“But Hart’s Crossing, Dad?” Jenna had made it sound like the end of the world. “You haven’t been back there since Grandma Scott moved in with you and Mom. I was still a teenager, for Pete’s sake. Why not move into a nice retirement community? There’s got to be some good ones in your area. That way you can still be near your friends.”
“I have a few friends in Idaho, too,” he answered her. “Besides, the cost of living is less there, and I own that house free and clear.”
“Dad, you’re not having money problems, are you?”
That comment irritated him. Did she think he was in his dotage? “No, Jenna. I’m not. But thanks for asking.”
His daughter might live halfway around the globe, but James was able to imagine the exasperated expression on her face at the end of that phone call.
Well, it was done now. His kids would have to accept his decision, like it or not.
The doorbell rang. James was glad for the interruption. He needed to stop woolgathering and resume his unpacking. He pulled open the door and discovered a woman on the stoop. “Yes?”
“Jimmy Scott, it really is you. I heard you were back, but I needed to come see for myself.”
No one had called him Jimmy in decades.
“Have I changed so much?” she asked, a twinkle appearing in her faded blue eyes.
James pushed open the screen door, peering more closely at the woman. About his age, she had a cap of curly white hair and a pleasantly round face with plenty of lines etched around her eyes and mouth. She looked familiar but he couldn’t quite…
Then she smiled.
“Steph!”
“In the flesh.”
He motioned her inside. “How are you?”
“I’m well, James. And you?”
“Good. I’m good.” He went to the sofa and cleared away some of the clutter to make room for her. “Have a seat. I’d offer you a cup of coffee, but the coffeemaker isn’t unpacked yet. How ’bout a glass of water?”
“I don’t need a thing, thanks. I’m fine.” She settled onto the couch. “I can’t stay but a moment anyway.”
James moved a box off his recliner and sat, too.
“I should apologize for barging in this way. But when Till told me this morning that you moved back after all these years, I just had to stop by to say hello. It’s such a surprise. Such a nice surprise.”
“My kids think I’ve lost my mind, returning to a rural town in Idaho when I could live anywhere else in the country.”
She laughed. “Most adult children would think that insane. Tell me about your children and grandchildren.”
James was happy to oblige. “My oldest, Kurt, lives in Pennsylvania. He and his wife have three kids, a boy and two girls. Kurt’s in the computer business, but don’t ask me what he does. I know just enough to send and receive email and surf the Internet a bit.”
He didn’t add that his son was always sending him new software to try out and that his failure to use them was a great disappointment for Kurt.
“My middle daughter, Jenna, and her husband live overseas. In England. He works for the U.S. government over there. They’ve been married about five years. No children yet, but they’re still hoping it will happen.”
Hope was a mild word for what his daughter felt. Jenna ached for a baby. But at forty-one, she heard her biological clock like the bong of Big Ben, and her childlessness had left her angry at God.
“My youngest, Paula, got divorced last year. She’s a school teacher living in Florida with her two daughters.”
James wasn’t sorry his philandering ex-son-in-law was out of the picture, but his heart broke whenever he spoke to Paula and heard the lingering sadness in her voice. He wished he could make it better.
Stephanie put her hands together in front of her chin, almost a clap but not quite. “Five grandchildren. How wonderful for you.”
“What about your family?” he replied.
“My daughter, Miranda, has made me a grandmother of two, Isabella and Foster. They live right here in Hart’s Crossing, so I’m quite spoiled.” Her smile was gentle as she added, “It must be hard for you, having your family living so far away. Is that one of the reasons you came back to Hart’s Crossing?”
“Mostly. Or maybe I’m trying to recapture a bit of my youth.” He shrugged. “But I think there were just too many memories in Bremerton to stay.”
Stephanie’s smile faded. “I know what you mean.”
James saw the sorrow that mirrored his own. “Of course you do. I heard about Chuck’s passing. I’m sorry for your loss. The few times I met him, he seemed like a real nice guy.”
“He was. Salt of the earth.” She rose from the sofa, the sparkle gone from her eyes. “I’ve taken up enough of your time. I should be getting on home.”
“I’m glad you stopped by.” He followed her to the door. “I’m sure we’ll see each other again.”
She smiled. A bit halfhearted but still a smile. “In a town this size, I can guarantee it.”
James watched her descend the porch steps, then closed the door and returned to work. At the rate he was going, he wouldn’t find that coffeepot for another week.
* * *
“You set eternity in our hearts, Lord,” Stephanie said softly as she walked toward home. “So no matter how long people live, no matter how old they are, it always feels wrong when death comes to someone we love.”
She thought of James, leaving his home in Washington after all these years because there were too many memories of his departed wife. Would Stephanie do the same if her daughter and family weren’t here in Hart’s Crossing? Would she run away if she could?
And yet, James hadn’t looked like a man who was running away. Yes, there had been a note of sadness in his voice when he’d mentioned the memories, but there had also been strength of purpose in his gaze. He hadn’t doubted his decision to return to Hart’s Crossing. Not a bit.
But wasn’t that always true of James? Even as a teenager, he’d seemed to know with unshakeable assurance where he was to go and what he was to do. It was that certainty that had taken him away from Hart’s Crossing, changing the course of both their lives.
Stephanie wondered what would be changed, now that he’d returned.
Chapter 2
SEPTEMBER WAS ONE OF Stephanie Watson’s two months to hostess the weekly meeting of the Thimbleberry Quilting Club. She loved having these women in her home. It made the old place feel lived in and less lonely. Most of the time, she rattled around in it like a bean in a baby’s rattle.
Chuck and Stephanie’s only child, Miranda, lived with her husband and two teenagers on the opposite side of Hart’s Crossing—no more than two miles away—in one of the new subdivisions that had sprung up in the last few years. Miranda tried to stop by to see her mother on a regular basis, but with a job in the mayor’s office and a busy family to care for, it wasn’t easy.
Till Hart removed her wire-rimmed glasses and set them on the arm of her chair. “Oh, dear. My eyes do get tired these days.” She shook her head. “Getting old is such a bother.”
“Isn’t that the truth,” Francine Hunter said with an emphatic nod.
Stephanie couldn’t agree more. Every year went by faster than the one before. It was enough to make an old woman dizzy. Still, if it weren’t for her tired joints and miscellaneous aches and pains, she wouldn’t believe she was sixty-nine. In her mind, she was no more than twenty-five or twenty-six, the same age as the club’s youngest member, Patti Bedford.
“What do you think, Frani?” Ethel Jacobsen asked. “Should we start working on a wedding quilt for Angie? Hasn’t Bill Palmer popped the question yet?”
Five pairs of eyes turned toward Francine, but she shook her head, disappointing them all.
“That man’s besotted with your daughter,” Mary Benrey, the secretary at Hart’s Crossing Community Church, said to Francine. “Why on earth is he dragging his feet?”
“Well, at first he was waiting for he
r to become a Christian. Now that that’s happened, I think he’s waiting because he’s afraid she’ll bolt back to California if he moves too fast. She’s always been so independent. Bill’s taking no chances on spooking her.”
Stephanie’s thoughts drifted to the autumn she first met Chuck Watson. Jimmy Scott had been gone for four months, an eternity when a girl is seventeen and all her friends have dates on Friday nights.
She and her best friend, Wilma Milburn, were sitting in the booth closest to the door at the Over the Rainbow Diner when Owen Watson came in, accompanied by a tall, good-looking boy Stephanie hadn’t seen before. Owen stopped when he saw them.
“Hi, Steph. Wilma. Meet my cousin, Chuck. He’s gonna be staying with us for the next year. Chuck, this is Steph and Wilma.”
Chuck Watson—broad-shouldered, golden-haired, blue-eyed—smiled at Stephanie. “A pleasure to meet you.”
Unlike Bill with Angie, Chuck didn’t waste any time. He asked Stephanie out that same night. When she said no because of Jimmy, he didn’t give up. He pursued her relentlessly. Little gifts. Flowers. Phone calls. He wore her down with his persistence. And one day, she just couldn’t say no again. After their first date, falling in love with Chuck was inevitable. They were engaged by the New Year, and their wedding was the day after her high school graduation.
Chuck’s one year in Hart’s Crossing with his aunt, uncle, and cousins turned into a lifetime with Stephanie. Fifty years. How blessed she’d been to be his wife.
“Did you know Mr. Scott, Frani, before he moved away?” Patti Bedford asked, catching Stephanie’s attention and drawing her thoughts back to the present.
“Not really. I was only eleven when he left Hart’s Crossing to go off to war. Nothing mattered to me back then but playing with my favorite dolls and trying to escape practicing the piano when my mother told me to.”
All the women laughed.
“He must have been a real heartthrob when he was younger.” Patti took several careful stitches before adding, “He reminds me of Sean Connery. Don’t you think so? Very distinguished with that white hair and close-trimmed beard.”
Stephanie frowned. She didn’t think James resembled the movie star at all. He looked like…James. Sure, his hair was silver and thinning instead of black and thick, but he was still just an older version of the boy she’d known so long ago. Handsome, yes. But Sean Connery? She didn’t see it.
“Well…” Till set her reading glasses onto the bridge of her nose, “one thing’s for sure. His return has given folks something new to talk about.”
* * *
James slid into a booth at the Over the Rainbow Diner and took a menu—one sheet of gold-colored paper encased in a plastic sleeve—from the rack beneath the window. After several days of his own rather pathetic cooking, he was ready for a meal prepared by someone else.
“Hello.”
He looked up at the waitress as she set a tall glass of water on the table. An attractive woman in her early forties, she wore a white apron over a red and white striped dress that was straight out of the diner’s heyday. The uniform went well with the retro decor.
“You must be Mr. Scott.”
James raised an eyebrow.
She laughed. “There aren’t that many strangers in town who fit your description.” She held out a hand in welcome. “I’m Nancy Raney. My husband, Harry, and I own the diner.”
“It looks great in here.” He shook her hand. “Reminds me of when I was a boy.”
“Thanks. It was pretty run down when we bought the place fifteen years ago. It took a lot of remodeling before we could reopen.” She motioned with her arm, as if inviting him to inspect the interior a second time. “We tried hard to recapture the way it looked in some of the photos that folks like Miss Hart had in their albums. Photos and the memory of some who lived here in the 1940s and ’50s.”
“Old-timers, you mean?” He chuckled.
She pretended to be horrified. “I’d never call Miss Hart an old-timer.” The twinkle in her eye gave her jest away.
“Smart girl.” He glanced again at the menu. “I’ll take the Scarecrow burger with a chocolate shake. Well done on the burger.”
“Coming right up, Mr. Scott.”
After Nancy walked away, James dropped the menu in the rack and turned his gaze out the window. Across the street was the Apollo Movie Theater. He’d noticed on the day he arrived that, like this restaurant, it appeared to have been restored, at least on the exterior. The marquee announced that one of the summer’s top action films would be playing over the weekend. Maybe he’d go see it tomorrow.
The door to the diner opened, and the sound of women’s voices drew his gaze away from the window.
“Well, look who’s here,” Till Hart said as she and Stephanie neared his booth. “James, were your ears burning? We talked about you at our quilting club meeting this morning.”
Out of habit, he started to rise.
Till waved him down. “Land sakes. Don’t get up for us.”
“Would you care to join me for lunch?”
Till glanced at her companion, then said, “We’d love to,” and slid onto the seat across from him. Stephanie sat beside her.
“Are you feeling more settled?” Till asked.
James took two menus from the rack and handed them to the women. “Yes. Although, to be honest, it’s a bit strange. The house is familiar from my boyhood, and my furniture is familiar from my house in Bremerton. But the two together?” He shrugged. “They seem an odd combination.”
“I can imagine they would,” Stephanie replied, giving him a warm smile.
It occurred to James that she was as pretty today as she was when he kissed her on V-J Day. Granted, it was a different kind of pretty. Her face was softly wrinkled, and the freckles that had sprinkled her nose as a girl were gone. Her hair was white instead of the golden blond shade of her youth, and she wore it short and curly rather than long and straight, the way he remembered it. But the style flattered her. The one thing that hadn’t changed was that smile. He’d always been partial to Stephanie’s smile.
Nancy arrived at the table with two more water glasses. “Hello, ladies. Joining Mr. Scott for lunch today?”
“That we are.” Till pointed at the menu without having looked at it. “I’d like the Emerald City salad, please, with the dressing on the side.”
“Anything to drink?”
“Water’s fine, thank you.”
“And you, Mrs. Watson?”
“I’ll have the same, Nancy. Thanks.”
More people entered the diner. A farmer in overalls and work boots. A businessman in slacks and short-sleeved shirt, sans coat and tie. Two young mothers with several toddlers in tow.
“So tell me, James,” Till said. “I’m sure you’re sick of the question, but I want to know. What brought you back to Hart’s Crossing?”
She was right. He was sick of that question. Sick of trying to come up with an answer that sounded logical—or at least humorous. This time he didn’t choose his words carefully. He just spoke from his heart.
“Till, I’ve been asking God what I’m supposed to do with the rest of my life ever since I retired two years ago. When the Pattersons moved out of Mother’s house, it seemed like the answer to my prayers.” His gaze shifted to Stephanie. “I felt like the Lord said go, so here I am.”
* * *
His answer made Stephanie smile. She liked knowing that James was the kind of man who sought God’s guidance.
Nancy approached their booth, carrying a large brown tray above her shoulder with one hand. In the blink of an eye, she placed the two salads, hamburger platter, and milkshake on the table. “Enjoy your lunch. Let me know if you need anything else.” Then she was off to wait on other customers.
Stephanie picked up her fork. “The Scarecrow is my favorite burger,” she told James. “I love fried onions.”
“I hope it’s as good as it used to be. I’ll try not to breathe on you when I’m finishe
d.” He punctuated the comment with a wink and a grin.
For goodness sake. Stephanie caught her breath. Patti’s right. James did bear more than a passing resemblance to Sean Connery.
Chapter 3
From: “Kurt Scott” [email protected]
Sent: Saturday, September 24 8:16 AM
To: “James Scott” [email protected]
Subject: Online yet?
HI, DAD. JUST WONDERING if your computer is up and running. Haven’t heard from you since you called to say you and the movers got to Hart’s Crossing okay. Directory assistance didn’t have a local number for you as of yesterday, so I tried your cell phone but couldn’t get through. I didn’t bother to leave a message. I figured you’re busy.
I wish I could take some time off to help you move in, but it just wasn’t possible right now. Glad you understand. Don’t overdo it and hurt yourself with all that unpacking. Ask for help or hire somebody if you need to.
The kids returned to school a month ago, and now everybody’s going a different direction several nights a week. I remember how we always had family dinners together when I was a boy, and I’m wondering how you and Mom managed that. It seems like half the time at my house, nobody’s home at the dinner hour, let alone sitting down to eat together.
Give us a call or respond to this email when you can. Sure hope you’re not regretting your decision to move.
Kurt
* * *
From: “James Scott” [email protected]
Sent: Saturday, September 24 10:32 AM
To: “Kurt & Neta” [email protected]
Subject: Re: Online yet?
Good morning, Kurt. My telephone service was finally up and working as of 4:45 p.m. yesterday. My number is 208-555-4632. I set up my trusty computer in my boyhood bedroom, which is now serving as my office. This is the first time I’ve turned it on, so I’m glad to see it’s working. The worst of the unpacking is done, and except for a few minor aches and pains (which could be my age more than anything else), I’m feeling fine. You don’t have to worry about me. I still have a modicum of good sense in this head of mine.
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