by Loree Lough
He turned back to his father. “Can we, Daddy?”
Noah closed his eyes, took a deep, shuddering breath, then looked at Dara. “He can see,” he mouthed, smiling with relief. “He can see!”
She could only imagine how he must be feeling right now, if the realization that Bobby wasn’t blind had stirred her so deeply.
“The doctor says that when you fell,” Noah explained, his voice patient and kind, “you bruised your brain.”
For a long time, no one said a word. The stillness was so complete the only sound in the room was the tick, tick, tick of Noah’s wristwatch.
“When is it going to stop hurting?” he cried.
Dara patted the child’s hand. “Soon, Bobby,” she assured him, “soon. Before you know it, the swelling will go down, and you’ll be your ornery old sel—”
“Don’t,” Noah interrupted, his soft voice suddenly hard edged, his face stern.
With a nod, Noah let Dara know he wanted to speak with her outside.
“Don’t feed him a line of bunkum,” caine his harsh whisper when they reached the hall. “We’re not out of the woods yet. It won’t do him a bit of good, believing everything’s gonna be right as rain. He needs to know it might get worse before—”
Dara stood as tall as her five-foot-three-inch frame would allow. Chin up and shoulders back, she glared at him. “What he needs,” she hissed through clenched teeth, “is to be allowed to act like a little boy, because that’s exactly what he is.”
She watched the muscles of Noah’s jaw flex, saw his lips pull back in a taut, strained line. It was as though he’d drawn invisible boundaries around the boy, and she’d unwittingly crossed them. Her blatant statement had offended—no, it had enraged—him. This was not a man accustomed to being challenged, the somber look on his face said.
If you thought that was bad, wait till you hear what I have to say about your late wife.
In Dara’s opinion, Angie and Bobby had been functioning like mini-adults more than long enough. She didn’t know if their mother alone had required the stoic, straitlaced conduct or if their father had demanded it, as well, but right now, it didn’t matter one whit to her. It was time someone spoke out on behalf of the Lucas children. You have no job, no family. What have you got to lose? she asked herself.
“Father?” Bobby called.
It broke Dara’s heart to hear Bobby calling Noah “Father” again, and she would have said so, if Noah hadn’t already turned on his heel and stomped back to his son’s bedside.
She couldn’t help but notice the child’s clenched teeth and hands. He was making a Herculean effort to be brave…to gain Father’s approval. You’re lucky you and I aren’t alone, she told Noah mentally, because you’d get such a piece of my mind that—
“Yes, son?”
They stood on either side of Bobby’s bed, each holding a small, pale hand.
“I didn’t mean to act like a baby,” he said, sniffing. “I’ll be good from now on. I promise. No more crying, ‘cause I know you don’t like it.”
Noah would have needed to be blind not to see the boy’s quavering lower lip, the agony in his eyes. She wanted to gather the dear little boy in her arms, tell him to cry at the top of his lungs, to rant and rave and stomp and shout if he felt like it, to be a little boy!
Dara reached across him, instead, gave Noah’s shoulder a not-so-gentle shove. “Tell him!” she mouthed silently. “He’s not a man!”
A shuddering sigh escaped Noah’s lips as he slowly shook his head. Her rage seemed to have diffused his. “You’re not being a baby, son. You’re a brave, tough little guy, and I’m proud of you.” And wrapping both arms around Bobby, Noah held him tight.
Father in heaven, she prayed, give him the strength to be weak, for Bobby’s sake.…
“Ah-h-h, son.” Noah sighed raggedly, struggling to contain his tears.
A sob ached in her own throat when Noah did exactly what his son most needed him to do…
Wept.
Chapter Seven
Bobby had never gone to bed without a fight. At least, that’s what Angie told Dara on Thanksgiving night, during their marathon “girl talk” session after the stint at the hospital; since his release, he’d been going upstairs without a word of protest, saying his prayers and drifting right off to sleep, almost as if he believed the accident had been a punishment of some sort.
And Dara had never missed a day’s work, not once in eight years. But the Monday following the accident, she’d called the Centennial principal and informed him she wouldn’t be coming back, explaining only that the Lucas children needed her more than the high school did.
“But…but you have three months to go before the semester break,” he protested.
“What’s the board gonna do, John?” she’d teased halfheartedly. “Fire me?”
He hadn’t been happy about her pronouncement and said so, but agreed to make the necessary calls. A substitute would take her place until spring break, he said; after that, thanks to budget cuts, the rest of the math teachers would have to divide Dara’s students among themselves.
Ever since she’d heard about the reallocation of county funds that would phase out her job, she’d joked about the sedentary lifestyle she’d soon begin. Life would be anything but inactive once she began taking care of Angie and Bobby full-time, and she intended to do that full-time until the boy had completely recovered. After that, she’d volunteer at the elementary school, minister to the sick…and try to come to grips with what her father had done.
Money would be tight for a while, but if she watched how she spent her savings, she could last a year, maybe longer. For now, supporting herself was the least of her worries, because these next few days would be devoted to nursing Bobby back to health.
The neurologist had made it patently clear how close the boy had come to blindness, coma, brain damage. Once the doctor had explained that Bobby had hurt himself in a previous fall, Dara understood why, on the day the broom fell out of the pantry, Bobby had reacted so strangely to what should have been a minor bump on the head.
Dr. Tilley had said Bobby could go home, but only if, during the critical first twenty-four hours, he rested quietly. “Low lighting and as little noise as possible,” the doctor had insisted. “And if he sleeps, someone has to wake him every sixty minutes, shine a flashlight into his eyes to make sure his pupils are constricting.” They were to monitor him carefully throughout the next week, watching to see if Bobby could walk a straight line, hold down his meals, that he had no trouble focusing and that his memory of where objects were was intact. “Things are looking good,” the doc had warned, “but it’s too soon to celebrate.”
Noah immediately agreed to reschedule his afternoon meetings so he could keep an eye on the boy. But Dara insisted he let her take care of the kids while Noah worked.
That had been four days ago.
Since then, first thing every morning, she’d been driving the three miles from her place in Valley Mede to his house in Font Hill, staying until the kids were sound asleep. It was starting to feel like home, this tooneat house of Noah’s, from the big deck out back to the wraparound porch out front.
Dara had learned how to run Noah’s multifunction computerized dishwasher and the tornadic vacuum cleaner. He’d shown her where he’d hidden the spare house key, taught her to operate the garage door opener by punching a secret code into the keypad.
And because her houseplants had more than doubled in size, blocking light—and, in warm weather, air from the open windows—she packed most of them into the back seat of her car and brought them to Noah’s. They looked much better here than they had at her place, standing tall and lush in dark corners, brightening bookshelves, dangling from the mantel.
She’d brought over a few knickknacks, too—things she probably would have sold at a yard sale in the spring anyway—to further cozy up the place. The pink priscilla guest room curtains she’d been thinking of replacing now cheered Angie’s room. And
the spur-of-the-moment purchase she’d made at the church’s Christmas bazaar—an antique quilt—didn’t really match her decor, so she hung it over one arm of Noah’s family room sofa.
If he noticed any of the things she’d done to warm the austere atmosphere of his house, he didn’t show it But he’d had a lot more than usual on his mind lately. And then, she’d been careful to keep her alterations and additions to a minimum, to make minor, insignificant changes. Because she certainly didn’t want him thinking she was trying to run his life. That was the way he’d interpreted her tirade in Bobby’s hospital room, and things hadn’t been the same between them since.
She hadn’t made her “let him be a boy” speech to hurt Noah. Rather, she’d made the statement totally on Bobby’s behalf. And she’d remind herself of that every time the wounded, surprised look materialized on Noah’s face.
Sadly, the expression seemed almost a permanent part of his demeanor these days, as if he blamed himself not only for Bobby’s accident, but also for the fact that both his children had for years been behaving more like cute little robots than kids. Dara had spent enough time with the family before the boy’s fall…had heard enough about the late great Mrs. Noah Lucas, to know it had been Francine, not Noah, who’d encouraged their virtually mechanical mannerisms.
But Francine had been dead for nearly four years. Why hadn’t Noah sat those kids down before now, explained to them it was perfectly acceptable—preferable, even—to act their ages?
If she’d asked the question in the privacy of her mind, surely Noah had asked it of himself, dozens of times. She had to assume he’d asked it recently. What else could explain his dour mood, his quieter-thanusual demeanor, his inability to meet her eyes for more than a fraction of a second at a time. He was hurting, a fact that annulled her “Be Tough with Noah” plan.
Maybe she was reading too much into the hurt looks she believed she saw on Noah’s face. Stop obsessing about it, she told herself. You may think he’s hurting, and he probably hasn’t given it a second thought.
Whether she was right or not really didn’t matter. If he was suffering, she couldn’t stand idly by and watch it. It was time for a confrontation. And tonight, the minute the kids were asleep, she’d go toe-to-toe with him if need be, until she could make him see it was never too late to change course, not when you had God on your side!
While she finished up the supper dishes, Noah tucked the kids in. Prior to the accident, the children were expected to be upstairs and ready for bed by eight-thirty; now, they didn’t get started until then. A week ago, they could expect Noah to read them one story after they’d said their prayers; lately, they got at least two fairy tales apiece, following an overly long bedtime prayer and several trips to the bathroom—tiny paper cups leaving a water-drip trail from sink to bed—before he left them. And the odd thing was, Noah, not the children, had been the procrastinator.
She kept an ear cocked so she’d know when he came downstairs. When she heard his big feet thudding down the stairs, she stood in the kitchen doorway, a roll of tin foil in her hands. “Finished?”
“Yeah. Finally.”
He could pretend he’d just survived yet another bedtime ordeal, but Dara knew better: Noah was afraid to let them out of his sight, even long enough to let them get a night’s sleep.
Standing in the middle of the foyer, he pocketed both hands. “Need any help in there?”
“No, thanks.” He’d been upstairs long enough for her to bake a pan of brownies, and she’d just stuck the foil-covered, nearly cooled treat into the microwave, when he descended the stairs. “I’m almost finished.”
Grabbing his jacket from the hall tree, Noah opened the front door. “I’ll be outside,” he said, “in case the kids want me or anything.”
It was becoming a habit, his walking in the cold, damp night alone. Right now, the temperature was thirty degrees and falling, and the weather bureau was predicting more snow. What had driven him out there this time?
Ever since she was a child, Dara had been enamored of wolves. When other little girls were dreaming of owning a pony, or becoming a ballerina, Dara had her nose stuck in a book, reading about Canus lupus. Even after all these years, Dara could almost quote her sources chapter and verse: one of the most intelligent beings in the animal kingdom, the big, beautiful beasts possessed well-honed instincts, sharp eyesight, keen hearing. But their most admirable trait, Dara believed, was devotion to family. Pack life was a carefully woven braid of togetherness that began with the collaborative nurturing of puppies, to group hunts that required the cooperation of all. Because they craved attention and affection, there were few things in nature sadder than a lone wolf. Whether alpha male disapproval or a forest fire separated him from the pack, the results were the same: overwhelming and heartbreaking yearning that could be measured by the sorrowful notes of his lonely howls.
Noah’s behavior of late reminded her of a lone wolf; he prowled the outskirts of the family, darting in now and then to test if acceptance was possible, bolting again when the threat of rejection seemed likely, even if only in his own mind. Did he blame himself for Bobby’s condition? For neglecting to notice when the boy had experienced the initial injury? For missing the signs that something was not quite right with the child? Self-recrimination could be a powerful emotion if it was allowed to get out of control.
And Noah’s was bordering on despair.
Dara heard the front door close quietly behind him. Lord Jesus, she prayed, closing her eyes, help me to help Noah. He’s wounded so badly that I think he’s grown numb from the pain. Give me the right words, words that will help him remember You’re there for him, words that will help him begin to heal.
After cutting a brownie for each of them, she strode determinedly into the foyer, shrugged into her coat and went outside. He stood at the far end of the porch, bent over the banister, forearms leaning on the rail. “Hot from the oven,” she said cheerily, walking toward him. “Your favorite.”
In the faint sliver of moonlight slanting through the clouds, she could see the hint of a smile playing at the corners of his mustached mouth.
“I thought I smelled brownies baking while I was with the kids,” he said, accepting one.
Dara plopped down on the top step, patted the space beside her. “Take a load off,” she said, biting into her brownie.
Noah hesitated for a moment, as if uncertain whether or not he deserved even that minuscule bit of comfort. Sitting beside her, he stared straight ahead.
“This has been a strange winter, hasn’t it?” She laughed. “And it isn’t even technically winter until December twenty-first.”
Staring across the snowy lawn, he munched the brownie. “Tasty,” he said.
“I memorized Grandma Mackenzie’s recipe. She called it ‘Lots of Brownies.’ Too bad, though.”
“Too bad?”
Dara nudged him with her shoulder. “They’ll just end up on my hips.”
Noah chuckled softly, his breath becoming tiny clouds that floated heavenward. “Like you have anything to worry about, skinny as you are.”
“Thin, Noah,” she scolded good-naturedly. “Ladies prefer trim or willowy or slender…anything but skinny.”
“I’ll make a note of it…Slim.”
Even now, in his gloomy mood, his compliment had the power to make her blush. “It’s awfully calm, considering what the weatherman said.”
He turned slightly, looking into her face. “What did he say?”
“That we could get another six inches tonight.”
“The calm before the storm,” he observed, facing forward again.
Dara finished up her brownie, wadded up the napkin and stuffed it into her pocket. Holding her hand out, palm up, she waited until he gave her his. Hands deep in her napkin-lined pockets, she hunched her shoulders against the biting cold. “Noah?”
“Hmm.”
“It isn’t your fault.”
Silence.
“Bobby’s accident, I m
ean.”
“I know what you mean.”
“Well, it isn’t.”
She saw, rather than heard, his sigh, watched as its vapor was quickly carried away by an icy breeze.
Lord, be with me now. She searched her mind for a scripture verse to fit the moment: “A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver.” She waited, hoping for a sign of some sort, some divine guidance that would help her know what to do, what to say, to comfort Noah.
No such assistance came.
Suddenly, she remembered what he’d said about life at St. Vincent’s, where people were always talking and a person was hard-pressed to get a moment’s privacy. “I’m sorry, Noah,” she said. “It wasn’t very thoughtful of me, coming out here, interrupting you. You get so little time to be alone with your thoughts, especially these days, what with your work and trying to find time to be with the kids.”
She made a move as if to get up, but his hand, clamped on her jacketed forearm, stopped her. “No, don’t go.” He met her eyes. “Unless…unless you’re going in because you’re cold.”
Actually, she’d been shivering since she’d set foot outside. And with the weatherman predicting more snow…You don’t want to get snowed in again, do you? she asked herself. But Dara smiled and shook her head. “I’m fine.”
They sat side by side in companionable silence for a long time.
And then several scripture references flitted through her mind: “A fool’s voice is known by a multitude of words”…“There is a time to keep silence, and a time to speak.” The Bible verses had made no sense whatsoever when she’d memorized them as a child. But she understood them perfectly now. So that’s Your answer, Lord.…
She didn’t know how much time had passed—five minutes? fifteen?—before Noah said, “I don’t suppose you’ve given any more thought to my question.”
“What question is that?”
“About us, about getting married.”
Heart thundering, Dara swallowed. Except for Bobby’s accident, she’d thought of little else. “Oh,” she said. “That question.” Because the boy’s headache hadn’t completely vanished yet, she’d more or less moved in to keep watch over him. Often, while driving home after a long day at the Lucases’, Dara had mentally rewritten those highway signs advertising available housing from “If you lived here, you’d be home now” to “If you and Noah were married…”