by LoRee Peery
Don’t leave me again, my lovely lady. His plan was to show her she couldn’t live without him. He feared his dark world would return and last forever if she took off.
10
Would Paisley ever breathe again?
Rob curled her hair away from the damp skin of her neck and deepened their kiss. Her toes ignited. Her cognition sank into an endless sea of sensation. Her whole world at this moment in time was encapsulated in Rob. He surrounded her and invaded her sanity.
His heavy breathing as he pulled back told her their connection got to him as well.
The heat of his touch left a trail of awareness down her side as his fingertips brushed her ribs.
He released his hold on her arms.
Her knees noodled.
They slumped to the couch together.
He leaned forward and she raised her arms to shoulder height, palms out.
She couldn’t meet his gaze.
Rob coughed. Then he chuckled. And he laughed wholeheartedly, a sound she’d never heard. Even Sara in fine performance, hadn’t brought forth such a heartfelt reaction.
The beautiful tones astonished Paisley because Rob’s world had been so glum. What a thrilling, full-of-life, beautiful sound.
Still unable to look him in the eye, she giggled like a teenaged girl who’d entertained a boyfriend while babysitting.
“Hey, you two, you guys woke me up!” Sara stood in the doorway rubbing her eyes. “What’s so funny, anyway? Are you two still telling redneck jokes?”
Paisley snorted, choking down more laughter.
Rob stood. The couch cushion shifted back into place. “Maybe we’ll tell you someday, sweetkins. For now, let me walk you back to your room, and I promise we’ll be quiet.”
He moved down the hall, accompanied by the adorable little girl in lime-green and purple polka-dotted pajamas. The man was everything she could hope for. Paisley drank half her glass of sports drink in the hopes it replaced rattled emotions as handily as it reenergized athletes.
Rob returned with a huge grin on his face. He picked up his glass and drained it, the whole time gazing at her over the rim. He smoothed the moisture off his mouth with the back of hand then rubbed his neck. “I had this crazy picture of a kid sneaking into a house where his girlfriend was babysitting.”
She covered her mouth with both hands, shoulders shaking in silent laughter. Once she gained control, she only managed, “Me, too. And then Sara walked in.”
“Are you finished? We need a little space.” At her nod, he took their glasses to the sink. “Lights’re coming up the lane so they must be back.”
Paisley didn’t add much to Rob’s rundown of the evening. “In answer to Nora’s question, we had a wonderful time with Sara. You’ve got a pretty smart cookie on your hands.”
Paisley nodded in agreement.
“Sometimes I think she’s eight going on fifteen,” Oren said.
Nora stressed her thanks three times.
They bade a final good night and rode back to Norfolk in silence.
At the light, Rob pulled up behind a car with California plates.
Paisley stared at the plates, her mind winging back to the job offer. As if Rob was thinking about it too, the space between them suddenly filled with tension as palpable as a third body.
“You never said,” he ground out. “Are you taking that nursery job?”
“I haven’t decided. Right now, I’m enjoying every day we’re given, Rob.”
He turned the corner onto Aunt Rainbow’s street. “Your indecisiveness, my never knowing where you’ll be a week from now, or even tomorrow, is as irritating as a nail that won’t pound straight. You drive me crazy.”
“I don’t mean to. I’ll let myself out. And don’t forget you promised Sara you’ll be in church in the morning.” She had to be sure this new, contented Rob was the real man, not putting on a show to coax her back. They’d kissed, they’d spent time together, but she still wasn’t confident enough that happy Rob would stick. After his outburst, the time wasn’t right to tell him she had no plan to accept the job.
Paisley manhandled the pickup door, straining hard to open it against the wind, fighting with her own anger. The door didn’t stay, but crashed against her thigh as it slammed behind her. She started walking and was yanked back against the pickup. Her full skirt caught. She twisted around just as Rob released the door. She yanked her torn skirt and gathered it next to her side.
The wind bit off whatever Rob was saying as the door slammed.
*
Sunday morning Paisley smiled over the way they’d both expressed feeling like naughty teens. She sat close to the back of the church, soaking in the potpourri of people and the building. At one point, Sara turned and waved at her.
Rob had honored his promise to Sara and attended church with his brother and the family.
The pastor spoke. “In order for us to apply what the Bible teaches we have to make it real to us today. God’s Word needs to be a message from the heart rather than a message from the head. And isn’t that what faith is all about?”
Paisley listened. Her head held the key to all rationalization. Her heart was another matter. It hurts inside because I care. She slipped out early due to her distracted musings without talking to anyone other than the usher.
On Monday, she marked the rainbow colored tags with the fine point marker, her second pen since the project began. Countless times, she bumped her bruised thigh.
The family had worked on the basement mess together, separating, discussing, and stacking items salvaged for sale.
This job in Norfolk would be over as soon as she finished marking what was left in the basement corner. What other jobs could Aunt Rainbow have in the hopper? Did she still need Paisley’s help?
Thoughts of Rob accompanied her work. She cherished the bittersweet memory of the way Sara and Oren had broken through Rob’s grim exterior. He smiled freely and even laughed now.
The pastor’s challenge of the head/heart idea took its turn replaying. Matters of the heart were uppermost in her head. Paisley recognized that her prior lack of dedication to the Lord had been an issue of the heart. Believing with her head was one thing, but by giving her life totally to Him, she allowed the Lord Jesus Christ to shine through her. So she’d have to ask Rob to forgive her for stomping away from the pickup Saturday night.
Rob’s anger might cloud his acceptance of her apology. Could negativity be so ingrained it changed a personality and prevented opening up a heart to live a life of faith? No tears formed in her eyes but they saturated her heart.
She set a wooden crate on end, its red and white painted logos worn well over the years, bearing minimal scratches. She jotted a price. Her withheld emotions fizzed like a shaken-up bottle of soda. Something had to give. She couldn’t keep going like this or she’d explode.
She closed her eyes, concentrated on her breathing, relaxed her muscles, and prayed for a calm spirit. She opened her eyes to catch Rob’s lower legs and feet passing by the window. Upon seeing him, she remembered the antiques taken to the shed for his attention. She still had to deal with those few pieces, mark them, and place them in strategic places throughout the house.
Paisley needed contemplative down time. She had to leave town for her sanity.
*
“It has to be a message from the heart rather than a message from the head. And isn’t that what faith is all about?”
The pastor’s Sunday challenge wouldn’t leave Rob alone.
Sara had said she’d seen Paisley but she must have been seated in the back and hadn’t lingered after service. He’d had a nice lunch with Oren’s family and later, poured out his heart to his brother.
“Spill it, Rob,” Oren had said. “Your trouble will stay with me.”
“All my life I held a grudge because my only family affiliation was to my mom. I had no identification by surname because she chose to slap that Paisley name on me. She told me she changed hers.”
; “Hey, no one thinks ill of the country singer with the same last name.”
“Now that I think about it, I wonder if Mom changed her name legally. No one has told me who Precious really was. Not a Paisley.”
“She had to have made it legal. You have a social security card, I assume.”
“She never told me anything about my father. Meeting all of you in Nebraska misled me to believe all over again that I didn’t matter enough for my mother to inform my father I even existed. So is there any wonder I questioned why I was born? I always felt like I lacked a heritage.”
“You have one now. This is where you hailed from. You came from our father. I believe you’ve learned you are a Waverly now at thirty-nine because it’s part of God’s design for your life. God changed Abram’s name to Abraham at age ninety-nine. Our heavenly Father calls us by a name He chooses for us. Remember, He wants us to look forward, not back.”
Rob continued to think over what he’d heard Sunday from the pastor and from Oren during their talk earlier on Monday.
Should he work into the night to finish the small repair jobs on the Waverly goods?
Waverly. He needed to accept he was a Waverly now in every way that mattered. Oren said he wanted to share the inheritance. In fact, he’d offered Rob the property. Not just the contents of the shed where he now leaned on a bench, but the house and the lot. Mind blowing stuff.
Rob released the C-clamp holding one leg of a handsome three-legged corner table. The glue had dried overnight and only an expert would be able to detect the repair. Rob should have prolonged fixing these things in order to hold up the tag sale and keep Paisley around longer, but he knew better than to think that delay was enough to keep her hanging around.
Due to his dumb behavior Saturday night, he couldn’t blame her for not wanting to be anywhere close to him.
11
Paisley awakened early. Dawn now hovered over the horizon, promising a clear weather day. She drove the same direction out of Norfolk Oren had on their way to Willow Lake. She familiarized herself with Aunt Rainbow’s van, liking the higher seat because she could see more.
Self-examination got in the way. She’d done it again. She’d run away.
That’s how Rob would see it. As soon as she didn’t show up at the house, he’d believe she left town to avoid facing him again. She was convinced God had planned no one else for her to share her life with, and was willing to make it work between them.
But Rob had to be willing or they would never amount to anything together. For his spiritual wellbeing, he needed to put the past behind by forgiving his parents. His bad moods pulled her down.
She’d continue to pray. He needed God in order to face a future of making decisions…the only way of working through the trials of life was with Jesus.
“My dear Lord and Savior, I pray You enable Rob to see his struggles are lighter if he gives them to You. I believe all things are possible in Your name and in Your time. Please help Rob turn those burdens over to You. I give You the rest of this day, and I pray for the whole Waverly family to be safe and healthy and growing in You. Amen.”
She continued north through Pierce and journeyed northwest on Highway 13. She breezed through the small towns of Foster, Plainview, and Creighton. In Winnetoon, the ghost town, were chainsaw sculptures of bears standing at attention. If people had lived there, they were long gone.
She basked in the scenery south of Verdigre and the hilly landscape surrounding the village of Niobrara. Maybe she was a little bit country at heart. She gassed up and grabbed free brochures at the convenience store that detailed the surrounding history.
But the Ponca Tribe Museum, Standing Bear Bridge spanning into South Dakota, and the state park were places she wanted to visit with someone along to share the experience. Someone with the name Rob Paisley…or Waverly, if he chose to accept it.
The day was meant for relishing the autumn air and soaking in the hint of fall colors that dotted the landscape of fertile pastures and rich fields. Many generations of people had gone before, nestled in their picturesque homesteads. Their spirit of survival was hard to imagine. She stopped to snap pictures of two barns, and later, black cattle sprinkled around a water tank near a windmill.
At the end of the day, she pulled the van up to the Waverly house and onto the drive. A sandwich board advertising the tag sale had been placed between the sidewalk and curb.
From inside the vehicle, she read a sign on the shed that said No Admittance. She hoped Rob recognized Oren’s generosity as a gift of love. The legalities of their relationship made the whole situation a family thing.
She may have left town on a day’s road trip, but she came back home. Norfolk was home now because Rob was here. She heard a power tool whine as soon as she clicked off the van’s engine. She’d driven to see him first, rather than return to her temporary room at Aunt Rainbow’s house.
Paisley grabbed her hat off the seat and opened the door. A walk through the house to check on her job may give her courage to face Rob. Would he be glad to see her?
“Nice hat.” Edna Mae called from behind her house. “Lots of activity today, but I didn’t see you around.”
“No, I took a bit of a road trip. How are you?” Paisley gave a wistful glance over her shoulder toward the shed and then turned her attention to the older woman.
“After I saw what you all had to do in Mark’s basement, I didn’t want my young kin digging through my years of garage dirt. I got all inspired to clean out my stuff. I hired Andria and borrowed Waverly trash cans. Had to buy some more. Just look at that.” Edna Mae directed Paisley to the side wall of the garage. Overflowing receptacles lined up the whole outside wall. “A body sure can pile up the junk over the years.”
“You have been busy. Glad we inspired you. I hope I can have such a caring neighbor like you someday.”
“Oh, you will, honey. I’m the one that got Linda interested in old, small pieces. We’d go to yard sales and auctions and it ended up she had two or three things neither of us needed.” She gave a smile and slapped her leg. “I even have four mirrors right in here. Left ‘em to give my garage sparkle.”
Paisley couldn’t help but laugh. “Mirrors and magazine racks. I lost count.”
“Mark liked the fancy framed ones. Rob comes by his woodworking naturally. Mark could lose himself for hours out back in that shed tinkering on the oddest things sometimes. Come see this special box he made just for me.”
They walked into the garage and Paisley noted the neat shelving and floor swept free of debris. A large, old mirror that needed to be re-silvered was propped up on the shelf attached to the back wall where Edna Mae led Paisley. The mirror reflected an ornately carved and polished wooden box that faced the parked car.
“Mark watched out for me after I lost my Johnny. That dog was the best friend a gal could have. Mark made that special box for what’s left of Johnny. Suppose the technical term is an urn, but to me it’s a fancy box. Least I could do in return, was check on Mark every day. And he did need watchin’ out for. There came a point when Oren took the truck keys and the checkbook. I don’t have someone that close to take care of things for me. If my mind goes, I guess I’ll lose my home. My nieces sure aren’t interested in me, and my sister lives in Hawaii.”
“As quick witted as you are and spry, too, I don’t think you have to be concerned about needing someone to watch over your affairs.” Paisley hoped that was a good remark. “Did Mark ever say if Precious still had family around here? I’m fairly sure Rob hasn’t asked Oren. That would be a bit awkward.”
“Oren took care of business and then put the papers in the glass cupboard in the kitchen. Enough of all that. You came to see your young man and I know he’ll make things right with his momma.”
“About his mother’s relatives?”
“Oh, right.” Edna Mae walked Paisley out and then let down the overhead door.
“Isn’t that too heavy for you?”
“Nah. Mark mentioned
an automatic opener to me a couple times, but I’m an old farm girl and, as long as it’s greased, the door rolls just fine.” She checked to make sure the side door was locked and addressed Paisley. “As for any relative Precious may have had, she was an only child. Her pa was a mean old cuss. They moved within a year of Precious disappearing.”
“You are a fine woman, Miss Edna Mae.” Paisley gave her a hug, glad for a little more news of Rob’s mother. She had to make things right with Rob.
*
The dulcet tones of jazz played in the background. Rob couldn’t help but compare the contralto vocalist to Paisley’s soothing voice. The music did nothing to soften his agitation over what she had done. Again. Why should he expect any different behavior from her? He knew her pattern by now.
He opened the bi-fold door on the driver’s side of the truck and stepped up to check paint coverage on the truck’s roof. Not bad. Smooth and white, no ripples or bubbles to sand.
Had she really gone away again? She hadn’t answered her phone the two times he called. Was she running again? Didn’t she know by now that anything that bothered a person went with them no matter where they chose to live?
He yanked painter’s tape from the top of the windshield and wadded up the newspaper from where it had protected the glass. He wasn’t sure if he’d tackle the hood or the doors next. It would be tricky but he was up for the challenge. The side doors were both bi-fold and the hood rolled up from the sides. Rubber seals and hinges were paint magnets.
Maybe Paisley closed the door on the people she left behind when she changed locations.
But he was familiar with how easy it was to carry the garbage in his head wherever he went. He’d gone by the silly name his mother had given him and resented her all his life because he hadn’t known who his father was. He knew who the man was now. And he needed to make things right with his mom.
