Perri looked up. The light coming in the barn from the open roof changed everything about the structure. She stepped inside, drawn by the peaceful way the evening shadows altered the familiar old building.
The acoustics had been modified dramatically by the rolled-up roof. Locusts in the surrounding trees emptied their anxious hum into the sound-sensitive space. The wind remained still. Spent. Not even the tin roof clattered.
Perri smoothed her palms lovingly over her belly and looked west. Broad, soft ribbons of copper and aqua were showcased in the barn’s open doorway. And Matt stood in the shadows. Abruptly, the locusts paused, the silence going deep. It was thorough, startling and complete. And in the silence, as she watched the fireflies wink around them, Matt crossed the threshold into the barn and came toward her.
Perri silently viewed his approach. She could only wait for him to reach her. Grief slowed a person down. Whenever grief was in command it took every bit of remaining life just to move through the everyday, mundane rituals of existence.
Matt continued toward her, steady, confidant and strong. His footsteps struck the earth, sounding so right. Matt belonged here.
Her desperate need to weep remained tightly reined. It lodged in her throat, an ache for which there would be no immediate relief. She hadn’t run. He’d come back. They’d survived the storm and the night. Apart.
“Thank you for clearing away the wreckage and dealing with the back porch,” she said. “I’m grateful to you.” Trying for calm, Perri took a deep breath. “So, who did you call first, Matt,” she asked, “the roofer or the tree surgeon?”
“The travel agent,” Matt replied quietly. “And your grandmother Anne, in Tucson.” After a moment, he smiled faintly. “She sounds wonderful, hon. Five minutes on the phone with her and I felt like I’d known her all my life. I, uh, spoke to my grandfather,” he said, his voice gruff.
“I’m glad for you, Matt,” Perri replied.
“He says he wants a chance to get to know me. Somehow, I found myself agreeing that they should come here to visit us.” He seemed a little bewildered as to exactly how that had happened. Perri knew her grandmother. She could just imagine.
“Anne insisted they could house-sit while we go to San Francisco,” he said. “Your grandmother sounded like she had the whole thing already planned. She seemed to relish the idea of supervising the renovations. So, do you still want to go to San Francisco,” he asked. “Shall I tell them to come on?
“Or we could visit them, if you prefer,” he added when she didn’t respond. “There’s a racetrack in Tucson, Rillito Park—the oldest one in the Southwest. I’d like to take you to see it. We could book one of those cottages at the Arizona Inn,” Matt said cautiously, “drive out to watch the sunset at Gates Pass.”
Perri blinked, stunned by his words. If he meant it, could she handle it? The question disturbed her. She’d never prepared herself for any dramatic shift in Matt. She’d never thought such a thing possible. She had always expected she would have to work around him.
Did she have the courage to trust that he could change; that he would change for her? She wondered. Perri stared at the sunset, letting doubt wash over her. If Matt could make an alteration, then she would have to alter yet again to accommodate it.
He watched worry darken her eyes, making the shards of amber most prominent. “You’re not going to give me another chance, are you?” Matt asked quietly. “I can see it in your eyes. You don’t believe I can change.”
“Most people can’t, Matt,” Perri cautioned, “even if they want to desperately.”
“You did,” Matt reminded her.
“I had to,” she answered forcefully. Change was certainly a skill that the events of her life had honed fine. “I didn’t have any other choice. I lost it all. You’re losing nothing,” she reminded him. “Change is painful, slow and lonely. Nobody changes unless they have to, in my opinion.” Perri broke away. She couldn’t bear to stand so close to him. She loved him and the ache in her throat was the desperate longing for a family.
“Change leaves you shaky, Matt,” she went on more quietly. The effort to explain took her back into the hurt. “It uses all your courage. And no matter how hard you work at it, no matter how far you go,” she reflected, “you’re never that far removed from what you were.
“Even 180 degrees isn’t far enough,” she said, turning away from him as if to protect, to keep private that last shred of truth. “You wake up one morning certain in the knowledge that you’re just the opposite side of the same familiar coin. And that coin is in the currency of longing and regret. Of yearning, Matt,” she said. “Yearning for what you’ve lost, for what you lost the chance to have. There’s always a silent longing for what you had to change From.”
Matt didn’t respond. He stood there and let her get it out. For once he didn’t push; didn’t try to impel her to bend.
“You’ve never bad to change, Matt,” she said. “Believe me, you can’t holler it done. It’s easier to simply announce that you can’t do it and have everybody work around you. Make everyone else adjust.
“And why would you change when you don’t have to?” she asked, turning toward him. “I’m not taking our baby away from here, away from family. However shaky or disjointed it may be, this is where my baby’s family lives.” She stood before him for one final question. “What would you change for?”
“For you,” he said quietly, closing the remaining space between them. The last of the light glinted off the locket he held in his palm. Warm fingers closed over hers as he put it into her hand.
Perri searched his eyes for the truth and found it in the dwindling light of sundown. She knew him. She knew that if Matt said he would do it, he would. Perri saw all the courage and skill he possessed focused on their future. She smiled. “You mean it. Don’t you?” she asked softly.
Matt stood unflinching in the presence of her hesitation. Perri deserved the truth. It was more than he could take to think of losing her. “Yes, I do,” he whispered as his eyes filled. “I love you, Perri. You are a part of my world. The best part. You’re my family,” he declared. “If Gannie was the backbone, honey, you are the heart.”
Matt opened his arms and she joyfully rushed to him. He held her fiercely enough to take her to the edge of pain. She didn’t mind.
“I don’t expect I’ll be any good at it at first,” he said pulling back to look at her. “But I love you so much, and I can bend. I can’t live without you, hon.”
If things get better; if you get what you want; Perri believed you damn straight better have enough courage to meet it. Breathless from his kiss, she smiled. “So, honey, how was your day?” she inquired.
Matt laughed out loud and hugged her with obvious delight. Night was approaching; the air had transformed. He could feel it. Gledhill and Spirit Valley were at peace.
She stood gazing at him in the darkening preserve of light, delighting in the way the laughter lit up his eyes. Holding the locket of promise close to her heart, Perri knew they would finally be a family—forever.
ISBN : 978-1-4592-5806-8
THE BRIDAL PROMISE
Copyright © 1999 by Virginia G. Kotimsky
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