The Barefoot Believers

by Annie Jones

  “Not fail so much as not try,” she told him. “To flounder and keep floundering until everyone gives up on you. That’s my fear. That I will always live down to everyone’s lowest expectations of me.”

  He touched her fingertips, not quite taking her hand in his. “I know the fear and angst the ‘real world’ can deliver. I also know there is a love that changes all that, a perfect love that casts out fear.”

  “You’re quoting scripture?”

  “First John 4:18.”

  “You have the whole Bible memorized?”

  “Nope.” He shook his head. “But I like First John, chapter four.”

  “Hmm.” She thought about asking him to quote more but knew it wouldn’t throw him off track. He’d only find a way to use the Word to bring it all back to doing the right thing. She moved her hands away from his and dropped her gaze. “This isn’t my spiritual life, Travis. This is business.”

  “You honestly think you can separate the two?”

  “It’s not that easy. I don’t have a lot of options.”

  “You always have options. You always have choices.”

  The only other option Jo had, besides getting a windfall from selling the cottage, was to go back to Georgia and sell the flip house as is, under value. For that, she would be rewarded with a mountain of debt and her reputation as a go-getter Realtor thrown down a dark hole.

  But she would be free. Free of the bitterness. Free of the neediness. Free of Paul Powers. Free to start over.

  “I’ll think about that,” she finally said.

  “And if you ever need anyone to talk to about it—”

  She knew he meant that. “Saying thank you doesn’t seem like enough.”

  “It’s enough.” He pushed his chair back, a signal he was preparing to leave.

  He would leave and what then? Jo didn’t know. She did know that they only had this moment and she did not want to waste it. “I wish I could kiss you.”

  He froze, his eyes searching hers for a moment before he said, “You can.”

  If she’d known it would be that easy, she’d have asked it earlier. “Yeah?”

  “On the cheek.” He grinned.

  “That’s all?”

  “For now, yes.”

  For now? Meaning at some point in the future…? Jo didn’t voice that question, and Travis went on to explain.

  “We have to set boundaries, Jo. I am not going to court temptation.”

  She’d already told him her greatest fear and he hadn’t laughed. She’d asked for a kiss and he’d said yes and for now not no way, never. So she decided to take one more risk. “What about me?”

  “I don’t want to put you in the path of temptation, either.”

  “No, you said you wouldn’t court temptation…”

  He didn’t catch on.

  “So I said, what about me?”

  “You mean?”

  “Would you ever consider courting me?”

  “We just met.”

  Jo couldn’t believe her boldness. But she’d never met a man like Travis and deep down, she wondered if maybe she was just looking for a reason to stay in Santa Sofia. “So?”

  He bent down, putting his face before hers, and touched her cheek.

  She brushed the lightest of kisses over the tanned, whisker-stubbled skin.

  He smiled and turned to face her, nose to nose.

  His gaze sank into hers.

  Jo caught her breath.

  “Gnn-aaaa-rrr-pp.” Kate let out a big ol’ pig-snuffling-through-a-trash-trough kind of snore.

  Both of them startled, then broke into laughter.

  “So much for the path of temptation,” she whispered.

  “I think you have enough to deal with without adding in stolen kisses and starting a relationship with someone you plan to leave behind in a matter of weeks.”

  Jo knew he was right. But as she watched him walk out the back door, she couldn’t help but wonder, if she stayed off the path of temptation, what path would the Lord lead her to instead?

  Back to Georgia? Or maybe just off to the hardware store to get the goods to start fixing this place up to sell?

  Chapter Eleven

  Kate tossed the pencil and the pad with her notes on it onto the coffee table. “Done and done.”

  She leaned on her cane. Though exhausted, she just couldn’t face another minute sitting on that lumpy floral couch.

  Then don’t sit there on your face, she could just hear Jo teasing.

  Jo could afford to tease because her ankle had gotten strong enough that she felt up to getting out and able to drive her car. Except for the fairly physically and socially uncomfortable trip to Billy J’s and a quick stop off at the grocery store, Kate had stayed right here in this house.

  From her vantage point in the front room, she took a moment to do a 360-degree look-see around her.

  Jo had asked her, after she saw to a few housekeeping duties, to look around the place and write down her first impressions. In one column Jo had instructed her to note what looked outdated, what seemed dingy, what appeared downright disastrous. In the next column, a list of the high points, paying particular attention to things with strong emotional appeal.

  “Strong points,” she’d said. Kate suspected her sister had wanted to say selling points. “Tell me what you find compelling about the place. What makes it inviting or cozy.”

  It all looked that way to Kate. Inviting. Outdated. Compelling. Emotional. Cozy. Disastrous.

  “You know…” she whispered. She looked toward the window that framed their view of the mystery house and echoed the last word she had written on the strong point side of the list. “Home.”

  But it was not her home. Not likely it ever would be, especially not if Jo carried out her plan. The plan she thought she had so cleverly concealed from everyone. In reality she might as well have hammered a For Sale sign in the yard the minute they’d driven up. She wanted, very, very much, to get rid of the old place.

  And Kate might have gladly gone along with that plan earlier. A few days ago, all the way back to ten minutes after her mother had announced she wanted to move down here. If Jo had just asked, Kate would have gotten onboard. What was here for them but a lot of frustration?

  But today?

  She just wasn’t ready to let go.

  Kate sighed then ran her hand through her hair, snagging a few strands between her fingers where she must not have washed away all the stickiness from the work she had done earlier.

  Before Jo had left this morning to “run errands,” she had set out some light housekeeping for Kate to do, in the thinly veiled guise of giving her out-of-necessity suddenly sedentary sister some much needed exercise. Kate had protested. Pleaded infirmity. Even insanity—saying that staying in the house had driven her batty and begging her sister to let her tag along just to get outside and feel the sun on her face.

  “You were outside yesterday,” Jo had said flatly.

  “I’m like a delicate flower. I need sunshine and fresh air, every day.”

  “You need to move around in here where it’s safe,” Jo had argued. “Get your strength back before you venture out too much. There’ll be time for going out after you do your chores.”

  “Thank you very much, wicked thinks-she’s-in-charge-because-she-can-take-the-steps sister.” Kate had harrumphed, going so far as to lie back on the couch in a picture of overwrought drama to prove the depths of her unhappiness about her circumstances. “Easy for you to say stay put and get better. Your Prince Charming already showed up to offer his admiration and assistance. I’m still waiting for mine.”

  “Oh, yours showed up all right. Don’t blame me that when he did, you fell into a hole, demanded he feed you greasy fish then fell asleep and snored right in his face.” She’d grabbed her keys and limped off toward the door, carrying her crutches under her arms in case she needed them for walking any distance.

  Leaving “Kate-erella” behind to ponder all that as she labored
away helping to get the cottage ready for whatever next step Jo had in mind. Alone. With her thoughts. With her, well, they weren’t quite hopes and dreams so much as what-ifs and if-onlys.

  Kate hated what-ifs and if-onlys.

  Now she was stuck with them. In a place where she could visualize everything from her parents arguing on the front lawn the first time they’d all come here to the way Vince Merchant had looked standing on the front porch yesterday.

  If only her father had stayed, how would things be different? Would her parents have found a way to work things out? Or at the very least, would her father not have whisked away the youngest of the sisters? How would that have changed Kate? Would she have stayed with Vince all those years ago?

  It all connected in her mind, in her experiences and choices, in the very way she saw herself and everyone she loved. Marriages do not always work out. Children are hurt. Despite God’s design, people do bad things. If you care too much for someone, you make yourself vulnerable to loss.

  Those kinds of thoughts had driven her from place to place, job to job. They had kept her distant from her mother and sister, and cost her the love and commitment of a good man. And his son.

  “Gentry,” she murmured and could see that big-eyed already fragile kid looking up at her and saying the words that had made her break her engagement.

  “Quasi-engagement?” She crinkled her nose. Made it sound as if she were marrying the Hunchback of Notre Dame. She gazed at her left hand. Vince had never put a ring there. He’d bought one and offered it to her. Gotten down on one knee on a moonlit night on the beach.

  Kate sighed and then took in a quick breath, the way her patients did when she hit a sore spot in the course of her exam. He’d asked her to wait to wear the ring until he had told Gentry about it. She had agreed more to buy herself time than out of concern for the child.

  She had been fresh out of college, practically a kid herself, and if she married Vince, after just four months together, she would become the child’s mother. Responsible for his upbringing, his care, his safety. She, who had already failed her sister by not telling anyone when she’d heard her father leaving.

  She had never slipped that ring on. Never let Vince tell Gentry about their plans because Kate knew in her heart that people have so very little real control over the way their lives turn out. That was why the wise ones rested their faith in God and surrendered to His will.

  That was a wisdom and grace she had not possessed back then.

  So, Gentry was the real reason she had run away from Vince, though she could never tell anyone that, least of all Vince himself. Not that she would have the chance to tell Vince anything, nor should she expect it, but…if only…

  “Enough!” She’d forced the unproductive thinking to the side and fixed her attention on the work before her.

  Much to her surprise, it had turned out that she actually enjoyed her time alone in the old cottage. Puttering. Muttering to herself. Going through things. Even throwing things away had a cathartic effect.

  In a strange way, doing all that had presented Kate with the opportunity to do something she hadn’t done in a very long while.

  Nothing.

  Not the sitting around staring into space or lying about, waking up just long enough to complain about the abysmal quality of offerings on television. But a wonderful, lose yourself in the moment and the memories of moments gone by kind of nothing that made the hours sail, cleared the cobwebs from her head and lifted up her heart.

  And during it all she had never once felt trapped or had to squelch the urge to get away. Instead of that low undercurrent that constantly buzzed in her ear telling her she should be someplace else, she just let herself be.

  “That alone had made the trip down here worth the trouble,” she murmured, imagining what she might tell people about the whole adventure once she returned to the angst and pressure of her “real” life.

  That alone? Oh, brother! Hearing the sappy sentiment out loud made her cringe. Nobody who knew her would ever buy that. Spending the day doing busy work a justification enough for her burst of goodwill today? For her renewed affection for and sense of belonging in a crummy little cottage she had ignored for over sixteen years? For the fact that she had begun to think ahead to when she could return to Santa Sofia for another visit instead of plotting how she could run away and never look back?

  “What is wrong with me?” Kate glanced down at the pad and pencil she had just tossed aside.

  Grabbing them up and desperate to avoid that couch, she turned toward the dining room. But from there she couldn’t see the mystery house.

  Not that she cared one whit about the mystery house, but who knew when a prince or handyman in a pickup truck might come riding along and park in its drive?

  She glanced around and her gaze fell on the door of the enclosed stairway. They had yet to venture up there because Kate had deemed neither of them ready to do stairs without an able-bodied bystander there to help.

  Of course by “neither one of them” she had meant Jo.

  Kate herself was always ready, willing and able to take on anything. They didn’t call her Capable Kate for nothing.

  “Maybe they just call me Capable Kate because Unrealistic, doesn’t-know-her-own-limits, so-pigheaded-she-rushes-in-where-wise-men-fear-to-tread Kate takes so long to say they knew I’d have time to take a swing at them before they got it all out.” Kate collapsed onto a step halfway up the stairs. She stretched her leg to place her mending foot on the step below where she sat, giving her cast support. She laid her head against the railing.

  She had come trying to find just the right spot to sprawl out and make out her list of everything that was wrong with her, and whatever few things she could think of that were right. “First thing on the wrong list…too stubborn for my own good.”

  She didn’t actually write it. Which probably should have been the second thing on that list: too proud to admit even a simple human flaw.

  She winced and adjusted her foot to try to get more comfortable. A glance up over her shoulder to the remaining steps, and knowing that the comfort of her old room waited there for her, made her grit her teeth.

  She could scoot her way up.

  One step at a time.

  Once up there she could go through things, look around. Who knew what she might find? If she could do all that before Jo got back and started in with whatever she wanted to do with the place, it would be as though Kate had proprietary claim on the whole of the cottage. Like a mountain climber planting a flag.

  Hers.

  Kate blinked.

  Hers?

  Why?

  Just to keep Jo from…What? Winning?

  No, there was more to it than that. Kate wanted the cottage to be more hers than Jo’s. Even more hers than her mother’s. She had not felt that way until she’d spent the day here, thinking, dreaming. Hoping for…

  “Home,” she said again.

  And besides, if she could make her way to her old room, she could look out over the cul-de-sac at the mystery house and spy on anyone who came over there today.

  She looked down at the list.

  Had she said she failed to admit a human flaw?

  Strike that.

  Many flaws.

  Starting with not being honest, even with herself. She wanted the family to retain ownership of the house because it gave her a reason to see Vince. This place around her did not feel so much like home as it represented what she had lived her whole life trying to avoid—hope.

  Hope for a full life. Hope for a healed family. Hope of finding love without the constant fear of loss nagging at her, driving her to move on before she made another mistake.

  “Many, many flaws,” she murmured, her eyes on the paper. How much sweeter, she thought, was it that no matter how long that list of flaws and things that were wrong with her, they would be balanced out by a single concept? Salvation.

  She would not be measured, ultimately, by the sum of her sins but
by the magnitude of God’s grace. People who did not share her faith might not understand, but to a person like Kate, who’d lived so long in fear and sadness, that promise was the only thing she had ever felt she could fully depend upon.

  What had passed was past. She could not change it. But she could accept her role in it and work with all her heart to do better from now on.

  She picked up the pad and held it to her chest as she took a moment for a silent prayer of gratitude.

  Then with the word amen still humming on her lips, she sniffled and tried to get herself in a position to move. Up or down, she hadn’t decided but she didn’t want to be stuck sitting here when—

  Wham! The back door slammed shut.

  “Lousy timing,” she grumbled, envisioning yet another fault on the already heavily weighted list. Then, after a deep breath, she used her cane to prod the stairway door fully open so she could call, “Jo, is that you?”

  “Where are you, Kate?” The rustle of plastic bags. The thump and bump of objects hitting the kitchen table. The clunk, swoosh, clunk of Jo moving with new confidence using the borrowed crutches preceded her sister peeking around the corner of the door frame and staring at her. “Who were you hoping it would be? Oh, let me guess, Prince Charming?”

  Kate winced at the very thought of Vince barging in and finding her not at her best. “Last night, did I just fall asleep or did I drool, too?”

  “Vince left before the drooling began.”

  “Good.”

  “And only a few minutes after the snoring started.”

  Kate groaned.

  “What are you doing in here? I thought we agreed that we’d wait to try the steps when we both felt up to it.”

  “I felt up to it enough for both of us.”

  “Obviously you were only half-right.” Jo gave a direct deadpan look to where Kate had landed on the stairwell. “Did you get any rest at all while I was gone?”

  “Yep.”

  “Yep? No complaint about being stranded here wanting to get out and about?”

  “Nope.”