“Dad!”
He laughed at whatever Paul’s comment was. “Here she is. You take care, Paul. Pleasure talking with you.”
Mr. Jensen offered Sierra the phone. She put her hand over the receiver and waited for him to close the door behind him as he left.
“Hi,” she said, trying to sound calm. “I’d apologize for my dad, but there’s no excuse for him when he gets like that.”
“I told him you looked good in blue, so the hair shouldn’t be a problem.”
Sierra laughed.
“It’s good to hear your laugh, little Daffodil Queen,” Paul said, his voice sounding clear and as close as if he were standing right beside her. Sierra closed her eyes and let his tender nickname for her melt into her heart.
“It’s really good to hear your voice,” Sierra echoed. She felt as if she might start to cry and pursed her lips together. Poor Paul had already paid for two phone calls and had endured an interview with her dad. The last thing he needed was to listen to her blubbering for sheer joy. “I got your letter today,” she said, forcing herself to be even-keeled.
“Good. So you know I was able to make arrangements to come on the 12th. Is it okay with you if I come to your graduation?”
“Yes, of course. I’d love to have you come. My friends and I are planning a party. Maybe a dinner. It will probably be here at my house. I’m so glad you’re coming.”
“Now, you are being honest with me, aren’t you? I’m not crashing your party or any other plans with your friends?”
“No, not at all! Having you here will be the best part of my whole graduation.”
Paul hesitated.
Sierra bit her lower lip, wondering if she had said too much. Had she sounded too eager? Too forceful? From the beginning, Paul had let her know that he wanted to take their relationship nice and slow. Never once had he signed his letters with the word “Love.” Never once had he written anything that indicated they were more than friends. Sierra was the one who kept running ahead, assuming and making more of the relationship than was actually there. She had tried so hard to pull back, go slowly, and be realistic. Had she ruined everything now?
“You know what?” Paul replied slowly. “Seeing you again will be the best part of my trip home.”
Sierra’s heart soared. This wasn’t the kind of response she expected to hear from Paul. Suddenly, she felt shy, which was out of character for her. Her mind raced with all the possibilities. What was he thinking? Was he ready to move forward in their relationship?
“I have a lot of things I’m eager to talk to you about, Sierra,” Paul continued. “It will be great to finally see you again and say those things face-to-face.”
“Uh-huh” was the only sound that came from Sierra’s lips. She chided herself and scrambled to find something more intelligent to say.
Paul went on. “Remember that café we went to last year?”
“Yes. Carla’s.” Sierra spilled out the words quickly. “Of course I remember.”
“Good. I’m hoping you remember how to get there. I thought it would be nice to stop in for a mug of good Northwest coffee. I know this is pathetic, but I’ve even had dreams about mocha lattes like I used to get at a little drive-through place. I seem to remember Carla’s Café had pretty good coffee, too.”
“Oh,” Sierra said. Another brilliant response. She couldn’t help but feel her emotions plummet when he said he had been dreaming about coffee at Carla’s. Sierra had dreams about the same place, only in her dreams she and Paul were at the same table by the window where they had sat a year ago. This time, instead of his teasing her because he had heard she had a crush on him, Paul was holding her hand and confessing his love for her.
“What did you think of the rest of my letter?” Paul asked.
“To tell you the truth—” Sierra began.
She was going to confess to not having had a chance to read the rest of his letter, but Paul interrupted her and said, “Of course you’ll tell me the truth. That’s what you do best. You’re a proclaimer, Sierra. You proclaim the truth. That’s one of the things I wanted to tell you face-to-face, but I guess I’ll say it now. I know I’ve given you a hard time in the past about being zealous. Lately I’ve come to appreciate that quality in you, and I wanted to tell you.”
“Thanks.” All Sierra could think at the moment was how her truth speaking might have just “proclaimed” Amy out of her life for good. But all she said to Paul was, “I appreciate your encouragement.”
“I’m the one who appreciates your encouragement,” Paul said. “Your letters have meant so much to me this year. So have all the verses you sent me, and all the prayers I know you’ve prayed for me. You’ll never know what a difference you’ve made in my life. I’m serious, Sierra. I really think God used you in a big way to turn my life around, and that’s why I wrote the poem for you that I put at the end of the letter. It’s the first poem I’ve written just for you.”
He paused again. All she could say was, “Thanks, Paul.” It would be too awkward to mention she hadn’t read the whole letter now.
“I was going to wait and read it to you when I saw you, but I decided to go ahead and send it. Some things are easier to say on paper than in person.”
“That’s true,” Sierra said.
“Well, I guess I’d better hang up or I won’t have enough money left to buy either of us a cup of coffee by the time we get to Carla’s.”
Sierra quickly tried to think of what she should ask him before he hung up. “Do you need a ride from the airport?”
“No, Uncle Mac is picking me up.”
“What time do you get in?”
“Around ten o’clock.”
“In the morning on the 12th?” Sierra asked hopefully. “No, ten at night.”
“Well, I’m just glad you’re coming. It will be so good to see you again and finally talk in person.” Sierra tried hard to contain her feelings. She wanted to blurt out crazy words like, “I love you, Paul Mackenzie! I can’t wait to throw my arms around you and smell that pine-tree fresh aftershave you wear.”
Fortunately for both of them, she kept her wild thoughts to herself.
“I’ll give you a call from the Highland House when I get in. Or maybe it’ll be the morning of the 13th if I arrive too late. It’s less than a week and a half away.”
“I know,” Sierra said in a voice that revealed her eager heart. “I’ll be counting the days.”
After a tiny pause, Paul said just before hanging up, “So will I, Daffodil Queen.”
five
SIERRA FELT as if all the air had been sucked from the room when she heard the click on Paul’s end of the line. She was still standing in the middle of the den where she had taken the phone from her dad. The whole time she and Paul had talked, Sierra hadn’t moved. She hadn’t even thought of sitting down. It was as if she had been suspended in time and space. Maybe if she closed her eyes tightly enough, Paul’s voice would come back over the dead line of the phone she still held to her ear. But the only sound she heard was the wail of the dial tone.
As though pulling herself out of a deep dream and back to the dawn of a new day, Sierra opened her eyes slowly and forced herself to return the phone to its cradle. She wanted to remember every word, every nuance.
The poem! My poem! She hurried from the den and grabbed her backpack from the coat tree in the entryway.
“Is everything all set with Paul’s trip?” Mrs. Jensen asked, stepping into the entryway.
“Yes. He’ll be here the night of the 12th, after ten o’clock.” Sierra reached into the backpack and pulled out Paul’s letter. “So that ruins our plans for the dinner party.”
“Our plans for the dinner party?” Mrs. Jensen questioned.
“Oh. I didn’t talk to you about it yet. We were all talking about having a dinner party for graduation. Amy said she could get lobsters.” As soon as she mentioned Amy, Sierra remembered the way her friend had hung up on her twenty minutes ago. She needed to
call Amy back. And she needed to talk over the dinner party plans with her mom. But all she wanted to do was flee to her room, where she could read Paul’s letter and take into her heart the poem he had written for her alone.
“And you wanted to have the party here?” Mrs. Jensen asked.
“Yes, if that’s okay. But now I don’t know when to have it. We thought the day before graduation, but Paul won’t be here in time, and I really want him at the party.”
“It could be just as special with your friends and without Paul,” Mrs. Jensen said.
An image flashed into Sierra’s mind of her being paired with Warner, and she said, “No, believe me, Mom, it won’t be the same. I only want to have it when Paul’s here.”
They stood in the hallway, discussing options, but none seemed to work.
Mr. Jensen, who could hear them talking from the living room, called out, “Why don’t you have it the night of graduation? We can have the family over the night before. Then they can go home right after graduation, and you can have your friends over. Isn’t the ceremony at two? That’ll give you plenty of time for a fancy dinner.”
“What about the other kids, Howard? Won’t they have family parties on graduation day?”
“Amy doesn’t,” Sierra said. “Her graduation is this weekend. And Randy hasn’t said anything about a lot of company. It didn’t sound good for Vicki, but maybe we could work something out.”
“I suppose it’s worth a try,” Mrs. Jensen said. “Let me know as soon as you find out for sure, and I’ll make the calls to our family.”
Sierra went back to the den and took the letter with her. Eventually she would get to it, but first she had some calls to make. Sierra dialed Amy’s number and waited for her to pick it up, not exactly sure what to say. On the sixth ring, Amy answered.
“It’s me. I’m sorry. Can we talk?”
“Why do you do this, Sierra? Things are going nice and smooth in our friendship, and then you have to say something that puts us both on edge.”
“I’m not sorry for what I said, just the way I said it. I could have said it a lot better.”
“Oh, really?”
“Can we talk about something else for a minute? It’s the dinner party at my house. Paul doesn’t get in until late on the night of the 12th. My dad suggested we have the party on Friday night, after the graduation ceremony, which is at two o’clock. What do you think?”
“I think it’s amazing the way you can switch moods so fast.”
“Me switch moods? You’re the one who switches moods all the time, Amy.”
“But I don’t go around telling you you’re going to hell and then call back and say, ‘By the way, can you bring the lobsters over Friday?’ ”
Sierra sighed. “Did it really sound like that, Amy? I’m sorry. Can we put the whole heaven and hell topic to the side until our Monday get-together? I want to talk about it more and tell you why I feel strongly about it, but I think it would be better with Vicki there, too.”
“Why? So you can gang up on me?”
“No, of course not.”
“You and Vicki have no idea what I believe or where I am in my relationship with God.”
“Exactly,” Sierra said. “And that’s why I want to talk about it. I always let you talk about the things that are important to you; now I think it’s only fair you let me talk about what’s important to me.”
Amy paused, then said, “Okay, you’re right. We can talk Monday. And yes, I think next Friday would be a good night for the dinner, mostly because I already have the night off.”
“Good,” Sierra said. “Great, actually. I’m going to call everyone else to see if we can set it up for then.”
“Okay. I’ll talk to you later.”
Sierra called Vicki and Randy and told them the plan. They both said they would try to convince their parents to have their family parties the night before like Sierra’s family. Neither of them expected many relatives to come, so it sounded like a good possibility. Randy agreed to call the guys in the band with the same information, and Vicki said she would call Margo and a couple of other girls they were thinking of inviting.
That settled, Sierra eagerly headed for her room, where she could read the rest of Paul’s letter without being interrupted. Passing the living room, she stopped in the doorway to watch the end of a funny commercial with her parents. Then she told them the plans were working out. Mrs. Jensen said she would make the arrangements tomorrow and told Sierra to relax about everything.
“This is your graduation, honey. We want you to have a memorable time and enjoy the occasion with both your friends and your family.”
On impulse, Sierra dashed over to the couch and gave her mom and dad a big hug. “You guys are the best parents in the world. Did you know that?”
Her startled parents gave each other looks of pleased surprise.
Mr. Jensen said, “Would you mind convincing Gavin of that? He’s still upset that we won’t let him go to the Burnside Skate Park on Saturday with his friends from school.”
“He wants to go there?” Sierra said. “He’s too young. Almost all the skaters there are in high school and much more experienced on skateboards than Gavin. They would run over him. Besides, the Rose Parade is this Saturday. Downtown will be jam-packed with people.”
“That’s right,” Mrs. Jensen said. “We should go to the parade—as a family.”
“I have to work,” Sierra said. “And I can’t take time off because Mrs. Kraus already gave me the next weekend off for graduation.”
“We still might go,” Mrs. Jensen said. “It could be a nice outing for Granna Mae if the weather is clear.”
“I’m going to bed,” Sierra said. “Thanks again for adjusting the family plans for me.”
“Flexibility is a sign of good mental health,” Sierra’s dad said.
Sierra looked to her mom for an explanation.
“He’s been reading those pamphlets the doctor gave us last week at Granna Mae’s checkup.”
Sierra nodded her understanding and headed upstairs with Paul’s letter in hand. Sierra’s grandmother had an undiagnosed condition that had grown worse over the last few years. She was sometimes as normal and clear thinking as ever, but then, without warning, she would blip into another dimension and become lost and confused. Sierra and her family had moved here a year and a half ago to be with Granna Mae in her large Victorian house and to care for her. The Jensen family adored Granna Mae and was understanding and considerate of her difficulties most of the time. But every now and then watching her became exhausting, especially for Sierra’s mom, who had to do most of the overseeing.
Alone in the cluttered haven of her beloved bedroom, Sierra went directly to the overstuffed chair by the window. She pulled back the sheer curtains and pushed the chipped wooden window frame all the way up. She had to use a board to keep it open. The soothing night breezes invited themselves in, ruffling the sheers. Two birds in the huge cedar tree began a happy concert of night songs. The sky, painted a hazy periwinkle blue in the late dusk, showed off its prized jewel, a crescent-shaped ivory moon hanging above the cedar tree.
Sierra drew in a deep breath, filling her lungs with the sweet fragrance of late spring and filling her heart with a prayer of thankfulness to God for all the beauty He had placed in her life. If she was grateful to her earthly parents for their love and understanding, she was even more grateful to her heavenly Father for His lovingkindness to her.
Feeling like celebrating, Sierra lit a candle she had received as a birthday present from Vicki months ago. Since Vicki knew Sierra liked daffodils, the candle was in the shape of a bright yellow daffodil blossom. It rested on a saucer with the trumpet part of the flower facing up and the wick in the middle of the trumpet.
Sierra placed the lit daffodil candle on her dresser. Gazing at her reflection in the mirror, she fussed a little with her unruly hair. She rummaged for some lip gloss and applied it to the cracked skin on the right corner of her mouth. Th
en she whispered another prayer of thanks to God for protecting her and Vicki from the near-collision with the pickup.
Since the night was still young, Sierra decided to treat herself to something she had done only a few times because it took so long. She decided she would read Paul’s letter and then go back and read all the letters he had ever written to her. She kept them in the large bottom drawer of her dresser in an old hatbox she had found at Christmastime in the attic. Her dad had sent her there in search of more Christmas lights, and when she had found the old silver and gray box, she had fallen in love with it. A handful of yellowed tissue paper was stuffed into the box, but the hat Granna Mae had once stored there was long gone.
Pulling open the bottom drawer, Sierra extracted the hatbox and settled herself by the window for a long visit with Paul’s precious words on a glorious spring evening.
The new letter came first. She skimmed the part she had already read that afternoon about his plans to come on the 12th and then read on.
As I’ve been preparing to leave here, I’ve been surprised at how much my life and my heart have changed since I arrived on a blustery day last June. I guess I blew into Edinburgh with about the same level of cool indifference to God as the storm that came in with me. The seasons changed, and so did I. I actually feel I’ve lived several lifetimes in the twelve months I’ve been here. Several seasons, at least.
For the first time in my life, I truly know God. Is that too bold to declare? It’s what I feel. He’s no longer just all around me or visible in the lives of people like my dad and my grandfather. He is alive in me. My life is no longer mine to control. I’m hidden inside His eternal life, and for as long as I walk this earth, the Good Shepherd will direct me.
You know that image of Christ’s being the Good Shepherd, don’t you? It’s in John 10. Lately that chapter has become very real to me, especially the parts, “… he calls his own sheep by name,” and “I am the door of the sheep.… If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.” I’ve finally entered through that door, and I’m finding pasture, as the verse says.
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