Happily Ever After

by Jenn Faulk

~Cammie~

  Jet lag. She never got used to that.

  She left Kait snoring in the tiny bedroom they’d shared in the Tsumeb house and got cleaned up in the bathroom before sunrise. With a quick glance to her hair and her clothes, she snuck through the living room where the boys had spent the night and made her way into the kitchen.

  Where David was already sitting at the table with a cup of coffee and his Bible.

  “Hey,” he said as their eyes met. “Early riser, huh?”

  “Yeah,” she nodded. “And even worse now thanks to the jet lag.”

  “Coffee?” he asked, standing to his feet.

  “Yes, please,” she said. “But I can get it. I don’t want to interrupt you.”

  “Just finishing up,” he said, pouring the cup for her. “Milk, sugar?”

  “Yes, both, please,” she said, watching him as he moved around the kitchen. He smiled as he opened the sugar.

  “You know, they say you can gauge a missionary’s seniority by how he reacts to bugs in the sugar.”

  “Oh?” she murmured.

  “Yeah,” he said, stirring the coffee. “The first year on the field, he’ll throw out all the sugar. The second year, he’ll scoop out the sugar around the bugs. And by the third year, he’ll just plop the bugs right into the coffee along with the sugar, not bothered in the least.” He held out her coffee cup. “There you go.”

  She peered at it cautiously. “Are there bugs in there?”

  “Oh, no,” he said. “Just a little missionary humor.”

  She nodded at this, taking the mug from him. “Thanks.”

  He watched her for a minute, smiling. “Wow. Camille Evans.”

  They were both still very, very surprised, obviously.

  “David Connor,” she said, hiding her own smile with her mug.

  “And it’s still Connor,” he said, holding his ring-less hand up to her with a laugh.

  She frowned, blushing, embarrassed all over again. “You little….”

  “Oh, Cammie,” he said, still laughing, bending his head down slightly as he did so. “I’m just playing with you.”

  “David,” she sighed.

  “I said I was just playing,” he insisted. “No need to take offense, and –”

  “No, your forehead,” she said, putting down her mug and reaching out to hold his head in her hands, marveling again as she moved close to him that David Connor had gotten so tall and big and... handsome.

  What an unhelpful thought.

  “What about my forehead?” David murmured, as she continued holding him.

  “Well, you’re bleeding,” she said, focusing on something besides his gorgeous eyes.

  “Oh, that,” he said dismissively, as she let go of him. “Poked myself right in the head with some of that brush we cleared out last night. Got it to stop bleeding after I showered. Or at least I thought I did.”

  “Do you have any bandages?” she asked, moving over to the cabinets, already searching. “Or maybe a –”

  And she turned to find David looking at her... well, looking at her backside, actually, then glancing up quickly to her face, his own face reddening as he did so.

  Surely not.

  “Uh, yeah,” he said, not meeting her eyes. “First aid kit underneath the sink. I’m always knocking myself in the head with something, so we’re always prepared.”

  “I remember that about you,” she said, smiling, moving to get the kit out. “You knocked yourself out completely once during a Disciple Now weekend. I think you were... a seventh grader?”

  She could remember it. In the dumbest move ever, Jay had the junior high boys play dodgeball against the senior high girls. Charity, Hope, and Cammie had all been aiming right for David, and before he could even throw the ball he’d been holding, he’d been hit in rapid succession – one, two, three – and had fallen backwards right onto a chair some other idiot thirteen year old boy was using as a totally illegal shield.

  By the time he hit the floor, he was out cold.

  The game had been called off before it had even started, with David lying flat on his back, unmoving.

  While Hope and Charity had huddled around him, hysterical and close to tears because they honestly thought that they had just killed their weird little brother, one of their friends went to go find Jay. Cammie had knelt down beside David, put her hand to his face, and said to him, just as frantic as his sisters, “David Paul Connor, don’t you dare die on us!”

  She’d gone into lifesaving mode at that point, checking his breathing, illogically wondering if she should try to give him CPR anyway because he was lying there so still and horrifically pale. Just as she began to lower her lips to his (which wouldn’t have helped at all since the fool was already breathing), David’s eyes had popped open, and he had said, with her lips just inches from his, “Oh, praise Jesus!”

  Little weirdo.

  Still just a little weirdo, apparently, as he smiled at his own private memory of the incident.

  “That was a great day,” he said, laughing. “Had to go to the ER. My dad was convinced I was concussed because I told the doctor that Cammie Evans was just about to kiss me. Made me want to go hit my head again and not come to so quickly.”

  “Ha, ha, ha,” she murmured, her cheeks blushed to hear him kid her this way. With an antiseptic wipe and a bandage in her hands, she turned to face him. “Come here.”

  He did, still grinning.

  “Why don’t you tell me what our plans are from here while I clean this up?” she said.

  “Plans,” he said as she put her hand to his forehead. “For the immediate future. With the work.”

  “That’s right,” she said, feeling a little rush of excitement as he put his hands to the counter behind her, his arms very nearly around her.

  He probably wasn’t even aware of what he was doing, as he winced at the sting of the wipe that she was carefully blotting on his forehead.

  “Can I tell you, again, that you surprised us?” he said, his eyes closed as she worked. “We were supposed to be getting another man on the field. Not a woman.”

  “You mentioned that,” she answered. “Everyone here has mentioned that, in fact.”

  “I know. Just wanted to affirm again, that plans have changed slightly.”

  In a good way, she hoped. She wanted to be effective here, needed, wanted...

  “Well, I told you already,” she said, praying that it would be so, “that the odds were better that the board would send a woman.”

  “Because you outnumber the men,” he said. “Got it. But still. We were surprised. But honestly?” And here he lowered his voice. “I’m glad for it.”

  She could feel her heart race just a little, wondering at the reasons why David would be glad that she was here. Silly thoughts, of course, but... wow, he looked really great...

  “Oh?” she asked, opening up the bandage, watching his face as she continued cleaning up.

  “Yeah,” he murmured, “because no matter what I do, I can’t be there for the girls like they need someone to be. Because I’m a guy. A single, young guy.”

  She understood this. “Girls’ ministry is my heart,” she said.

  “I remember,” he nodded. “And today? You’ll get to meet a lot of them.”

  “Today?” she asked, putting the bandage in place and securing it down with a soft touch, as he finally opened his eyes to look at her.

  And he finally seemed to notice how close they were standing. With a blush that reminded her so much of the David Connor she had known her whole life, he backed up with a little laugh.

  “Yeah, today,” he said, his eyes shining as he watched her.

  “I can’t wait, David,” she breathed, grinning.