“Faith is tricky business. I think I’ve only got it partly figured out.”
“Well, Mr. Halfway, you’d better get it all figured out, or one day you’ll check out of this life, and then where will you be?”
“You trying to scare me into heaven, Miss Patsy Pringle?”
“I’m telling you the truth, that’s all. What we do on this earth doesn’t mean squat unless we do it for God. And our goal ought to be that when we die, He’ll look us square in the eye and say, ‘Well done, thou good and faithful servant.’ ”
Pete studied her long enough that Patsy began to feel uncomfortable. “You really are something, aren’t you?” he said finally. “You’re a Christian, you own your own business, you’ve got about a bazillion friends and customers. You must be really happy.”
“I’d be happier if a certain someone would quit revving up chain saws next door.” She looked away, instantly regretting the way she had snapped that out.
“Listen, please don’t get the idea that I’m perfect, Pete,” she said in a softer voice. “I’ve had my problems through the years. I’ve made my share of mistakes. But am I happy? You bet. I’ve got a joy, anyway—‘joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart,’ as the song says. There’ll be days when I’m blue or angry or frustrated. Days when it seems like nothing’s going right. Sometimes I feel lonely, or I might wish my life had taken a different turn or two. But when you’ve got the Holy Spirit living in your heart, Pete, you know for sure that God is walking with you. He’s beside you and in you and all around you. And that’s what I call joy.”
“I never met anybody like you,” Pete said, shaking his head. “I mean that. You just buffalo me, Patsy.”
“Because I change my hair all the time?”
“That’s part of it. Mostly it’s just…well, just because.”
“Don’t you dare put me on some kind of pedestal, or you’ll get to see me fall flat on my face.”
“All right, I won’t put you on a pedestal—if you won’t leave me in the long drop under the outhouse.”
“What a thing to say! Especially while we’re eating Easter dinner. Good grief, Pete Roberts, are you just full of bad manners?”
His mouth tipped up into a slow grin. “Aw, only about halfway.”
Brenda was pulling weeds from the flower bed in front of her porch early Tuesday afternoon when Ashley Hanes drove down Sunnyslope Lane in her golf cart. Coming to a stop, she put the vehicle in reverse and backed into the Hansens’ driveway. Brenda got to her feet and brushed her hands on her jeans to dust off the heavy Missouri clay.
“Hey, Mrs. Hansen,” Ashley called as she stepped out of the cart and started across the lawn. “Is Jessica home? I haven’t seen her since church on Sunday. I’d like to catch up on things. So much has been going on in my life, and I’m sure she has stuff to tell about college too.”
The girls were the same age and had been friends since elementary school. But while Jessica had chosen to go off to college, Ashley had elected to marry Brad Hanes. That made the two young women about as different as night and day—not that they had ever been very much alike.
Jessica wore a cool blonde loveliness that both attracted young men and frightened them off. Like her older sister, she had a fierce moral code and a strong faith. Brenda wondered if this Josh fellow knew exactly how stubborn, determined, and single-minded his girlfriend could be.
Ashley, on the other hand, was attractive in a funky, bohemian, almost garish way. She wore her auburn hair long and rumpled, her necklines cut way too low, her gathered gauze skirts slung down on her hips, and beads of every color imaginable layered around her neck. She and Brad had made no secret of the fact that they were living together even before they got married. The arrangement didn’t seem to bother Ashley’s parents, either, when Brenda visited with them at the ice-cream-and-sandwich shop they owned in Camdenton. The little place was always on the verge of closing its doors, and Brenda had heard that Ashley gave her parents part of her paycheck every week.
From Jessica’s point of view, Ashley was smart and talented—but she didn’t try very hard in school, and she had barely managed to graduate. Her whole focus had been Brad and her job at the country club. Those left little time for friends or extracurricular activities, let alone schoolwork.
Brenda tried to stifle a sigh at the memory of her daughter’s hasty departure from Deepwater Cove. “Jessica left on Sunday after church,” she told Ashley. “She has a new boyfriend whose family wanted to meet her. She’s spending the rest of her break down near Branson at Table Rock Lake.”
“No way.” Ashley’s face fell. “That’s a rip-off to you and Steve. Is she coming back before school starts up again?”
Brenda couldn’t help but notice that Ashley had referred to Steve by his first name. Somehow that rankled.
“I doubt it,” Brenda said. “She plans to stay with Josh and his family the whole week. We were disappointed, of course, but we understand. Evidently this young man is very special to her.”
“More special than Darrell Dugan? That’s hard to believe. He was the catch of Camdenton High. Not that I noticed him much. Brad’s three years older than me, you know. Every day when he was done with his construction job and I got out of school, I spent most of my time with him and his buddies instead of hanging out with the high school crowd.”
Brenda smiled, sat down on the porch step, and patted a place for Ashley. The young woman settled down beside her. Wearing a pair of green shorts, she stretched out long legs as bare as her midriff and shoulders. Tiny straps held up her skimpy pink top. The usual stack of multihued beads covered Ashley’s collarbone and neck.
“Nice day to be outside,” she remarked to Brenda. “I don’t have to go into work until four. I was really hoping to talk to Jessica.”
“I know she would have enjoyed visiting with you.”
“I wanted to tell her how good Brad and I are doing. Did you see my engagement ring?”
Only about fifty times, Brenda wanted to say. But she admired the sparkly diamond all over again as Ashley turned it one way and another.
“Did you know Brad has a new truck?” Ashley asked. “He bought it a few weeks ago. It’s red.”
“I’ll bet that’s helpful for carrying firewood and moving furniture,” Brenda remarked. “I always kind of wanted a truck myself.”
Ashley laughed. “I can’t see you driving a truck, Mrs. Hansen. That would be too weird.”
“You can call me Brenda. After all, we’re both married women now, aren’t we?”
Even as she said the words, Brenda could think of Ashley only as a gap-toothed first grader with long red pigtails and dirty jeans. She realized she probably remembered her own children that way most of the time too. Scraped knees, braids, braces, sunburns. So hard to imagine them all grown up and on their own.
“Yeah, I guess you could say I’m an adult,” Ashley said. “I can’t get into bars yet, though. Not that it matters, of course. It’s just that Brad likes to toss back a few beers with the construction crew after work. They go over to Larry’s Lake Lounge, you know—in Tranquility? But I’m not old enough to get in. There’s other girls in the bar, and that really bugs me. I can’t wait until I’m twenty-one, but it seems like forever. It’s hard to sit around by yourself all day, don’t you think?”
“I do. It gets lonely.”
“Guys are lucky. After work they get to go hang out somewhere cool—like Brad at the Lounge, and Steve at the country club. I know Brad looks at the girls in the bar, and Steve’s always eating dinner with his rich, beautiful, la-di-da clients. I always admired you whenever I came over to hang out with Jessica. I mean, you can cook, you keep your house so pretty, you sew and paint, and you fix your flower beds all nice. You have this great husband and three awesome kids. If I were you, I’d be so happy. Sometimes it seems like Brad and I hardly see each other. That really ticks me off. I mean, I thought when we got married, it would be even more awesome than before. Like we would be
together all the time, you know? But Brad is so busy building houses, and then I’m gone at night. I hate it. I’d quit the country club, but I make really good money, and Brad wants me to keep my job.”
Brenda’s brain had snagged on one thing in Ashley’s long rant: “Steve’s always eating dinner with his rich, beautiful, la-di-da clients.”
Of course, these were business appointments, as Steve had told Brenda. But they included women. Could some of these clients be unattached women? Dining alone with her husband?
Brenda had always envisioned Steve seated at the country club with a married couple. A man and wife. Perhaps even a couple of kids. Steve would regale them with the advantages of buying property at the lake. He would modestly note how successful his agency had become and how happy his clients were. They would eat dinner together, shake hands, and part congenially with a plan for a future meeting. Then Steve would come home to Brenda.
It never occurred to her that he might be with a single woman. That they might sit long hours in the dim light of the country-club dining room. Perhaps dance together. Laugh and tell stories and feel attracted to each other.
Guilt seeped into Brenda’s worries as she suddenly realized that the emotion she was ascribing to Steve could fit her feelings for Nick LeClair. She had spent hours alone with him. They had shared memories and emotions. And, yes, Brenda felt attracted to him. More than she should. She had prayed for that feeling to go away, but lately it seemed God had taken a vacation from the heart of Brenda Hansen.
Probably He had vanished because she had stopped going to church and never read her Bible anymore. Despite years of faithful obedience and dedication to her faith, she could no longer bring herself to spend her time that way. God seemed far away and silent these days. Her prayers had changed too. Once she had been filled to the brim with gratitude and joy. After Steve slowly started abandoning her and then the kids left, she offered up heart-wrenching pleas for God’s help and comfort. Despite all her agony and tears, nothing in her life had changed for the better. Now, when she thought about praying at all, her efforts at communication were simply grumpy, matter-of-fact requests for God’s protection over her children. Brenda wasn’t sure she even believed in prayer anymore.
About the time Nick began work on the basement, Brenda realized she had come to resent spending her Sundays listening to stories and sermons she’d heard since she was a child. So she just stayed home, even though it made Steve mad. He said if they didn’t go to church together, it affected their standing in the community. She told him if it was that important, he could go stand in the community by himself.
“Brad doesn’t like the fact that I give part of my paycheck to my parents,” Ashley was saying when Brenda focused in again on the talkative young woman. “He thinks they should make their own way, and we shouldn’t have to support them. But my folks did so much for me, you know? I mean, they paid for me to go to basketball camp and do beadwork and even get a car. None of that was easy on them. They work hard for every penny. The restaurant doesn’t bring in as much income as people think, and when I was growing up, we always barely got by from week to week. I bet you’re enjoying all that money Steve is raking in. I heard over at Just As I Am that you’ve remodeled your whole basement.”
“Nearly,” Brenda told her. “We still have to lay the vinyl flooring and install a potting bench to store my gardening tools and bags of peat. That will happen next week.”
“You must be so proud of your husband—all the money he makes and how smart and cool he is. I mean, he’s really pretty handsome for an older guy, if you know what I’m saying. Not that you two are old or anything, but Steve is nice-looking and polite and generous. You’re working with A-1 Remodeling, aren’t you?”
“Yes, and they’re doing a great job.”
“Nick LeClair is kind of cute, don’t you think?”
A prickle ran up Brenda’s spine, but she shrugged as if the name meant nothing. “I suppose so. Nick is nice, and he works hard. He’s married, you know. He has a couple of kids and even grandkids. I think he loves his family a lot.”
“You could hardly call Nick LeClair married,” Ashley said. She lifted her hair off the back of her neck to feel the cool breeze from the lake. “His wife left him months ago. Maybe a year.”
“Are you serious?”
“Yeah. I know it’s true, too, because Brad is good friends with Nick and Nelda LeClair’s son, Leland. Brad and Leland are both in construction, so they hang out together at the Lounge after work. Leland told Brad that his parents were fighting like cats and dogs, until one day she up and called the sheriff on him.”
“Oh no.” Brenda was torn between her curiosity and the realization that she was encouraging Ashley to cross the line from friendly conversation to outright gossip. But since the girl seemed eager to talk…“What had he done?”
“She claimed Nick popped her, but he didn’t. See, Nelda had a meth lab set up in a little shed back in the woods behind their house, and he didn’t like it. Then she got it in her mind that he was cheating on her, which he might have been—nobody knows. The sheriff hauled Nick off to jail, and while he was gone, Nelda packed up his clothes and stuff and threw it on the lawn. He went over there and got it the next day, took it to an old single-wide trailer on his brother’s property, and he and Nelda haven’t been together since.”
“My goodness,” Brenda said, unable to reconcile the picture Ashley portrayed with the kind, gentle, supportive man with whom she had painted her basement.
“I’ll give Nick one thing,” Ashley went on. “He could have told the cops about the meth lab, but he didn’t. That probably would have landed Nelda up at the women’s prison at Vandalia, but then there wouldn’t have been anyone to look after the grandkids. Their no-good daughter is a tramp, and she lives in Texas somewhere. Leland isn’t married, and he works all day like Brad. So he sure couldn’t take care of the grandkids. We thought it was pretty good-hearted of Nick not to rat out Nelda, when he could have gotten revenge on her so easily. He must have been tempted, but he didn’t do it.”
“That’s quite a story,” Brenda said. “I’m surprised Nick never mentioned any of it to me.”
“What man wants to admit that his meth-cooking wife sent him to jail and then kicked him out of the house? It’s not really something you can brag about.”
“I guess not.” Brenda rubbed her temples. “Wow.”
“Anyhow, I’m glad you hired Nick. He’s supposed to be a good handyman.”
“You’ll have to come over and see the basement when he’s finished. You won’t recognize it. The TV and sectional sofa are gone, all the pictures and plaques are in storage, and the LEGOs went off to the elementary school in Camdenton.”
“I’d love to see it. And I’ll bring over my beads to show you. Did I tell you I’m starting a bead business? I used to think about going to college and then teaching kindergarten. But we don’t have that kind of money right now. So I’ve got another idea. See this necklace, right here?” She pointed to one of the many strands. “I made these beads. Made ’em out of this kind of clay you can bake in the oven. One of the regulars at the country club asked me where I got them—and what do you know? She bought two strands for fifty bucks! That put me into business. Brad thinks it’s dumb to bake beads instead of pork chops and beans in our oven. But I’m going to give it a try.”
“I’d love to see your beads,” Brenda said as Ashley stood. She rose to join the younger woman and knitted her fingers tightly together. Swallowing hard, she took a deep breath before plunging ahead. “Um, Ashley, you mentioned something earlier about Steve at the country club?”
“He’s a good tipper; I’ll give him that. I’m glad he’s over there nearly every evening. We all fight over who gets to wait on him.”
“About these people he takes to dinner. Are they ever women by themselves?”
“Once in a while. They’re those types with fancy leather shoes and matching purses and way too much French perf
ume. You know the kind I’m talking about. We get a lot of them at the club, especially in the summer when the Kansas City and St. Louis crowds swarm in.”
“Isn’t he usually with couples? Or families?”
“Oh, sure. Or with men by themselves. Steve does a good job schmoozing rich people like that. But he’s just a regular guy, even though he does throw money around. I still can’t see Steve as anything but Jessica’s dad, heading off to mow the lawn in his sneakers, shorts, and an old ragged T-shirt. You should be grateful, Mrs. Hansen. At least he’s not hanging out at the Lounge after work. That really bugs me. You’d think a husband would be eager to get home to his wife. But not Brad. He’d rather drink a few beers with the same people he’s been working with all day than come home and see his wife for a few minutes before I head off to work.”
Giving her long hair another flip, she rolled her eyes. “Oh well. One of these days I’ll get pregnant, and then Brad will want to get home to be with the kids.” As she spoke the final few words, Ashley gasped and covered her mouth with her hand. “I wasn’t supposed to tell anyone that we’re trying to have a baby. Don’t tell, Mrs. Hansen! Promise?”
“I promise.”
Ashley let out a deep breath. “Whew! Tell Jessica hi for me the next time you see her.”
“I’ll do that,” Brenda called as the young woman strolled back to her golf cart. “And thanks…thanks for stopping by. It was nice to have company.”
CHAPTER TEN
Patsy had just finished painting blonde highlights on one of her regulars when the pounding began. Alarmed, she glanced across the salon at the tea area. Sure enough, the entire wall was shuddering, the pictures of cottages and flower gardens were sliding cockeyed, and Patsy’s customers clenched their cups as they stared openmouthed at the crack slowly running down the corner of the room near the dessert counter.
“What now?” Patsy muttered.
Ever since Easter, she had allowed pleasant thoughts of Pete Roberts to infiltrate her mind. At Aunt Mamie’s Good Food, he had been polite. Funny. Even gentlemanly—insisting on paying for Patsy’s meal and then opening her car door for her. She decided she had misjudged the man, and he really was just a good ol’ boy trying to get along the best he knew how. He meant well, and the occasional chain-saw and weed-whacker incidents could be forgiven.
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