“Surprise!” everyone shouted.
Summer brought both hands to her mouth in shock and delight. And she cried anyway, but Ben was pretty sure they were happy tears—and they hadn’t even gotten to the best part yet. How he hoped she would like it!
He’d taken his mother’s advice to heart. In order to be the best man for Summer, he also had to be the best man for himself. And this was his chance to reveal everything and hope she liked what he had to show for himself—to show for them.
Summer couldn’t believe her eyes. While she’d always made friends easily, none of them had ever thrown her such a marvelous party—and a surprise at that.
“Do you like it?” Ben asked, gazing at her hopefully.
“I love it!” she shouted for everyone to hear, and then just for Ben, she whispered, “I love you.” Sure, she had promised she wouldn’t say it today, told herself it would only make saying good-bye that much harder, but he needed to know how much he mattered to her, that she’d stay if she could.
Their eyes locked, and she thought she saw the hint of mystery lurking in Ben’s beautiful greens, but before she could figure out what he might be hiding, he gave her a quick peck and said, “I’ll be right back, okay?”
“Ben, where are you—?”
Elise, Jennifer, and Kristina Rose ran up and surrounded her in a group hug.
“Are you surprised?” Jennifer squealed.
Summer nodded enthusiastically. “Very.”
“The best is yet to come,” Elise said, and the other two women immediately hushed her.
“Don’t ruin it,” Kristina Rose warned.
“What?” Elise argued. “She doesn’t know what I mean. Look, there’s Ben now anyway.”
They all turned to where Ben stood in the center of the slightly curved bridge, which served as the perfect impromptu stage.
“Summer, will you come here?” He reached both hands toward her and waited for her to join him.
“What’s this all about, Ben?” She still had no idea. Although she was starting to suspect that maybe… No, no assumptions. Just enjoy it.
“I want you to stand right here,” he said, planting each of his feet firmly on the old bridge. “Each of us has something we want to tell you, okay?”
She nodded, expecting Ben to say more, but he simply stepped aside to reveal a line of townspeople who were each waiting for that chance to speak one on one with Summer.
Maisie was first. She had her arm looped through an older man’s elbow. Summer hadn’t seen him before, but he bore a strong resemblance to each of the Bryant men.
“Summer,” Maisie said, “I’d like you to meet my dad, Mayor Matthew Bryant.”
“Oh, hello.” Although stunned, Summer remembered her manners and reached out to shake hands.
“Hello, young lady,” the mayor said. “I understand you’ve made quite the impression on my town and all the people in it. Have you enjoyed your stay in Sweet Grove?”
“Yes, very much. You have a lovely community here,” Summer answered.
Maisie grinned so big, it looked as if she were about to burst. “Tell her. Tell her now, Dad! I seriously can’t wait another minute.”
Mr. Bryant chuckled. “Hold your horses, Maisie. You always were in too much of a rush.”
“What’s going on?” Summer looked from one Bryant to the other, then searched the crowd for Ben, who was nowhere to be seen.
“As my over-exuberant daughter just told you, I’m the mayor of this here town. Have been for nearly thirty years now as a matter of fact. It’s with great pride and joy I’ve watched it grow ever bigger and bigger. I’m afraid Maisie’s little notice board at the grocery store just isn’t enough to get the word out about important goings-on. As Maisie so astutely pointed out to me, I could accept a bit of official help with that.”
“He wants to give you a job!” Maisie shouted, still shaking with glee.
Well, this was definitely not what she had expected. “A job?”
“The title is fancier than the actual role, but I’d like to hire you to start up the new Sweet Grove Sentinel, a proper town paper. Besides reporting on the events, you’d also get to help plan them. Keep bringing the town together as you already have been. Besides, I understand communications are a bit of a specialty for you?”
“Yes, I majored in communications.”
“The high school could also use someone to pick up the drama club, what with Mrs. Green retiring come spring. Ben tells me you’re phenomenal at, umm, actressing was it?”
Summer laughed. “If I do say so myself. Theater was my minor.”
“It will be a lot of work, but I could sure use someone with your skills. Just tell me, are you comfortable with using a computer to do your reporting? We can print a paper on Sundays to give out at the church, and keep up with the news on a special Sweet Grove Sentinel blog during the week. That’s what all the modern small towns seem to be doing these days, and I want to make sure we can keep up.”
“Dad, you can tell her all the details later. For now, I just want Summer to say she’ll stay. Please, please stay in Sweet Grove,” Maisie pleaded. “Daddy is a great boss. You’ll like working for him. I do!”
It was all happening so fast. She liked the sound of everything, but she needed a moment to herself to process it all. Private moments, however, were in short supply, seeing as she was the guest of honor at this particular party.
“That’s very nice, I...”
Before she could fully form an answer, Maisie and her father stepped aside and the next person in the receiving line stepped forward.
“Aunt Iris? You knew!”
“Of course I knew.” Aunt Iris bobbed her head, and Sunny Sunshine, who was in a little birdy harness that resembled a tuxedo, bobbed right along with her. “And we want you to stay too, Summer. Stay and keep living with me and Sunny Sunshine. Just stay the heck out of Morning Glory’s, would you? It will take me weeks to get my records in order again. I supposed I just won’t have time to keep up with the gossip on top of that, and I’m so out of sorts after being away for the last couple months. Bout time I gave up gossip and let someone else do official reporting. Don’t you think?”
“Oops, sorry about that.” Summer blushed and accepted a hug from her aunt.
Next Jennifer, Elise, and Kristina Rose skipped forward.
“Sorry I almost ruined the surprise,” Elise said. “I just get too excited sometimes. And I really, really want you to stay.”
“Yeah, we could use someone with your… spirit as a regular for karaoke night,” Kristina Rose said with a giggle.
“And we could use a new best friend too,” Jennifer added. “Stay, okay? We all already love you so much!”
One by one each of the people Summer had met during the past couple months came up to tell her why she needed to remain in their town.
“You really have a way of bringing this town together,” Jeffrey said. “First the great Sunny Sunshine escape and now this. News seems to follow you. Might as well take advantage of that. You’re the perfect person to give this town an official news outlet, and you seem to be perfect for my boy Ben, too. Stay!”
Jeffrey stepped back into the crowd, and Summer thought she heard Aunt Iris say “Escape? What?” But by then the next person had come to make his case.
Jack Bryant grinned at her and said, “If you promise to stay, I’ll make you fresh apple turn-overs whenever you want. I mean it. That’s how bad we all want you to keep on being our neighbor.”
Even Pastor Bernie and his wife Tabitha were there. “Sometimes God’s plan is a little less than clear, but sometimes it’s so dag-nab bright that it’s like looking at the sun. God brought you here for a reason, Summer, and God wants you to stay for a reason, too.”
At last, after everyone had taken a turn to make their case to Summer, Ben came forward once more. “You already know I want you to stay,” he said. “So instead of telling you why I need you so much, I’m going to tell you what I plan
to do in order to deserve you. Summer, you swept into this town and fixed my broken life, simply by being wonderful, lovable, awesome you.
“When Stephen died, I never thought I could find a way to be happy again, but these past couple months have been happier than any life I could have ever imagined for myself. You gave me the courage to finally get my mother the help she needed and she’s thriving. You make me brave. You make me realize that I don’t have to settle in life, that by having one dream, I can also have them all. Summer, I’m going to finally go to college.
“Don’t worry, I’m not asking you to stay, just so that I can up and leave. But I’ll be going to an online university. I’ll tell you all the details later, but I’ve already applied, and my grades in high school were great, and I might be able to get a scholarship even. And it will just work out. I know that in my heart.
“What I’m trying to say is… Summer, you’re not just my dream girl. You’re the girl who has single-handedly made all of my dreams come true. I guess that’s what love does to you. It makes everything better. You made everything better, and you haven’t just touched my life or my mom’s. Everyone in Sweet Grove loves you and wants you to stay. I want you to stay. Not just for another week or month or year. I can’t picture even a single day without you at my side. Summer, I want you to stay forever. I want to be there for you forever.
“Please say you’ll marry me.” He took a deep breath and waited.
But Summer didn’t make him wait for long. “Oh my gosh, yes!” she cried.
All of their guests cheered as Summer and Ben embraced and shared their first kiss as a newly engaged couple.
Elise and Jennifer wasted no time in pulling the bon voyage sign from the bridge. They flipped it over, waving it high in the sky above their heads. Welcome home, the sign now read.
“Welcome home,” her fiancé said with so much love in his eyes she almost couldn’t believe any of this was true.
And in that moment, Summer knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that she was right where she belonged, where she’d always belonged.
Home.
Epilogue
Kristina Rose eyed the sheet cake longingly. Normally she’d take a big corner piece with extra rosettes for herself, but not this time. Had food really become such a big part of her life that she couldn’t even get through a single party without gorging herself?
“Eat to live, don’t live to eat,” her mother had always said, yet she did the same exact thing. In fact, she was the very person who’d introduced Kristina to her addiction at an early age. Kristina tore her gaze away from the treat table and watched the happy couple hug and kiss in the wake of their engagement.
Summer looked positively radiant in her A-line sundress and with her natural curls teased and highlighted from the sun with little streaks of blond. She looked like a fairytale princess—or at least the twenty-first century version of one. Kristina Rose sucked in her stomach and tried to hold her breath in, but it was no use. Nobody wrote love stories about fat girls, especially not fat small-town waitresses with nothing going for them but their winning personalities.
That’s what her family had said growing up. “You’re such a sweet kid, such a pretty face. If only…” They never finished those sentences, but Kristina Rose knew exactly what they meant to say. If only she weren’t so heavy. If only she took better care of herself. But despite her love for food, Kristina did take care of herself. She drank at least eight glasses of water per day, always managed to snag at least seven hours of sleep each night, took long walks on her lunch breaks, and went through nightly beauty routines to keep her skin and hair glowing. So why couldn’t she just stop eating?
“You’re trying to fill a void,” said the psychologist she’d met with as part of her mandatory surgery prep. “Even with surgery, you’ll never keep the weight off unless you can uncover the source of that anxiety that’s driving you to eat.”
That all made perfect sense, but begged more questions rather than giving even a single answer. She’d wracked her brain trying to uncover the source as she’d been instructed, but ultimately had come up short. Now her surgery loomed just a couple weeks away. In two weeks, a big city doctor she’d met only a couple times before would slice her open and reroute her intestines, taking out a sizable chunk of her stomach in the process. Then she would have to learn a new way of eating, a new way of living. But she would get a new body out of it, a healthier one.
No more diabetes, no more plus-sized clothing. Or at least that’s what they all hoped and felt reasonably certain would happen. There were, of course, exceptions to every rule, and Kristina had prayed long and hard that she would not be one of them.
Now her life was in the doctor’s hands, quite literally. She would have to trust him and trust in God as she started the next chapter of her life’s story. But who would she be if not that fat girl that was everyone’s friend, but nobody’s girlfriend?
Kristina Rose had never even been kissed, not once. Talk about pathetic for a twenty-something, but boys just hadn’t been interested in her that way. And in seeing that, Kristina had done everything she could to shut off that need center in her heart.
Friends could be enough. Food could be enough. But now food could no longer be an option. Which left…
Her friend Jeffrey strode over to her with a flute of champagne clutched in each hand. “They’re about to toast to Ben and Summer,” he said. “I didn’t want you to miss out.”
“Thank you,” Kristina said, accepting the glass and choosing not to point out that she would no longer be allowed to drink once the surgery had been performed. The doctor and psychologist both said her surgery would put her at a much higher risk of developing alcoholism, that so many people chose to substitute one addiction for another and that her tinier stomach wouldn’t be able to handle nearly as much alcohol. It would zip right through her, make her loopy.
But for now, she would toast. She would drink. She would smile and wish the new couple luck.
She and Jeffrey clinked glasses and she had to bite back a laugh when the champagne’s fizzy bubbles tickled her upper lip.
“Good stuff, isn’t it?” Jeffrey asked, smacking his lips. “I’ve never been much of a drinker, but I could get used to this.”
She nodded, smiled, did her Kristina Rose thing.
“I’m really happy for Ben and Summer,” he continued. “Aren’t you? I mean, it must be so nice knowing you’ve found the person you’re going to spend the rest of your life with. Knowing you’ll always have someone in your corner, no matter what.” Jeffrey smiled at her and let his eyes fall to the lip of her glass which she held close to her chin.
“I can’t even begin to imagine how nice that must feel,” she admitted and took another long drink.
“Oh, you’ve finished. Can I top you off?” Jeffrey held out his hand and waited for the glass.
Kristina hadn’t even realized she’d finished the champagne in two gulps. That was probably the reason she was so fat to begin with. Didn’t even realize when she’d downed a bag of chips or half a gallon of ice cream. Maybe she was hiding something from herself after all.
“You don’t mind?” She handed Jeffrey her glass, and their fingers brushed against one another’s. She felt a small thrill run through her, but then realized it must be the champagne getting to her head already. She and Jeffrey had been friends for years. They even worked together at Mabel’s on Maple for the past several years as well. He was one of her best friends, and—sure—she’d always found him handsome, but she’d also always brushed those feelings aside. After all, she wasn’t the type of girl men waged wars for. She wasn’t even the type of girl men threw parties for or sent bouquets of flowers to. She was Kristina Rose, plain and simple and oversized.
“Of course I don’t mind.” He watched her for a few beats, then ran off toward the refreshment table to refill both glasses.
She’d better watch it with Jeffrey, otherwise she’d find herself longing for two things she
could never have.
LOVE’S PROMISE is coming soon. Make sure you are signed up for Melissa’s newsletter, so you don’t miss out! You can do that at www.MelStorm.com/gift
If you enjoyed LOVE’S PRAYER, you’ll also enjoy Melissa’s books about angels, the Pearl Maker Series, which starts with DIVING FOR PEARLS.
Although Elizabeth died giving birth to her daughter, her death wasn’t the end. She awakens to find her sacrifice has transformed her into a special kind of angel—a protector—and if she is able to help her charge through the Pearly Gates, she too will be welcomed into Heaven.
Elizabeth is both heartbroken and overjoyed when she finds she’ll be watching over Daisy, the daughter she never got to meet. She’d like nothing more than to live with her little girl in paradise, but being a guardian is hard work. Will Elizabeth be reunited with her daughter, or forced to suffer in silence as she watches Daisy make mistakes that place her just out of Heaven’s reach?
Now please enjoy this excerpt from DIVING FOR PEARLS.
The unyielding wall of white surrounded her like an embrace, absorbed her, became her. Nothing existed except for the vast blankness. She drifted through it, a mere ripple in the endless ocean. Time passed, but not in any discernible way. She didn’t know where she was or why, but she also didn’t think to question this new plane of existence. It, like she, just was.
The milky infinity at last separated to reveal the silhouette of an enormous city on the horizon. And this city was made of all the most spectacular colors in the sky’s repertoire—pinks, purples, oranges, yellows, blue—an impossibly beautiful structure built of sunrise. Flanking the ethereal village stood two soaring gates made of the finest yellow gold and dotted with pearls, each of which loomed larger than the distant moon.
Love's Prayer (The First Street Church Romances Book 1) Page 15
