He returned to his mother’s room to find her ready and waiting to be released.
“Where’s Jessica?” she asked.
“Gone back to her hotel,” Paul answered.
“Something’s wrong,” his mother observed. “What is it, Paul?”
“Nothing for you to worry about,” he assured her. “Where do you want to go, home or my place?”
“Home,” she insisted. “Then I want you to go meet Jessica and get whatever it is that happened at lunch straightened out.”
“Wish it were that simple, Mom,” Paul muttered. “But it’s not. Besides, the doctor said your blood sugar needs to be checked regularly, so I’m staying with you the rest of the weekend. Norma will take over again on Monday.”
“That’s nonsense and unnecessary,” she scoffed. “When the Lord heals, He heals completely.”
“Maybe so, Mom, but if that’s true, why hasn’t He healed you of your other ailments?”
“What ailments?” Rosalie demanded.
“The doctor calls it the early stages of dementia.”
“Oh, pooh,” she replied. “There’s nothing wrong with me that a good old-fashioned dose of life can’t help. There’s no cure for loneliness, Son, except family, which is exactly why you need to settle down and give me some grandchildren to spoil.”
Paul smiled down at her. “I’m working on it, Mom. Always open to the idea. The right woman hasn’t come along yet.” Until now, his heart added, but he kept that thought to himself.
When the orderly appeared in order to wheel his mother out, Paul went to pull the car around to the hospital entrance. He waited until they were on their way to her home before continuing the conversation.
“If you’re so lonely, Mom, why won’t you consider moving into a retirement community or home?”
“I do not want to live with a bunch of strangers.”
“Aren’t you the one who always said that a stranger is just a friend in disguise?”
She rolled her eyes. “I hate it when you do that.”
“What?” he asked, trying to sound innocent.
“Use my own words against me.”
He chuckled. “It’s the law, Mom. Anything you say can and will be used against you,” he teased.
She snorted.
“Seriously though,” Paul continued. “Moving might be the best thing. There are communities where you can have your own home or an apartment where you can be closer to others. There’s an activity center with get-togethers planned for everyone and always someone nearby.”
“And what would I do with all this?” she asked waving her hand to encompass her home and property as Paul pulled into the driveway.
Paul waited to continue the conversation until she was settled on the couch and he in the recliner. “We’ve been over this before, Mom. You can sell the house and property. Or, I’ll buy you a home wherever you want and keep this; your choice.”
“My choice is to stay here, where I’ve lived most of my life. There’s plenty of room for you to build your own home on this land, and we’ll all be together as a family should. Case closed,” she added, holding up a hand to signify the conversation’s end.
Paul shook his head and refrained from comment. This was one argument he’d never win, and he knew better than to say another word.
****
Monday morning dawned bright and early. Dressed in a pair of jogging shorts and a T-shirt, Paul took his daily run around his old neighborhood. Not much had changed since he lived here as a boy. On one level, he understood why his mother didn’t want to leave. On the other hand, one couldn’t stop life, and sometimes life required change. That thought rolled into another and quickly progressed to the situation with Jessica. Paul was anxious to get to the office to see what he could discover. Finishing his run, he showered and dressed for work, breakfasted with his mother, then, when Norma arrived, went over the glucose journal they’d kept. Promising to call and check on her later, he left his mother and went straight to the office, relieved to find he had a relatively light caseload for the day.
Instructing that he not be disturbed unless his mother, her nurse, or Jessica called, he closed the door behind him and went to work.
Two-and-a-half hours later, he was in a much better frame of mind. Things weren’t as hopeless as he thought. Before he could pick up the phone to call Jessica, there was a knock on his door. It was Debra.
“You’ve a visitor,” she remarked. “I told her you’d be leaving soon, in ten minutes to be exact,” she said, consulting her watch. “But she insists on seeing you.”
“Who is it?” he queried.
“Jessica Aucoin.”
“Send her in,” Paul said, rising from his seat. The door hadn’t had time to close on Debra’s departing figure when Jessica walked through it. “Hey,” Paul greeted, walking around his desk to meet her. “I was just trying to call you.”
Jessica stiffened as he reached for her. “I came to say good-bye,” she said, and stepped back.
“But I have good news for you,” he countered.
She shook her head. “You’ve made it painfully obvious that you’re not happy with the situation—a situation that I can’t change by the way. So, I’m going home. Thank you for the help with my contract. I’ll pay your secretary on my way out.”
Before she could escape through the door, Paul stepped around her and slammed it shut. “Just like that?” he asked, his eyes narrowed into tiny slits. “You dump all this on me then run off like some coward before we can even discuss it? I don’t think so,” he remarked. “Not after Saturday. Not after what we shared.”
Debra’s voice cut off Jessica’s response. “You’ve a call on line one. Person says it’s urgent.”
Paul swore. “Don’t move,” he ordered and stepped over to the desk to take the call.
Jessica listened to his end of the conversation with mounting dread, his answers giving credence to its subject. When he turned to her, his face a mask of frustration and fury, she had no doubt that the call either was about or was Jasper.
“Will you hold the line a minute,” she heard Paul bark as she slipped through the door.
“Jessica, wait!”
“Why?” she demanded and turned on him in an angry whirl. “So you can tell me how foolish and irresponsible I’ve been too? Don’t you think I know that by now? But I can’t change the past, and I can’t seem to do anything about the present!”
He opened his mouth, and then closed it again before turning to his secretary who was staring at them with a mixture of concern and curiosity.
“Get on line one and take a number then reschedule everything else for today. I’m going to lunch with the Board of Directors of Loyola then taking the afternoon off.”
“What do you want me to tell them?” The secretary asked.
He fairly growled. “I don’t care what you tell them, just reschedule.” He turned back to Jessica and took her by the arm. His movements were decisive, but his grip was gentle as he escorted her to the parking garage. “Will you wait and talk to me this afternoon?” he asked, and turned her to face him. His hands rested lightly on her waist.
“I’ve already checked out of the hotel.”
“So,” he said. “Sight see, go shopping, visit my mother, do anything, just don’t leave. If I could get out of this meeting, I would, but I can’t. Wait for me,” he implored. “Meet me at Café Du Monde, one o’clock.”
Jessica hesitated a moment then nodded her consent.
“Good. Where’s your car?”
“Right next to yours,” she answered.
Only when he’d seen her safely into her car, did Paul allow himself the kiss he so desperately wanted. His lips covered hers in a tender caress, lingered, and then brushed over her cheek to whisper in her ear. “I’ll see you in a while.”
He climbed into his car and drove to the meeting, his mind preoccupied with Jessica and Jasper Tanner.
Arriving at the restaurant after everyone e
lse was seated; he apologized, for being late, and tried to focus on the discussion around the table. As the meeting wore on, he found himself more and more distracted and unable to concentrate, so he excused himself and hurried to Café du Monde, only to find Jessica gone, and a note in her stead.
Paul,
I know that the sins of our past are washed away by the Blood of Jesus to be remembered by God no more. Wish it were that easy for the rest of us. I guess though, that some reap what they sow forever.
PS: I fear I am a coward after all.
Paul felt as though he’d been kicked in the gut. His first instinct was to crumple the note and toss it in the nearest trashcan. The words from a song traipsed through his mind, something about a ‘tear stained letter.’
Unfolding the page, he smoothed it out as much as possible, noted the splotched ink, read between the lines, and knew that she’d neither been cold nor unemotional at the time of the writing.
And he was not going to let her go that easily.
It took less than two days to rearrange his work and class schedule and make plans for Norma to stay with his mother. Thursday morning, Paul called the office before embarking on his journey to Everglades, Florida. Debra’s harried tone sent a shiver of apprehension down his spine.
“I think you’d better come in. There’s someone here to see you. He’s very insistent.”
“Who is it?”
“Jasper Tanner.”
“Have him wait in my office, and I’ll be right there.” Paul turned his car around and put in a call to the Chief of Police. A patrol car pulled up to the office within moments of his arrival. Paul consulted with the officers a moment then went inside. He stopped at Debra’s desk and scribbled the police are here on a piece of paper, and then entered his office. Before Jasper could utter the first whine, Paul pinned him against the wall in a death grip, his teeth clenched as tightly as the fist on Jasper’s shirt.
“I’m warning you one time and one time only, quit harassing me and stay away from Jessica.”
The police entered as arranged and took Jasper into custody.
****
Spanish moss hung like gossamer curtains in huge Cypress trees, a Roseate Spoonbill rose gracefully from where it had been drinking in her pond. Birds sang their joyous praise. But all Jessica heard was the Mocking bird scolding her.
What had she done?
The fifteen-hour trip from New Orleans had been long and miserable. She’d cried as many tears as the miles she drove. Arriving home in the early hours of Tuesday morning, she’d collapsed into a blue funk unlike any she’d ever known. Depression and misery were her only companions, and more tears than a body should be able to produce.
Curling up in the antique rocker on her porch, Jessica sipped a cup of hot Chamomile tea and watched brilliant orange give way to yellow, gold and peach while the sun slipped from the sky. The moon rose in its place, full and glowing. Stars twinkled to life in the heavens.
Still, she found no peace.
Tears slipped slowly down her cheeks, and she contemplated the mess that was her life. Hearing an approaching vehicle, she put down her now-cold tea, and stood when it turned into her drive. Reaching inside the door, she turned on the porch light as the car came to a halt and the driver disembarked. What are you doing here? She wanted to ask but couldn’t get the words past the lump of emotion clogging her throat.
Paul watched a kaleidoscope of emotions flitter across her lovely features as he walked up on the porch–a glimmer of hope, a glint of fear, a shadow of pain. Stopping an arm’s length away, he cupped her cheek in his hand. “We never did finish our discussion,” he murmured. He pulled her against his chest as she burst into tears.
“Why are you here?” she wailed.
“Do you honestly think I’d let the one woman in the world who can move me with a single smile walk away without a by-your-leave?”
“What about Jasper?”
“The marriage wasn’t legal, Jessica. First, you were both minors and second, it wasn’t consummated.” He watched her closely. “Was it?”
She shook her head.
“So, you see, it’s not binding; not in the legal sense nor in the biblical. You’re a brilliant woman, Sweetheart, surely you know that.”
“That’s what my father says. But Jasper keeps insisting otherwise, stating that it’s the laws of Nevada that count, not Florida.”
“Honey, the man’s a nut case,” Paul said. “Don’t worry, though, I know exactly how to put a stop to the shenanigans of Jasper Tanner.”
“How?” she wanted to know.
“For starters there’s a restraining order…” He let his words trail off when she shook her head.
“I’ve tried that. He doesn’t bother me here, only where it’s not enforceable. Then, there are the chat rooms and message boards online where he constantly maligns my reputation.”
“Well, then, how about a law suit? Slander, defamation of character, stalking.”
“Who would take that case?” she questioned. “His father’s the Governor of Florida.”
“I’d take that case,” Paul said. “And I’d win, too,” he assured. “But if you think it’s useless, there’s only one other solution.”
“What?” she asked, afraid to hope he’d found one.
“You should get married.”
Jessica’s lips slowly curled into a smile and then laughter burst forth. “You call that a proposal?”
He grinned. “No, but this is,” he remarked, and pulled a tiny diamond ring out of his pocket while dropping to one knee. “Jessica Aucoin, will you marry me?”
Her exuberant response nearly tumbled them to the floor.
****
Three months later in the early fall morning, they watched workmen lay the foundation for their new home. “I still can’t believe it,” Jessica breathed and tightened Paul’s arms around her waist.
He rested his cheek against her head. “Believe what?”
“That all it took to get Jasper off my case was to get married. All of the blogs and forums where he posted things against me have been shut down or his posts erased and I haven’t heard from him in months.”
Paul chuckled. “I have a confession to make. Jasper showed up at my office the day I left to follow you to Florida.”
She turned her eyes wide and full of questions.”What happened?”
“I had him arrested. The Judge ordered him to cease and desist all activities against you and to remove all liable and slanderous material he’d posted on the Internet otherwise Jasper would see the inside of a New Orleans jail cell for an undetermined length of time.”
She laughed and threw her arms around his neck. “How on earth did you manage all that without me even knowing?”
He twirled her around. “It pays to have connections,” he admitted with a laugh and set her on her feet.
She placed her hand against his cheek and emitted a lusty sigh, “My hero,” she murmured, her arms sliding around his neck, her lips reaching to receive his kiss.
Dear Reader,
We all make mistakes in our lives. Some are easily forgiven though not always quite so easily forgotten. The good news is that the Blood of Jesus washes us as white as snow and God remembers not the sins of our past.
We shouldn’t either.
If you don’t know Him already, I pray that you will seek to know the Lord Jesus Christ and if you do, that you will pursue a closer walk with Him.
As always may God BLESS and keep you and yours always in the palm of His mighty hand!
Pamela S Thibodeaux
“Inspirational with an Edge!” ™
Review of Love
Judge not, that you be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged also.
Matthew 7:1-2
Jason Stockwell watched from his small patio as Kylie rounded the corner and then jogged up the stairs to her apartment. As was his custom, he fantasized about following in her wake and…. His breath jagge
d in and out of his lungs, heart thundered in his chest and palms sweated. The sound of running water upstairs didn’t help his state of mind as he envisioned her in the shower.
He closed his eyes and willed his emotions into some semblance of order. His hand shook as he raised the coffee cup to his mouth. The scorching liquid burned his tongue, and a curse hissed between his lips. Should have known it was still too hot, he berated himself. Especially since this same scenario happened every single day!
To say Kylie Erickson intrigued him would be the understatement of the century. His infatuation had begun five years ago, in college. They’d taken several writing and journalism classes together, but he’d never had the intestinal fortitude to ask her for a date. He always knew she was destined for greatness, and he’d followed her career, silently cheering her on with each accomplishment. Then, a year ago The Sparkling Star Report commissioned him to review her work and interview her. He’d already purchased and read every book she’d written, therefore the assignment was both pleasure and agony. Rereading and reviewing each novel was pure joy, and the evaluations appeared in an on-going segment in the popular magazine. Though the publication was known as a “rag mag,” he did his best to present an honest and straightforward opinion of each book and every interview he produced.
Unable to secure an appointment with the prolific author, he was thrilled when she moved into his apartment building in a unit just above the one in which he lived. He’d hatched a plan to coax her into an interview, but he could barely bring himself to approach her.
Hence his agony.
He couldn’t get over his innate shyness to share more than a few words much less have a meaningful conversation with her. It hadn’t taken long for her to recognize him as the SSR reporter, and from the day she realized who he was, she ignored him.
Love in Season Page 13
