Crossing the Wide Forever

by Missouri Vaun

  “Where’s Lillie?”

  “She’s resting in the next room. She’s been up with you all night.”

  “What…how… Why are you here?”

  “You came down with a sudden fever. Lillie needed help taking care of you. She came and got me right after she put you to bed.” Beth felt Cody’s forehead again. “I think you’re through the worst of it. How do you feel?”

  “Like somebody used me for a punching practice.” Every muscle telegraphed a dull ache, even her head. Although the headache from earlier had eased some. Cody looked down and realized her nightshirt was partially unbuttoned. Her heart rate sped up, and she shifted on the bed away from Beth.

  “Hey, it’s okay. Lillie told me. She had to.” Beth moved from the chair to sit on the side of the bed. She put her hand on Cody’s arm. “Cody, I’m not going to tell anyone and I don’t care. You are who you are no matter what sort of clothes you wear. Okay?”

  Cody nodded. She had to sit with Beth’s words for a few minutes and let her fuzzy head settle and her heart rate slow. She’d been instantly afraid that by getting sick she’d ruined everything for herself and for Lillie. In that instant she realized how attached she was to the life she’d begun to create with Lillie. She wasn’t ready to give any of that up.

  Beth knew who she really was. She wondered if Beth had seen the scars also.

  “Cody, you’re going to need to stay in bed for a couple of days, okay?” Beth tucked the blanket around her and, possibly sensing that Cody needed some distance, moved back to the chair.

  “I’m sorry I acted the way I did just now.”

  “It’s all right. Under the circumstances I completely understand.”

  “Thank you for being here for Lillie.”

  “And for you, Cody.” Beth squeezed her hand. “I was here for you too.”

  In rural Arkansas there hadn’t been much opportunity for friendship. Remote as it was and then losing her mother, Cody had been even more isolated. Having women in her life was a new thing. She’d already let Lillie get so close, and now Beth knew her truth, or at least the physical proof of part of it. Cody felt exposed in her weakened state. Emotion, unbidden and unexpected, choked her windpipe. She wiped at a tear that escaped despite her best efforts to hold it back.

  “You’ve had a long night. I think you just need to rest now.”

  Cody nodded, afraid if she tried to speak she might not be able to get the words out.

  “You rest. I’ll be right here if you need me.” Beth wiped a cool cloth across her forehead and across her chest at the opening of her shirt. “The fever is almost gone. Just sleep.” Beth’s words were soft and soothing.

  Cody closed her eyes and let exhaustion pull her back under.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  The next morning, Lillie walked Beth to the door.

  “Are you sure you won’t let me take you home?”

  “No, the walk will feel nice. It’s barely more than a mile.” Beth stepped off the porch and looked up at the sky. “It’s going to be a nice day, I think.”

  “Beth, thank you.”

  “I was happy to help. You just make sure that Cody rests until he’s better.”

  Her conscious use of he didn’t escape Lillie.

  “Tell Joshua and Patience I send my regards.”

  Beth waved to her as she walked toward the trail.

  She heard shuffling noises from the bedroom as Lillie stepped back into the house. Cody was struggling to get to her feet.

  “What are you doing? You’re supposed to stay in bed.”

  “I have to make a trip to the privy.”

  “I’ll help you.” Lillie was about to put her arm around Cody’s waist, but Cody shooed her away.

  “I can do this myself.”

  “Can you? From my perspective you don’t look very stable on your feet.”

  “I just need a minute for my head to catch on to the fact that I’m standing up.” Cody braced herself on the footboard of the bed and smiled sheepishly at Lillie. “I’m feeling better. I promise.”

  By the time Lillie had poured herself a cup of coffee, Cody was back. She took a seat at the table.

  “Would you like a cup?” She raised the cast iron pot in Cody’s direction.

  “Yes, please. I don’t think I can drink one more cup of Beth’s ginger tea.”

  “She left some other teas that I’m supposed to make sure you drink also.”

  Cody could see dark circles under Lillie’s eyes.

  “You look sleepy.” Cody nibbled on a piece of leftover biscuit from the previous evening meal.

  “I am. As soon as you’re back in bed I’m going to sleep on the cot.”

  Cody wanted to say something. Thank you didn’t seem to cover what she was feeling. She wasn’t sure she’d sorted through all the muddled thoughts she’d had. Some of them seemed like parts of a dream, but some of them seemed real.

  “Cody, I want you to know that I never would have let Beth in on our secret if I hadn’t thought there was no other way.”

  “I know.” She figured it hadn’t been easy to reveal the truth of their situation because it not only changed the way Beth saw Cody, it also potentially changed the way Beth saw Lillie. “I’m sure it wasn’t an easy decision.”

  Lillie reached across the table and took her hand. “I was looking out for you. I want you to know that.”

  Cody lifted Lillie’s fingers to her lips and held them there. Words weren’t coming to her. The things she wanted to say to Lillie would have to wait until her mind was clearer.

  “I’m going to go lie down.” She let their fingers drift apart as she stood.

  “Okay, I’ll come check on you in a little while.”

  *

  By midafternoon of the second day, Cody was feeling a bit more herself. Weakness in her legs and arms slowed her progress as she moved through the house. She poured a cup of water, then a second. There was a pot of something on the stove. She lifted the lid. Potatoes, beans, and wild onions simmered inside.

  The potatoes seemed soft enough to be fully cooked so she spooned a little food onto a saucer and stood looking out the kitchen window while it cooled. She could see Lillie sitting out quite a way from the barn. She ate and dressed and stepped outside for some fresh air. Cody couldn’t remember the last time she’d stayed in bed most of the day, let alone two, probably never.

  The afternoon air was warm and dry. Clouds hovered low on the horizon to the south. Maybe they’d get an evening shower, although at the moment there was no wind to carry the clouds in their direction.

  Shadow came to the fence as Cody passed. She patted his neck and spoke softly to him about her fitful night. As she rounded the barn and headed out into the pasture, she could see that Lillie had set up her easel for painting. Cody stopped in her tracks, as if she were approaching some wild and elusive creature that she didn’t want to spook by getting too close. Lillie still hadn’t noticed her so she stood for a while and watched from a distance. She was too far away to see what Lillie had painted on the paper.

  Debate about whether to return to the house or continue was won by curiosity. Cody ambled slowly in Lillie’s direction. As she drew closer, she spoke.

  “Hey there. I wanted to make sure you knew I was walking up so that I didn’t spook you.” Lillie seemed in a bit of a fog. Her eyes had a far off look to them. It took a few seconds for her to register that Cody was talking to her.

  “Hi.” A palette with an opening for her thumb was balanced in one hand covered with various paint colors, and a brush was suspended in her other hand. “I thought I might try to paint a little while you were sleeping.”

  “Do you mind if I see what you’re working on?”

  “Not at all, but it’s not nearly finished.” Lillie stood up and stepped away from the small wooden easel. “It’s so hard to capture all of this…space.”

  The painting was mostly sky, which Cody thought conveyed the feeling of their smallness in the land
scape well. Cody didn’t know anything about art, but she thought Lillie had captured the view in both texture and color. Somehow, Lillie had managed to enrich the spectrum of color so that subtle variations that might have escaped Cody’s observation were somehow gathered in the brushstrokes.

  “It’s good.”

  “You think?”

  “Yes, I like it.” That response seemed inadequate. “I think you’ve captured the feel of the place.” That reminded her of the conversation they’d had in Council Grove about how one might paint a feeling.

  “I tried a bit of drybrush technique on this one. You use the brush with pigment but very little water. And then drag it over the rough surface of the paper. It creates a texture that sort of enlivens the duller washes.”

  Cody cocked her head. She wasn’t sure she understood completely, but she loved seeing Lillie’s eyes light up when she talked about her work. It was as if a bright light lit her face, and her eyes practically sparkled.

  “You should probably get back to bed. Beth said you’d need plenty of rest to make sure you were over the fever.”

  “I’ll go back in a minute. I do feel tired still.” Cody had pulled a blanket around her shoulders when she left the house. It wasn’t that the air was cool, but she was feeling puny and easily chilled. She pulled the blanket more tightly now, not because she felt cold but because she was feeling sensitive and exposed. The sickness had made her feel unbalanced and emotional. And then there’d been the dream she’d had. It had come back to her with crystal clarity once she’d been fully awake this morning.

  “I had this dream last night.”

  Lillie noticed her pensive expression, but it didn’t seem to be directed at her. Cody was focused on something out there, something possibly distant and unseen.

  “What sort of dream?” Beth had mentioned that one of the side effects of quinine was vivid dreams, but she hadn’t expected Cody to remember any of them.

  “It was almost like I was seeing the future.” Cody was talking to her but not looking at her. She was focused on some distant point on the horizon. “The field where we planted corn was lush and green with stalks head high. There were blue curtains in the windows of the house. And you were standing on the porch waving to me, as if I’d been gone for a while and had just come back.”

  Cody looked thin and tired, but when she turned to Lillie, some of the sparkle had returned to her eyes.

  “That sounds like a nice dream.” Lillie wasn’t sure what else to say or what response Cody was looking for.

  “That dream felt like home.”

  “This could be home, Cody.”

  “I think it already feels like it to me.” Cody moved closer to Lillie but didn’t reach out to her. “I’ve held back from saying this to you, Lillie. I’m not sure why, maybe fear, maybe doubt about myself, but…well, together I think we have something really special, something that I was looking for but didn’t even know it.”

  “I feel the same way.” Lillie brushed her hand up and down Cody’s arm hidden beneath the thin blanket.

  “When we had that argument in Council Grove you said I was just going along with everything, that I wasn’t making decisions for myself. Maybe you were right.”

  “Cody, I—”

  “But I’m not going to do that anymore. I do know what I want and whether I’ve been saying it out loud to you or not makes it no less true.”

  Lillie could stand the distance between them no longer. She put her arms around Cody and leaned against her chest.

  “We get to decide how we live our life. Wasn’t that the whole point of doing all of this in the first place? Wasn’t that why we got married?”

  “Yes, we get to decide.” Although Lillie wasn’t so sure any longer that freedom was the only reason she’d suggested they marry. She was fairly certain that on some deeper emotional level she’d known all along that she was attracted to Cody.

  “I know I said my plan was to go to California, but I’d like to stay here with you.”

  Lillie looked up at Cody’s face. “Oh, Cody, I want you to stay, more than anything. What we’re doing here we’re doing together for the both of us. I could never have done this without you.”

  Cody smiled and kissed Lillie on the cheek as she pulled her into the blanket still around her shoulders. “I guess we did it all backwards didn’t we?”

  “Maybe it was the only way it could have happened.” If they hadn’t married first and gotten close, they might never have explored a relationship. However it happened, Lillie was glad that it did.

  “Maybe so.” Cody smiled for the first time since the fever had struck.

  “Come on, let’s get you back to bed.” Lillie tugged Cody toward the house.

  “What about your painting?”

  “I’ll come back for it.”

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Spring gave way to summer, and Lillie began to think that rural life agreed with her. Her drive to paint was insatiable. Maybe it was the uncluttered landscape of the prairie. Maybe it was the air. Maybe it was Cody. Whatever the cause, she felt stirred and inspired to create.

  Sometimes she’d set her easel up at different times of day in the same spot just to capture the light and the sky in that moment.

  Mostly she painted landscapes, but on those days when rain kept them indoors she entertained herself with still life studies.

  She sat at the other end of the kitchen table watching Cody load her Colt Dragoon. Lillie moved the pencil across the paper in fluid strokes to sketch the tilt of Cody’s head, the expression of serious focus on her face, her fingers on the loading latch as she packed the powder, and finally, the dark shape of the six-cylinder revolver itself.

  “I hope you’re making me look good.”

  Lillie laughed. “Always. That’s the artist’s prerogative. What are you doing now?”

  Lillie had fired the gun a few times. Cody was teaching her to improve her aim, but as yet she hadn’t mastered the skill required to load it. That was Cody’s job.

  “I’m adding the percussion caps.” Cody pressed a small cap on the stem at the end of each cylinder. “It won’t fire without them.”

  “I’ll never remember all the steps to actually load the thing.”

  “And then most importantly, be sure the cylinder is rotated to one of the safety notches between the firing notches so that you don’t shoot yourself in the foot while you’re carrying it around.”

  “Got it. Don’t shoot my own foot off.”

  Cody smiled but didn’t look up from the pistol.

  Lillie set her drawing aside and got up to serve herself more tea.

  “I sent some of my paintings back to my old tutor in New York.” Lillie had rolled a group of paintings into a bundle tied with string and sent them through the post from Emporia.

  “You did?” Cody looked up. It was hard to read the expression on her face. She wasn’t sure why she hadn’t told Cody; for some strange reason she thought Cody might be upset. New York was her old life, her life before now, before them.

  “When I left New York I hadn’t painted in months. I wanted Mr. Weathers to know that I was painting again. He was always so supportive, despite the fact that I was a woman, and he was very disappointed when I left the city.” Lillie fussed with the handle of her teacup. “I think he thought I was never going to paint again. Maybe I did, too.”

  “Do you miss it a lot?”

  “What? New York?”

  “Yeah.”

  Lillie hesitated. The truth was she had been missing the comfort of home and family, but she’d been reluctant to say too much to Cody. She knew enough to know that Cody had no home to go back to. But she couldn’t help missing her family and the conveniences of living in a city.

  “Sometimes I miss it.”

  Cody slipped the revolver into the holster and hung the belt on a wooden peg near the front door. She stood and looked out the window. The rain was still steadily coming down.

  “This rain w
ill be really good for the corn.”

  “Are you bothered by what I just said?”

  “Why would I be?”

  “Well, why would you start talking about corn all of a sudden?”

  “It wasn’t all of a sudden. I was just looking at it out the window.” Cody pulled on a jacket. “I’m going to go see about Shadow. I’ll be back shortly.”

  Lillie wasn’t sure what to make of Cody’s abrupt subject change. Maybe her intuition had been correct. Not talking about things wasn’t an acceptable option as far as Lillie was concerned.

  *

  Cody slogged to the barn. She didn’t really need to check on the animals, but she needed to be alone. Why did that conversation upset her so much? She wasn’t even sure, but she’d had an immediate gut-clenching reaction to it. Probably because she knew that Lillie must be missing home. She’d heard enough details about Lillie’s life in New York to know that it must have been quite grand. It seemed to Cody that there would be a lot to miss, and the logical conclusion to that assessment was, why would Lillie stay here? What did Cody and the farm offer that could even hold a candle to Lillie’s previous life? Not to mention that Lillie could have no real career in Kansas as a painter.

  She’d announced to Lillie a month ago that she planned to stay. She’d even sent a letter to her sister, Ellen, to say as much. A short note to say that she was in Kansas and that she was okay and that as soon as she was truly settled she’d send for her. But since then, she’d occasionally get this twitchy uneasy feeling that all of this was too good to be true, that it couldn’t last. She was reluctant to send for Ellen until she was sure.

  Shadow nuzzled her, and she rested her forehead against his neck.

  The heavy door creaked behind her and she turned to find Lillie, soaking wet, standing in the dry dirt in the center of the barn.

  “Cody Walsh, will you please explain to me what’s wrong?”

  “Nothing’s wrong.”

  “Not as long as we’re talking about corn or plowing or potatoes.” Frustration was obvious on Lillie’s face.