The Farmer's Daughter: The Dragon Dream: Book One

by Robin Janney

  And then – it got really confusing. Randy had been there, and a beautiful woman who said she was her mother. A terrifying Beast she’d beaten up. The handsome knight who sat at her side now, talking about everything, including…his father? And every time he said something about a woman named Veronica, why did she picture a dragon?

  She didn’t understand. Couldn’t separate dreams from what had really happened. She wasn’t sure what her name was; he alternated between calling her Angela and Angel. Sometimes they called her Ange. Or honey. Or sweetheart. Why didn’t they just tell her who she was?

  At least it was still 2006. She remembered something about New Year’s with him, they’d fought about…something. She remembered making up with him. There was a fuzzy memory of him kneeling before her and apologizing, even if she didn’t remember all the words. Had she been sick with pneumonia? He’d given her daisies. She remembered him telling her he was holding the hand of a poor farmer’s daughter because he loved her.

  But as she watched her beloved speak to her, with a voice full of joy and the love she craved…she accepted what he told her, but she didn’t remember it. She could see the truth in the picture someone had placed in her lap. It was her in a pretty dress, his arm wrapped around her and smiles on both their faces.

  “Do you remember?” he asked.

  No, she didn’t. But she nodded anyway.

  57

  “I

  ’m not going to lie to you,” Dr. Evans was saying to them on Monday. Craig sat in the doctor’s office, along with his wife’s parents. “Angela has a long road ahead of her. She’s going to need physical therapy to remind her muscles how to work and to strengthen them. There’s mild atrophy, especially in her shoulder, but I think the therapy she received while comatose warded off the worst. She’s young, she has that in her favor. So far, her brain function appears normal. But I’m sure there are scars we can’t see.”

  “We understand,” Philip was saying. He held his wife’s hand. “And we know our daughter well enough to know she’s not going to talk about anything until she’s ready.”

  Craig saw the doctor hesitate, but asked with a hoarse voice, “When can I take her home?”

  “I’d like to keep her a couple more weeks,” the doctor replied. “Get her back on her feet and talking. I hope she cooperates.”

  “So do I.”

  I t took Angela only three days after her husband’s meeting with her doctor before she uttered her first words and stood on her own. It was late afternoon when she was returning to her room after physical therapy and she was surprised to find a tall policewoman in her room talking with her husband. What was the woman’s name? Why didn’t her husband come to physical therapy with her? Everyone talked about how he hadn’t left her side for months. She wanted him to touch her again. She remembered enough to know he was always gentle.

  Trooper Stevens. Yes, that was the policewoman’s name. The policewoman approached her in the middle of the room where the aide had parked her. She squatted, looking Angela in the eye.

  “Hi Angela,” the woman said, her voice gentle. “I’m glad you’re back. I was wondering if you’re up to talking about what happened?”

  About what happened? The trooper should know, she had been there. Angela shrugged and met the woman’s gaze without blinking.

  “I told you she’s not speaking yet,” her husband said. If Craig was her husband, why did he only kiss her on the forehead? She remembered a time he’d pressed her against a wall with his passion. He was strong, but hadn’t hurt her. When had that been?

  “I’ll try anyway,” the policewoman said to Craig. To Craig. Not her. Anger burned in her. Why were people dismissive of her? “Do you remember what happened?”

  Angela blinked and decided to nod her head once. Did they think she was stupid? Of course she remembered it! It was in her dreams. She was sure the images were out of order, but it didn’t matter. She knew them to be real.

  “Can you tell me anything about it?” The policewoman was talking again, speaking almost as though she thought Angela was a child. “Anything that happened in the van? The intersection? Did they say anything to you? Anything you can tell us will help.”

  Angela narrowed her eyes, and it felt to her like they were shooting sparks. “You should know, Trooper Stevens.” Her voice sounded pathetic to her ears, but she made sure to emphasize the other woman’s profession.

  She looked startled, and when Craig moved into view, Angela saw curiosity on his face.

  “What do you mean?” the policewoman asked, her voice cautious.

  She growled, but it hurt her throat. It was still sore from the feeding tube, and her nose still itched from it. She forced her scratchy voice to work. “You. Were. There. I saw you! You pulled me out of the van and put a bullet in their bodies.”

  Now the other woman’s eyes narrowed. “How…”

  “Go ahead and play dumb! I know you were there, and I know you work for Crane. I won’t tell you a single thing about that day because you’ll only kill them. Because he’ll order you to.” Gripping the wheelchair’s arms, Angela pushed herself to her feet, the policewoman rising to look down at her. She’d forgotten how much taller the other woman was. She tried to take a step towards the policewoman, but her legs were wobbly. She was vaguely aware of Craig rushing to her side, his hands coming rest lightly on her elbows. It felt familiar to her, but she couldn’t locate the memory. Back to the present, what were they talking about? Oh, yeah…her kidnappers. “I won’t have it. They’re petty, stupid women, but they don’t deserve to die. I don’t hate them enough to hand them over to a murderer.”

  “I had every right to shoot those men that day,” the blonde policewoman replied calmly, but coldly. “They were armed criminals who abducted a civilian and were hurting her. She was in mortal danger and I had no choice but to discharge my weapon.”

  Angela sneered at the woman who had saved her life. “Get out of my room. Get out and don’t come back.”

  Stevens shook her head. “Why won’t you help us?”

  Craig’s touch was light on her elbows, but she was sure if she started falling, she’d never hit the floor. Angela decided none of it mattered and didn’t answer the policewoman. “Please, just get out.”

  The policewoman looked at Craig, and Angela felt a slight movement which made her think he had given the woman a nod to leave. “Get well soon, Mrs. Moore,” the policewoman put her hat on her head and left.

  She was quivering with anger. Even the demon had seemed more afraid of Craig than he had of her. Why, she wondered again, don’t people take me seriously?

  “Well, I see your spunk is coming back, but let’s not overdo it, honey. Let’s sit back down.”

  The pressure on her elbows was barely there. But still, she was sure he’d catch her if she started falling. He’d caught her before, she remembered that much. When had that been? Why did it feel important? If Craig was her husband, why didn’t he touch her as he had before? He used to rub her wrists with his thumb. He’d held her before, why wouldn’t he hold her now?

  “I want to walk,” she said, anger being replaced with an all too familiar depression.

  “Alright,” her husband said without hesitation. He moved the wheelchair away from her, all without taking the hand away from her elbow. “Let’s go then. We’ll take a walk down the hallway.”

  She nodded and walked out of the room with him. Her feet were bare, and no doubt the nurses would have a fit when they saw but she didn’t care. She was cold in the hospital gowns she was wearing, one backward to cover her backside.

  Hadn’t her mother brought her a nightgown from home the last time she’d been in the hospital? It had been pink, just like the robe with it. Why hadn’t she brought something now? Or Craig for that matter? What was she missing? Aside from too many memories. Angela kept one hand on the railing running along the wall, walking determinedly despite the weariness of her soul.

  Walking down the hall and back again,
Craig at her side waving away aides and nurses alike. It made her angry. But at least he was still with her. There was that much.

  C raig sketched after dinner. They had her on a soft food diet, and as soon as they’d allow him to, he was going to bring her brownies. He hadn’t eaten yet, didn’t know when he would. Trooper Stevens reaction to what his wife had said was bothering him, made him think his wife knew far more than she had said. At least something in the trooper’s visit had been enough to jolt something in his wife.

  He looked over at her as he sketched, putting this moment on paper. She was sad, and he didn’t know why. Was she looking out the window, or was she looking at the daisies by her bedside? Fresh would arrive tomorrow; he saw no reason to deviate from the delivery schedule.

  “Can I see your sketches?” she asked, her face turning towards him.

  He hesitated, not because of the sketch he was working on now, but because of the other sketches in this book. Many were from the strange dream he’d had that day months ago. But he nodded and passed the sketchbook to her.

  She winced at the one he was working on now, and Craig wondered what he had captured to cause her reaction.

  Then she flipped back to a random one. And paused, running her hand over the figures. He swallowed hard at the one she was looking at. The Angel making her brave stand against the Beast, light streaming around, and the knight standing at her back. Behind them, a young boy and a woman watched.

  “This happened. I remember this. Are there more like this?” Her hand trembled.

  “A few.” There were more at home. He hadn’t been able to shake the images he’d seen. They haunted him.

  She flipped through other sketches. The scene Philip which had upset Philip months ago. One of the Angel running to the knight. Another where she was in his arms…his armor was gone in this sketch. He wasn’t sure why he’d sketched himself in the suit he’d worn when they married, it wasn’t how he’d seen himself.

  “You were there,” his Angel said. “I’m a woman in all these…”

  “Do you remember asking me how I saw you?” he asked, brushing uneven hair back from her face. It was getting long again. His mother-in-law had suggested having it cut while Angela was still asleep, but she hadn’t argued when he told her it didn’t feel right.

  “Yes. Fragments. Moments.”

  Her hands trembled, and he took her left hand in his. The sketch she was on now was of her mother caressing her face. “Talk to me, Angel. Please.”

  “Did you hear what she said? All of it? How she was sick…what she’d named me?” Angela asked him.

  “Yes,” he admitted. “Your father disagreed with her assessment of their attitude about your name. They never thought it was silly, they were just concerned about how you’d be picked on by other kids growing up. That’s why they renamed you.”

  She nodded and pushed the sketchbook away. “I want to walk.”

  “You’re not too tired?” Craig asked, even as he began moving things around to help her back out of bed.

  “I’m fine,” she insisted. “I want to walk.”

  So, even though Angela wasn’t talking to him, he stayed by her side walking up and down the hallway.

  “A

  ngela, I’m most pleased with your progress, and I think I’ll let you go home this fine afternoon,” Dr. Evans was saying to them just four days later. He stood at the foot of her bed, while she sat in a chair by the window. She nodded at him and looked back out the window.

  Evans turned his gaze to Craig, who stood behind Angela. His hands were resting lightly on her shoulders. “Her walking is excellent,” the doctor continued. “But she’ll need to come to physical therapy a few days a week for her shoulder. I’m releasing her a little earlier than maybe I should, but fresh air and the change of scenery will do her good.”

  “I understand,” Craig said with a nod, relief filling him.

  “I’ll go start the paperwork.” The doctor was smiling as he left.

  Craig moved around her chair. His Angel had started pulling her long hair forward, he assumed to hide the unevenness of her hair and the scars around her right temple and on her forehead. So far, she had made no mention of cutting it. Joy filled him as he said, “Did you hear that, Angel? We can go home!”

  Angela nodded, her fingers playing with the string of her hospital gown. “I heard,” she answered, her voice soft. “I’m being released. Craig, I want to go to the farm.”

  “What? Why?” Disbelief filled him, spilled over into his voice. “You’re my wife.”

  “I know. And I still want to be. It’s just…” She took a deep breath, which did nothing to erase the sorrow in her voice. “I need time, Craig. I don’t know who I am anymore.”

  Craig’s heart clenched painfully. He wanted to rage at her, remind her of her vows and the promises. But he couldn’t, because he’d made the same vows, the same promises she had. And she’d been broken in a way he didn’t fully understand yet. Looking down at her, he knew if he mishandled this moment, he’d lose her forever. It might happen anyway.

  “I understand,” he told her truthfully. His voice choked with emotion. “I’ll call your father to come get you then, because I cannot take you to a home that isn’t ours.”

  Angela looked up at him, her shock clear, and Craig seized the moment. Bending down, he kissed her. He meant to keep it light and gentle, but as was prone to happen the kiss turned passionate. Breathlessly he pulled back and rested his forehead against hers. His eyes popped open, and he was torn at the mix of pain and pleasure on her face.

  “Look at me,” Craig said gently, but firmly. It was hard seeing that mix of pleasure and pain shimmering in her eyes as well. He forced himself to speak, unable to keep his own pain out of his voice. Maybe she needed to hear it. “Know this, Angela: I love you. It will never matter to me what name you decide to call yourself, or who you decide to be, because you will always be the woman I love. You will always be my Angel. You are my heart, my life, my everything…and I will give you all the time you need. Know that I will always be waiting for you.”

  He kissed her again, able to keep it gentle. And then he did the hardest thing he’d ever had to do. He released her and walked away.

  58

  P hilip managed to hold his tongue far longer than he thought possible when he picked up daughter up from the hospital Monday afternoon. He said nothing beyond the necessary small talk needed with the nurses and the aides. He carried her bag of belongings and her freshest bouquet of daisies as the aide April pushed Angela in a wheelchair to the front entrance. He was quiet as the woman helped his daughter into the passenger side of their Dodge pickup. He gave Angela the flowers her husband had kept fresh the entire time she’d been unconscious and thanked April as he shut the passenger door.

  Stowing Angela’s bag of belongings behind his seat, he climbed behind the wheel. He said nothing as Angela buckled herself in and adjusted the air conditioning to her liking.

  But as the hospital and Sawyersville faded into the distance, Philip tried to reason with her. “Angela…”

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” Angela cut in quickly, her gaze out the window.

  But her father had reached a breaking point. He had met his son-in-law at the entrance when he’d arrived, had seen the agony and tears on the young man’s face, had felt his trembling when they’d embraced. They had shared a vigil by her bedside, had become father and son in these past few months.

  “Angela,” he tried again. “You can’t go through life not talking about the things that hurt you.”

  His daughter sighed. “I know. I remember that much. Not…not all scars can be seen. I’m not sure what that means, but I know I’m supposed to remember it. I just…I need time, Dad. Craig understands. Why can’t you?”

  “Of course I understand, but…”

  “No!” she broke in angrily. “No buts. Either you understand, and I can stay at the farm until I’m ready…or you don’t, and I can’t – in wh
ich case I’ll find somewhere else to go. I’m sure Maeve will help me.”

  “No, you can always stay at the farm,” ceded Philip. “Your mother and I will never turn you away. It’s just…”

  “Just what?” She sounded so angry and confused.

  “He’s your husband, Angela. Craig’s a patient man, but I don’t want to see you lose him because you’ve waited too long.”

  Her voice was quiet when she said, “He said he would wait. He promised.”

  Philip let it drop. The country scenery slid by seamlessly. He was ready to try a different tactic when a quiet whimper drew his eyes to her again as he began the turn at Simmons Crossroads. Tears were streaming down her face. She was already deep in the flashback and her hands were clawing at herself…at her breasts, at her neck, her face.

  He slammed the truck to a stop, her daisies crashing to her feet. The abrupt stop only made it worse for her. She was screaming at unseen attackers now, pleading for them to stop. He slid across the seat, trying to stop her from hurting herself, not caring if he was scratched in the process.

  “Angela, stop. Stop, honey. You’re safe. I’ve got you. Daddy’s got you…I’m sorry, I’m so sorry honey, I should have gone the long way around.” Philip kept repeating the words until the storm passed. He didn’t know how long it lasted, wasn’t aware of anything except her pain. He held his daughter, long after her trembling passed. He wasn’t so sure he wasn’t trembling too. Had people stopped to check on them? He wasn’t sure.

  “I broke my daisies,” she said at last. She made no move to leave his arms. Her tears fell hot onto his skin, stinging where they ran into the gashes she’d made in his arm.

  “I’m sorry, honey. I’m sure he’ll send you new ones.” He’d make sure of it. “I will never take you through this intersection again, I promise.”