by Susan Kirby
A knee protruded through a hole in his jeans as he shifted his stance. “Thought you’d be moving furniture today.”
“After church,” she said. “What time does it start? Do you know?”
“Ten, I think.” Eye caught by sunlight shining in her hair, he dropped his crowbar and moved to the edge of the roof. “Unless they’ve changed their schedule. I haven’t been in a while.”
“You’re welcome to come with me. I could use a familiar face.”
“I could use another pair of hands,” he countered.
“I’d offer, but I don’t like heights.”
He shot her a lopsided grin. “Heaven-bound and you don’t like heights?”
She smiled.
He swung from the roof to the ladder and down and crossed the grass. “Have you had breakfast yet?”
“No. I overslept,” Thomasina admitted.
“I’ve got doughnuts.”
“I better not, I don’t want to be late.”
“Did I mention they are iced in chocolate?” he coaxed.
Thomasina smiled. “On second thought…”
“I thought that might make a difference.” Grinning, Trace stepped past her to let down the tailgate of his truck. “Have a seat.”
“I thought the store was closed on Sunday.”
“It is,” he said. “I got these in town last night.”
With his date.
It was hot in the sun. Thomasina took off her suit jacket. She folded it across her Bible and purse on the tailgate beside her and smoothed her skirt as he circled back with a thermos of coffee and a sack of doughnuts.
Thomasina accepted first pick. “Mmm. How’d you guess chocolate was my favorite food group?”
“A couple of jailbirds were wearing the evidence. Remember?”
Thomasina laughed as he tipped the thermos. The coffee streamed black and aromatic into the cup. Her nose buzzed her taste buds as he offered it to her. Seeing only one cup, she fought the coffee bean tyrant and said, “I’m fine. You go ahead.”
“Take it. Wouldn’t want your equilibrium suffering.”
“Shame on you for reminding me.” Thomasina took the coffee and hijacked the thermos, too.
He chuckled and returned to the cab for another cup. She’d taken off her shoes while his back was turned. Slender feet, well-turned ankles and girlie toes, tipped in glossy pink enamel. Her white throat caught the light as she tipped her head back, looking toward the house.
“So how’s the roof coming?”
“Off,” he said.
“The whole thing?”
“Right down to the joists.” He explained his plan to convert it into another two-unit apartment.
“You’re quite the wheeler and dealer, aren’t you?”
“A regular horse trader.” He answered her smile. “Which reminds me—I caught a glimpse of Ricky’s truck last night when I dropped him off.”
“The purple one?”
“That’s the least of its problems.” He should have brought some napkins. Or maybe not. There was artistry to her tongue flicking to a corner crease, collecting a crumb. He took his time chewing and sipping, curious over the unseen flaw. Had to be one, or someone would have snapped her up a long time ago. His glance fell to her Bible, peeking out from beneath her jacket. For a moment, it was Deidre all over again. He hardened his jaw and watched churchgoers looking for parking space.
“You want to cut a deal?”
“With a horse trader?” she said doubtfully, and grinned when he did.
“I’ll help you move your furniture if you’ll go out to Milt’s with me tomorrow and hold Mary’s hand while Will and I cut down that tree. I told Will Mary’s attached to it,” he added as she opened her mouth to protest. “Even reminded him of how he and I used to crawl out his upstairs window, down that tree and off to the creek on hot summer nights.”
“And he wants to cut it down anyway?”
“He says it’s all wrong from a landscaping point of view.”
Thomasina had enough of an eye for balance to concede the point. “Still, it’s a shame to lose a mature tree. Especially a healthy one.”
“I’m no tree doctor, so I won’t venture a guess.” Seeing protest in her dark eyes, Trace added, “Will may be short on sentiment, but he’s right about one thing. If it did come down on its own, it would have a hard time missing the house.”
“Okay, okay.” Thomasina held up a hand. “I give up.”
“You’ll come out to the farm, then, Monday?”
“Yes, and hold Mary’s hand. If she can’t be talked into trying the last resort. Tears,” she said at his questioning glance.
“Now you’re showing some ingenuity!” He laughed, and splashed the last dregs of his coffee on the ground. “So when do you want to get started on the furniture? Right after church?”
“That’d be great.” The church bells chimed. Thomasina slipped into her jacket and stacked her clutch purse on top of her Bible. “It’s only fair to warn you, though. I’ll be getting the better end of this deal.”
“Let me worry about that,” said Trace. He grinned as she slid off the tailgate into her spiked heels, then waved as she hurried up the sidewalk, dusting the seat of her skirt as she went.
* * *
Later that afternoon, Trace and Ricky and two of Ricky’s pals lugged Thomasina’s furniture down two flights of stairs, loaded both trucks and drove south to Liberty Flats. Antoinette came with her kids while they were unloading, and offered to help.
On the second and final trip to town, Thomasina stayed behind with Antoinette to “clear a path,” as she put it. Storm clouds rolled in on the way back to Liberty Flats. Keeping the fixer-upper and water damage in mind, Trace wanted to make fast tracks. But he was following the boys, and their old clunker developed a hitch in its stride. The purple truck made it to Liberty Flats by the skin of its teeth, limped into the carriage house drive, coughed twice and died.
Trace pulled in behind the boys. Unloading was a race with coming rain. He and Ricky were carrying in the last piece when it started to drizzle.
Thomasina was throwing sheets over her shoddy mattress when Trace guided Ricky through the door with her free-standing mirror. Plain white cotton sheets. Nothing provocative about that. But as she turned and met Trace’s glance, she was uncomfortable and wished she’d ignored the impulse to hide the lumpy mattress.
Ricky ducked out the door and tramped down the stairs to go see about his truck. Thomasina hoped Trace would follow. He didn’t. Hearing rain hit the window, she said, “Just in time.”
“Hmm?”
“It’s raining. We’ve finished just in time. Thanks for all your help, Trace.”
Was that a note of dismissal in her tone as she tucked the last corner, and reached for the quilt? The quilt billowed out over the bed. Trace stirred himself, went downstairs and asked the boys to help him get the roof on his rental house covered.
They found tarps in the shed, hurried across town and got soaking wet getting the job done. Upon their return, the boys tried the truck, but it wouldn’t start. Trace slid the carriage house door open, helped them push it inside and looked under the hood.
“Could just need a tune-up,” said Ricky.
“Maybe,” Trace replied, fairly certain it was more than that. “See if you can get it running while I go change my clothes.”
Trace let himself in the back door just as Antoinette and the children cut across the yard, trekking homeward under a black umbrella. They quarreled as they went.
“Pauly’s a slowpoke!” taunted Winny.
“Nuh-uh, you’re the swow poke,” retorted Pauly.
Trace tramped over the back deck and into the laundry room. The door leading into Thomasina’s kitchen was standing open.
“Where are the boys?” she called to him. “They didn’t leave, did they?”
“No, they’re trying to get their truck running.”
“Good. I want to treat them to supper over at t
he church. It’s the least I can do for the way they’ve pitched in. You’ll come, won’t you?” Thomasina added, and tossed him a hand towel. “You’re wet.”
“I won’t melt,” he said, and pitched it back.
“Trace!” she protested, and came toward him, the towel in hand. “Antoinette just finished mopping this floor. Dry off before you come in here.”
“Is that an invitation?” he asked.
“To the soup supper? I just said…you’re dripping all over!”
He caught her wrist just as she raised the towel as if to catch the rainwater trickling down his face. “Don’t start with me, Tommy Rose. Not unless you mean it.”
Her jaw dropped. “Mean what?”
“Mean to finish it.”
Her face went still, right to her eyebrows. Her gaze quickened, but it did not waver. Evenly she replied, “That depends on what you mean by finish.”
Words were like bullets, once spoken. Clearly his had gone afoul of the mark. Her full lips took a sudden lean line with an even thinner ridge of white edging them.
“Tell you what,” she said softly, clearly thinking the worst of him. “Forget the soup. What do I owe you for helping me move?”
“Nothing.” He let go of her wrist and turned away from the hurt in her eyes. He should have stayed on the roof. Mean to finish it. What kind of a crazy thing was that to say?
Trace climbed the stairs and changed his clothes and went back out to help the boys. They’d flooded the carburetor, trying to start it. Boylike, they didn’t get too worked up over it. After a while, Thomasina called to them from the back porch. Ricky loped across the yard and reported back again.
“Miz Rose’s taking us to eat. You comin’?” he asked.
“No, thanks,” said Trace.
“You sure? Antoinette and the kids are coming, too. All the soup you can eat, she says.”
“You go on. I’ll see if I can get your truck running.”
Ricky’s pals went without hesitation. But Ricky turned in the door. “I’ll stay and help.”
“Better not,” said Trace. “Thomasina’s wanting you there.”
“She sore at you?”
Trace did a double take. A grin stole over Ricky’s face. “She is, ain’t she? What did you do? Track on her floor?”
“Something like that,” said Trace. He took out his wallet and gave Ricky the tickets he’d bought from Milt earlier in the week. “You go on now. Eat some soup for me, too.”
The soup supper was a success with the boys. They stuffed themselves to the gills, charmed a couple of Liberty Flat girls into giggling sprees and were attentive throughout Trace’s high school sweethearts’ slide show, which was more than Thomasina could say for herself. She wasn’t here for soup. Or even to treat Antoinette and the boys. It was curiosity over Deidre and Trace that motivated her to come. She wanted to see them together, to see the look in Trace’s eyes as he looked into Deidre’s. To know what was what before she pursued whatever it was she had thought might be worth pursuing.
But that was before Trace’s words in the laundry room. Now there was nothing to pursue. “I’d adore a man who adored me.” Her light words of a few days ago had sharp spurs. She hadn’t known until now just how truly she had spoken.
Trace didn’t adore her. He hadn’t seen past her curves. She’d gone out with a dozen like him, and not wasted a second thought. So what was wrong? How was this different?
It was hours before Thomasina untangled it all. After the supper. After Antoinette and the kids had gone home. After the boys rang her cell phone to say they’d made it home in their patched-up truck. Search me, oh God.
God was light. By holding that moment in the laundry room up to the light that peeled away pride and false pretense and whitewash and hogwash and all the other sleight-of-hand tricks of human nature, she got at the unvarnished truth.
“Don’t start with me,” he’d said. Trace had caught her up short, orchestrating the whole evening, her altruism a screen to suit her own ends. She winced. Okay, God You’re right. I did.
God wasn’t done with her yet He dropped into her consciousness the bald truth that she had invited what followed, albeit thoughtlessly, by reaching with the towel to dry his face. There was a familiarity in that gesture that reached beyond the borders of their short acquaintance. She didn’t think of herself as a flirt. Nor had she set out to mislead him. But gloss or no gloss, she had touched him. Or would have, if he hadn’t caught her wrist.
Create in me a pure heart, O God The words soothed the healing wounds of honesty. Tomorrow was another day. A fresh slate. An apology, and if he accepted, a fresh start. Thank you, Father.
Chapter Eleven
A gnawing stomach and birds singing outside his window awakened Trace the next morning. He rolled off the sofa where he had fallen asleep, found the remote on the floor, turned on the TV and caught the weather forecast. Warm and sunny. A good tree-cutting day. He showered and shaved and was reaching for the toaster and a packet of instant oatmeal when the phone rang. It was Will calling from his folks’ farm. His sisters were flying in today for a family conference regarding the farm, so he was hoping to get the tree cutting out of the way early.
Trace tucked the tail of his light blue T-shirt into his jeans, pulled on his boots and skipped breakfast in the interest of time. Emmaline had fresh goodies in the bakery case if you got there early enough on Mondays. That and a couple of cartons of milk would do him. He had to stop for gas, anyway.
Trace grabbed work gloves and a denim cap on his way out the back door. He put a can of blended fuel for the chain saws in the truck along with his saws, ropes and climbing spurs, then drove the truck out of the carriage house.
Thomasina stepped off the front porch as he bailed out of the truck to slide the door shut. Was she coming with him? Trace flung her a guarded glance. Open loose-fitting blue shirt, red knit T-shirt beneath it, neatly pressed jeans. No clues there as to her intentions. A red bandanna made a bright splash at the tail of her French braid. Her handtooled leather purse matched her belt and lace-up boots. It swung from a long shoulder strap, brushing a slim hip as she strode down the walk, oblivious of him. Or pretending to be.
He started to call out to her, then got stubborn and didn’t. Was she or wasn’t she? Body language said no, she had other fish to fry. Trace watched her park sunglasses on her nose, unlock the car door and climb in. One poorly turned phrase, and the flaws cropped up right and left. Moody. Didn’t keep her word. It wasn’t that he needed her help—Milt would look after Mary. It was that he’d wanted…
Trace snapped the lock on the carriage house door and the thought, as well. He climbed in his truck and headed to Newt’s. Thomasina had beat him there. She was standing out front with a bakery sack in her hand, chatting with Emmie’s uncle Earl and his checker buddy, Charlie.
Trace’s gas needle was on empty. But he wouldn’t give her the satisfaction of thinking he’d stopped because she was there. If worse came to worst, he had the gas can full of fuel for the chain saw.
Worst came, two miles out of town. Trace’s truck sucked up the last of the fumes, bucked a few times and rolled to a stop. E wasn’t negotiable. What was wrong with him? He got out, took a gas can from the back of the truck and was unscrewing the cap when a car came up behind him. Thomasina. She hit the brakes, put the car in reverse and stopped even with him. The power window whined down.
“Run out of gas?”
Trace looked at her with all the docility of a bull and a red flag.
“Need some help?”
He clamped his jaw tight and glowered, even as he tipped the gas can a notch higher.
“I’ve got doughnuts.”
“Good for you,” he said without inflection.
Her brown gaze swept over him. Her hand went to the gearshift, her foot to the pedal. Trace spilled gas down his pant leg, watching her pull away.
He jerked his attention back to the task at hand, shook out the last drops, then looked to
see her stop up the road. His hackles rose as she threw the-car in reverse a second time. What now? She stopped, slid across the seat and passed the bakery sack through the open window.
Trace’s reflexes kicked in a stride ahead of his pride. He took the sack, then felt compromised, standing there holding the bag. The splotch of red bandanna shrank as she accelerated. He was on the verge of flinging the doughnuts after her when lipstick script on the outside of the bag caught his eye. “I’m sorry,” she’d written. Just that, nothing more.
He scratched his head and sagged against the truck as her car disappeared down the road. God, she’s good.
God had nothing audible to say in reply. But for the first time in a while, Trace felt a sense of His presence. Not in a cloud of smoke or pillar of fire. But in two peach-colored words on a bakery sack.
Milt was in his favorite chair by the bedroom window. His face wrinkled into a broad grin as Thomasina sailed into his room bearing empty cups and a coffee carafe. “Tommy Rose! Wasn’t expecting you today. What’s that you’re wearing—lumberjack boots?”
“These old things?” Thomasina arched her foot, displaying her work boots with all the grace of a ballerina in combat boots. “They’re hiking boots.”
“Fetching,” said Milt, running a hand over his bald head. “You know Will, don’t you?”
“Sure. Hi, Will.” Thomasina winged Will a smile as he rose from the chair facing his father.
“’Morning, Thomasina. Let me help you with that,” he said, making space for the coffee on the nearby dresser. “Take my chair. I’ll go see how Mom’s coming with your breakfast, Dad.”
“The boys are going to take down the tree out front. Somebody’s got to be boss,” Milt said when Will had gone.
“Are you auditioning for the part or shall I?”
Milt cackled, encouraging her glib tongue.
She talked too loud, too fast, and too much. But couldn’t seem to stop herself, for to stop was to let thought catch up, and she couldn’t, not with Trace’s drop dead look stuck in her head.