A Handful of Hope

by Elizabeth Maddrey

  “You there?”

  “Yeah, I’m here. I...could explain, but I’m not sure there’s a point.”

  “Try me.” There was an undercurrent of hostility in Ben’s voice. Was David going to lose his friends, in addition to Jen, because of this?

  “Our first date was horrible. You know that—even she admits that. And so, on a whim, I opened an account, though I never even finished the setup process before I realized that Jen was worth another chance. That she was special and I wasn’t going to find someone better—or at least that I didn’t want to look until I gave her, us, another chance. I talked to Jackson about it.”

  “As it happens, I already talked to Jackson. He’s fully on your side, if that helps. Given what you just said, I’m inclined to be as well. Though that might cause some problems with my wife. Jen and Sara are two of her best friends. They’ve seen her through some of the darkest parts of her life. She’s fiercely protective.”

  “I understand that. I’m glad Jen has someone like that on her side. I...I can’t even get her to talk to me though. How can we get past this—how do I fix it—if she won’t talk to me?” David pinched the bridge of his nose. It was like something out of those cheesy movies his sisters watched. He never dreamed it could happen like that in real life. Didn’t people just have rational conversations and hash through their problems? That’s what his parents always did.

  “I don’t know, man. But...here’s the thing.”

  David winced. That was never a good intro. “Yeah?”

  “Unless Jen tells Rebecca otherwise before then, she doesn’t want you at the wedding, and she convinced Paige that you shouldn’t be there. I tried to tell her she was being unreasonable. But, like I said, fierce.”

  There went one plan that had been forming in his mind. He’d been willing to bet she wouldn’t cause a scene at a wedding. Maybe it was for the best. “Yeah, okay.”

  “I hope you can work it out. I’ll be praying for you.”

  David scoffed. That was the only possible thing that was going to fix this. Prayer. “Thanks.”

  “Hi, Mom, Dad.” David called out as he let himself into his parent’s house, a bag of ice cream sundae fixings in his hand.

  “In the den.”

  He smiled at the surprise in his mom’s voice and made his way to where they sat, watching a movie on TV. “I brought ice cream. Anyone game?”

  “Whatcha got?” His dad looked up and squinted at the bag. “Oh yeah, I want some.”

  “Why are you here, David? I thought you had a wedding that you were going to with Jen?”

  David sighed. Of course his mom didn’t forget. “We had a disagreement. I guess. I got uninvited.”

  “What?” His mother started to stand. He smiled in spite of himself. Even now, his mom was his best defender.

  “Sit down, Mom, it’s okay. They’re her friends more than mine.” That stung. The truth of it. He’d broken away from his usual group—not that it had been hard to do, it was time, really—but now he had nothing. Sure, he could probably go back to them, but the thought of hanging out as they tried to one-up each other held no interest. He wanted to be with Jen. With Jackson and Paige, Ben and Rebecca, Zach and Amy. They were real. Genuine. Fun to be around. “I’ll go get bowls.”

  When he got back, his mom already had the ice cream open and the toppings arranged on the coffee table. She ran her hand up and down his arm. “You’re okay?”

  David swallowed the lump in his throat. “No, Mom. I’m not.”

  “Oh, baby. What can you do to fix things?”

  He flipped the lid off the ice cream and began to scoop. “I don’t know. She won’t talk to me. I’ve tried going to her office, but she freezes me out. And when I call or text, she ignores me. I haven’t gone by, mostly because I don’t want to cause a scene and have her neighbors talking. It’s likely I’d end up banging on her door while she ignored me and refused to come out. I don’t know what else to try.”

  “Your—her—friends, do they know what’s happened?”

  He squirted whipped cream on top of his ice cream and explained the misunderstanding.

  “Oh, David. Online dating?” His father shook his head. “Your grandfather and I would have found you someone. How is that any different?”

  David winced. Put that way, maybe it wasn’t. But...it took the choice out of his hands, didn’t it? “It doesn’t matter, Dad. I never did anything with it. I’m in love with Jen. More than that, I know in my heart she’s the woman God has for me.”

  His father scoffed and tapped his bowl with his spoon. “That may be true, but you’ve messed it up.”

  “Oh, hush. You made some missteps when we were courting. I nearly went to my father to call off our marriage three times.”

  His father looked away.

  “Seriously?” David dug into his ice cream. “You’ve never mentioned that before.”

  “I respect your father. I never wanted his children to know he could be a fool.”

  “We fixed it, didn’t we?” His father frowned at his mother. “I apologized.”

  “True. You did. And I didn’t call off the wedding.” She smiled and patted his hand. “My point is this, sometimes men are stupid. What you did, David, was stupid.”

  He hunched his shoulders. She was right. Even if it pained him to admit it.

  “You’ve deleted the account now, right?”

  He winced. “I keep forgetting.”

  His mother tsked. “Go. Use the computer in the kitchen and do it now. You can take your ice cream. Come back when you’re finished and we’ll figure out what you should do next.”

  David started to stand then pursed his lips. “I...might have a better idea.”

  Jen pulled out a chair next to Sara. “Where’s your date?”

  “Getting some punch. I can’t believe they didn’t rent a restaurant or something. This is so...”

  “Lovely? Them? And the food’s from Season’s Bounty, so it’s not like it isn’t catered.” Jen frowned. Sara had been negative the whole time, complaining that there weren’t many people, the side chapel of the church was too plain. Then again, Sara loved the wedding shows on TV where people spent more on one day than she made in a year. Those shows made Jen’s stomach turn. Maybe she wanted a little more frills than Paige and Jackson had, but extravagant wasn’t on her wish list. To each her own.

  “Speaking of dates, where’d Brandon go?”

  “Braedon. He got a phone call as we were on the way up. He stepped outside to take it.” Jen shrugged. She’d only asked him on the off chance David showed up. She hadn’t wanted to be there alone, like she was pining for him. Even if she was. David. His name was like an ice pick through her heart. Had he really been cheating on her?

  Sara frowned. “I shouldn’t have shown you the dating app, should I?”

  “You thought you were doing the right thing.” Maybe it was the right thing. She deserved better than someone who’d cheat, didn’t she? But was he cheating? She didn’t trust herself to ask—after all, what if he said no? She’d have to choose whether or not she believed him. The heaviness that had been her constant companion throughout the week snuggled closer, blurring the edges of her vision. She just had to make it through cake and then she could escape. She’d go home, turn off her phone, and lose herself in the beautiful oblivion of sleep. At least until two a.m. when the barrage of questions and doubt started. But then she had her puzzle. Even if she couldn’t make sense of her life, eventually she could find where pieces of the puzzle were supposed to go. Maybe when she finished the whole thing she’d have figured out a way to move on.

  “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry.” Sara brushed her fingers over Jen’s hand. “I didn’t want you to get hurt.”

  “I know.” Jen forced a smile.

  Braedon strode across the room and rested his hand on Jen’s shoulder. “Hey. I have to go. That was—”

  Jen waved away his explanation. “Don’t worry about it. I can find a ride h
ome.”

  “You’re sure?”

  She nodded. She could always call a cab if push came to shove. There wasn’t any hope of a relationship with the guy. They were co-workers. Well, technically he reported to her, and besides, there wasn’t any spark. The few times they’d tried to have a conversation on the ride to the church, they’d ended up reverting back to talking about work. They didn’t have any other intersecting points of interest. And frankly, despite only being three years older than him, he was too young.

  “Okay. Thanks. I’ll see you Monday.”

  “Sure. Thanks for coming.”

  He waved before disappearing through the crowd. Jen sighed. Another failure.

  “He’s not your type.”

  Jen raised an eyebrow at Sara. “Yeah? Well, who is my type?”

  Sara blushed and turned away.

  At least Sara understood what she’d done. The first guy in...ever, who was exactly what she was looking for. Jen pushed the chair back and stood. “I’m going to go see if they need help with anything.”

  Maybe if she kept busy she’d stop looking for David at every table.

  “Is this seat taken?”

  Jen looked up, her eyes widening as she saw David. “Yes.”

  “That’s too bad.” He sat down in the pew and dragged his laptop bag onto his lap. “I won’t stay, if you don’t want me to, but I’d like you to see something before I go.”

  She shook her head. He couldn’t be doing this. Not here, in church. She checked her phone. There were still twenty minutes until the service started. That’s what she got for being early. If the insomnia would go away, she could get back to sleeping past her alarm, and missing the opening song. And then she wouldn’t be trapped next to the last person in the world she wanted to talk to. She crossed her arms. She could get up and barge through the cluster of old people at the other end of the pew. Or jump over the back. But that would cause a scene and be even more humiliating than it already was.

  “Here.” David angled his laptop so she could see. “This is my account on the dating site. Yes, I have one—well, half of one. If you look here, you’ll see the prompt to finish filling out my profile. And, if you look here.” He clicked on the account history tab. “You’ll see that I never did any searches or sent any messages. So, I have the account. And I made it after our disastrous date, I’ll admit to that bad judgment. But I never used it. It’s always been you. Even when I wasn’t sure why.”

  She blinked back tears and looked at his laptop before inclining her head. It was an acknowledgement. Nothing more.

  “Now, this is me deleting that account.” David clicked several times, pausing with each confirmation pop up and waiting until her eyes darted over to look. He closed the laptop, slid it back into its case, and stood. “Like I said, it’s always been you. I think it’s always going to be you, Jen. And so I hope, and pray, that you’ll come back to me. Because I don’t want to spend the rest of my life without you in it.”

  Jen’s heart raced. What was she supposed to say to that? No words formed her mind.

  He offered a tight smile. “Goodbye.”

  He walked down the aisle and ran into Ben and Rebecca as he was leaving. They looked confused. David spoke, briefly, but he was too far away to hear.

  Rebecca sat next to Jen and let out a breath. “Maybe we were too hard on him. Did you realize he’s in love with you?”

  Tears spilled down her cheeks. Jen buried her face in her hands. Oh, God...what am I supposed to do?

  She’d made it through the week. Mostly. She just had to get through today and then the weekend, blissfully free of any obligations, stretched out in front of her. She just had to get out of bed and start the day. Jen continued to stare at the ceiling while her alarm beeped. She should turn that off. She closed her eyes and rolled over. The alarm chimed in tune with her heartbeat. Which at least made it clear she had one. That was a step in the right direction. She sighed and, gathering her energy, rolled back over and flung her arm toward the alarm. The noise stopped. Now to get out of bed.

  Tribble whined and jumped up on the bed, her pink tongue darting out to leave a wet, slimy trail on her cheek.

  “Ugh. Tribble, down.” Jen frowned and pushed herself into a sitting position. Tribble danced around her feet, but even that didn’t poke a hole in the gray clouds that surrounded everything she saw. “Come on.”

  Jen shuffled down the hall and to the patio door. She leaned against the frame while Tribble dashed outside and did her business at the very edge of the grass. It must be a lot later than usual. How long had she laid there? Didn’t matter. If she had to work later than usual to make sure she got her hours in, it wasn’t the end of the world. Or, honestly, she could leave and skirt on a few hours. It wasn’t like everyone else didn’t do that occasionally. Just because she had always walked the straight and narrow didn’t mean she had to keep doing it. That was another thing that didn’t matter.

  Did anything matter?

  Tribble bounced back to the door and grinned up at her, tongue lolling out the side of her mouth. Jen sighed. “Now you want to eat, right?”

  She followed the dog into the kitchen and poured food into her bowl then stood in front of the refrigerator. She should eat something too. Her stomach twisted. Hunger? Nausea? Whatever. She closed the fridge and, with a glance at Tribble who had finished gulping her food and was now lapping up water, trudged back to her bedroom. She’d take a shower, go to work, come home, and the week would be over. Another fifty years of that and life would be over, finally, too.

  Shoulders slumped, Jen twisted the knob in the shower to hot, as tears ran down her face.

  David ducked around the corner as Jen came down the hallway. Though it wasn’t like she’d see him. She walked with her head down, shoulders stooped. Almost as if she had a heavy weight pressing down on her from above. She probably wouldn’t see him if he stood directly in front of her and blocked the path. She’d just step around him and continue to her office on autopilot. His heart ached—not just because she still wouldn’t speak to him, despite what he’d done on Sunday—but for how clearly she was hurting. All week, David had been getting in early and sneaking into her office to leave her a little something that would, hopefully, brighten her day at least a tiny bit. Each morning, it was gratifying to see that she hadn’t thrown the previous day’s gift away.

  They weren’t anything amazing—a Bible verse on an index card, a pretty picture he’d printed from the Internet and put in a frame, chocolate—but she had to know they were from him. And maybe it would remind her that he cared about her. She’d lost more weight. Clearly she was one of the people who lost their appetite when they were depressed. Ji had been a comfort eater and had ballooned up several sizes before they’d found a combination of medication and counseling that helped her.

  “What is this?”

  David grinned and snuck closer. It was too bad he couldn’t see her. Today, since it was Friday, he’d gone for something a little flashier. The tulips in a riot of colors at the grocery store had caught his eye this morning. Even as he tried to find something smaller, he’d kept the vision of those flowers. So he’d given in. From the sound of things, he’d made the right choice.

  He scooted out the door into the elevator lobby and ducked into the stairwell. He jogged up the stairs to his floor. That would be his exercise for the day. Unless his lunchtime plan failed. In which case, he might need to beat a hasty retreat again.

  When the meeting finally ended, David checked the time and groaned. He wasn’t going to be able to catch Jen for lunch, most likely. Not that she was probably going to agree to come, but he’d given her space and it was time to ask. And then keep asking until she either agreed or told him to go away. He’d go down and ask anyway. He still needed something and maybe he could talk her into an ice cream cone.

  Except that someone was sitting in his guest chair. He sighed and rearranged his plans for the afternoon. Unexpected visitors—especially lately�
��never ended up being a good thing.

  “Hope you weren’t waiting long, our meeting ran...Jen?” He stopped his default spiel when he was close enough to recognize her. David closed his office door, set his laptop and folders on his desk, hooked his other guest chair and tugged it around so he was facing her, and sat. “Hi.”

  Jen pressed her lips together before she spoke. “Hi. And I wasn’t waiting long. I...called up to see if you were in. The receptionist let me know when it looked like the meeting was wrapping up.”

  “Smart. I’m glad you came up.” He took a deep breath. It was a difficult balance to avoid pulling her into his arms and spilling every thought and feeling he’d had in the last two weeks. He’d missed her to the point of pain. But her being here didn’t automatically mean she was back. Better to take it slow. Casual. “Want to go grab a bite?”

  She twisted her fingers in her lap. “Maybe. First, I have a couple of questions.”

  “Okay.”

  She took several deep breaths and stared over his shoulder before her gaze cut over to meet his. “Why haven’t you given up?”

  His eyebrows lifted. “Because I think you’re worth fighting for. I apologized once, but I’ll do it again. I’m sorry. For opening the dating profile, for how you found out about it, and for getting so distracted, or lazy, that I didn’t delete it the handful of times it occurred to me, which could have avoided the problem altogether.”

  Jen shook her head. “But why? Why, when you see how big a mess I am, would you still want anything to do with me? Even if just as friends?”

  He reached out and closed his hand over hers. “I don’t want to just be friends. Not if there’s a chance we can be more. I love you. And maybe this is the wrong time to say that. I don’t want to pressure you. You don’t have to feel the same way, yet, though I hope at some point you will. But, when you get down to it, that’s the reason.”

  “You deserve so much better.” Jen looked down and tried to pull her hand free.