by Nancy Moser
A pause. “The plane crash.”
She held in a duh! “Surviving then, and surviving now, is like a wool blanket on a hot day. I’m suffocating and want to throw it off, but it’s too heavy. In fact, surviving the crash was the easy part. My instincts took over. My body did what needed to be done. But now…” She put one hand to her collar. “Now I have to think about breathing in and out. I have to make an effort to move, to sleep, to eat, to think, to feel.” She looked at him. “To be.”
“I’m so sorry.” Bailey actually sounded as though he meant it. “Do you really think about such things all the time?”
“There are times when I forget, when life grabs hold and takes me along for a ride.” Her hand stroked the steering wheel. “Remember what it was like to be on a trip with your parents and fall asleep in the backseat? You’d stop hearing their voices, the sound of tires against pavement, or even the schwoosh-schwoosh as other cars passed. Until the car slowed down. The change in momentum was like a clanging bell, waking you out of your sleep. That’s the way it is when life takes me for a ride. I’m fine until it slows. Then I remember and I have to make myself take a breath. And let it out. And take another one in.”
They turned onto his street and she recognized the moment for what it was: Bailey, coming home from the hospital to an empty house, his son gone who-knows-where; and her, pouring out her woes, adding to his stress.
“Don’t worry about Jered.” Merry patted his arm. “He’ll get through his crisis, just like we all do.”
Bailey took a deep breath. “The thing is, I love him. I never told him that. I want him to come home so I can tell him that.”
What could she say? She, more than anyone, knew about regrets.
Claire watched Sim emptying the book-return box. The girl looked up and smiled. “Claire!”
Sim ran to her and surprised Claire with a hug. Claire exchanged a look with Harold. The act of affection suddenly made everything harder. Why didn’t Sim show she cared before? Why now?
Sim pulled back. “Are you crying?”
Claire was surprised to find she was. “I always cry at reunions.” She wrapped an arm around the girl’s shoulders. “I missed you.”
“I missed you too.”
Really?
Sim drew Claire to the front desk like she was the owner of a prized possession. “Look, Merry. Look, Blanche.”
Blanche shook her head. “We saw, we saw. Well, I’ll be…”
Merry nodded a greeting. “Hi.”
“Hi.”
Sim’s eyebrows dipped. “That’s it? Claire is gone for days and that’s all you can say?”
Obviously Merry hadn’t mentioned sharing a cup of coffee at the Plentiful. She tapped a stack of papers against the desk. “Glad to see you, Claire.”
“Long time no see.”
Sim rolled her eyes. “You guys are ridiculous. There are questions to be asked, things to find out.” She turned to Claire. “Why did you leave? Where have you been?”
Claire hesitated.
“Maybe she doesn’t want to tell,” Merry said.
“Sure she does.” Blanche nodded. “Because if she doesn’t, I’ll sic Ivan on her—as soon as he gets back from the hardware store.”
Claire glanced at Harold. How much should she say? When he scurried off to his corner, she knew she had to keep his secret. “Let’s just say I’ve been around.”
“But why did you go?” Sim put her hands on her hips. “We didn’t get in any real trouble for staying in the library.”
That was such a small portion of the bigger situation. “It went way beyond having our hiding place discovered.” Claire looked at the others. Having a public forum for her faults was not pleasant, but it was necessary. “The truth is, I left because I was a coward. I didn’t like what people said about me when my story came out.” I didn’t like that they didn’t recognize my name. She took a deep breath. “I wanted them to ooh and aah over the great sacrifice of giving away my fortune. My motives were pitiful. I ran away because of my pride.”
“To my house.” They all turned around to see Harold standing nearby. He stood tall.
Sim looked at Merry. Merry looked at Blanche. Merry spoke first. “What did you say, Harold?”
“I said, to my house.” He grinned and looked ten years younger.
Blanche waved a finger at his mouth. “What happened to Shakespeare?”
Harold shrugged. ‘“Part, fools! Put up your swords! You know not what you do!’ How’s that?”
Claire giggled and drew him into the group.
Merry shook her head. “What’s going on?”
He glanced up, then down, a part of the old Harold coming through. “Quoting Shakespeare was my way of running away.” He looked wistfully at Claire. “It happens to the best of us.”
Blanche took his hand and patted it. “Glad to have you back with the rest of us, Harold. Deciphering your Shakespeare was exhausting. I’ll be glad to revert to ‘Hi, how are you?’ instead of ‘What light through yonder window breaks, you cowardly knave.’“
“That’s pretty good, Blanche.”
She curtsied.
Claire moved to the counter and traced its edge between her thumb and finger. Should she tell them she was leaving now?
She didn’t have a chance. Sim bounced twice on the balls of her feet and grinned. “I’ll be right back.” She headed to the storeroom.
“Where are you going?” Claire called after her.
“You’ll see.”
Blanche crossed her arms. “So. You’re not the loony pervert we thought you were, huh?”
“Blanche!”
The older woman pulled a face at Merry’s reprimand. “I didn’t say anything she hasn’t already heard.”
Claire slipped her arm around Blanche’s shoulders. “Have you ever been friends with a loony pervert?”
Blanche looked toward the ceiling. “A few.”
They laughed. All seemed right with the world.
Merry only partly heard the chitchat between Claire, Blanche, and Harold. Harold speaking sans Shakespeare was surprisingly easy to accept. It was Claire’s presence that unleashed the butterflies in her stomach. Just yesterday, Claire had told Merry she didn’t want to insert herself into Sim’s life until she knew what to do next. Did her presence here mean she’d made a decision? What was it? Unfortunately, with Blanche babbling on, there was no way for Merry to take Claire aside to find out.
All conversation stopped when Sim popped back through the storeroom door with a bang. “I’m ready.”
She was carrying an armload of Claire’s stuff from the attic. She dropped the things on the counter. A shoe slipped to the floor. “Can someone else get the cooler? My hands were full.”
Merry was glad when Claire spoke first. “Sim, what are you doing?”
“Getting your stuff. The rest of it is already at Merry’s. I was thinking…you can have the couch in the bedroom and I’ll sleep on the love seat.”
Merry felt a twinge of jealousy and didn’t like it one bit. It was repulsive. She looked to Claire, who had a pained look on her face.
Sim kept glancing between them. “Hey, that’s the only solution. I don’t want you staying at Harold’s anymore. No offense, Harold, but…”
Claire spoke up. “Harold’s house is lovely—on the inside.”
“And the outside too—” Harold smiled—“since Claire’s been working on it.”
Merry found that hard to believe. She’d seen it. The outside, anyway. It was a disgrace. And it wasn’t that she minded Claire staying with them; it was Sim’s exuberance at the idea that bothered her.
Sim refolded Claire’s black pants. “Do you have a sack or something, Merry?”
Before Merry could answer, Claire stilled Sim’s hands. The girl looked up. “What?”
“I’m going home, Sim.”
A crease formed between the girl’s eyes.
“Home, Sim. My home. Kansas City.”
Mer
ry froze, then suddenly shook her head. She knew she should say something, but what?
“Had enough of us, eh?”
Claire ignored Blanche and took Sim’s hand. “This isn’t where I’m supposed to be. It’s where I was supposed to come, but it isn’t where I’m supposed to stay.”
Sim jerked her hand away. “But you said—”
“I know. And everything I said I believed 100 percent. But a lot’s happened.”
“Nobody’s making fun of you anymore. No one’s said a thing about you or the library ghost for days.”
“It’s not that. Truly, it’s not.”
“Then what?”
Claire glanced at Blanche, and Merry knew she wanted some privacy. But Merry wanted to hear what she had to say too. Luckily, Harold came to the rescue. He sidled up to Blanche and took her arm. “Come show me how to work a computer, Blanche. I hear you’re a real expert.”
Blanche looked over her shoulder as she was led away. “But…”
There was an awkward moment of silence. Merry broke it. “Is it all right if I hear this too?”
“Certainly.” Claire smiled at her. “You deserve that. And so much more.”
Sim shoved Claire’s possessions aside, making half of them fall to the floor. “You can’t go! There’s nothing for you back home. You gave it all up to come—”
Claire took a deep breath. “I’ve been offered a huge mosaic commission from a large church. I accepted.”
Sim shook her head and said what Merry was thinking. “You’re selling out.”
“I’m buying in. Buying in to what I think is God’s plan for my life.”
“But He sent you here! That was His plan. You said so.”
“Yes.” She took their hands. “Because of coming here, I met both of you. And I’ve realized that giving up my talent—temporarily—was God’s plan. He had to do a bit of work on me through my obedience, but now that He has…He’s giving it back. I have a responsibility to use the gift He gave me. Use my art.”
With an intake of breath, Sim ran out of the library.
Claire took a step toward the door. The thought of Claire going after Sim made Merry’s stomach roil. Hadn’t the woman teased their affections enough? She grabbed Claire’s arm. “Let her go. She needs time for it to sink in.”
“I feel awful.”
“You should.” Claire opened her mouth to speak, then closed it. Merry was glad. The woman had said enough. “When did you decide all this about accepting a commission and going home? Yesterday, you were all gung ho about saying yes to God. You even got me thinking about it.”
“Leaving is a part of saying yes to Him. I think it’s the right thing to do.”
Merry flipped a hand. “Whatever, Claire. Come, go…it’s hard to keep up with you.” Claire’s face fell. And even as Merry said the words, she questioned what she was doing. She was acting as if she wanted Claire to stay. But did she? Hadn’t she liked this time alone with Sim?
“Don’t be that way, Merry. This is hard enough.”
The painful sincerity in Claire’s voice made Merry’s questions dissipate. Wasn’t Claire the one in tune with God? If she felt God was leading her to leave, what could Merry offer to counter it?
Claire looked to the door Sim had used only moments before. “I’m worried about her.”
“You should be. Her time’s running out.”
Claire did a double take. “What do you mean?”
“Officer Kendell held off as long as he could, but he’s had to contact the authorities in Kansas City to see if he can find her aunt and uncle.”
“Has he found them?”
“I haven’t heard anything. But it’s inevitable he will. The hard aspect about missing-children cases is not finding the relatives, but finding the child. We have the child.”
“Does she know what he’s doing?”
“No. I was afraid if she did, she’d run.”
“She would. She just did.”
A solution raised its hand, and Merry found herself verbalizing it at the same moment it entered her mind. “Everything else aside, maybe you should hang around a little while longer to see Sim through the hard time ahead.” She shook her head. “Truthfully, I could use the help.”
With a breath out, then in, Claire nodded. “Yes. Absolutely.”
They both looked toward the door. One of them had to go talk to Sim. Would it be Surrogate Mother 1 or Surrogate Mother 2?
Claire headed for the door. “I’d better find her.”
Merry was left to clean off the counter. There was no joy in being number two.
Sim looked up from her position on the bench in the town square to see Claire come out of the library. Her legs twitched, wanting to run again, but her torso seemed to lodge itself heavier on the bench. She was tired of running away. She was tired of people leaving her.
She was tired. Period.
Claire approached as if Sim were a squirrel that would bolt at any quick movement. Finally, she stood in front of her.
“I wish I had a chocolate donut to offer you as a peace offering.”
Sim wouldn’t let herself smile. “It’s not that easy. I’m not that easy.”
Claire nodded and scuffed a toe on the edge of the grass. “May I sit down?”
“Must you?”
Her toe stopped its movement and planted itself. She did not sit. “I know you don’t understand.”
“My, you’re smart.” What am I saying? Why am I being so rude?
“There’s nothing further for me to do here.”
“I agree.” God, make her stay!
Claire blinked. “You agree?”
Sim drew her knees to her chest, balancing her heels on the edge of the bench. Unable to get comfortable, she dropped her feet to the ground and pretended to chip away at a fingernail.
“I’m sorry I pulled you into all this, Sim.”
Sim abandoned her nails, hating the tears that threatened. “Hey, you didn’t pull me into anything. I came here on my own, I dealt with things here on my own, and I will leave here on my own.” I’m so alone!
“You’re leaving?”
Sim risked a glance. I don’t want to. I really don’t want to. “What’s it to you?”
Claire looked toward the library. “Actually, I told Merry I’d stay a few more days.”
Sim eyed her. That made no sense, but she was glad anyway.
Claire held out a hand. “Let’s go back to the library. Merry needs you.
Sim ignored Claire’s hand, stood, and brushed past her. “At least somebody does.”
Three females staying in the same house after a tension-filled day. Not exactly a formula for a pleasant evening.
Gone was the usual banter. In its place was a dinner of chopped salad combined with chopped sentences. Pass this, pass that. Thank you very much.
Going to bed was a relief.
Yet kindness was present. Merry was proud of Sim when she gave up the couch in the guest room for Claire and slept sprawled on the love seat in the living room. That simple act said a lot about the girl’s character. She deserved a better hand than the one life had dealt her.
Didn’t they all?
Merry flipped sides for the tenth time. She couldn’t sleep. Memories of Lou played on the screen of her mind, like a family newsreel.
But it wasn’t enough. She found herself needing actual pictures. She tiptoed downstairs to find the photo albums in the living room, careful not to wake Sim. She took the photos into the kitchen and spread them on the table. She ran a hand over the top of the newest album, thinking of all the times she’d seen Lou working on them. Taking snapshots had been his thing. He would pester her mercilessly to “Hold that pose. I need a picture of this.” Hence, the albums were full of pictures of Merry hammering, Merry and Justin cooking, Merry dancing with Justin to the old Neil Diamond song “Porcupine Pie.”
Lou took such pride in arranging the photos in an artistic manner, adding funny captions and even poems or c
lippings to the pages to create a unique presentation of their life together. But since he took most of the pictures, there were few with him in them, which was one reason Merry had not opened the albums since his death. But even a few pictures were better than nothing.
She opened the newest album for the first time ever. It contained photos of Christmas. No one could have known that just one month later…
She paused at the picture she’d taken of Lou holding Justin in his lap, his strong arms wrapped around the boy like a seat belt.
The plane had had seat belts. Little good they had done.
Merry’s eyes were drawn to a poem Lou had added to the page:
The Creator descends on family moments
with a warm hug and a soft word.
Man shakes his head in awe, “Surely, this is perfection.”
The Lord, our Christ, descends on mankind
with a warm hug and a soft word.
God nods his head,
“Surely, He is perfection. My perfect Son.”
It was signed by Lou.
She stroked the words with her fingers as if they had physical as well as spiritual depth. Lou had had such a strong faith; he had been an unmovable rock compared to her pebble that could be kicked aside on a whim. How many times had he tried to get her to truly commit to Jesus? And how many times had she only pretended to believe, to shut him up so she could think about “more important things”?
Merry let the tears come. She wanted to believe. It was lonely keeping God on the outskirts of her life and rude living a faith of convenience, only going to Him when she needed something. God was so giving and forgiving…
What would happen if she gave a little?
She closed the album, her thoughts skimming over the events of the past few days. The destruction of her shrine and the subsequent surrender of that icon. Her discussion with Claire about saying yes. And Claire’s strong, sure decision to go back. Did that strong, sure decision come directly from her saying yes to God?
She wanted to feel strong about something. She wanted to be sure.
Then say yes.
As she thought, Why not? she realized her motives were far from pure. At the moment, saying yes to Jesus was a means to gain something precious: peace. Once more she was using God to get what she wanted. And yet she had the feeling Jesus would forgive her flawed motivation. He—all man and yet all God—would understand and be so pleased at finally having Merry Cavanaugh’s full attention and dedication that He would overlook its imperfection and zone in on the least bit of purity it possessed.