It Happens Every Spring

by Gary Chapman; Catherine Palmer

  Steve tried to picture all this activity going on at the house in Deepwater Cove. He wondered what Brenda had told her friends about him. Had she confessed? Had she blamed him for abandoning her and made it look like their problems were all his fault? He frowned.

  “Anyone else drop by?” he asked Cody, getting around to his real concern. “How about that handyman, Nick LeClair?”

  “He doesn’t share his hot dogs—”

  “I know, but have you seen him? Has he been to the house?”

  Cody gulped. “No. I don’t like him.”

  “I don’t like him either.”

  “He said, ‘Who do you think you are, fella?’ in a mean way, like he wanted to fight me. I don’t like to fight, because I always get hurt.”

  Steve’s breath hung shallow in his chest. “What was he doing? That day when you came to the house…what did you see?”

  “He was hugging Brenda, but she pushed him away and said, ‘No!’ Just like that. I don’t think she wanted him to hug her.”

  “Yes, she did,” Steve blurted out before he could stop himself. “Never mind. Forget I said that.”

  “I forget lots of things, all except my Bible verses. My daddy and me used to say them over and over so we wouldn’t forget. Shall I say a verse since the big fish aren’t eating the little fish?”

  “I guess so.”

  “Psalm 139,” Cody began. “ ‘O Lord, thou hast searched me, and known me. Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandest my thought afar off—’ ”

  “Steve?”

  Brenda’s voice carried across the green lawn toward the lakeshore. He turned and saw her, dressed in a pink top, blue jean shorts, and sandals. Her hair was too short—almost boyish—and she looked thinner than she should. She lifted a hand in greeting.

  “Cody?” she called. “Is that you?”

  “It’s me and Steve.” Cody dropped the rod and clapped his hands. “Look, he came back! I told you he would. I told you!”

  Brenda approached, stepping onto the gangway that led from the shore onto the dock. As she made her way down the aisle between two rows of boat slips, Steve pictured her melting into Nick LeClair’s arms. Slender, beautiful, looking younger than her age, she had wanted that man to hold her and kiss her. She had longed for his touch—and more. Rage boiled up inside Steve’s chest, and he fought the urge to bark out his fury in front of Cody.

  “See all the little fish, Brenda?” the young man said, motioning toward the minnow bucket. “We don’t eat these. We eat big ones.”

  Brenda laid her hand on his arm. “Have you caught any big ones?”

  “Nope,” Cody said. “Steve came back after you went to the beauty shop. We bought these little fish and then we came down to the dock.”

  Her green eyes focused on Steve, softening as she gazed at him. “I’m glad you’re back,” she said. “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah,” he growled. “Doing great.”

  Her face froze. “I see. Where have you been for the past week?”

  “I’m going back to the house,” he said.

  “Good!” Cody exclaimed. “That means it’s time for my shower, Steve! Brenda told me that when you came back, we would take a shower—you and me—and get all clean and put on my new clothes.”

  “I thought you might be willing to help Cody,” Brenda clarified.

  Steve eyed his wife as he gathered up the fishing rods and the minnow bucket. Was she frightened now—scared that he would divorce her, force her out of the house, compel her to get a job? He hoped so. The taste of bitterness soured his mouth as he placed the tackle in the storage cupboard near their slip. Let her worry. Let her feel some of the hopelessness and hurt he had suffered.

  He started for the house with Cody and Brenda trailing behind him. The thought of dragging out his anger for weeks and months somehow satisfied Steve. He would punish Brenda, keep her in a state of dismay and fear, and then he would leave her.

  She had admitted her failing, apologized, asked him to forgive her. He held all the power now, and it felt good to watch her grovel.

  A touch on his hand caused him to stiffen. She wouldn’t dare—

  “A shower, a shower!” Cody sang out, wrapping his skinny fingers around Steve’s hand. “This is going to be lots and lots of fun. Just me and you and Brenda, back together again. It’s a happy day!”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Steve Hansen came home.” Charlie Moore made the announcement after parking his golf cart in the driveway and stepping onto the front porch of his tidy little home in Deepwater Cove. “He took Cody fishing. I saw them down on the dock. They had a bucket of minnows.”

  Esther glanced at Kim Finley, who had dropped by to pick up a quart of strawberries. The Moores planted a big garden every year, and their strawberry patch was famous around the lake. Esther had invited Kim to drop by and take home some of the fruit in the hope that it would help little Luke feel better. The boy had missed so much school that Kim was afraid he might not be able to advance to the next grade level. That would put him a full year behind his twin sister, Lydia, and Kim feared it would damage his self-esteem.

  Esther watched Charlie grimace as he settled into a white wicker chair. His knees were getting worse, though he did his best to deny it. She hated to see him in pain, but what could she do if he refused to go to the doctor?

  As Boofer, their little dog, settled into her husband’s lap, Esther stroked Charlie’s arm. “Did you talk to Steve, honey? Surely Cody must have seen you drive by.” She smiled at Kim. “The boy may be slow, but he never misses a chance to wave at us on our golf cart. I think he’s just a sweet, simple young man who wouldn’t hurt a fly. Don’t you, Kim?”

  “I haven’t talked to him much, but he’s always friendly.”

  “It was good of Brenda Hansen to try to help him. Did you see her on the dock too, Charlie?”

  “Not when I drove by. But I can tell you one thing—I’m awful glad Steve’s back.”

  “So am I,” Esther agreed. “I don’t believe for a minute what people were saying about the two of them. He and Brenda have always been the happiest couple—raising those beautiful children, working hard, going to church every Sunday. What could possibly have come between them? No, I’m sure he was on a business trip.”

  Charlie shook his head. “Now, Esther, you can’t go making things all apple pie and ice cream. There’s not a married couple in the world that doesn’t have a little trouble now and then.”

  “Not us. We’ve been happy since the day we said, ‘I do,’ and don’t tell me otherwise.”

  “Oh, Esther, you know we’ve had our rocky times. If Steve needed a little breathing room, then so be it. And Brenda—well, she’s had her hands full with Cody and that basement project.”

  “She was very quiet when the TLC visited her,” Kim put in. “It was the middle of the afternoon, and she hadn’t even changed out of her nightgown. I think she’s been suffering a deep depression.”

  “I wouldn’t know a thing about depression,” Esther said, waving a hand to brush off the unpleasant thought. “It doesn’t make a bit of sense to me.”

  “When my husband left the twins and me, I sank into a depression,” Kim told Esther and Charlie. “At first I couldn’t believe he was really gone. Then I got so angry that I could hardly keep it inside. I yelled at the kids a lot, and I even snapped at my clients. Everything irritated me. Finally, I went numb. Even though I had my precious children, a stable job with benefits, and a nice home, the whole world looked black to me. I felt like I was inside a box with no way out.”

  “Now that sounds pretty awful to me,” Charlie said. “My mother went through a time like that when her last baby died. My father put her in the hospital for what seemed like forever to me. One day she came home, but she was never the same after that. She had lost her joy.”

  Kim nodded. “A friend talked me into seeing a counselor, and I took some medicine for a while. Finally the darkness started t
o lift, and I got back on my feet. But when I saw Brenda the other day, I recognized all the signs of depression.”

  “Depression is nothing more than a state of mind,” Esther argued. “People have to be tough. When hard times come, they ought to buckle down and face things head-on. I’m sorry to be plainspoken, but all this psychology stuff sounds like a bunch of hooey to me. I realize you feel better now, Kim, but why didn’t you grab yourself by the bootstraps and pull yourself up? Snap out of it is what I tell myself.”

  “For some of us,” Kim said softly, “it’s not that easy.”

  “Well, I just hope things get back to normal around here now that Steve’s home.” Charlie took a large white handkerchief from his back pocket and wiped his forehead. “Sure is hot today. I think we’re about to have to call an official end to spring. How are the strawberries holding out, Esther?”

  “They’re still coming on,” she told him. “I baked a strawberry cobbler for dessert. We ought to have fruit for a good while yet. But I found a hole in the garden fence this morning. The rabbits got into the lettuce already.”

  “Aw, shucks,” Charlie grumbled. “If it isn’t one thing, it’s another.”

  As Ozzie rubbed against the side of her leg, Brenda stood outside the open door of the master bathroom and cradled a stack of clean, new clothing. In anticipation of this moment, she had purchased three pairs of blue jeans and five T-shirts for Cody, plus socks and underwear and some shiny white sneakers. As the water hissed, steam crept out above the curtain. She could hear Cody laughing as Steve, standing just outside the shower, gave instructions.

  “Wash right there,” Steve was saying as he peeked behind the curtain. “Get that soap on good, Cody, or I’ll have to make you do it again.”

  “It’s slippery!” The younger man giggled from inside the tiled shower stall. “Like a fish! Like one of those big fish we didn’t catch!”

  “Hang on to it.” Steve mumbled something Brenda couldn’t make out. “When was the last time you had a bath, kid?”

  “Me and my daddy washed off in gas-station bathrooms. If you buy a piece of bubble gum, you can get the key and use the bathroom. That’s how we did it.”

  “I believe it. The dirt is ground into your pores. Get your neck, Cody, and use that washcloth. You have to scrub every bit of yourself, even in the back.”

  Brenda closed her eyes and settled her chin on the clothing. Steve had come home. For days she had lived with the fear that she would never see him again. He never called home, though Brenda left several messages on his voice mail. It was as if her confession and their argument had propelled him out of her life forever.

  Though Brenda had longed to slide back into her cocoon after Steve left, the members of the Tea Ladies’ Club prevented it. After the day Esther Moore showed up with fresh strawberries, she began to stop by regularly, bringing fresh spring lettuce, a bouquet of irises, or a card signed by all the women. She always had some activity in mind for herself and Brenda—baking pies or cookies together, drinking tea on the porch, weeding a neighbor’s flower beds, or figuring out how to use the new computer Charlie had purchased. Brenda resented the intrusion at first. But she gradually acknowledged that she looked forward to Esther’s visits as an uplifting way to start each day.

  By noon, Esther would zip off in her golf cart to fix lunch for Charlie. Within minutes, Ashley Hanes usually showed up at the Hansen house. She longed to do beadwork in the new basement crafts area, she told Brenda. And she needed help. Together they strung necklaces, bracelets, and anklets. Ashley taught Brenda how to form clay into colorful beads that could be baked rock-hard in the oven. She begged for sewing lessons, too, and Brenda felt obligated to drag out her machine and help the young woman stitch new kitchen curtains.

  About the time Ashley left for work each afternoon, along would come Kim Finley and her twins. The kids wanted to play on the swing set in the backyard, paint pictures in the basement, or chase the cat around the house. Kim helped Brenda prepare Cody’s meals and assemble goody packages to be mailed off to Justin and Jessica at college.

  At the end of each day, Brenda was exhausted. But she had her new friends to thank for keeping her so busy. None of them had questioned her about her relationship with Steve, and she was grateful. She didn’t have time to dwell on her absentee husband. In fact, Steve had been away from home so much anyway that things almost felt normal.

  By the time Brenda had spotted Cody and Steve down on the dock, she had been up and about enough to find the energy for a trip to Just As I Am. Patsy Pringle had been her usual cheerful self that afternoon, asking about everyone in the family and clucking in sympathy each time Brenda hinted that she and Steve were going through a hard time.

  The sight of her husband fishing on the dock had lifted Brenda’s heart. But his anger and surliness quickly squelched any hope she may have held for a reconciliation. Clearly Steve’s time away from her had done nothing to heal his hurt. He had returned home—but she had no doubt he intended to end their marriage.

  “Ha!” Cody cried. Stark naked, he tore open the shower curtain. “I’m clean, even in my ears! Even behind my neck! Even—”

  “That’s enough, Cody,” Brenda said as Steve attempted to push him back into the shower. “It’s bad manners to let people see you without any clothes. Now, get back in there until we shut the door. Then put these things on, and you can come out again.” She handed over the new outfit.

  Yanking the curtain closed to block Cody, Steve stepped into the bedroom and shut the bathroom door behind him. He blew out a breath as he held out Cody’s rags. “You probably ought to burn these. They smell.”

  Brenda took the clothing into the kitchen and dug in the pantry for a plastic grocery bag. She could hear Steve behind her, his footsteps on the tile floor. He sounded so normal, so much at home. For the hundredth time since her confession, she shuddered at the enormity of what she had been ready to risk—the loss of Steve’s stability, his stalwart practicality, his comforting presence.

  During his absence, remorse had driven Brenda back to her knees. She had finally admitted—to herself and to the Lord—that she’d chosen to distance herself from Him and from the support and teaching of her local church. What a mistake that had been. She prayed that God would forgive her for wandering from the path she had chosen to follow so long ago. She begged the Lord to change Steve’s mind and bring him home to her. The past Sunday, she had returned to LAMB Chapel and asked God to help her understand how to rebuild what she and Steve had almost destroyed.

  But then her husband had come back with all his rage and hostility tied up in a weapon that he had already flung at her more than once. What would he say to her now? How would he begin their ending?

  Praying for strength, she stuffed Cody’s old T-shirt into the bag. As she gathered up the jeans, she instinctively checked the pockets. Years of doing laundry had taught her to expect coins, stones, keys, wallets, even fishing worms. This time her hand closed on a piece of paper.

  “There’s a note in Cody’s pocket,” she told Steve. He stepped to the counter beside her. Grimy and worn, the page nearly tore as she unfolded it.

  “‘Dear Friend,’” she read aloud. “ ‘I know you have found my son, Cody Goss, or you would not be reading this letter. Cody is backward, but he never means any mischief. His mama died when he was born, and I have had the sole care of the boy ever since. I did not send him to school lest the other children tease him. Cody knows his numbers pretty good, and he can say some of the alphabet. He can’t read, but he has learned lots of Scriptures. He can also clean things up spic and span. Cody is a Christian, and you can trust him. He don’t steal nor tell lies. I have got cancer that is going to kill me pretty quick, and I don’t want Cody to watch me die. He cries real easy. I checked all over for a place he could live. But they all said he’s twenty-one, and he’s going to have to make his way. So I am putting him out on the road for Jesus to watch over, and then I will head for the nearest hospital where
in I shall cross the Jordan River and pass on to glory. I don’t have nothing to leave Cody, not even my car. It is plumb shot after all these years. Please be kind to my son and don’t harm him. Sincerely, William Goss.’ ”

  Brenda laid the wrinkled note on the kitchen counter and turned to Steve. “Look at the date,” she said. “This letter is almost two years old. Cody’s father must have died by now. I guess…well, I imagined that somehow we could find him…we could fix it all. I thought if we took care of Cody and helped him, eventually things would…things would be okay again.”

  Tears welled in her eyes. She had cherished the same hope for herself and Steve, Brenda realized. Somehow, someway, the problems would fix themselves. Cody’s father would reappear. All memories of Nick LeClair would vanish. Steve and Brenda would be just like they had always been. Together. Happy. United.

  “Why are you crying?” Steve asked. His voice had softened a little. “You didn’t expect Cody’s life to be easy, did you? The kid was a mess when he showed up here. His father is gone, buried who knows where. Cody’s too old to become a ward of the state, and he’s way beyond anything a foster family could do. I tried to tell you…everyone tried to tell you that Cody was a homeless man, not a little boy who could be rescued. He’s just like the other destitute, down-and-out people who sleep on the streets of cities and towns all over the world. He needs a place to live. A job. Transportation. If you want to make Cody’s life better, it’s going to take a lot of work.”

  Brenda nodded. “Good things take work. I’m willing to put out the effort to help Cody. I raised the kids through all their ups and downs. I took care of our family—fed and clothed everyone, drove endless miles to ball games and dance lessons, kept up with homework. And us…”

  She looked up at her husband, recalling Esther’s words of advice and encouragement. “I did my part to make a good marriage, Steve. I worked very hard at it. I want you to know that I’ve had a lot of time to think and pray and cry…and I’m willing to do whatever it takes to put us back together. Maybe not the way we were. But maybe better.”