“I’m not a Christian yet.” Her heart knotted up and tears smarted at the corners of her eyes. “I know how important it is to you. And—”
“You’re right, Missy.” He leaned his forehead into hers. In the silence between them, she imagined him saying a silent prayer. He stepped back, and smiled softly at her.
“I’m so glad you didn’t elope, Missy. That’s all I’m going to say.”
Had he forgotten that he’d already told her he loved her?
In the moonlight, she could see as plain as the stars that Robert had volumes to tell her. Poetry to recite. Maybe even symphonies to write. She wondered if he played any instruments.
Retaining her hand, he led her slowly back to the house. He closed the screen door quietly behind them. In the living room, Daddy snored loudly with his feet on top of the coffee table. The Rockford Files was still on. Douglas had gone to bed. Missy flopped down in the recliner while Robert sat on the couch. For a good fifteen minutes, she tried not to smile.
Robert was happy she hadn’t eloped.
Robert had a lot more to tell her.
He’d almost kissed her.
Missy finally fell asleep in the old, corduroy recliner with her head tipped back and her mouth slightly open, snoring softly.
Robert gently shook Big John’s shoulders until he awoke. The large man yawned and looked around.
“She’s asleep,” Robert whispered. “I need your supervision.”
John stretched and nodded.
Ever so carefully, Robert picked up Missy. John rolled a kink out of his neck and led the way toward her room. In the dimly lit hallway, Robert gazed at Missy’s angelic face. John drew closer to also take a look.
“I take it that your walk went well,” he whispered.
Robert nodded and followed him into Missy’s room.
“Daddy?”
“Yes, darlin’.”
“Gone?”
“Um . . . do you mean is Bobby Boy gone?”
“Good.”
Bending low in the moonlit room, Robert placed her on the bed. Missy turned toward him on her side, and placed her hands prayer-like beneath her cheek. A peaceful smile teased her lips.
“I’m sorry, Robert; I don’t know why she has to be such a stinker when she’s asleep.”
“What was that, Big John?”
“I said, I don’t know why she has to be such a stinker when she’s asleep. Sorry about her feet.”
“Huh?”
“Must be on account of the nylon,” John said, and dropped a black sock near the foot of her bed. “Nylon makes my feet stink, too.”
Robert’s gaze returned to Missy. She looked happy, almost as happy as he’d look if he were asleep right now. If he didn’t know any better, she—
“Robert . . .” John cleared his throat.
Robert managed to look away. He was surprised to see John standing in the doorway.
“Yes, she’s beautiful, Bobby Boy, but it’s my bedtime.” He tapped his fingers on the molding and smiled.
Robert nodded and glanced one more time at Missy. If he didn’t know any better, he might even dare to imagine that she loved him too.
CHAPTER 45
Robert found his keys right where he’d left them on the corner of the china cabinet.
“Bertha said she talked with Missy,” his mother said. She had her ironing board set up in the great room while she watched the morning news.
“Oh.” His heart skipped a beat. “Last night or this morning?”
“It had to have been before Elderly Angels last night.” She misted one of his father’s dress shirts.
“Hmmm . . .”
“Bertha said Missy admitted that she’s liked you a lot longer than she realized.”
He closed his eyes and let Missy’s sweet sentiments sink in like butter on warm toast. She loved him.
“Bertha said Missy’s concerned that she’s not a Christian. And she’s afraid that you’re thinking more seriously about your relationship than you should be. Are you, Robert?”
“Did Missy say that? Or Bertha?”
“I’ve lost track.”
He inhaled. “I love her, Mom.”
His mother unplugged the iron and sat down in a chair at the kitchen table.
“I remember you didn’t love her in the beginning.” She watched him closely.
“It’s not my imagination, Mom. She’s changed.” After he’d told Missy he loved her, tears had filled her eyes. She loved him. It all made sense to him now. Complete sense.
“I’m going to call Peg and Bertha and ask for prayer.”
“You like her, Mom, don’t you?” Standing near the end of the table, he held onto the top knobs of a chair.
“Yes, Robert, I like Missy very much. But you’re my son, and we want you to marry someone who shares your deepest convictions. Not someone who’s merely changed, or softened.”
“She loves me.” Robert dwelled on Missy’s words. “I knew it. I knew she was afraid to tell me.”
“Robert, what’s always been the most important thing you’ve wanted in your future bride?”
His heart knotted up. “That she be a Christian.” He sighed.
“You need to slow down, pray, and wait upon the Lord.”
“I’m not proposing or running off to Vegas with her, Mom. But I am happy.”
“When the time comes, you two are going to have a church wedding. Promise me that.”
“I promise.” He smiled.
On his way to a sales presentation in Battle Ground, Robert took the back route through Ridgefield, instead of Interstate 5. He’d stop by the Stuarts’ to give Big John the new fall catalog and say hello to Missy. He had plenty of time.
When he walked into the office, Douglas’ boots were propped up on the desk, the receiver to his ear. Robert nodded a greeting and set the new catalog on John’s desk. The clink of a tire rod on cement told him that John was in the second bay. On his knees, the large man rotated radial tires on an older Jeep. Lug bolts and hub caps littered the ground.
“I was going to call you,” John said. “Going fishing in the morning. Thought you might want to come.”
“I can’t. I promised my folks I’d help with the trim tomorrow. The old, dark green doesn’t look so great with the orange sherbet color. We’re painting it a bright white.”
“That’s too bad. See the letter P here…” John pointed at the tire. “It’s the first letter of the serial number. The P stands for passenger. These are passenger tires.” John had obviously forgotten that he’d already given Robert this little lecture. From here he’d go into PSI—pounds per square inch—and explain how the R stands for radial.
“Big John,” he interrupted.
John paused to look up at him. Grease marred his cheek, forearm, and hands.
“I dropped by our new catalog. I left it on your desk.”
“Don’t tell me this is the only reason you stopped by.” John grinned.
“I planned to talk with Missy for a bit, too.” Robert felt his chest inflate just a little.
“She’s canning. Let me give you a little advice.” Sitting back on his heels, John looked up at him. “Never interrupt a woman when she’s canning. She plans to can sixty quarts of peaches and her mama’s pickles. She found her mama’s recipes. They were in a box, got pushed way to the back in an upper cupboard.”
From the second bay, Robert could see the kitchen window. He had to at least say hi. See her. At least catch a glimpse of her.
“How long does canning season last?”
“Hard to say. She’s already told us it’s TV dinners for the next couple days.”
There were things they needed to talk about, Bible verses they needed to share, and time that they needed to spend together. Stepping over tools, Robert started for the house.
“Don’t say I didn’t warn you,” John bellowed.
Robert knocked on the screen door, stepped inside the entry, and paused in the doorway to the kitchen
. Steam wafted up from the dishwasher as Missy transferred canning jars to a cooling rack. A bowlful of baby cucumbers, a jug of cider vinegar, fresh dill, and pickling spices were strewn across the countertop. She’d taped the recipe to the fan above the stove—probably for easy reading.
On the table, quart-sized jars of canned peaches lined the table. Boxes of peaches lined the floors. Overnight, Missy’s kitchen had turned into a manufacturing plant.
“Wow, look at you,” he said.
“Don’t look at me,” she said, her back to him. “I didn’t curl my hair today, just pulled it back into my ole, plain Missy look.”
“You were never plain.”
“Not now, Bobby. I got way too much going on. You have no idea.”
“Are you canning peaches and pickles at the same time?”
“Don’t lecture me. Now leave.”
Her back had been to him the entire time. He hadn’t even seen her face. He still had fifteen minutes before he had to leave for his appointment in Battle Ground. He pulled a chair away from the table, sat down, and decided he’d just wait it out for a couple minutes.
“Is there anything I can help you with?” he asked.
“Be quiet, or I’ll lose my mind.” She tossed fresh heads of dill, little red peppers, and whole cloves of garlic into quart jars.
Maybe the Lord was providing him a glimpse of their future for a reason. That is, if Missy would marry him, and after she became a Christian, of course.
“My mother no longer cans,” he said. “Her theory is why should she go to all the work when she can buy peaches, pickles, green beans for a dollar, sometimes fifty cents a can at the store?”
“It’s very important that you keep your yapper shut this next step,” she said, measuring a tablespoon of white powdery looking stuff into each jar.
He glanced at his wristwatch. He only had ten minutes left. Most likely it was their only ten minutes together for the rest of the day.
“Let me know when you get to a part when I can talk to you.”
“Sh!”
Five more minutes passed. Canning season might take a little of the fun out of marriage. It was definitely having a negative impact on their courtship. He wondered how long canning season lasted. Was it all of September? If that was the case, maybe he’d take up deer hunting with Big John.
“I have thirty seconds.” She remained at the stove with her back to him.
He rose from his chair, and taking Missy’s hand, steered her away from the steam wafting from the canner. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail and her bangs hung straight down. She looked fourteen instead of twenty.
“I found Mama’s recipe box.” She smiled up at him. “Her secret for making fried chicken was... she’d soak it in buttermilk overnight in the fridge.”
“Sounds like you found a treasure box.”
“I did.” Her eyes could have lit the night sky.
He cradled her warm, flushed face in his hands, and kissed her full on the mouth without asking because he couldn’t wait any longer.
“Call me when canning season’s over.” He kissed her forehead and grinned as he let the screen door bounce closed behind him.
“Robert,” she said through the window screen above the sink.
He turned around and paused in the middle of the gravel drive.
“Come back here.”
She was either going to kiss him again or she was going to tell him to never come back. The woman was that predictable.
He stepped inside and waited in the doorway to the kitchen.
“Canning season officially ends this Sunday at five o’clock p.m.,” she said as she held a stainless steel ladle shoulder high.
He smiled.
“And another thing...” She suppressed a smile. “If Daddy complains about this batch of pickles, I get to blame it on you.”
She loved him!
He grinned. Even though she hadn’t said the words, he knew. They teased her brain at this very instant, and she was testing them on her tongue.
Missy Stuart loved him.
He closed the screen door behind him and started for his vehicle. He was now two minutes behind schedule.
“Robert.” Missy called after him again.
He turned, and looked back at her through the kitchen window screen.
“The peaches will rot if I don’t make them a priority.”
“I understand, Missy. You want to be with me, but you have peaches and pickles to can.”
“Exactly.”
She loved him.
He smiled on his way to his wagon. It was so clear now; he didn’t know why he’d ever questioned any differently.
CHAPTER 46
“Rise and Shine,” Daddy turned on the overhead light in Missy’s room. “Did I tell you that we’re fishing the Lewis?”
Squinting, she looked toward the pleated, gold curtains; it was still dark outside. Saturday—her one day to sleep in, and she hadn’t finished her canning.
“I gotta can pickles.”
“We’ll only be gone a couple hours. Be home by lunch.”
“Where on the Lewis?” He better not be taking her to The Meat Hole.
“Rainbow’s End.”
Rainbow’s End was where they’d first met Pink Rollerhead. The spot was one of the best fishing holes on the river. Missy stretched and rolled out of bed. In her pink bathrobe, she wandered down the hallway into the kitchen.
“Who else is going?” She yawned.
“You and me.”
“Douglas overheard you asking someone on the phone yesterday.”
Daddy frowned and flipped open his tackle box on top of the table. He grabbed his metal file in one hand, a black Roostertail spinner in the other, and began sharpening the points of the treble hook.
“I asked Rosie. She can’t go. She has a hair appointment. I told her if we catch an extra steelhead, I’d stop by her place on our way home and give her one.”
Missy tried to imagine what the kitchen window would look like with Rosie’s yellow and white ruffled curtains.
“Should I take something out for supper?”
“No, we’ll barbeque a steelhead.”
Because they needed two steelhead, one for Rosie and one for themselves, all likelihood was they’d get skunked. Sometimes fishing wasn’t only know-how, it was luck.
Missy made some bologna sandwiches and changed into her fishing clothes.
True to the lesson of their last fishing trip, Daddy had brought his Bible. He’d wrapped it in a plastic bag and set it in the side compartment.
“If someone does park in this hole, Daddy, what verse are you going to read?”
“Just thought I’d start reading.”
“I think you should put a little more thought into it than that, don’t you? I mean, if you’re really going to use the opportunity to fish for souls, shouldn’t you find a verse you really like?”
“You’re trying to make me accountable, aren’t you?”
“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “I don’t think it’s right that you would use God’s Word to purposefully make people leave.”
“You’re right.” He sighed. “Hand me the Bible and the Bugles.”
She handed him the box of Bugles corn chips and the Bible.
He made a long cast, set his hook, and placed the butt of his rod in the rod holder attached to the side of the boat. After a few minutes of looking through the Bible, he shoved his hand deep into the corn chips. “Here’s my favorite verse. It’s in the Book of John. ‘For God so loved the world that He gave His only son...’”
“That’s the section you should read.” Missy nodded.
While they waited for a fish to strike or for a boatload of non-believers to park in their favorite fishing hole, the lapping of the gentle current against the side of their jet boat almost lulled her to sleep. To stay awake, she watched the tip of her rod, and did a mental checklist in her head. Peaches were done. Now she only had to worry about pickling the re
st of the small cukes while they were still in their prime.
“After last week, I want to call this Rosie’s Stretch of River.” Daddy’s line whizzed as he cast upstream. “Whether she becomes my sweetheart or not, I’ll always remember this stretch of river as where we first met.”
“You didn’t meet here, Daddy. You met at church—”
“We officially met on her front step.”
Pink Rollerhead might like fishing, enjoy cooking, and go to the same church and all, but Daddy needed someone less ornery. He could be ornery enough as it was.
“How’d your walk with Robert go the other night?” Daddy reeled the slack out of his line.
“Goooood.” She was unable to keep the smile out of her voice.
Three hours later, they were out of snack food, sunburned, and into the heat of the day. Daddy’s lone steelhead chilled in the ice chest. Missy hadn’t even had a bite. And for the first time in months, they didn’t need to fight for their fishing hole.
“We’ll buy hotdogs,” Daddy said on the way home. He drove past their driveway and headed south toward Rosie’s. “Do you think I ought to get her another handful of flowers?” He slowed his truck as they neared the U-pick dahlia stand.
“I think you should wait until Rosie agrees to a date with you.”
“I don’t agree.” Daddy drove the boat and trailer into the shade of an apple tree that bordered the side of the road. Wearing his rubber boots and fishing vest over his white T-shirt and old, striped polyester pants, Daddy used the loaner scissors to cut dahlias of all blooming colors. Missy wished she had her Polaroid camera. She pictured Robert in his powder-blue leisure suit cutting red and yellow dahlias. She wouldn’t see him tonight, and she missed him.
On Rosie’s doorstep, Daddy held the steelhead with his pointer finger through the gill and the bouquet of dahlias in his other hand. He rang the doorbell with his elbow. Missy watched from the truck. This Saturday, Rosie’s hair was fashioned in big, poofy curls, not rollers. She waved at Missy from the doorstep, and then motioned Daddy inside. It was probable that he’d carry the steelhead to the sink, eviscerate it for her, cut it into fillets, and wrap it in freezer paper if Rosie so desired.
Fried Chicken and Gravy - Christian Romance Page 25