by Patti Berg
Yet, Anabelle thought, full of pride for this woman who, she hoped, would become her daughter-in-law.
“So what do you expect me to do?” Evan continued. “Where do I even start?”
“You can start by finding all the good pumpkins. You can put them in wheelbarrows and move them to the front of the nursery and try to sell them. This is the first day of our pumpkin patch, or have you forgotten that?”
“Of course I haven’t forgotten, but they’re a mess. All of them—at least the ones that aren’t smashed—are covered with soot.”
“We’ve got at least twenty people here to help us. We can wash them and get the pumpkin patch we promised the people of Deerford ready to go. It might not be exactly the way we’d planned it, but I think people will understand. I think they’ll also cheer you on, and if I’m not mistaken, it’s gumption like that that will bring you more customers. They’ll know that Evan Scott isn’t a quitter.”
Evan took a deep breath while Anabelle and everyone else watched the drama unfold.
“So I guess you want me to dish out orders?”
Maureen’s eyes blazed. “If you don’t, I will.”
Evan turned around, surveying the mess. The mud. The soot. The burned straw bales. The roof to his garden center that was pretty much history. And then he looked at the arched entry. Flat. Broken. Completely crushed.
He let out a heavy sigh.
“Okay, guys, let’s get the archway back up so people know that Scott Landscaping is still in business,” he ordered. “Pop. Doug. Would you go to the lumberyard and pick up some wood? I can sketch something out real quick, give you dimensions, and I’ve got an account there, just tell them I need…”
Anabelle watched Maureen smile; and when Evan finished laying out plans for the archway, Maureen took his face in her hands and kissed him, right in front of God and everyone. It was a great way to get the work under way.
Long, dirty, almost backbreaking hours passed. By the time the last remnants of sunlight fell upon the nursery, they’d covered the roof of the garden center with heavy plastic and a new metal roof had been ordered. What was left of the straw bales was hauled off, shrubs and trees and potted plants that had toppled over were put back in place. The pumpkin patch Buy One Get One Free Fire Sale that was held out at the street had been a huge success.
Anabelle’s fingers were wrinkled from washing pumpkins and anything they could salvage from inside the garden center. Birdbaths, stepping-stones, sundials. Some things were keepers. Some were maybes. Far too many had to be tossed. Yet…getting the nursery back into some semblance of order had become a labor of love for everyone working there today.
Later, when it was far too dark to work, friends and family converged on Anabelle’s home for dinner. Elena, Sarah, and Fern had been cooking most of the day. When the buffet was laid out, the scent of good food replacing the stench of smoke, they gathered in a circle around the dining room table. Anabelle turned to James and asked him to lead the prayer.
Hands folded; heads bowed.
“Dear Lord, we ask that You walk beside Evan and Maureen and each of their family members, so that they may feel Your comforting arms around them. Stay with them as they begin the work of picking up the pieces, and grant them strength for the tasks ahead. We ask for Your support and counsel, in the name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.”
“Thank you,” Evan said to all those who were gathered around him. “And thank you, in particular,” he said, slipping an arm around Maureen’s waist and pulling her close, “for standing at my side through all of this, for working with me, guiding me, and comforting me.” He kissed her softly. “I didn’t think it was possible to love you any more than I did a little over twenty-four hours ago, but I was wrong. I do. More than you’ll ever know.”
It was quiet in the room as everyone listened to Evan; but the moment he dug into the food, the noise began. It had certainly been an amazing ending to a miraculous day.
Chapter Seventeen
ALL DAY SUNDAY, EVEN ON MONDAY AND Tuesday, Elena could smell smoke. It seemed to have worked its way into every pore in her body, but they’d accomplished so much over the weekend.
What a team.
Now, if only the radiologist’s office would get its act together and send a report about her CT scan to Dr. Lydell so he could tell her what was going on.
But she wasn’t going to think about it. She had too much to do in the ICU.
A teenager had run his dad’s car off the road while racing a friend, seeing who could take the winding road the fastest.
Playing chicken hadn’t been a wise idea for either young man. One boy had escaped it with only a few scratches; Ethan Gilbert, however, had been hanging by a thread, but in spite of his injuries and thanks to fabulous and caring doctors, he was doing better.
The poor kid was covered from head to toe in bruises and cuts. When Elena looked at him she could almost feel his pain. Six ribs had fractured during the rollover; and they, in turn, had punctured his lungs. He was breathing with the aid of a tube inserted down his throat. Fortunately he was a pretty tough kid, and he’d easily survive the two broken legs and the concussion. If it wasn’t for his inability to breathe on his own, James would be taking care of him now in the General Medicine and Surgery Unit.
Danielle Tyson, one of the respiratory therapists, came into the room to check Ethan’s breathing tube and to swab out his mouth. Elena asked if she’d help her change the linens on Ethan’s bed, taking advantage of any help she could get, since the ICU was operating at a hectic pace. With him heavily sedated—on pain meds and a drug that kept him asleep so he wouldn’t have to suffer from the tube inserted down his throat—it took two people to roll him onto his side, pull out the old sheets, and put on the new. While he was on his side, Elena was also able to listen to his lungs and check the bandages covering several other contusions.
The boy was a mess, and he would be for quite some time. The important thing now was to keep him stable, to concentrate on his lungs, and get him up and out of this place. Elena might love Hope Haven, but it wasn’t all that great a place for a teenaged kid to hang out when there were so many more exciting things he could do.
Pressing a cool palm to Ethan’s cheek, she found herself smiling at the fourteen-year-old. He shouldn’t have been driving his dad’s car, let alone racing.
Elena was checking the IV on the back of Ethan’s hand when her cell phone vibrated. She jumped, not realizing how on edge she’d been. She pulled the phone from her scrubs pocket and recognized the number. It was Dr. Lydell’s office.
“I’ll stay in here with Ethan if you need to take that call,” Danielle said. Elena thanked her and dashed out of his room.
Please let this be good news, she prayed, as she answered the phone; but it wasn’t the doctor or even his nurse. It was the receptionist. “Dr. Lydell would like to see you as soon as possible.”
Elena dropped down in a chair in the nurses’ station. “I can come in any time.”
“Could you be here at three thirty today? I know that’s short notice, but—”
“I’ll be there.”
She didn’t want to see Dr. Lydell. But she forced herself to accept the fact that it had to be good news that she was seeing him and not a urologist or oncologist.
She punched in Cesar’s cell phone number to tell him about the appointment. He’d want to be with her. As she waited for him to answer, she reminded herself that God would be with her too.
She simply needed to hang on to her faith.
“All of your blood work looked good, Elena.” Dr. Lydell sat on a stool across from Cesar and Elena in the examining room and looked up from the paper he’d been studying. “Would you like a copy of this?”
Not really, she thought but said, “Yes, please.”
“The blood tests ruled out an awful lot of what could have caused the pain and bloating you’re experiencing, and you’re not lactose intolerant. You’re not anemic. You’re
not—”
“What about the CT scan?” Elena wanted to get down to business. If the blood work all looked good, she didn’t need for him to continue ruling out what her blood had been tested for. She needed to know what they’d seen in and around her abdomen, if anything. “Did it look good?”
“No,” he said all too quickly. “The radiologist gave me a complete report, and I’ve looked at the scan too. There’s a suspicious spot near your ovary. Fortunately, it’s small and whatever it is—a tumor, possibly—it doesn’t appear to be attached to anything other than the ovary.”
“So if it’s cancer, it hasn’t metastasized?” As Elena asked the question, she kept on the bravest face she possibly could; but Cesar squeezed her hand. He didn’t want to hear the word cancer. Didn’t even want to think about it. But if she did have cancer, she needed to know.
“I’m not an oncologist,” Dr. Lydell stated, “but I’d say that’s a good conclusion. That said, I would like you to see an oncologist.”
She’d fight the disease, but she wasn’t going to fight seeing another doctor. “Do you have someone you recommend?”
Dr. Lydell offered a few suggestions, and Elena picked one she’d worked with in the ICU. She needed to be treated by familiar faces, people she knew shared her faith in the Lord. She wanted a doctor who’d pray with her if she asked.
“It may be a few weeks before they can fit you in. I know that seems like a long time, but the oncologist may want to run additional tests before he sees you. He’ll want to review your CT scan, and he might even order another. But I’m fairly certain we’ll know what’s going on long before Christmas.”
Good. Elena didn’t want something like cancer putting a damper on her favorite holiday.
“Are you okay, Elena?” Dr. Lydell asked, standing now and putting a comforting hand on her shoulder. “Is there anything else I can do for you now?”
“Pray for me, Dr. Lydell. And…come out in support of the Walk for a Cure that we’re holding in less than three weeks.”
Dr. Lydell laughed. “Do you ever stop volunteering, Elena?”
“Never. It’s one of the many things—like my faith—that keep me going.”
Elena stood outside in the darkness, looking up at the heavens. It was clear out tonight, not a cloud in the sky, and an untold number of stars twinkled above her. A chilly breeze and the scent of ripe pumpkins from the garden she, Izzy, and Cesar had planted wafted about her.
It was so beautiful out. God’s presence was everywhere.
“Heavenly Father, although I pray that it isn’t true, I may have developed cancer, a disease that I have feared, a disease that has taken the life of far too many, including Cesar’s beloved mother. I don’t want to be afraid, but I am. Questions haunt me day in and day out. What will the oncologist say? Will I be cured? Will there be more pain than I am experiencing now, and how will I get through it?
“Dear Lord, I know I should be happy with what You have given me already—a husband, son, and grandchild whom I adore. Friends galore. A job I love. If I do have cancer and there is no cure, how long will I live? How will my family cope?
“I ask with all my heart, Father, that if I am diagnosed with cancer, that I be cured.” Elena sighed. “But, Dear Lord, if my healing is not in Your great plan, I ask You to be with me every step of the way, that You give me peace and let me live with hope. Amen.”
She wiped away a tear that had slid halfway down her cheek and took a deep breath, trying to calm her nerves as she walked back into the house and into the family room. She rarely had time to watch TV, but she wanted to be near Cesar, and she found him there, unwinding, sitting on the couch with a newspaper spread out on the coffee table in front of him. A classic car restoration show blared on the television. He didn’t seem to be paying any attention to the show, but his hand was on the remote, as if he might change the channel at any moment.
Elena sat beside her husband, and he slipped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her closer to his side.
“Is there something you want to watch?” he asked. “Not that there’s much of anything on.”
“No, I thought it might be nice to just sit here with you awhile, doing nothing.”
“It’s a pretty rare sight for both of us to sit in front of the TV doing nothing, isn’t it?”
“It had better stay rare too.” Elena laughed lightly. “I could easily get sucked into watching food and home decorating shows, not to mention anything having to do with travel; but then I’d never get any work done.”
“Maybe we should give up all our extracurricular activities and sit side by side on the couch more often.” Cesar flipped through channels until he landed on a show about Alaska grizzlies. “Maybe we should think about taking an Alaskan cruise or give serious thought to your trip to Andalusia.”
Elena frowned as she took the controller away from her husband. She hit the mute button to turn down the racket. “You’re sounding terribly fatalistic tonight. My having cancer isn’t a foregone conclusion, you know.”
Cesar’s fingers tightened around her arm, as if he wanted to pull her even closer and never let her go. “I’m just worried, that’s all.”
“You’re not making it any easier for me to look on the bright side, when that’s what I need to do. I don’t have the time to be glum or fall into depression. You don’t have the time for that, either.”
He blew out a heavy sigh. “Care to offer a suggestion or two on how I’m supposed to keep that from happening?”
“We could go out for a run.”
Cesar’s left eyebrow quirked. He grinned. “It’s dark out. And cold. On top of that, Izzy’s sound asleep, Rafael and Sarah are at the movies, and we can’t leave until Rafael gets back.”
“All right, since that idea isn’t all that great, you could always try prayer.”
Elena expected Cesar to frown, but he didn’t. Instead, he seemed to ponder her words, that one simple act that had helped her through so many troubling times. He nodded slowly. “Okay, I’ll give it some thought.”
He hadn’t said no, hadn’t said “prayer doesn’t work,” as he’d told her so many times before. It was a big step for a man who’d lost his faith.
Chapter Eighteen
HOW’S EVAN DOING?” CANDACE ASKED ANABELLE, as she, James, and Elena slid their cafeteria trays onto the table where Anabelle was sitting. “Not a night has gone by this week when Brooke and Howie haven’t asked about him and Maureen.”
“All things considered, they’re doing pretty well,” Anabelle said, swirling a spoon through the big bowl of clam chowder sitting in front of her. “The insurance adjuster was out on Tuesday, and they’ve gotten two estimates so far on repairing the garden center building.”
“It won’t have to be torn down, will it?” James asked.
Anabelle shook her head. “The structure’s still good, thank heaven. It was mostly the roof that was damaged and the water from the fire hoses wiped out their computer system.”
“And all the work they’d done on their Web site?” Candace asked, knowing that Evan and Maureen had come up with a fancy design, that they’d taken photos of their products. She wondered how they were ever going to get back on their feet.
Anabelle patted Candace’s hand, as if she’d seen her concern. “Fortunately they had everything backed up to an outside source, so it’s only the computer and software that are gone. You know me, I don’t know the first thing about electronic gadgets, but Maureen tells me they’ve already ordered a new computer that has even more bells and whistles than the one that was damaged, and it even costs less than the old one.”
“That’s pretty typical for computers,” James added. “They get smaller, more powerful, and cheaper all the time. I just hope they never try to take over my job.”
“That’s coming,” Anabelle said in a huff. “Mark my words. Twenty years from now there will be robots taking care of patients.”
“Robots don’t have heart,” Elena stated. “And
they could never be as gentle or understanding.”
“And bodily fluids could clog their cogs.” James laughed. “No, they’ll never drive us out of a job.”
Anabelle looked from one friend to another. “Thanks so much for helping me get through this past week. It’s been terrible—but I feel like things are finally close to normal again. I even spent part of yesterday talking to people about Paint the Town Purple. I was afraid I might have to turn everything over to Candace and Fern, but I managed to call five businesses in town and they’re going to take part.”
“Nelson’s Boy Scout troop has put out donation boxes and flyers about the walk at most every store downtown.” James took a sip of his soda. “And did any of you see the piece about cancer survivors on TV last night? Fern dragged me away from a video game I was playing with the boys to see it. Marny Jefferson did a great job.”
“I saw it,” Elena said, and Candace couldn’t help but notice the way her friend had only nibbled a corner off her sandwich. If Elena didn’t tell her—or all of her friends—what was wrong within the next week, she was going to be rude and simply ask.
“Two of the women Marny interviewed will be at the survivors’ ceremony the first night of the walk,” Elena continued. “All in all, I think we have about fifty-seven survivors right here in Deerford who plan to attend.”
“That’s wonderful, Elena,” Candace said, then laughed. “I’m not the best runner in the world, but I do like to walk, and Heath and I are going to do the walk as a team. We’ve already signed up fourteen sponsors, and the more laps we do, the more money we’ll make.”
They talked and laughed, and all too soon it was time to go back to work. As they stood and shoved their chairs back under the cafeteria table, Candace asked Anabelle, “Do Evan and Maureen need more help this weekend? Saturday, in particular?”
Anabelle shook her head. “They haven’t said anything, but I really don’t think so. Cam’s been at the nursery from sunrise until sunset every day since the fire. Except for the plastic-covered roof and a lot of soot, which, in the end, will be good for some of the plants, I think everything’s under control.”