Summer of Joy

by Ann H. Gabhart

  She’d already talked to David. He’d called after Jocie got to the Banner to see how she was feeling. She told him she couldn’t go anywhere that night barring a miracle and nobody would want to waste a miracle on a cold that would go away in a few days. She hadn’t called her mother yet. She’d wait till tomorrow morning for that. She hadn’t planned to drive to Grundy till late Christmas Day anyway. And then David was going to drive up for dinner with her parents on the day after Christmas.

  She’d had plans. All kinds of plans that were going down the drain. She yanked off a piece of toilet tissue and blew her nose with a loud honk. She rubbed that horrible smelling salve all over her chest, took two aspirins, and crawled under the covers on her bed. The Christmas presents would just have to wait.

  She lay there feeling extra miserable for a long time before she dozed off. Then she dreamed she was running. She had to keep running. Somebody was chasing her. She wasn’t really afraid. More worried that whoever it was might catch up with her. She kept looking over her shoulder, but she couldn’t see anybody. She knew somebody was there, though. Knew somebody was coming after her.

  She turned her eyes back to the dim path in front of her, and there in the distance was David, smiling and holding his hand out toward her. Relief exploded inside her. It was going to be okay. David was waiting for her. But then roses started raining down around her, landing on her shoulders and in her hair. David stopped smiling and dropped his hand. She tried to run faster to get to him, but she slipped on the rose petals. She couldn’t move. She couldn’t get to him. He looked so sad as he began turning away. She yelled his name, but he didn’t hear her. The roses piled up around her feet and behind her someone was reaching for her. She screamed.

  Leigh jerked awake, not sure whether she’d actually screamed out loud or not. She was soaking wet. Her fever must have broken. She lay still while her heart slowed its gallop as she pulled herself out of the molasses of the dream. She surely must be the only woman in the universe who could have a nightmare about getting roses.

  But even awake the roses scared her. Not the actual roses, but what David might think when Jocie told him about them. He might remember his worries about being too old for Leigh. He might feel bad that he couldn’t buy her roses. He might think she needed roses. He might think he shouldn’t encourage her to love him. He might not believe that in fact there was nothing he could do to discourage her from loving him. A thousand secret admirers and a million roses couldn’t change that one way or another. He had her heart already.

  She got out of bed and headed for the bathroom. She needed a shower. The hot water pounded down on her head as she breathed in the steam. Once she thought she heard the phone ringing, but she didn’t turn the shower off to be sure. Whoever it was could call back.

  16

  David walked down the street to the Appliance Center and paid off the refrigerator at noon. He didn’t save out money for the flower shop. How could two roses compete with a dozen? Even Jocie had been impressed before Zella had said who must have sent them to Leigh.

  Edwin Hammond. The teacher from Neptune. He was making Jocie’s life miserable at school. No doubt about that. David hadn’t figured out why. He’d talked to the man, listened patiently to his complaints about Jocie, but David hadn’t understood the problem. He knew Jocie could talk out of turn at times. He knew Jocie didn’t mind pointing out when people were wrong about something. He knew Jocie sometimes thought she didn’t need to learn anything else when it came to writing, and in truth, the girl had a gift for words.

  Most of her teachers praised and encouraged her gift. Not Edwin Hammond. He marked up Jocie’s writing assignments with a red pen until it looked as if the papers were bleeding. Nitpicking things about a comma here or there and her o’s not being round enough and not enough spacing after punctuation marks. Then after Jocie had used a ruler to make the spaces after the periods in her next paper, he’d marked them as too wide. If the idea wasn’t so far out in left field, David might believe Mr. Hammond picked on Jocie because he was envious of her natural writing ability.

  Zella said that same Edwin Hammond was Leigh’s secret admirer. Now it was somebody else’s turn to be envious. Envious of the man’s age. Of the man’s flare. Roses from a secret admirer, indeed. It sounded like something straight out of one of Zella’s romance novels.

  How could he fight youth and romantic flare? Should he even try? If a person truly loved another person, he wanted the best for her. Maybe Edwin Hammond was the best man for Leigh. Maybe David was wrong to stand in the way of a man who might make Leigh happier than he ever could. A man more her age. Not someone tied down with family responsibilities. And a calling as a man of God.

  As he walked up the street back to the Banner offices, he slipped his hand in his pocket and felt the ring box. The words Wes had said echoed in his ears. Faint heart never won fair maiden. Is that what he was? Faint of heart? A verse from Psalms popped into his mind. Be of good courage, and he shall strengthen your heart, all ye that hope in the Lord.

  That was what he needed. His heart strengthened. His courage boosted. He did hope in the Lord. And trust in him. If the Lord had sent Leigh as a blessing to David and his family, another man sending her roses wasn’t going to change that. Didn’t he think Leigh was capable of making the choice that was best for her? If her heart had been touched by another man’s attentions, by another man’s roses, she’d tell him.

  And a cold wasn’t going to keep him from letting her make that choice. He had the ring in his pocket. The Lord was going to give him the courage to lay his heart out in front of her. David didn’t know exactly how, but somehow before the end of the day, he was going to pull the ring out of his pocket and give it to Leigh. Maybe her getting the roses was a good thing.

  They shut down the office officially for Christmas at three. David took Jocie home. Aunt Love and Tabitha were baking cookies while Stephen Lee lay on a blanket on the living room floor staring at the Christmas tree. When Jocie knelt down beside him to put her wrapped presents under the tree, the baby smiled and kicked and threw out his arms as if trying to propel himself off the floor into her arms.

  It worked. Jocie grabbed up the baby and bounced him up and down in the air in front of her face. “Look here. Santa Claus has already come and left this very best Christmas present.” The baby squealed as Jocie kissed his cheeks. Jocie smiled over his head at David. “I can’t wait until morning. It’s going to be so much fun with everybody here. You’ve got to talk Leigh into coming even if she is still sneezing.”

  “Do you want her here that much?” David asked.

  “Sure. Don’t you?” Jocie kept her eyes on him. “I mean, you are in love with her, aren’t you?”

  “You do have a way of getting straight to the point.”

  “That’s what newspaper reporters are supposed to do, aren’t they?” Jocie didn’t wait for him to answer her as she started swinging the baby back and forth. “Me and Stephen Lee could write a story for you. Who? You and Leigh. What? A big date. When? Tonight. Where? Leigh’s place. Why?” Jocie grinned at him. “Maybe me and Stephen Lee should let you answer that one.”

  “That might be best.” David put his hand in his pocket and rubbed the ring box.

  Jocie danced Stephen Lee across the room to David. “Give your granddaddy a hug so he can go out and slay dragons and win fair maiden.” She held the baby up to David.

  David took the baby and kissed the curls on top of his head. Jocie was right about the baby. He was a gift, just as she had been. He stroked Stephen Lee’s back as he looked at Jocie and said, “You don’t mind?”

  “Mind what?”

  “Leigh.” David hesitated, then added, “And me.”

  “Leigh and me. Hey, that rhymes. Say, Dad, maybe you should write a poem. I’ll bet even Zella would say that was romantic,” Jocie said. “But why should I mind?”

  “I don’t know. I mean, we’ve pretty much held down the fort around here alone for a long ti
me. Along with Aunt Love.”

  “But now Tabitha is home. And we have Stephen Lee. Not to mention a whole church full of people who are always wanting you to do something. Maybe that’s why the Lord picked this year for Leigh to decide she liked you.” Stephen Lee reached for Jocie and she took him back while she kept her eyes on David. “Maybe he could tell we needed help. What’s that verse about Adam and Eve? You know the one about why Adam needed Eve.”

  “‘And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.’”

  “That’s the one. Tabitha told me that the same was true about you. That it wasn’t good that you were alone.” Jocie peeked toward the kitchen to see if Tabitha was listening and lowered her voice. “I told her you weren’t alone. That you had me and Aunt Love and her and like I said, the whole church, but she said there were all different ways of being alone. And that you’d been alone one of those ways way too long.”

  David looked over Jocie’s head toward the kitchen where Tabitha was taking up cookies. When she raised her head to meet his eyes, her cheeks were red, maybe from the heat of the oven and maybe because she’d overheard Jocie telling him what she’d said. She looked relieved when he smiled at her. The poor girl. She knew about him being alone because she was feeling very alone as she faced raising Stephen Lee as a single mother. He’d been praying for her even though he had no idea what to pray. The Lord knew her needs, knew all their needs.

  David drove back to town. The wind was picking up and turning colder. Now and then a few flakes of snow hit his windshield as if to remind him it was Christmas Eve, but then the snow was gone on the wind as quickly as it had come. The weathermen weren’t forecasting a white Christmas.

  He didn’t call Leigh. She’d already told him she was too sick to go anywhere. He stopped at the market on Model Street, making it in the door minutes before Harold locked up to go home. David bought three cans of chicken soup, the fanciest crackers Harold had, some cheese, two big chocolate bars, a box of tissues, some cough drops, and a bunch of grapes.

  “That’s an odd assortment on Christmas Eve,” Harold said as he rang up the groceries.

  “Not all Christmas Eves are the same.” David began sacking up the groceries while Harold got his change out of the cash register.

  “True enough,” Harold said. “True enough. I’ve seen my share. A couple of them I was overseas during the war. I guess you were too.”

  “Not overseas. In the sea.”

  “That’s right, you were one of those submarine guys. I never envied that tour of duty. I’d rather see the bomb coming at me.” Harold handed him his change. Then he went around the counter to pick up one of two poinsettias sitting in the window. “Here, Merry Christmas, Reverend. Take this home with you. I’ll never sell it after Christmas anyway.”

  David’s heart started doing a strange fluttering dance as he carried the groceries and the poinsettia across the yard to the stairs leading to Leigh’s door. This was it. He was going to pull the ring out of his pocket and give it to Leigh before he left. One way or another.

  He still didn’t have a plan, but he was going to do it. He was going to ask Leigh to share the craziness of his life, to jump into being a preacher’s wife and a stepmother. He wasn’t going to think about how he was too old or how Leigh was too young. He wasn’t going to think about Edwin Hammond. He was just going to think about how he felt when he looked into Leigh’s eyes. His heart did another strange dance in his chest.

  He hoped he was just having an attack of nerves and not a heart attack. His father had died of a heart attack, but he’d been seventy-three. Thirty years older than David was now. He’d already been in his late fifties when David was born. A late blessing, David’s mother always said. David could still have his own late blessings. The thought nearly froze him in place as he reached the bottom of the steps. What in the world was he doing?

  He took a deep breath to steady himself. Bits and jumbles of verses played through his mind. Be of good courage. Desires of your heart. Knock and it shall be opened unto you. There shall be showers of blessings. Hadn’t he always been showered with blessings? Hadn’t the Lord helped him recognize those blessings one by one? He would not turn away from those blessings just because he was getting weak in the knees. He started up the steps.

  Mrs. Simpson peeked out the window to watch him as usual. He’d stopped waving when he realized the woman thought she was hidden behind her curtains. Leigh said Mrs. Simpson kept a log of his visits including arrival and departure times to share with Leigh’s mother. One thing for sure, in Hollyhill somebody was always watching.

  David shifted the groceries and poinsettia to one arm and knocked on Leigh’s door. He couldn’t hear anything from inside. Maybe he should have called. Maybe her parents had come after her so she wouldn’t be sick and home alone on Christmas. Maybe Edwin Hammond had ridden his white stead up the steps to carry her away with him.

  David shook that thought away and knocked again, a bit harder this time. She had to be home.

  17

  Leigh’s teakettle was heating up and her refrigerator was making its usual assortment of rattles and hums as she folded the wrapping paper around the box holding Stephen Lee’s blocks. She had to stop and blow her nose twice, but she wasn’t sneezing as much. Coughing a little more, but the aspirin had dulled her headache. She was better, but not enough better.

  If she were enough better, she wouldn’t be alone eating crackers and drinking hot tea on Christmas Eve. She’d be with David doing whatever special thing he’d planned for them. She blinked back tears as she yanked off another length of toilet paper. She thought she heard something as she blew her nose. She stopped to listen but all she could hear was the popping in her ears and the teakettle starting to whistle. It sounded a little as if it had a stuffy nose too.

  She picked the kettle up off the stove and poured it over the tea bag in her cup. This time there was definitely knocking. On her door. She glanced quickly at the roses still sitting in her sink and whispered, “Please, Lord. Not Edwin Hammond.”

  Without making a sound, she very carefully set the teakettle down on one of the cold burners. She could pretend she wasn’t at home. Nobody stayed home alone on Christmas Eve. Maybe he’d go away if she could keep from coughing and making any noise. But then he knocked again. Louder. Mrs. Simpson would be coming outside to see what all the racket was about, and she knew Leigh was at home. She kept watch from her downstairs window. Leigh would have to go to the door.

  At least she wasn’t wearing her ratty old robe the way she had been that morning when Jocie came. She’d dressed after her shower. Nothing fancy. Her most comfortable putter pants and a red sweater to match her red nose in honor of Christmas Eve. Why was it red had come to symbolize Christmas? Santa’s suit maybe or poinsettias or lights. Not roses, certainly. Even if there were a dozen of the red things sitting in her sink on Christmas Eve leering at her. Making her feel like a coward.

  Another knock. She’d go to the door. Tell him thanks but no thanks. She didn’t need roses from secret admirers. She happened to already be in love and would he kindly get lost? Forever. Before he messed things up. Her cold was doing a fine enough job of that already, and she didn’t really need Mrs. Simpson spreading the news of his visit all over Hollyhill. She couldn’t quite block out the image from her dream of David backing away. Letting her go.

  Of course it wasn’t smart to just open the door to anybody. It might not be her secret admirer. It might be an encyclopedia salesman or some psycho pretending to be an encyclopedia salesman. No real salesman would be trying to sell anything on Christmas Eve.

  Leigh put her hand on her forehead. She must still be feverish to be having such crazy thoughts. Psycho salesman? In Hollyhill?

  She felt like Mrs. Simpson as she inched back the curtain to peek out at whoever was standing outside her door. She had been so prepared to see Edwin Hammond there that for a minute she couldn’t believe her ey
es. David. Of course it was David. Just because she’d told him not to come didn’t mean he wouldn’t.

  She thought about running back to the kitchen to shove the roses into the broom closet. But no, he knew she had them. Jocie would have told him.

  Besides, she’d already made him stand out on the landing so long he had to be half frozen while she imagined secret admirers and psycho salesmen at the door. She pulled open the door.

  “David. I wasn’t expecting you.” She had to look horrible with her watery eyes, her hair barely combed after her shower, and her Rudolf nose, but at the same time just seeing him standing there made a smile run through her clear down to her toes.

  “We had a date,” David said as he stepped inside.

  “We did, but I told you I have a terrible cold. You might catch it.”

  “I’ll take my chances.” He held up his sack. “I brought supper for the sick and a beautiful flower for a beautiful lady.”

  Leigh took the plant with a laugh that turned into a cough. “No beautiful ladies around here tonight,” she said when she could quit coughing. She set the poinsettia down on the floor and fished a piece of toilet paper out of her pocket to blow her nose. “I must look horrible.”

  David reached out and put his hand on her cheek. “No, you could never look horrible. You’re always beautiful.”

  She almost melted into his hand. “Even with a red nose?”

  “Even with a red nose,” he said.

  For a minute she thought he was going to kiss her, red nose and all, but then he pulled his hand away and shifted the grocery bag. “Point the way to the can opener and get ready for a feast fit for a queen. At least one who has a cold.”

  Leigh positioned herself in front of the sink, but David still saw the roses. “Funny place to set such a beautiful bouquet,” he said.