Happily Ever After

by Jenn Faulk

~David~

  The roof had nearly killed him. Very nearly.

  Piet, too, though he wouldn’t admit it as he breathlessly reclined right there on it, demanding a break.

  It was too hot up north to be doing this. Ironically enough, it was summertime in Texas, wintertime in Namibia, and David was still certain that Namibia was hotter. How it could be winter and still be so scorching had him befuddled, honestly. It would be worse in another few months when it actually was summer, which is why they’d taken on the job now of re-roofing the house that had once been the property of the mission board.

  It belonged to Piet now, who had made it into a stopping point for their trips up north. Piet’s trips to run his clinics in Tsumeb and David’s trips to visit his students when they were on holiday and school was out of session – both types of trips made it certain that they were here a lot.

  Enough that they’d finally gone ahead and done the work of re-roofing the house.

  It had been a good reintroduction back to Namibia. David had left the overly air conditioned hotel just a few hours after saying goodnight to Cammie back in Dallas, hesitating more than a few minutes outside of her door.

  It had been too early for her to be up. But he hadn’t cared. He had still wanted to knock on her door, say goodbye to her, ask her if he could have a way to get in touch with her, see if there was any interest in her eyes...

  Stupid, actually. Even if she wasn’t going to be on another continent, she was still Camille Evans. The Camille Evans. That was reason enough that she wouldn’t ever consider spending more than just a brief dinner with him, chatting about the past, not dreaming of any kind of future with him in it.

  As if there could be any future at all, given where they were each headed, in opposite directions.

  Just as well. That had been his thought as he’d turned away from her door and made his way down to the lobby, where Hope had been waiting for him, her car double parked, ready to take him to the airport and send him halfway around the world.

  He’d thought about Cammie a few times on the long flights back. Okay, so he’d thought about her a lot. But he’d also thought about the new guy who would be arriving on the field soon. He’d been making plans for all that they could begin to do initially, before the school session even began in Swakopmund. He’d pick the new guy up at the airport, drive him straight up to Tsumeb, and introduce him around. Then, in Swakopmund, the work could really get going.

  Plans changed, though, thanks to the roof.

  David had been on enough summer missions teams from his dad’s church that he knew a few things about roofing a house. He knew how long it would take and knew that he and Piet could get the job done by the end of the day if they just kept working. So, he’d reluctantly sent Kait on to pick up the new guy from the airport in Windhoek, which she’d done gladly, telling them both that watching them work was exhausting her.

  It had exhausted Piet as well, if the way he was lying on the roof was any indication.

  “Not much more to go,” David said, kicking him softly in the side. “If you get your big butt up, we can have it finished in the next hour.”

  “Nee, man,” Piet groaned. “It’s so hot. I need to rest.”

  “No, you don’t,” he answered. “We gave up being there to welcome the new guy in. Don’t make the time we gave up go to waste.”

  And with that, Piet heaved himself up, his bulky frame blocking at least some of the sunlight from David’s eyes. “Ja,” he droned. “Heard it before. Should have been there, Piet. All of us should have been there, Piet.”

  David grinned, thinking about the day he himself had arrived and how Kait and Piet had both been there. He’d know that neither one was still connected to the board, that neither one was there in any kind of official capacity, but that they were both so excited, as if they had more invested in David’s arrival than their distance from the situation certainly dictated.

  It was because they loved the students. They loved the work that had gone on when the former missionaries were here. They were still a part of it, even in a non-official capacity.

  It had been a good welcome. They’d headed straight to the coast and gotten right to work. David hoped that even though the initial introductions would be different for the new guy, it would still be a good welcome, coming up north with Kait, right to where the work was happening.

  “Well, we should have been there,” David said, nodding at the roof. “But it’s more important that we finish this. Let’s get back to it.”

  “How did you learn how to do all of this anyway?” Piet grumbled, getting down beside him, placing shingles and preparing to secure them.

  “Long summers, working in neighborhoods with my dad’s church,” he said. “We’d fix up houses for people who couldn’t afford the repairs themselves. Got so good at it in high school that I had some men offer to put me on their construction crews once I graduated. Tried to talk me into that instead of college. Tried to talk me into making a career of it.”

  Piet glanced over at him. “You’d have been paid better.”

  “True enough,” David acknowledged. “But it’s God’s grace to you that I wasn’t. Otherwise you’d be doing this all by yourself.”

  “Ja,” Piet grinned. “And clearing out the brush. It’s crept up to the back door again. Will take us a few hours to get it done.”

  “I know all about that, too,” David murmured, thinking about the jobs he’d been given those summers before he’d been old enough and strong enough to handle the roofs.

  He remembered Jay, pointing the older boys towards the ladders, pointing him towards the weeds in the yard.

  He had grumbled at this, of course. But only for a minute. Because out there in the yard in a really cute pair of cut-off jeans, a T-shirt, and a baseball cap with her ponytail hanging out the back was Cammie Evans.

  Oh, how his heart raced every time he saw her... even when she was standing with Hope and Charity.

  “Hey, Cammie,” he yelled, running towards her and totally ignoring his sisters in the process.

  “Hey, David,” she said, straightening her hat and looking out at the yard. “How is it already ten thousand degrees out here at nine in the morning?”

  “Dunno,” he grinned, moving closer to her, very nearly breaking out in a sweat because she smelled so good, even out in that yard, and –

  “Look at Matt, up on that roof,” Charity murmured, grabbing Cammie’s arm. “Gets any hotter, he’s gonna take off his shirt. And then, it’ll be really hot.”

  Cammie fought a grin at this as they both watched the older boy. David glanced over at him as well, even as he gave a head nod the girls’ direction.

  He really hoped that nod was for Charity and not Cammie. Though if Matt was smart, he’d be doing everything he could to get Cammie’s attention because Cammie was –

  “Hot, yeah. Well, I really hope he doesn’t take off his shirt,” Hope said. “He’ll probably blind us all with his pasty white self if he does.”

  “What?” Charity asked, looking over at her twin. Fraternal twin. They didn’t even look like sisters. Certainly didn’t act like it either.

  “He’s pale,” Hope said. “I mean, bless his heart. Do you remember back in third grade when we went to the lake over spring break, and he blistered up like a lobster?”

  Cammie laughed out loud at this. David couldn’t remember it, of course, because he hadn’t been there. He had been in kindergarten. Always three steps behind Charity, Hope, and Cammie. It hadn’t bothered him, then, but watching Cammie totally see through him now as if he wasn’t even there had him feeling it differently.

  “Well, holy moly,” Charity said. “Maybe he should leave his shirt on, then.”

  “That’s the problem, you know,” Cammie said, smiling wistfully.

  “That Matt’s got a pasty white chest?” David said, trying to insert himself back in the conversation and feeling that pointing out Matt’s flaws was an excellent way to do it.

&
nbsp; All three girls looked at him as though they’d forgotten that he was there. Of course.

  “No,” Cammie said, shaking her head and watching him oddly. “The problem,” and she turned to the twins, “is that we’ve grown up with these guys. We know too much about them, remember them in decidedly uncool contexts. It’s hard to see any of them with any real potential because we know them all too well. I mean, who can think romantically about someone when you’ve known them their whole lives and –”

  Her musings had been cut off by Jay, who came up to them with several unappealing yard tools in his hands. “You girls planning on working at all today?” he asked, just lumping David together with the womenfolk. (Which happened a lot and just came with having two older sisters.)

  “I’m just here to look pretty, Jay,” Charity said, grinning at him. Flirty, even with the youth pastor.

  “Well, that won’t do much to help this family,” he said, ignoring her. “Hope, you and your sister take these hedge trimmers, and go over and cut back the bushes that are covering the windows.”

  “Can do,” Hope said, taking the tools and dragging Charity with her.

  “And you two,” he said, looking at David and Cammie, holding out two pairs of work gloves and two garbage bags. “Weeding. Easy enough, right?”

  David saw Cammie sigh then smile. “Where to?”

  “The south side of the house,” he said, nodding that way before leaving them.

  “Let’s see how bad it is,” Cammie said, reaching over and messing up David’s hair just like she always did. From the time he’d been four and she and her family had moved to the church, where she’d become good friends with his sisters, Cammie had been treating him like her little brother, too.

  He didn’t mind, though. Because attention was attention.

  He hurried to keep up with her, and once they got to the south side of the house, he let out a long whistle.

  “Well, we’ve got a lot of work to do,” she said, pulling on her gloves and getting down on her knees.

  He followed suit, looking at those cute shorts that she was wearing...

  “Seems a shame, doesn’t it?” he asked softly.

  “Tell me about it,” she said even more softly. “The single mom who lives here has been working so hard that she doesn’t have time to do any of this. And she doesn’t make enough to do anything but cover her bills, much less pay anyone to help her out. My dad’s coming up later to help out with some plumbing problems. Said the pipes are all rusted out.”

  David hadn’t been thinking of the work at all, honestly. He’d been thinking that it was a shame that she’d be getting her pretty clothes all messed up. But there Cammie went, talking about the real reason they were here, the good they were doing, the way they were loving Christ. Calling him back to what he knew to be true, making him so thankful that he was here to do something, helping him –

  “What’s that look for, you little weirdo?” she asked, already looking back down at the work she was doing, pulling weeds right out of the ground.

  “Nothing,” he said, joining her, vowing silently to work even harder so that he would lighten her load as the day passed them by. “Just a lot of work, huh?”

  “Good work,” she said, smiling up at him. “Any work done with the right heart is good work, isn’t it? Especially when it’s done for Jesus.”

  David thought about her words as he and Piet continued sweating in the oppressive Namibian heat, thinking about all the good that would come from them both having this place up north, smiling even as he thought about it. It was good work, being here, giving his life to this, to all that Christ had called him to.

  Thanks for that, Cammie.

  “What are you smiling about, David?” Piet asked.

  And David grinned and said, “Just glad to be back home.”