Sage and Sweetgrass

by LoRee Peery

  “That’s normal. I did the same thing after Keith was killed. In fact, I kept the sheets on the bed for a month just so I could inhale his scent. I held on to his clothes for six months. Then one day I realized I couldn’t smell him anymore.”

  “I kept a bottle of Becca’s perfume. It put me in a depression for days every time Lezlie opened it to keep in touch with her mother’s favorite scent.”

  Lanae, at a loss for words, headed for the stairs. She wanted to understand. Yet she wanted to pound something—like Sage’s broad chest—and say, “Get over it already!”

  But she knew from experience people grieved and moved on according to their own process.

  During the first-floor tour, Lanae was most struck by the handcrafted furniture in the bedrooms. The headboards of the sturdy looking beds, the nightstands, and in one room, even a corner table with matching chair, were all constructed of pine. It looked as though the tree branches had been lobbed off to leave the trunks for construction. The chests of drawers and one dresser were fronted with cedar.

  “I am so impressed, Sage. I’d like to be snowed in here so I can enjoy your furniture. It is lovely, like being in a rain washed forest glade.”

  “Thanks. I like it. Especially ‘cause it’s so different from the girly stuff Becca was into.”

  Becca. She couldn’t escape the deceased wife.

  Down the stairs, a five-by-five deer mount startled a gasp from Lanae. “You hunt, Sage?”

  “Nah. That guy’s a leftover from the previous owner, which surprises me. He was a vet.”

  She scanned the room where he obviously spent time. A worn, wide-ribbed corduroy couch in burnt orange angled so the watcher had the best view of a huge flat-screen television that took up most of the darkest wall. A beautiful antique cedar chest was covered with horse magazines, a giant mug with the design obliterated by age, and a library book.

  One item Lanae hadn’t seen in the house was a Bible.

  She’d have to think about that. The man wasn’t crass, didn’t appear to treat women like doormats. The gentle way Sage had with horses and the way he loved his family exhibited Christian character. But exactly what kind of relationship did Sage have with the Lord?

  Lanae shook her head over her wandering mind. A lower level walk-out to the east drew her close. “Oh, I’ll bet this is lovely in the mornings.”

  “It is. The elevation right here is a little low, but the colors of the sky are still visible as the sun rises over the hill.”

  “What about animals? Do they wander up from the creek?”

  “Oh, yeah.” His chuckle filled her with warmth.

  “Including little rascals, like ‘coons and opossums. But the deer make up for it. Early this past spring a young buck, going into velvet, came meandering up.”

  “Velvet’s before the antlers harden?”

  “Right. Then once, back in late summer when I was messing with rocks in the flower bed, I had my back to the field out there on the other side of the creek. A rumbling ‘moo’ sound came from behind me. First thought I had was the neighbor’s cows must be out.”

  Sage’s relaxed pleasure over nature’s offering lit up his face. “I turned to find a large doe looking right at me, ears straight up in silhouette.”

  “Oh.”

  “‘Well, hello there, sweetheart,’” I said to her in a low voice. ‘There’s room for both of us here,’ I went on to tell her.”

  Lanae held back the urge to giggle at his exaggerated cowboy drawl.

  “Did she listen?”

  “She made her vocal noise once more. I’ve thought of it since, but so far haven’t been able to put a descriptive word to the sound the doe made. And I’ve been unable to mimic the sound. We just stood there looking at one another, her ears poked straight up and her white tail straight down.”

  “What a thrill that had to have been.”

  “I told her thanks for talking to me. And it’s all right for us to share this place.”

  Lanae looked to the dormant grassy area Sage indicated with a lift of his arm. The full moon gave the landscape an eerie, yet luminescent glow, a different sky than when she’d looked out earlier.

  “The best was yet to come,” Sage continued his tale. “She growled and stepped away, full of grace, at a loping walk. Then the doe turned to look back at me, grumbled once more. Her tail went up and twitched before she walked another ten feet or so.”

  He grinned, tanned lines accenting his fabulous eyes. “That doe made my day. It was one of those suspended-in-time moments.”

  My day and night have been made by you, Sage. How many days will we have together?

  “But my day hadn’t been complete until a fawn wearing its spots rose from the grass across the creek.”

  She couldn’t resist. She gave him a quick hug before stepping back to tease him a little. “Ah. She wasn’t talking to you, but to her baby.”

  She tried to decipher the emotion that turned his eyes such an silver in the moonlight. The weakness started in Lanae’s stomach and traveled to her knees.

  “Sage?” His name blew a whisper above a breath.

  She leaned toward him.

  He read the message in her eyes, and came closer with opened arms.

  Lanae wanted Sage.

  She wanted to reach inside him and pull him close. She wanted his mouth on hers. She wanted to feel him, to breathe him in. She wanted to taste him. To smell him. She wanted all of him.

  Her knees wobbled when she remembered the heroic, yet tender manner in which Sage had carried Kate Rawlins through Frivolities.

  Her head rolled back.

  His head leaned forward.

  This time, her name whooshed from his lips as a sigh, a beat before their lips finally met.

  Somehow, with all the tumultuous shattering of her insides, she was suddenly calm with the rightness of it all. She might laugh later at her own contradiction, being calm and all riled up at once.

  The kiss was more than a kiss. It was a release.

  Her loneliness, her longing, her desire, all poured through with the heightened pressure of Sage’s lips on hers.

  He drew her tighter against him, as though he answered her silent pleas with wants as deeply buried as hers.

  She hadn’t felt so small, so secure, or so protected in a long, long time.

  Intense, pent-up yearnings threatened to begin the weeping all over again.

  She protested at the sudden assault on her senses, and a moan formed in her mind but didn’t escape her lips. Sensations attacked her whole body, yet she was aware of each one. Her eyes drifted shut, and she closed out the world, subliminally exposing to Sage what he was awakening in her.

  He smelled so good, like maple syrup and chocolate. And the tiniest hint of spice. Sage.

  She imagined the scene he had described and wanted to be outside in the warm sunlight. She wanted the breeze to whisper over her skin. She longed to feel the sun warm her, to drive away the chill of all sickness.

  More than anything, she wanted to let him know God was watching over them the way the doe protected her fawn. She wanted him to believe and trust God’s purpose in taking Becca when He did. She hoped the next time Sage tended his garden in the sunlight, he saw God through the nature He provided.

  And she wanted to share the great outdoors with Sage in his country life.

  Her whimper escaped, loud in the quiet room.

  Sage groaned and drew back, holding the tiniest piece of her bottom lip gently between his teeth as though he was reluctant to break their intimate connection.

  He raised his head, but held hers in the palm of his hand, and nudged her against his chest. She closed her eyes and nestled her ear near his heart. They stood without stirring while their breathing and pulse rates returned to normal.

  Normal? Not on your life.

  He pulled back with a start as though coming to after getting bucked off a horse.

  “That shouldn’t have happened.” His voice was gruff. “Yo
u’d better go.”

  What happened to her gentle horse whisperer? Becca must have entered his thoughts.

  Lanae had counted six pictures of the woman in question, all propped in prominent places throughout the ranch home.

  Did Sage mean to give her the subliminal message his one true love reigned in his house?

  Was that message enough to keep Sage from Lanae’s heart?

  Too late. He was already there.

  And it appeared Sage would stay in her heart rather than her life. As long as he still loved Becca.

  It was right there in his eyes.

  Sage was full of contradictions in the vibes he’d put off throughout the evening. Did he even recognize his conflicted thinking? He hadn’t let his dead wife go.

  And it appears he’s unwilling to take on another diseased woman. Even if I am healed.

  “It is time for me to go. Tonight was emotional for all of us. I’ll see myself out.”

  She started up the staircase and waited for him to step close behind. At the top of the stairs he turned to her, where they stood at the end of the hallway before re-entering the great room.

  “Watch out for deer.”

  He may have shut her out, but he cared enough to repeat the same warning he’d given Lezlie.

  Lanae smiled in the darkness. Would he ever address her as “honey?”

  And why in the world did some men apologize for a kiss?

  ****

  July 12, 1960

  4:30 a.m.

  Darling Ted,

  Where are you?

  Your mother finally answered the telephone, and she sounded as sick as I feel for you inside. And I can understand that.

  Oh, Ted, I’m so sorry your father is dead, and in such a tragic way.

  On the Fourth of July, no less.

  There is so much talk about what happened.

  Do you think it was a hobo passing through?

  I so wonder where you were when it happened. Not making it to your own father’s funeral, people are talking about that, too, even here in Platteville.

  But the old saying is “you never miss the water until the well goes dry.” And I have missed you that much, dear. Last night I couldn’t get to sleep for thinking about you and what has happened to your family.

  Your poor mother. Your poor sisters.

  It was past 2:00 a.m. when I finally fell asleep, only to wake an hour later. I can’t imagine where you are, sweetheart. I feel like life isn’t real right now.

  Well, honey, I am not going to write much anymore. So, bye, bye, dearest, until we meet again.

  Be good, sweet. Lots of love and kisses. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

  Lovingly,

  Katherine

  Lanae didn’t even attempt to swipe at the silent tears washing her cheeks. “Not the thing to read right before bed.”

  She followed Katherine’s written example, unable to sleep. After tossing for an hour, Lanae got up and went down the stairs to the Frivolities office. Once logged on, she searched Nebraska’s unsolved homicides on the Internet.

  Nothing more than what Sage had told them. Only a listing in a newspaper article from years before, naming a state trooper who was assigned to cold cases.

  No hits. Evidently the case of Earl Tippin was far too cold.

  Lord, I seek the joy that only You can provide. Please help me be content in where You have me right now.

  Maybe, someday, she’d look back and be thankful for the way Sage had made her feel so alive.

  Someday.

  Right now life felt like a roll of yarn unraveled by a naughty kitten. And the closer it got to the end, the faster it rolled.

  “Can I end my days in happiness having known Sage? Will I thank the Lord for letting us meet?”

  And why have I been exposed to country life again?

  Could she get through to Sage by following Kate’s example and writing him a letter? Would it be easier to get her feelings down on paper, where he’d have something other than Becca before his eyes?

  She reached for pen and tablet.

  The middle of a December night

  Dear Sage,

  Thank you for the deer warning. I was within spitting distance of your driveway, when a voice, probably my guardian angel, or the Spirit of the Lord, said “slow down.” It was so strange. Through my mind’s eye, I saw a doe bound from the field on my right seconds before she appeared. Does that make sense? She darted out of nowhere, but I was going slow enough that she crossed the road while I was braking, so we both escaped a nasty outcome. I was pretty shaken, though, and couldn’t settle down to sleep when I tried to get comfy.

  I looked out the sliding glass doors of the loft, into the dark, early December night. The air is definitely growing frostier. The sky is all gray and cloudy, but the beautiful moon shone bright earlier. The first snow has got to be around the corner. Can you feel it, too?

  For some reason I had a flash of memory from a night on the ranch. Sometimes I mourn the loss of the ranch as much as I do the loss of Keith. That’s so stupid, really, considering the blessings I have found here with Geneva and Moselle and Frivolities.

  And now meeting you and your family.

  Sage, thank you also, for including me in your revelation to Lezlie and Jaxson. That must have been so difficult for you. I can’t imagine facing July Fourth each year with that kind of unresolved family history.

  Love,

  Lanae

  P.S. I do love you. You can take it as a free gift, or you can leave it in my heart where it will never grow to fruition, as long as you remain in love with a dead woman.

  A tear dropped with a splat on the back of Lanae’s hand. If she found the nerve to send the letter, she’d leave off the postscript. Then again, maybe not.

  Would she be content if Jesus remained the lover of her soul?

  Knowing He was there as part of who she was didn’t mean it brought contentment to Lanae’s heart. Contentment came from spiritual growth.

  Looked like she had some growing to do.

  13

  I refuse to be an old lady who says, “If I had my life to live over I would do such-and-such.”

  The following morning, Lanae rose early, feeling like she moved in a dream, she was so sleep deprived. And achy. But she fought going there, recalling the way she used to wake up. When she rose, she’d search for signs of jaundice in her mirrored image. Often her pinkish eyelids looked as though she’d brushed on shadow.

  “Why are you going there, woman? Think about the cowboy all alone on his acreage,” she admonished herself in the empty bathroom.

  Oh yeah, it had felt so right to be held close by Sage, with all those muscles and his masculine strength surrounding her. Filling her up with how things could be.

  If I don’t live my life to the fullest, there is no one else to live it for me. And I want to share my life with Sage.

  But he was still in love—even though she was gone.

  Daydreaming about Sage, Lanae soaped her underarms. She set aside the shaving gel and grabbed her shaver. Rinsing off, left arm upraised, she jerked and fast came out of her dream state. The bristles jabbed. “What in the world?”

  She burst out laughing, and snatched her shaver off the rim of the tub again. So preoccupied with thoughts of Sage, she didn’t know what she was doing. She soaped up but hadn’t shaved. “It’s come to this? Not only talking to myself, but pulling off Geneva antics?”

  Geneva once had Lanae rolling with laughter when she’d described creaming up one smooth leg only to discover she had forgotten to shave the other. All because she’d been thinking about Rainn.

  Lanae removed the plastic cover from her shaver, a newly established safety precaution with Mia around, and attended to the business of hair removal.

  A short time later, she spoke to her baking utensils as she gathered cheesecake ingredients. “I love you, Sage. I know you don’t wan
t me to.”

  She was in the mood to bake. The cakes lasted in the freezer nicely until needed in Frivolities.

  She could hear Sage answer something like, “That’s right. You had your love in Keith. I’ve loved Becca. I still love Becca.”

  Would he be that honest?

  Would she be brave enough to mail the letter?

  At the sight of her baking chocolates lined up in a row—white, dark, milk—she decided to use two-tone chocolate for curls. Sage claimed to love dark chocolate.

  She got all fluttery inside at the recollection of savoring his tasty kisses, the way she’d melted like chocolate in his embrace.

  She had no idea which flavors she’d end up with, so she also set out chocolate chips, along with nuts and a variety of flavorings. She grabbed a can of pumpkin pie mix and added the peanut butter jar. She wasn’t in the mood for fruit or berries today. Lanae danced around her kitchenette and pictured the long counter in Sage’s home. “Now, that’s the place to do some serious baking.”

  Just that fast, inert, she bowed her head.

  Thank You, Lord. Thank You for giving me the energy to cook. For so long I couldn’t think of or even taste and appreciate food. Thanks for giving me restored health.

  Lanae opened her eyes and turned on her mixer, singing, “Jesus Loves Me.”

  The beaters churned and rhyming words flitted through her mind: burn, churn, fern, learn, stern, yearn.

  Next, Lanae thought of Katherine. Rather, Kate Rawlins, and the impact Kate’s written yearning for her Teddy had on Lanae’s own emotions.

  No doubt about it, Lanae yearned for Sage. And she could love Sage with every fiber of her being if he would open up and let her in.

  “Is that what you want, Lord? I can’t help but think Sage and I wouldn’t have met if You didn’t want us to be together.”

  And I could live in the country again, where I belong.

  She went through the rest of the day wondering how Kate fared. By the time Frivolities was locked up for the night, Lanae had determined to take half a cheesecake to Kate.