks and she would be thirty. She understood Rob’s concerns all too well.
“It’s so easy to give in to fear on that subject, isn’t it? We get into our thirties and we start to worry. Time marches on, like it’s bound to do, and worry becomes anxiety. Anxiety becomes fear. And fear, as the Word says, involves torment.”
A little flutter in Lucy’s stomach gave way to a fury of butterfly wings, flapping around inside of her.
“If I’ve learned anything in my thirty-six years,” Rob told them, “it’s that we tend to make foolish choices when we’re operating in fear. Fear is a very destructive enemy. It leaves hurting and angry people in its wake. And so I think it behooves us, as singles, to take hold of the Word and believe in that perfect love that casts out fear. Don’t latch on to the wrong person out of fear that the right one will never come along.
Anxiety swooshed through Lucy’s stomach, and an unexpected mist of emotion rose in her eyes.
“My grandmother used to say, ‘Desperation makes for bad bedfellows,’” Rob said on a laugh. “She was a very wise woman, I think.”
“My aunt Sue told me that it’s better to be alone than to marry the wrong man,” Alison piped up. “I’ve always believed that to be true.”
There were many nods and murmurs of agreement from the group, and Lucy noticed a look pass between Brenda and Jeff, followed by mutual smiles. Jeff reached over and took Brenda’s hand into his.
Lucy remained silent, her hands folded in her lap and her eyes cast downward as she mulled over all that she’d just heard. She wondered if Rob’s message had been sent just for her.
She glanced over and met Justin’s gaze, which told her he’d been waiting for her to do so. Another wave of anxiety crested and left Lucy feeling queasy.
“So in closing, I’d like to read you this passage out of First Corinthians, chapter thirteen, from the NIV. If God chooses to bless us with partners, let this be the way we choose them, without haste and without fear.
“‘Love is patient, love is k
ind,’” he read. “‘It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.’”
Deep down in her gut, Lucy felt that there truly was a takeaway message for her in tonight’s devotions. The verses from First Corinthians played over and over in her head, cementing her conviction about their significance.
Lucy knew a love that was patient and kind, never proud or self-seeking, one that kept no record of wrongs, that protected, hoped, and never failed. Yes, the love of her Father was every bit of that and more. But there was another love in her life that stood up to the scrutiny of every point in the passage of scripture Rob had just read.
Justin smiled at her just then, and she returned it, filtering out the sadness as best she could.
But it’s not you, Justin. You’re not The One.
Lucy propped her feet on the coffee table and fluffed her hair. She identified the exact moment when doubt started to creep its way into certainty. It was just as her second kiss with Justin had come to a conclusion.
It was strange that their first kiss had been so unmemorable, but she’d chalked it up to the fact that she had been distracted by Matt and Wendy. But she’d prayed for their second kiss, wished it into being, yearned for the jolt of chemistry to make it unforgettable.
But Lucy had felt nothing. Not even a small glimmer of zeal that she could coax into the vicinity of passion. As handsome and funny and personable as Justin was, when he kissed her, the magic just wasn’t there.
What a letdown, she thought. He has it all.
And then there was that one little thing.
He wasn’t Matt.
Lucy wondered why it had taken her so many years to realize the truth. She’d known him since she wore knee socks, for crying out loud. He’d seen her through the devastation of losing her mom, the disenchantment of countless relationships; he’d even sat on a hard plastic chair in her hospital room for two days when her appendix had burst and the infection had her out of her head.
Love Finds You in Snowball, Arkansas Page 18