A Family for Gracie

by Amy Lillard

  Gracie could hear the commotion even over the rattle of the buggy on the packed gravel. It sounded like a very unhappy child. The sound grew louder as the buggy grew near. It was nearly deafening by the time Matthew pulled to a stop. He got down from the buggy, barely acknowledging her with a dip of the brim of his hat. Then he went around to get the baby. Stephen climbed down from the front seat to get out of Matthew’s way, leaving Henry and the twins to crawl out of the driver’s side.

  Henry jumped down without any help. He landed solidly but managed to graze both knees on the ground. Thankfully it was only dirt, but she wasn’t sure Eunice would take kindly to all that coming into the house.

  “The baby’s crying,” he said to no one in particular.

  “Thank you,” Matthew replied, his exasperation apparent. Gracie wasn’t sure if it was all directed at his son or some of it was saved for the fact that once again the baby Grace was crying. Did she just wail nonstop?

  She noticed the twins were struggling and went to help them. The dark-haired one, she thought his name was Benjamin, looked up at her with such gratitude it made her heart melt. If only all of them looked at her that way. Or maybe just Matthew. But she was asking too much too soon from this impending marriage. Uh, upcoming marriage. That sounded better.

  “I’ll just take the baby inside,” Matthew hollered over Baby Grace’s cries.

  She nodded. What else could she do but stand there and nod as Matthew carried the screaming baby into the house, his boys following behind him like a trail of ducklings?

  * * *

  Matthew felt beyond guilty walking out of the house with the baby still crying. He couldn’t make her happy— so much like her mother—that much was notably apparent. So there was no sense in trying. But when she got like this it seemed no one could help her, and he hated to hand her off. But honestly he could use the break. Did that make him a bad father? He felt it did. And though he might still be angry with Beth, he had gained a better understanding of what she went through every day.

  It was pretty obvious that the baby didn’t like the carrier, but if he was being honest she still cried when he took her out of it. Only Gracie had been able to quiet the child. Gracie and sometimes Eunice, depending on how wound up the baby was before Eunice got her. Today just might be a disaster.

  “Don’t worry,” Eunice called behind him. “We’ve got this.” The we was made up of Eunice and her mother, who was at least ninety. They had said that Hannah had gone for a bit and would be back later, but who knew exactly what that meant. Hopefully she wouldn’t be gone long and the three of them would be able to take care of his rowdy brood. Henry alone really needed two people watching him at all times so if one blinked the other would catch it.

  “Danki,” he called over his shoulder, guilt burning a hole in his stomach. It mixed there with the nervousness of a date. Thirty years old and he was going on a date. With a woman he was going to marry in less than a week. Next Thursday, five days away.

  He caught Gracie’s gaze and made himself not look away. There was something in her eyes that seemed to know him. More than he wanted. It was as if she could see all his secrets. And he had a few. Ones he didn’t want to share.

  She looks at you with compassion now. How would she look at you if she knew the truth?

  He frowned at the thought. In the house behind him the cries abruptly stopped. The lack of sound made him stumble, his ears ringing from the almost quiet that surrounded him. Had they stuffed a rag in her mouth? He couldn’t say he blamed them. He loved the baby. He did. He was her father, but it was hard to live with someone who seemed to hate the very ground you walked on.

  “Are you ready to go?” His voice sounded rough and stern. Why did he always sound angry?

  Gracie took a step back instead of toward the buggy and he had a flash of feeling that she was about to tell him that he could go alone.

  Then the creases in her forehead smoothed out and she gave him a tentative smile. “Jah,” she said. She was really pretty when she smiled. It made him think of blue skies and daisies swaying in the wind.

  What? He must be going crazy from listening to the baby cry. Thinking about daisies and the sky.

  He shook his head at himself.

  “Are you okay?” she asked. There was that compassion again. Where did it all come from? She had more consideration for others than anyone he had ever known. And she was giving. That he knew from talking to some of the members of their church district.

  “I’m fine,” he growled.

  At least this time she didn’t shy away from him. It was a start. Maybe he would make it through this dating thing.

  Or not, he thought after they had been on the road a while. It had seemed like forever because she was just sitting there beside him on the bench, back straight, eyes forward, chin in the air. She hadn’t said a word since she asked him how he was, back at the house. It was as if she had shut down. But why?

  Because you’re not nice.

  He didn’t want to be nice. He didn’t want to scare her, but he also didn’t want her to get any ideas that their marriage could be anything more than it was right then. But it was tricky. They could be friends, but nothing more. Married, but not married. It was complicated.

  Still, he wanted her to talk to him from time to time. Like now.

  He cleared his throat. She didn’t move.

  “Nice day,” he grunted. Why did he always sound so rumbly? He didn’t want to scare the poor girl.

  You don’t scare your children. At least not unless you mean to.

  But that didn’t matter. His children and his soon-to-be wife were two entirely different matters.

  “Jah.” She dipped her chin just a smidge but otherwise didn’t move. She didn’t turn to look at him, to smile, or any of the things that Beth would have done back before they had gotten married, before they had started their family.

  They rode in silence a bit more. What had happened to his ability to hold a conversation with another person? It seemed to have left town. Or maybe he had been talking so much to his children lately that having the attention of a willing adult was more than his stunted brain could deal with. He definitely needed to get out more. Other than his trips to church every other week and his occasional jaunt into town, his associations with adults were nonexistent. Could being alone for three months make such a difference? But it was really more than three months. Beth had been born a quiet person and there at the end . . .

  He pulled that thought in. He didn’t want to think about Beth today. He had loved her, but as it turned out, love wasn’t quite enough. That love was part of the past, and the woman beside him was the future. It was time to stop looking back.

  “It’s going to get hot soon,” he said. He glanced her way. She was still sitting prim and proper, staring straight ahead. One hand was resting in her lap, the other braced on the bench between them to keep from swaying in that direction and accidentally touching him, he was certain.

  She waited a beat, then she shifted, turned her entire body toward him. “You don’t really want to talk about the weather, do you?”

  He stared at her blankly, then shook himself out of his surprised stupor and faced the front. They were driving down back roads made of red dirt and gravel. There were never many cars on these country lanes, but the ones that were usually traveled fast. And one thing he had learned about Mississippi roads: They curved around like nothing he had ever seen. Every quarter mile, sometimes less, there was another bend to go around. And in the early summer months, like now when the kudzu was thick and full, those curves became dangerous, blind corners. He needed to keep his eyes on the road instead of staring gape-mouthed at the woman beside him. Regardless of the surprising things she said.

  “Do you?” she asked again. Her tone was nearly a challenge. If he said no, she would be right. He could almost see her nod in self-satisfaction. If he said yes, as a matter of fact he did want to talk about the weather, he suspected that she would call him
out.

  He cleared his throat. “Not really.”

  There went that nod he’d been expecting. “People always feel that they should talk about something when they’re together. And two people who are just acquaintances will talk about the weather.”

  He understood her implied message: They weren’t just acquaintances. They were about to be married. “What would you like to talk about?”

  “Tell me about your children.” Mission accomplished, she turned back to the front and relaxed. A little. Sort of. Her back was still ramrod straight and her chin still high in the air.

  “Stephen is the oldest.” He figured that was the best place to start.

  She nodded. “He’s very mature for his age,” she said.

  “Jah. Always has been. I think he takes his role as the oldest very seriously. And since Beth passed . . .” He trailed off. He wasn’t going to talk about Beth today.

  “It’s okay,” Gracie said. “You don’t have to act like she didn’t exist. That would be ridiculous.”

  “It’s not that.” He wished he had kept his mouth shut. He didn’t want to explain, didn’t want to tell anyone about his relationship with his wife. Now the woman he was about to marry was going to ask, Then what is it? And he wouldn’t have the answer. Not one he was willing to share anyway.

  “Whenever you’re ready,” Gracie said.

  Once again he was so shocked by her words he turned to stare at her. “When I’m ready for what?”

  “To tell me whatever it is you’re stewing about over there.”

  It was on the tip of his tongue to tell her that he wasn’t stewing about anything when she continued.

  “Or you may not be ready to ever talk about it. And that’s okay too.”

  He had no words, so he simply nodded.

  “But I’m here for you,” she prattled on. “Whenever you’re ready. Just say the word.”

  He smiled to himself, glad that she had said that last part. Here he was thinking that she was some sort of super wife sent from heaven or God Himself. He wasn’t sure what to do with a wife like that. Beth had been a good wife, mostly, but not necessarily a wife he could boss around without question. He pushed the thoughts away. He wasn’t thinking about Beth today. But he had been the head of his household and she had been his partner. He was about to think that Gracie would be too agreeable and wouldn’t challenge him. She had seemed better than good, saying he could tell her about Beth when he was ready. Not that it was ever going to happen. He had thought her emotions to be detached maybe. Not of this world. But after her little spout off, he knew she was bothered by what secrets he kept, and that reduced her to human. Jah, he’d rather be married to one of those instead of an angel sent from above. Even if the marriage wasn’t one rooted in love.

  So he said the only thing he could. “Danki.”

  She nodded, then reached out a hand and braced it on the dash as the buggy lurched to one side. “What’s happening?”

  “I don’t know.” He tugged the reins to keep Cotton, his horse, from taking off. He was usually even-tempered, a good gelding for the job, but something had spooked him, and bad.

  Gracie let out a yelp of what he hoped was surprise and moved both hands to the dash to keep herself steady as the buggy pitched again.

  Something was wrong. Very wrong. He stuck his head out the window to get a better look.

  * * *

  “What is it?” Gracie asked as the buggy began to shake. She managed to keep her voice steady, but inside she was quaking worse than the buggy she was in. She had read stories about buggy accidents caused by spooked horses. Her biggest fear was to be pulled unwillingly into traffic. She closed her eyes at the thought, then opened them again as the crazy sway made her sort of queasy.

  “I’m not sure.” Matthew leaned his head out the window for what seemed like ten minutes but could only have been a couple of seconds, then he ducked back in. “The wheel is coming off.”

  Panic shot through Gracie. “The wheel is coming off?” It took everything she had not to take the reins from Matthew and pull on them with all her might. Why were they still moving if the wheel was coming off?

  “Not the whole wheel,” he explained. “Just the metal rim.”

  That was better, she supposed, but her fingers still tingled with panic. And his horse didn’t seem to care about the difference. He was dancing sideways, tossing his head as Matthew struggled to control him.

  Then the buggy started to slow. Thank heavens. Finally, after what seemed like forever, Matthew was stopping the buggy. Maybe not as quickly as she wanted him to, but most probably at a safer speed. Then the horse reared his head and started off once again.

  Chapter Seven

  She had never been as grateful for someone’s size as she had in that moment. Not many men could control a horse the way he did. His sheer strength and a calm demeanor saved them from what could have been a very terrible accident.

  Once the buggy was actually stopped, Matthew jumped down, throwing the reins to her. “Stay put,” he tossed over one shoulder as his feet hit the ground. Gracie wasn’t sure she liked being bossed around like that, but she couldn’t move just yet anyway. Her body parts seemed to be in all the wrong places. Her heart was in her throat, her stomach somewhere around her ankles, and the remainder of her legs had been replaced with spaghetti noodles.

  What could have happened kept circling in her thoughts with various ends, none of which were pleasant and most dealt with death.

  Matthew muttered something, and though she couldn’t understand the words, his tone was unmistakable. He was angry. Very angry.

  She slid from the buggy, somehow managing to make her wobbly legs support her body. This was a lot like the time she and her cousin Abby got into the secret stash of muscadine wine that Abner didn’t think anyone knew about. A couple of swigs of that and she felt as unsteady as she did now.

  Trailing her fingers along the side of the buggy for better balance, she walked around the back end of it. She didn’t want to spook his horse any more than he already was.

  Matthew was forcing the rim back on the fiberglass wheel. His face was red with the effort. They couldn’t travel without it. He let out a final grunt, then stood back to survey his work. Thankfully, the entire rim hadn’t come loose, just one side. Even more thankfully, he had managed to push it all the way back on. Now they could go again. Once the horse calmed down, of course.

  Yet Matthew smoothed one hand across the rim, stepped back, and shook his head. He took off his hat and wiped his sleeve against his brow.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “It’s not going to stay,” he said with a grim slant to his mouth.

  “It’s not?”

  “No. The rivet that was holding it on is missing. Here,” he said, pointing toward the little hole where the piece once was. “It’s just going to slip off again and I don’t think Cotton can handle that.”

  Cotton could only be the gelding who was still snorting out his displeasure over the whole ordeal.

  “What do we do?” She asked the question, but she already knew the answer.

  “We walk.” He squinted down the road in the direction they had come from, then walked around the back of the buggy to look in the direction they had been going. Gracie mutely followed. “Where are we?”

  She could only blink as his words settled around her. “You don’t know where we are?” Not to panic. She had lived here since she was a child and she knew these roads like the back of her hand. She looked in both directions. There were no houses in sight. There were a couple of badly dented mailboxes, so there had to be some, but they were so far back from the road that she couldn’t see them. The kudzu-covered trees kept them hidden from view.

  But her biggest concern? She had no idea where they were either. Her heart jumped back into her throat, but she swallowed it down and did her best to remain calm. “We must have missed a turn somewhere.”

  “You don’t know where we are either.�
��

  They had been so engrossed in their conversation, neither one had paid any attention to the signs directing them to Sarah’s Sweet Shop.

  She sighed. “We just need to walk back in the direction we came and eventually we’ll get to someplace we know.”

  “Good idea.”

  She grabbed her wallet out of the buggy, thankful that she hadn’t brought her big purse. She would hate to lug that thing down the road. Hannah was always teasing her about it. She filled it with everything she needed, then so many times left it at home, opting instead for the convenience of carrying only her wallet.

  Matthew unhitched Cotton from the buggy, talking to him in soothing tones. The horse seemed calmer than before, but she could tell that he was still upset. He had some personality, this horse. Now she wished she had her purse. Then she could give him a peppermint candy as a treat.

  Without a word, Gracie and Matthew headed back down the road, leading Cotton behind them.

  They walked in silence, but her mind wasn’t still. It was swirling around, trying to piece together the little parts of this situation that seemed . . . off a bit. Like the fact that they were now in the middle of nowhere, walking away from their broken buggy, when they had started out to get candy.

  She had heard about Englisch boys who took girls out on some back road, then feigned car trouble in order to be alone with them and not have to leave, because they were “stranded.” She was certain there had to be more to the trick. She didn’t know all the particulars, but she had a few ideas.

  She wanted to ask Matthew if he had done this on purpose so they would be forced to spend more time together. But why would he do that? She was more than willing to spend time with him. They were getting married! But more than that, once she got past his perpetual scowl, she found she liked spending time with Matthew Byler. And that was good.