A Time to Surrender

by Sally John

  If only she could breathe.

  If only she had not begun to let go of the past, to let down her guard, to believe she’d arrived at last in Kansas.

  Slowly, so as not to draw attention to herself, she hunched her shoulders and moved sideways, melding into a nearby group, angling herself behind a cardboard sign. Peace now! Shortening her typically long strides, she made her way back around to where she’d talked with Danny. Resisting the urge to peek over her shoulder, she doddered along, staying close to people.

  Advantages raced through her mind. Eighteen months was a long time. She looked different. Although her last dye job was several months old, the telltale auburn roots in her hair were covered by the ball cap. A trendy So-Cal ponytail bounced through the cap’s opening. She wore—thanks to Lexi—blue jeans that did not bag and a nondescript light-brown shirt that did not scream “flower child.”

  And, if she could catch up to him, her new best friend Wally Cleaver just might buy her a cup of coffee. Even the most annoying Beaumont seemed to know how to offer a safe harbor.

  Twenty

  I have to say, Wally—I mean Daniel.” Skylar smiled. “That is one major scowl you’ve got going there.”

  Danny relaxed facial muscles that had instantly contorted at the sound of her annoying nickname. Whatever had possessed him to invite her to have coffee? Every time the woman spoke he felt like hives erupted all over his body.

  She said, “You don’t like the moniker?”

  “It’s probably more the tone than the name.”

  “You’re kidding. This is my teasing tone.”

  “Hmm. What does your derogatory tone sound like?”

  “Like this.” She slouched, sneered, and exhaled huffily. “Wally sod-ding Cleaver.” Straightening, she smiled again. “Hear the difference?”

  He raised his hands in surrender. “Got it.”

  She laughed and eyes the color of sunlight through a Perrier bottle twinkled. The splash of freckles across her nose danced.

  He steeled himself against another stab of attraction. Green eyes, intriguing face, and common pro-peace grounds were not why he’d invited her. No way. It was solely because he did not trust her. Better to know an enemy than not.

  But her looks were appealing.

  She made him laugh.

  And . . . okay . . . hives aside, her personality was growing on him. Why wouldn’t he want to tango with her over a cup of coffee and explore the recesses of her wacky mind?

  He said, “You started to say something?”

  “Yes. I was saying that I have to say, you surprise me to no end.” She held up her mug in salute. “Funky nonchain coffee shop. Antiwar demo. Total acceptance of your uncle’s illegitimate Vietnamese daughter. Not in the office on a Friday.”

  “My apartment is my office. I’ll be working tonight. Probably tomorrow too.”

  “You get my drift.”

  “Not exactly.”

  “The bona fide nerd who is also an in-your-face Jesus freak doesn’t do funky. He doesn’t do anti. He doesn’t do out-of-wedlock.”

  “For all your freethinking, Skylar, that really is a narrow-minded attitude.”

  She pulled off the billed cap, ruffled her hair, undid her long ponytail, reassembled it, and slid the hat back into place. Her eyes reflected its green. “Yeah, I agree. It is shockingly intolerant.”

  “Hey, you’re supposed to argue with me.”

  She flashed the grin again, the one that crinkled her nose and set the freckles in motion.

  He said, “What makes you think I’m an in-your-face Jesus freak anyway?”

  Skylar opened her mouth as if to reply, then closed it.

  Danny took a wild guess. “My twin didn’t used to talk so much.”

  “Lexi didn’t use those exact words. She just confirmed what I already assumed. I mean, you haven’t hit me up with the plan of salvation—yet—but you did give me a spiel on forgiveness the other day.”

  Danny leaned back in the overstuffed chair and crossed his legs, ankle to knee. “I don’t understand the world’s problem with forgiveness. There’s such a commonsense side to it. I mean, if everyone extended and received forgiveness, wouldn’t that lead to world peace?”

  “Maybe, if we didn’t have to include Jesus. He’s the divisive factor.”

  He wasn’t going there with her. “Did you grow up going to Sunday school?”

  “Hasn’t every American over a certain age?”

  “Then what?”

  She frowned. “Then what, what?”

  “Then you stopped going to Sunday school, to church. You stopped wanting to hear about Jesus.”

  “Why would I want to hear?”

  “Because He was real to you or real to someone close to you.”

  She shook her head.

  “You want to see my surf shop?”

  “See your—Danny, you just jumped in one breath from world peace to Sunday school to your business. I’m getting whiplash here flipping over the segue gaps.”

  He grinned. “I promise not to hit you up with the plan of salvation. Unless you want me to.”

  “Uh, no thanks.”

  “No thanks to the speech?”

  She nodded. “Heard it once or twice.”

  “How about the shop tour?”

  “We just got our coffee.”

  “In to-go mugs.”

  “I’m trying to imagine you sitting still at a computer.”

  “Baffles the mind, doesn’t it?” He wondered at her hesitation. She didn’t seem the type to weigh a lot of consequences in her decision-making process.

  The resemblance between Skylar and his old friend Faith kept knocking him off balance. It went way beneath a similarity in outward appearance. It went to the core.

  And he knew Faith’s core. She’d rejected everything he believed in, everything she had said she believed in the first twenty-one years of her life. Despite the day’s momentary connection with Skylar, he suspected she, too, at her core, rejected not only God but all that was good and hopeful in the world. If so, there was no reason she would choose to work at the Hacienda Hideaway.

  His grandmother would say Skylar behaved as she did because of wounds, hurts that God wanted to heal, pain through which He would call out the true Skylar Pierson. The thing Nana didn’t get was that Faith Simmons refused to receive from God. There was no reason to believe Skylar would not do likewise.

  “Danny.”

  He blinked and saw that Skylar was standing, mug and sunglasses in hand.

  “Let’s go see your Ro-Bo Shop.”

  He uncrossed his legs and slowly got to his feet, surprised she would accept his invitation. “You don’t have anything better to do than hang with Wally Cleaver?”

  “Of course I do.” She shrugged. “But making points with the bosses’ son is a priority.”

  There was more truth than joke in her remark. He really did not trust her. She was all about herself.

  Meeting her eyes, he forced a smile. After all, it was the honey that attracted the bear. “I didn’t drive here. You don’t mind a bus ride, do you?”

  “No.”

  “I’ll drive you back later to the garage where you parked Mom’s car. After what Rosie told us, I’d rather avoid the protest area and that church.”

  “Yeah, me too.” The typically confident voice warbled. Skylar spun abruptly on her heel and headed toward the door.

  Danny followed, reminded that despite their current teasing rapport, despite her good work at the Hideaway, Skylar Pierson was an unknown.

  As they walked along the sidewalk, he glanced at his watch. “It’s one-thirty-six. The bus should be—”

  A rumbling noise cut off his speech. It was distant, but he immediately comprehended that it did not belong. In the vicinity of airstrips for F/A18 Hornets and commercial airliners, it did not belong. Near rails for the Amtrak, it did not belong. In an area familiar with earthquakes, it did not belong.

  Something was terribly aw
ry.

  Twenty-one

  There was no warning, just an abrupt, thunderous boom that shook every inch of the old church.

  Before Jenna’s eardrums registered the explosion, a glass sliver pierced through the sleeves of her polyester black suit jacket and white silk blouse and embedded itself into her left forearm. The splinter came from the huge stained-glass window at the end of the pew, a colorful depiction of a dove, a rainbow, and the ark.

  Before her mind registered the injury, the world slid into a state of suspension. Her thoughts wandered backward, over the events that led to her being in that particular place at that particular moment . . . on a Friday afternoon with hundreds of mourners and a flag-draped coffin flanked by Marines in dress blues and gloves so white they almost glowed in stark contrast to the surrounding dark-stained woods of paneling, altar, rail, and pulpit . . .

  Amber had been at her all week to attend the funeral. Not a lunch, prep period, or hall sighting went by without an Amber exhortation.

  “Come on, Jenna,” she had said. “Keep me company, please, please. It’s not like I know the widow either. Except we did attend that book club last month and shared similar views about Empire Falls. By the way, did I mention how much you with your literary background would add to the group? I hope you can make it next time. This woman is a sweetheart. Not that it matters if she’s sweet. She lost her husband. I’d go anyway, as a show of support. We’re all in this together, you know? All us military families.”

  Jenna might have withstood Amber’s onslaught if not for other forces at work.

  Cade was one of those forces. On Wednesday he’d asked her to step into his office. “Jenna, Friday afternoon is a professional half day.” That meant no classes, just faculty business. “If you need to do this thing with Amber, don’t worry about missing a department meeting.” His eyes did their ice melt.

  Via e-mail, she poured the dilemma out to Kevin and, on Thursday, he replied.

  Jen, I can’t put into words what it would mean to me if you went. I know all this military stuff is still new for you and it’s so hard for you to make sense of it. I wish I could call you, cuz this will probably come out wrong and I can’t fix it online. But here goes. If you attend a fallen comrade’s funeral, it’d be like you’ve really come on board. You know? You are my Pretty Lady and I love you. Kev.

  Seven thousand, seven hundred thirty-one miles away, the guy turned her to mush. Still, a corner of her heart resisted that “really” coming on board business. Images of doing everything alone and talking to him only long distance haunted her. That’s what coming on board meant.

  Like pretending those things didn’t describe her life right now could make it all go away? Who was she fooling?

  The final push came indirectly from Beth Russell. “God is in the gatherings with other wives . . . He wants you to step into your ‘princess’ role, to give to others . . . He will take care of you.”

  Friday morning she had not yet decided, but she put on her black suit, white silk blouse, and pearls and went to school.

  And then the bell rang. First hour began. Her thoughts already on John Donne, she went to shut her classroom door. A straggler shuffled down the hall, his back to her. She recognized him. Last year she had attended his brother’s funeral. Not long after that, Kevin reenlisted.

  How the boy must ache, unspeakably ache.

  Maybe Donne had it right. Maybe no man was an island.

  Maybe she ought to find a bridge and take a hike across it.

  She would go to the funeral . . .

  The world spun again, slamming Jenna into a state of nauseating vertigo.

  “Oh God! Oh God!”

  Was that her scream?

  Amber came into focus, her face a hairsbreadth from Jenna’s, her voice nearly lost in the din of a thunderous echo.

  Jenna gasped for air. “Huh?”

  “I said hang in there! We’re okay. We’re fine—no, lie still. Lie still. There’s glass everywhere.”

  Amber’s hair glittered, sparkly stained-glass beads dotted its curls. She was kneeling beside Jenna, looking downward, smoothing Jenna’s collar, the jacket, her skirt. “There’s a cut on your arm, hon. Otherwise”—she flashed her signature smile—“you’re good to go. We better wait for medics, though. I hear sirens.”

  Sirens. And screams. Shouts. Cries. Moans.

  “It shouldn’t be long, hon.” Amber’s calm voice silenced the chaos for Jenna. “Help is on the way.”

  “What . . . what . . . ?”

  “Two simple bombs. Just large enough to pop out a couple windows.” Again the quick smile. “Walls are still standing. Homemade, my guess. Type my chem whizzes could make, no sweat. Planted outside this window and that one up a few rows.” She indicated the direction, tilting her head. On her neck a trickle of blood appeared, ominous in its sudden, steady seeping. “I really don’t think it’s a major terrorist attack—”

  “Amber! You’re bleeding.” Jenna pressed an elbow against the floor. “Help me sit up.”

  “You shouldn’t move.” But Amber supported her to a sitting position. “I tumbled us both to the floor. Comes from four brothers whose favorite game was always ‘duck and cover.’ Jen, keep your jacket on.”

  “Your neck.” Jenna struggled out of her sleeves. The left one caught on something and a sharp pain shot through her body. “Ah!” Tears sprang to her eyes as she worked her arm out. Now her blood-soaked blouse sleeve came into view. Her stomach lurched.

  “Sit still. You’re hurt. Wrap the coat around your arm.”

  Instead she wrapped the coat around Amber’s shoulders. Her friend, dressed in skirt and short-sleeved jacket, was shaking uncontrollably. Jenna leaned back against the pew and pulled Amber into her arms.

  “Lord, have mercy,” Amber whispered. She slumped then, dead weight against Jenna’s chest.

  “Christ, have mercy.” Jenna Beaumont Mason burst into tears.

  Twenty-two

  Hands on her hips, squinting against the afternoon sun, Claire gazed up at the fountain in the center of her courtyard. Above the sound of rushing water she called loudly to Max standing beside her, “If you hurry, you might be able catch the delivery guys before they reach the highway.”

  He chuckled. “Trevi Fountain comes to mind.”

  “The one in Rome? Nah. Ours isn’t that, uh, big.”

  “Or gaudy. There are no mythological gods.”

  “Still.”

  “Exactly.” He shrugged. “But let’s look on the bright side. It’s not cracked and it’s not on back order.”

  “I just didn’t have giant flying sea bass in mind, spurting forth rivers. Just a pleasant, hushed, ambient gurgle.”

  “I think they’re Chinook salmon.”

  She sighed loudly.

  “I’m sorry, sweetheart.”

  “I know. It’s not your fault.”

  “I’ll play with the water pressure.” He bent and flipped a switch on the fountain’s side. Sudden silence engulfed the courtyard.

  Claire eyed him as he straightened. Mr. Handyman he wasn’t. He’d proven that time and again since they’d started the remodeling project. “Your dad can help, right?”

  “Before or after I break something?” Max smiled. “I’ll see if he and Tuyen can lend a hand.”

  Claire slipped her arms around his waist and leaned against him. The blossoming relationship between Ben and Tuyen was a beautiful sight. They’d become inseparable that week, since Beth Russell’s visit. Every inch of the Hideaway’s three hundred acres held a memory of BJ that Ben couldn’t wait to tell and Tuyen couldn’t wait to hear. Time and again Claire had come upon them inside the house or courtyard, at the barn or heading out on the horses. Ben would be saying, “I remember when your dad . . .”

  “Phone.” Max kissed the top of her head and strode over to the porch where she’d left the cordless. “Nobody would call on a Friday afternoon to plan a Saturday getaway, would they?”

  Smiling, she shr
ugged. As fun and rewarding as their first weeks of company had been, she and Max were anticipating a weekend of empty guest rooms. As a couple, they were overdue for some alone time.

  Word was spreading quickly in local circles that the Hacienda Hideaway was open for business. Still winging it policy-wise, they hadn’t yet decided how much lead time they needed for a reservation. Literally speaking, the place was ready. Fresh linens were in place. The freezers were stocked with some of Skylar’s goodies.

  Max picked up the phone, checking the ID display. “It’s Erik.” He answered it. “Hey . . . What . . . No . . . Yeah . . . Hold on. Claire, do you know what Danny was doing today?”

  She heard the hesitation in his voice and walked over to him, shaking her head.

  Max said, “There’s an antiwar demonstration.”

  Claire tried not to read panic in his widened eyes. He knew as well as she did that Danny attended those things when he had the time. Growing up with an MIA uncle, their son adopted at a young age a deep compassion for soldiers and a deep distrust of reasons for war.

  Max said, “Erik, we don’t know . . . Okay, yeah. Thanks, son.” He clicked off the phone, his face creased into a tight frown. “We need to turn on the news. There was an explosion just moments ago.”

  “Oh, Max!”

  “It appears it happened outside a church. The TV crews were already there for the demonstration. And Rosie’s there.”

  “He talked to her?”

  “No. She’s not answering her cell and neither is Danny. She told Erik last night about her assignment. She said they were expecting some problems.”

  “Is anyone hurt?”

  “Some people inside the church. Apparently the demonstrators weren’t at that spot right then.”

  “So Danny would be okay?” She was clutching his hands.

  “It sounds—”

  “But Rosie—”

  “Is trained for this sort of thing. Let’s go inside and turn on the TV. The news is covering—”

  Claire cried out. Her breath felt ripped from her chest. In the recesses of her imagination she heard the echo of a wind.