He grinned at her, shaking his head. “You are something else, Rica. I’m so glad Gretchen didn’t want to marry me.”
“She’s prettier than I am.”
“She’s eight months pregnant with someone else’s child. I don’t need that. I’d have done it for Doris, but I married you for me!”
She put supper on the table and sat down across from him, her hand immediately going to his for their prayer. “I talked to Gloria’s mother today,” she said softly.
“Oh! How did that go?” He’d thought of the situation several times throughout the day, but Rica hadn’t mentioned it at lunch.
“I couldn’t tell you I was going to at lunch because there were too many children around. She came in right after school and told me that Gloria is getting married on Saturday. She’s arranged the marriage.”
“Are you serious?”
Rica nodded. “I talked to her about it, telling her about Gloria’s hopes and dreams. She told me that Gloria is a child and there’s no way she can know what she wants at this time.”
“That’s right! She’s a child, so she can’t be expected to marry a man with six kids and give up her childhood!”
“My argument exactly. I think she may have listened, but to be honest, I’m just not sure. I hope so. I’ll know tomorrow when Gloria comes into school. She didn’t even speak to me this morning, just handed me her mother’s note and left. I realized why when her mother mentioned she’d told her over breakfast she was expected to marry on Saturday.”
He shook his head. “I’ll kidnap the girl if I have to. That wedding isn’t happening.”
Rica grinned. “Thanks for making my problems your own, but I don’t think kidnapping one of my students could possibly be the answer.”
“Maybe not . . . I could shoot Mr. Jackson!”
“And leave six orphaned children?”
“We’ll adopt them all!” He looked around the house with a frown. “No, that’s a bad idea. We’d never be able to consummate the marriage if that happened.”
Rica couldn’t help it. She giggled. And once she started giggling, she simply couldn’t stop. After a minute or two with tears streaming down her face and a couple of sips of water to stop the spasm of coughing that went with the giggles, she finally calmed. “You are a breath of fresh air in my life. You make me laugh like no one ever has. How did I live so long without you?”
He tilted his head to one side to think about her question. “Just lucky, I guess.”
When Gloria came into the schoolhouse the next morning, she had a smile on her face. “Thank you, Mrs. Miller!” She hurried to Rica and hugged her. “My mother said you made her understand that she was doing me a disservice by forcing a marriage. She’s going to let me be a child for a while longer.”
“That’s wonderful!” Rica was thrilled to have her favorite student smiling again.
“And do you know what the best part is?” Gloria asked, her eyes dancing with laughter.
“No, what’s the best part?”
“Mr. Jackson came over last night, and she wouldn’t even let him see me. She told him I was a child, and I needed to be treated as such. I wouldn’t be allowed to court him or even see him until I was old enough to make decisions for myself, and that would be at least a couple of years down the road.”
“I’m so happy for you!” Rica couldn’t believe her talk with the girl’s mother had gone so well, but she was ecstatic. “Now you can live a normal life again. Do you want to sit inside and read until it’s time for class to start?” It was something she rarely let any of the students do.
“No, thank you. I think I want to go outside and watch the boys play baseball and maybe talk to some of the other girls. If I have two years of childhood left, I think I should make the most of them instead of running around with my nose in a book all the time.” Gloria hurried out the door, a skip to her step that hadn’t been there for a while.
Rica smiled as she wrote some sentences to diagram on the board. Everything was right in her world again, and she could concentrate on the dance in two more days. She would finally have a chance to dance with her husband—the man she loved.
By Friday morning, Rica was getting used to sleeping with her husband. It had seemed so strange at first, but now it was second nature. She found herself wrapped in his arms most mornings, and there was nothing she wanted to do about it. Darryl made her feel both loved and protected.
Her friends were both meeting her at the schoolhouse at lunchtime to help her decorate the school for the dance, and she had all of the decorations laid out beside her desk at school.
She practically bounced out of bed to get breakfast started, wanting to start her day as soon as she could. She’d decided that this would be the day when she told Darryl she loved him. While they danced together in her school.
Rica fixed pancakes and bacon for breakfast, wanting to give Darryl a hearty meal before he started his day. With them having the dance that night, she knew it was going to be a very long day for him.
She giggled as she made a pancake into the shape of a heart, but then she was afraid for him to see it, so she put it at the bottom of his stack. Still, she knew she was giving him her heart, even if he didn’t.
When she walked over to the bed to wake him, he groaned and pulled her down on top of him. “I need to sleep a little longer. Come back to bed with me.”
“You’re not a morning person, are you, husband?”
“I would be if mornings came just a little bit later in the day.” He held her close, kissing the side of her neck, knowing it would make her squeal. “Who would have thought the schoolteacher would have such a fun side to her?”
“No one. I don’t think I had a fun side until I met you,” she said, getting to her feet. “Coffee’s ready. Come and eat.”
“All right.” He pulled his pants on while she turned her head, and then he walked to the table, taking a big drink of his coffee. “How do people who don’t drink coffee ever get out of bed?”
She shrugged. “I could get up without coffee. I like coffee, but I don’t need it to kickstart my day.”
“Well, I’m not sure I like you then.” He grinned at her, and she shook her head.
“You are silly. Sometimes I wonder if I ever laughed before I met you, and now it seems like that’s the only thing I ever do.”
“I’m glad. If I can bring laughter to your life, then I’m doing something right.” He hid a yawn behind his hand. “Do you plan for us to eat before the dance tonight? I only have an hour between work and the dance.”
“I think your boss should let you leave early for the dance, but I understand. I’ll have something quick ready for you when you get here. Then we’ll go over to the school together. I still need to bake some cookies to take with us.”
“Sounds good to me. I’ll hurry home as quickly as I can. I don’t want to get in trouble with the teacher.”
“Somehow, I think if you ever do get in trouble with the teacher, you’ll be able to talk your way out of it. Teacher has a soft spot for you.”
“As she should.” Darryl took a bite of his pancakes with a grin on his face. Every day with Rica, he was just a little bit happier than the day before. He didn’t know how she did it, but he was married to a very special woman.
Chapter 10
At lunchtime, Rica had fun decorating the school with Gretchen and Doris. The three of them worked quickly, along with some of the older girls, to transform the school into a fun place for everyone in the community.
Gloria watched it all with a grin. “I’m going to dance with Charlie tonight. He asked me if he could have a dance already.”
Rica smiled at the girl. Charlie was one of the boys she’d be graduating that year, and he was a little more than a year older than Gloria. “I think that sounds like a lot of fun.”
“Me too!” Gloria worked to pin a paper chain to one end of the chalkboard. “Do you think any of us will be able to concentrate on our studies this
afternoon with the school already decorated for the dance?”
Rica shrugged. “I’m not sure, but if you can’t, we won’t be able to have a lot more dances.”
Gretchen was more excited than anyone. “The first time Reginald kissed me was after a dance in this very school. The last several teachers we’ve had wouldn’t let us use the schoolhouse for dances, so it’s been a long time since I’ve been to one.”
Rica realized that Gretchen was much younger than her. She’d only graduated from school in May before Rica started teaching in September. It seemed odd that one of her closest friends had almost been one of her students. She looked over at Gloria and wondered if one day she’d be a friend as well.
Doris had given Pris and Pauline their lunches on one of the school benches, and the little girls watched everything as it happened around them. They were excited because everyone else was happy.
“Who will I dance with?” Pris asked as everyone was decorating.
Doris had an answer for everything. “You can dance with your brothers and with Papa. You might even be able to talk Uncle Darryl into dancing with you. He’s a good dancer.”
“I have a feeling Uncle Darryl’s dances will be taken,” Rica said with a smile.
Gretchen grinned over at Rica. “You’re really happy. I’ve seen you smile more in the past hour than I have in all the time I knew you before Darryl arrived here in town. I think marrying him just might be the best thing that ever happened to you.”
“I think so, too.” Rica couldn’t help but grin. “Doris, you sure do have a pretty exceptional twin brother.”
“Oh, I know that. He’s told me every day of our entire lives!” Doris replied saucily.
Everyone laughed at that. “Are your other brothers like him?” Rica asked, still worried about Gretchen needing to marry someone.
“They’re all fun-loving like Darryl, but not all are as conscientious. Twins have a special tie to one another, and if anything upset me, Darryl was there. My other brothers didn’t have twin sisters.”
“That makes a lot of sense,” Rica said. She was glad she finally understood what had made Darryl so understanding.
“Doesn’t it? That’s my theory. I might not be right, but I will say, anytime I was upset about anything, I’d run to him first. Our other sisters went to each other, but for me it was always Darryl.” Doris smiled. “I love watching my twins have that same connection with each other.”
Rica loved how Doris had immediately taken on Harv’s kids as her own. The moment she’d stepped into town, they’d been hers. It didn’t matter to her that she hadn’t given birth to them.
Gretchen smiled. “I think we’re done. I’ll be coming to the dance with the Butlers. Doris is going to need help with her four so she can spend some time dancing in the arms of the man she loves.”
Doris smiled. “I don’t know what I would have done if I’d come to this town and you two hadn’t been here. You’ve made my life a good one.”
“I just hope I bring you half as much joy as you bring me,” Gretchen said with tears in her eyes.
They both looked at Rica, so she knew she had to say something. “I’m just glad I can bring joy to your lives.”
Doris sighed. “You’ve been hanging around my brother too much. You’re starting to tease everyone.”
“You like it, though, right?” Rica asked, a twinkle in her eye.
“I suppose I can tolerate it.” Doris took the girls by the hands and led them toward the door. “See you tonight, sister!”
If the pupils were inattentive that afternoon, Rica didn’t notice. She was too antsy for the dance herself. She dismissed school fifteen minutes early so she could go home and start supper. She wanted to be able to leave for the dance just as soon as Darryl had eaten. No one would be able to get into the school until she was there to unlock it.
She started supper, and she went to her wardrobe and picked out a pretty purple dress that she had never worn before. It had been made for a dance that she’d just known a young man back home would ask her to, and he’d asked someone else instead.
Now she had a reason to wear it, and she couldn’t be more excited. She laid it out on the bed to air out, planning to put it on right before Darryl was due home. She spent some time on her hair, trying a new hairstyle that swept up a lot of her hair but left some of her curls hanging loosely around her face. She knew it would please Darryl, but she wanted to make sure she looked like a schoolteacher as well.
She put supper on the table and hurried to change before he came in, smoothing the skirt of her dress down and looking into her little hand mirror. She couldn’t see the full effect of the dress, but she hoped it looked as good as she thought it did.
Darryl came in as she set the mirror down, and he stopped in the doorway. His face and hands were dirty from his hard day at work, so he went to the sink and pumped the water, cleaning himself up. “I’m afraid I’ll muss you too much if I touch you.”
She laughed. “I can be fixed. As long as you don’t get my dress dirty, I won’t mind even a little bit.”
He walked to her and cupped her face in his hands, his lips descending on hers. “Do you have any idea what it means to me to have you waiting for me at the end of a hard day of work? I’m not complaining about what I do, but you make everything worthwhile.”
Rica smiled at that. “Gretchen commented today how much more I smile now that you’re in my life. I don’t think I can express the difference in me since your arrival.”
“Well, I think we should stop this mutual admiration and eat our supper. Someone has to be to the school in a few minutes.” Darryl grinned at her, sitting down at the table where his supper waited for him.
“As soon as I’ve eaten, I’m going to put the dishes to soak in the sink and head over to the school. You’re going to need to change and follow me over.”
He nodded. “I can do that. I was hoping you wouldn’t mind going over on your own for just a little while.”
She shrugged. “I’m used to being a wallflower at dances, remember?”
“I do remember. I’m used to running around begging every girl there to dance with me and hoping one of them will have pity on me!”
Rica grinned. “Somehow I have a very hard time believing that. You don’t seem like the type of man who has ever lacked for female attention.”
“You just don’t know how bad our reputations were back home. Even ask Doris. No one would look at any of us romantically.”
“So none of your other siblings are married?”
“Mary got married, but no one is quite sure how. Elizabeth married a man who worked for her. Susan was a mail order bride. Wally was a mail order groom. Do you see a recurring theme here?”
“Well, I wouldn’t have been able to resist you, even with your reputation. I would have taken one look into those big brown eyes, and I’d have fallen at your feet.”
“That sounds like something I would really enjoy! It’s too bad you weren’t there to put me out of my misery sooner.” He winked at her. “Actually, I think that if I’d met you sooner, I wouldn’t have been ready for you. I needed to go through life just as long as I did, so I’d appreciate you like I should.” He took her hand and brought it to his lips. “I’m ready to dance all night with you.”
As soon as they finished eating, she soaked the dishes. “I’m heading over. Please hurry!” Rica told him.
“I will. You get everything opened up, and don’t dance with any other dashing men who come your way.”
She laughed. “As if I would!” She hurried out the door to the school, opening the building at ten minutes before seven. As soon as it was open, women brought in cookies and cakes, and the small band set up on the teacher’s platform.
The turnout was bigger than she’d expected. Some people would have to dance outside, and she loved the idea of being one of them. Dancing under the stars with the man she loved sounded like one of the most romantic things she could possibly do.
Darryl walked to her and bowed low. “Mrs. Miller, may I have the pleasure of this dance?”
Rica smiled and nodded, going right into his arms. There was nowhere else in the world she would rather be than right there with the man she loved. The schoolhouse was crowded, so she suggested dancing outside under the stars as she’d thought about just a short while before.
As soon as they were away from others, she met his gaze with her own. It was dark, but some people had hung lanterns up around the playground. “Darryl, there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you.”
“There is? What’s that?” He seemed so at ease and so happy with her there, dancing in the moonlight.
“I thought this would be a good place to tell you that you’ve changed my life. The things that were mundane before all have meaning now. I love you with everything inside me, Darryl Miller.”
His grin was so big, she was glad she told him, even if he never reciprocated her feelings. “I knew I was done for the minute I saw you. I was so glad to find out I wasn’t marrying Gretchen. I love you right back, Frederica!”
“You do? Really?”
“Really. There’s no one on this planet who would be a better wife for me.” He leaned down and kissed her softly.
Rica should have protested that he was kissing her in front of her students, but she just couldn’t make herself care about it. “Thank you for coming into my life.”
“Does this mean the courtship part of our marriage is over?” he asked with a grin.
“I hope the courtship part of our marriage never ends. But it does mean we can move on to other things as well as courtship.”
“Do you think your students would notice if I swept you up in my arms and carried you off to our house?” He glanced over at the house and thought about how far it really was.
She laughed. “Yes, I do. Dance is over at nine. You can wait that long.”
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