The Cowboy’s Return

by Aarsen, Carolyne

  “I was wrong to think of myself more than you,” Glenda said, her voice a quiet whisper. “I remember reading somewhere that grief is a selfish emotion, and I let it be exactly that. It’s still hard to think of the empty space in my life. Being here, in this house, is just another stark reminder of what I lost. But right now it’s the only home I have. I have no brothers and sisters, and one cousin I barely know.” Her voice broke again, and her grip tightened on his. “You are all I have left. And I have neglected you badly. Like I said, I was too caught up in myself. My own grief. I forgot that you were grieving too. I lost a daughter, but you lost a mother and a father. I thought bringing you to an intact family would make all the difference. Would give you what I didn’t think I could.”

  Lucas swallowed down an unexpected knot of pain and grief and anger. Her words only underlined everything he had ever thought about her.

  It had been easier to dislike her in the abstract, easier to be angry with the shadowy figure that she was in his life.

  But now that she was directly in front of him, her hands on his, he saw her for what she was. A broken woman, lost and alone. Just like Summer’s mother.

  How grief can ravage a family, he thought.

  “Will you please forgive me?” Glenda asked. “I know I don’t deserve it, and I don’t expect you to grant it right away, but I need to start the process.”

  Once again he struggled with memories, and then the words of the pastor drifted into his mind.

  Forgiveness given and received means freedom.

  He had spent too much time disliking this woman, being angry with her. Those emotions had held him hostage. He prayed for strength, he prayed for peace, and slowly he felt a new emotion wash over him.

  Release.

  He squeezed Glenda’s hands in return, speaking the words he knew would give her some absolution.

  “I forgive you,” he said, his voice quiet, as if recognizing the gravity of the situation. The seriousness of it. This holy moment. “I don’t want you to hold on to this any longer, I want you to let go of it.”

  Glenda lowered her head, a sob breaking free.

  Lucas got up, knelt beside her chair, and drew her into his arms. She was much more frail than he realized, just a collection of bones and skin. Her vulnerability caught in his soul.

  She cried quietly, and Lucas patted her back, supporting her.

  They stayed that way a few moments longer, then finally Glenda pulled away. She took out a tissue tucked in the sleeve of her sweater and dabbed at her eyes.

  “I’m sorry for the display,” Glenda said, her voice choked.

  “I’m not,” Lucas said, slipping onto his chair again and pulling it closer to her. He took Glenda’s hands between his own, leaning forward, holding her bright gaze. “I think too many times we hold our emotions in, and I don’t think that’s healthy. Nor is it healthy to withhold forgiveness from you.”

  “I don’t deserve that,” Glenda whispered. “I’ve not been a good grandmother at all.”

  “I guess I never stopped to think what you were dealing with either,” Lucas said.

  “You were only nine years old.” Glenda reached out to cup his face. “You were always such a good, sweet boy. I counted on that when I brought you to the Tye family. And I’m so thankful they took you in.”

  “I am too. I had some amazing and fun years there. We had a lot of good times, and it was a loving home.” He thought back to the dinner conversation this afternoon, the memories that ping-ponged back and forth. The stories that came out, and the laughter. That too was a holy moment.

  So why are you still thinking of leaving?

  His thoughts shifted to Summer, wondered if he stayed where she would fit.

  He shut that train of thought down. Things were so tentative for him. Even though he knew there was an attraction between them, he also knew she was holding something back.

  And that “something” scared him.

  “I’m going to go to my bedroom and read for a while,” Glenda said, slowly getting to her feet. “Why don’t you go keep Summer company?”

  Lucas stood and shot her a searching look. Had she sensed what was going on between them?

  But Glenda wasn’t looking at him. She grabbed the walker, and with surprising confidence, marched to her bedroom. She closed the door behind her, leaving him alone.

  He stayed a moment, still absorbing what had just happened. Reconciling the broken woman of a few moments ago with the woman he had always seen as cold and reserved. He said he had forgiven her, but he knew it would take time before their relationship was without tension.

  He was about to sit down again when the door opened, and Misty bounded inside.

  She ran right up to him, just about knocking him over, jumping up and down in circles around him, her tail wagging.

  “My goodness, she acts like she hasn’t seen you in months,” Summer said with a laugh.

  Lucas bent down to fondle the dog’s ears and try to settle her down. “She certainly makes a person feel important.”

  “I can’t believe no one has claimed her. She’s such a lovely dog,” Summer said.

  “I have to confess,” Lucas said, scratching Misty under her chin, “I hope no one does. I’m getting attached to her.”

  “I can see why,” Summer said. “She has a wonderful personality.”

  Summer took her coat off, shook snow off the shoulders, and hung it in the front entrance. She walked past him to the counter full of dishes and started cleaning up.

  Without a word, Lucas got up to help her.

  They worked in silence together for a while, a surprising ease seeping into the moment.

  When they were done, and the table was cleared and the counters wiped, Lucas picked up the pie and held it out.

  “Do you want a piece now?” he asked. “I think I worked up an appetite cleaning up.”

  “I should ask Glenda to join us,” Summer said. “I’m sure she’s in her room reading.”

  Lucas put his hand up to stop her, giving her a smile.

  “I think she might want some space right now,” he said. “We had an emotionally draining talk.”

  Summer didn’t ask any questions. Instead, she walked to the counter, filled the electric kettle with water, and plugged it in. She pulled out a teapot and a couple of mugs, tossed a tea bag into the teapot and leaned back against the counter, her arms crossed over her chest.

  “She asked me to forgive her,” Lucas said, even though Summer hadn’t asked for any information. He wanted her to know.

  “Did you?”

  “Of course I did,” Lucas said, frowning at her.

  Summer gave him a gentle smile. “I know how angry you were with her, and how grieved you were because she didn’t seem to want to have anything to do with you.”

  “Apparently, she was doing the same thing your mother is doing,” Lucas said. “Grieving the difficult loss of a child.”

  Summer nodded slowly, as if she understood.

  “She said that was why she couldn’t be around me,” Lucas said. “That I reminded her too much of the daughter she lost.”

  This was followed by another beat of silence.

  Then Summer released a heavy sigh. “I’ve read several books about grief, as I’ve tried to deal with losing Michael. Something that they all talked about was that grief can be self-focused. The grieving person can get so caught up in their own sorrow, they forget that other people are also grieving in their own way. I’ve had to realize there’s no right or wrong way to grieve.”

  Lucas knew she was talking about her mother, but her words were like little lashes. Little reminders of what he had done to her. How he had failed to understand her loss, because he was so caught up in his own.

  And now this beautiful woman, the woman who once held his heart, was standing in front of him, opening up to him. He knew the old attachment was returning. He could see it in her eyes every time they looked at each other. The awareness was so real it was
like he could touch it.

  “Every time I see you, it’s like another year that separated me from you slips away,” he said quietly. “Disappears.”

  Again she looked up at him, and again those well-known emotions sparked between them.

  He dared a step closer, cupped her face, and gave in to the feelings that tangled his thoughts, that had taken over every waking hour the last few days.

  He bent closer and tentatively brushed his lips over hers. A gentle touch, a hesitant connection.

  Again her hand came up and rested on his shoulder, and she moved closer to him. His hand slipped to her neck, and he pulled her face close, his lips pressed to hers, his mouth moving over hers, igniting a response.

  He crushed her close, her stomach holding another man’s baby pressing against him.

  He wanted to ignore it, but he couldn’t. This child was here, present, and a reality.

  Summer must’ve felt the same, because she immediately drew back.

  “We shouldn’t do this,” she whispered.

  Lucas knew he should acquiesce, but her response, the way she clung to him, showed him that while years had separated them and events had changed in their lives, the old feelings were as strong as ever.

  Instead, he stroked her face, tangling his hand in her hair, his eyes following the path of his fingers as they trailed down her neck and over her shoulder and down her arm. He caught her hand in his and raised it to his mouth, pressing kisses to it.

  She closed her eyes, moaning.

  “Please,” she breathed.

  “Please what?” he asked, deliberately misunderstanding her. “Please kiss you again? Kiss you until you can’t breathe anymore?”

  She pulled her hands free from him, looking down the hall, as if planning her escape.

  He frowned, puzzled at her reaction.

  Then she looked at him, her eyes wide with fear, and another inexpressible emotion that made his heart tremble. He felt as if something deeper was happening and he wasn’t sure what to do about it. He stepped back to give her space.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yes. I’m fine.”

  “You don’t seem fine. What’s going on?”

  She just stood there, looking away from him.

  “Summer. Talk to me. Tell me what’s going on.”

  She looked up at him now, her eyes holding his, holding a glimmer of their previous connection.

  “I care about you. You must know that,” he said.

  “I know,” she whispered. “But I can’t give in. I can’t change my plans. I have to stick to them.”

  “Plans about the baby?” he asked, puzzled at her response.

  She nodded decisively. “Yes. I made a promise, and I have to keep it. I’m giving this baby up. I can’t keep it. I just can’t.”

  And then without another word, she pushed past him, hurrying down the hall. She slipped into her bedroom, and though she closed the door quietly, it resounded like the crack of a shot.

  * * *

  Summer eased herself down onto her bed, tears threatening. She pushed them down, sick and tired of crying. She had done too much of that the last little while. Pulling in a steadying breath, she struggled to center herself. This was not who she was—weepy and emotionally fragile.

  She blamed it on hormones and the uncertainty in her life. But right now, all she could think of was Lucas kissing her. How familiar it felt and how good. She had been frightened at first but when she looked into his eyes and saw the compassion there it was as if, like he said, years slipped away. She had always felt safe around him. Secure.

  But she was in another place now and she couldn’t allow those emotions in. Couldn’t go there now, not with all she had coming at her yet.

  Shaking it off, she reached for her Bible, looking for the passage the pastor preached on. Remembering how Lucas had asked her to forgive him for not understanding what she had dealt with when her brother died. When he spoke those words it was like a weight had fallen away from her soul. A wound healed.

  Losing Michael had been like a brutal severing of a limb. Lucas was in training when it happened, and thinking of losing him as well had been something she knew she couldn’t deal with.

  As her thoughts slipped back to him, her hand rose to her mouth, touching her lips, remembering the kiss they shared. And yes, they had shared it. She had participated in it and as she did, as they embraced, as they connected, one painful thought was abundantly clear.

  She still loved him. Deeply, madly, dearly.

  But things had changed, and the child now stirring in her womb was clear evidence of that. The child she had told Lucas she had to give up.

  Do you? Can’t you keep it?

  She fought the question that had lingered too much the past month.

  As she pressed her hand against the baby growing within her, thoughts, once again, reluctantly shifted back to Dustin. The baby’s father.

  She and Dustin had dated for over a year. Summer had never been with anyone after Lucas, but when she met Dustin at the bar she worked at, she was mildly attracted. He seemed kind, caring, considerate. He was good-looking, and he gladly attended church with her. He ticked most of the boyfriend boxes.

  But he wasn’t Lucas.

  Summer knew it was unfair to keep stringing him along, so she broke up with him. He would call her, tell her he missed her, take her out for coffee, and she would relent and go out with him again.

  It became a habit she couldn’t break. All her friends were married or engaged, and it seemed easier to have someone, even if she didn’t care for him the way she had loved Lucas.

  She had loved before and knew what it was like. What she and Dustin had wasn’t that.

  Finally, she called it off for good.

  He thought she was joking, but when she got angry with him, the trouble started. He called her repeatedly, crying, begging her to take him back. It became embarrassing, and uncomfortable. He sent her texts, calling her at all hours of the night, and even though she blocked him on her phone he still found ways to get a hold of her.

  He showed up at her work, telling her he needed to talk to her. She declined, but when she left from her shifts at the hospital, he would be standing across the street watching her.

  His constant presence shifted from uncomfortable to creepy to frightening.

  Then, one night, as she let herself into her apartment, she heard a noise behind her, and there was Dustin. He pushed open the apartment door and followed her inside. He was drunk and pleaded with her, telling her that his life wasn’t worth living without her.

  Summer tried to reason with him, but all the while she was trying to unobtrusively pull her phone out of her purse to call the police. When he caught on to what she was doing he grew furious. He grabbed her purse and tossed it aside.

  That was when he dragged her to her bedroom, yelling at her repeatedly that this was what she needed, this was what she wanted. This would change her mind. He pushed her onto the bed and yanked on her clothes—

  Summer hugged herself, mentally slamming the lid on the memories, determined to keep them corralled. But they slithered out, creating shame and guilt.

  She didn’t tell anyone. Dustin had warned her that he would follow her. She knew she should call the police, but disgrace and humiliation were the stronger emotions. And a muted terror as Dustin hung around the street outside her apartment for the next few days, alternately sitting in or leaning against his car parked outside her apartment. Besides, as an emergency room nurse, she had done rape kits. She knew what was involved. And by the time she steeled herself to go through that it would probably have been too late.

  Nor could she face the people she worked with. She had always been the good girl. The girl who ran countless Bible studies, the girl who worked so hard to do the right thing and be the right person, determined not to be like her mother—a woman who had a reputation for loose living and easy morals.

  Finally, she couldn’t stand it any longer and
left her apartment, confronting him. He apologized, tried to make it up to her but she lashed out at him, feeling a moment of control.

  He finally left. But somehow he had found out she was pregnant and sent her a cheque. To take care of things, he had told her in the note he had sent with it.

  Then, three months later, a couple of weeks after she got his cheque, she heard that Dustin had gotten into a fight in a bar. He was hit in the head, which triggered an aneurysm that had lain dormant for years. He died two days later.

  Her reaction was a mixture of relief and, at the same time, unexpected grief. She didn’t want to feel sorry for him, he didn’t deserve her pity.

  He had violated her in the worst possible way. Had taken away her innocence, had attacked her in her own home. Deliberately.

  And he had put his seed in her womb—against her will.

  The words of the minister echoed in her head, but she didn’t know how she could find it in her heart to forgive him. Didn’t know how she could even begin to learn to live with the result of that horrible act.

  She knew it was wrong to blame this child for what its father had done, but at the same time she was so afraid that every time she saw him or her she would be reminded of what happened, how it was conceived. It wouldn’t be fair to the child, she had reasoned. The baby was innocent and didn’t deserve to be raised with anything less than unconditional love in a secure and loving home.

  With a shake of her head, she turned back to her Bible, leafing through it as if trying to find something to distract and comfort her at the same time.

  Her eyes fell on a passage she had marked at one time. Clearly it had spoken to her.

  She read the words, letting them soak in. “‘You hold me in behind and before and you lay your hand on me’”. The words had been a comfort at one time and were a comfort now. She read further, feeling as if God’s hand was resting lightly on her shoulder, guiding her. “‘Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I escape from your presence?’”