Healing a Heart

by Amy Lillard

  “No!” the young girl wailed. “I can’t go.”

  Bryn paused, closed her eyes, and wondered what the drama was this time. She opened the door a crack, peeking in to see Wesley lying in the middle of the floor, arms and legs spread-eagle.

  “Why can’t you go?” It was the Cattle Creek Elementary School Christmas pageant and Wesley had the great honor of playing a snowflake. One of many.

  “I don’t think I want to be a snowflake,” Wesley said.

  “I think it’s a little late for that, don’t you? You have to be there in half an hour and everyone’s depending on you.”

  She didn’t even raise her head. “No one will notice if I’m gone. All the snowflakes are just alike and there’s fifteen of us.” This time she did raise her head, branding Bryn with that serious brown gaze. “Fifteen. No one will miss me if I’m gone.”

  Bryn eased further into the room. “You really think that?” She sat on the edge of Wesley’s bed. A few months ago she might’ve crouched down on the floor next to her, but these days she would never get back up if she did something like that.

  “Who’s going to miss one snowflake out of fifteen? I wanted a better part, but the kindergartners all have to play snowflakes. They wouldn’t even let me try out for anything different.”

  “I think that’s so you get experience for when you can try out for better roles. You’ll know more about how it works. All kindergartners are new, right?”

  She laid her head back on the rug. “I guess.”

  “And you know about snowflakes, don’t you?” Bryn asked.

  “I know they’re cold and wet and there’s fifteen of them in the Christmas pageant this year.”

  “No, snowflakes are all different. No two snowflakes are alike. Can you imagine with even an inch of snow all over the ground how many snowflakes are out there? And every one of them is different. There’s more than fifteen, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Yeah,” Wesley said, though her tone was more skeptical than anything.

  “A whole field of snow and no two snowflakes that are just alike. That’s pretty incredible, isn’t it?”

  “Is that really true?”

  Bryn crossed her heart with one finger, then made a heart shape out of her hands. “Honest.”

  “What can I tell you? There will be fifteen just alike tonight.” She raised her head up again. “Make that fourteen.”

  So it was all about individuality. Wesley had on her white tights and white leotard for underneath the white and light blue snowflake costume that had been cut out of cardboard and spray-painted for the occasion. They used one pattern, Bryn had found out from Wesley’s teacher, and it would be waiting on them when they got to the school.

  “I’ve got an idea,” Bryn said. “I have spray glitter.”

  Wesley pushed herself up onto her elbows. “You do?”

  “I do. And we can take it to school and spray-paint it on your costume.”

  “We can do that?”

  Bryn shrugged. “I don’t see why not. We can paint yours on the ends and maybe paint everybody else’s in a different spot, so everyone gets glitter, but everybody’s different.”

  Wesley nodded, her blond ponytail bobbing with the motion. “I like that idea.”

  “You do? Well, you can’t spray-paint glitter laying on the floor here.”

  Wesley was on her feet in a second. She found her coat and slipped her arms inside, turning to Bryn as she finally managed to don the garment. “What are you waiting for? Let’s go.”

  • • •

  Bryn had never been more proud or more uncomfortable as she sat in the auditorium chair and watched snowflake number fourteen dance to the Nutcracker Suite. The glitter was a huge success with all the snowflakes wanting different parts of their costume sprayed so they all could be a little different than each other. And the glitter caught the lights of the auditorium and sparkled like real snow in sunlight.

  Bryn shifted in her seat.

  “Are you okay?” Jake asked from beside her.

  “Yes, just miserable.” She shot him a rueful smile.

  “I don’t think we have much longer now.”

  “I hope not.” Then she realized she was talking about until she gave birth and he was talking about the end of the program. “I mean I’ll be okay.”

  He shot her a concerned look, then turned back to the front.

  First-grade sugarplums danced across the stage followed by candy canes and Christmas stockings that she was pretty sure were second graders.

  Jake leaned in close again. “Are you sure?”

  “I’m not going into labor, if that’s what you want to know,” she said.

  The look on his face was filled with such relief that she almost laughed out loud. “This chair has a broken spring that keeps poking me in the back.”

  “Do you want to trade seats?”

  “No, I’m fine.” But his concern touched her.

  Finally the program ended and everyone milled around, drinking punch and eating Christmas cookies.

  Bryn felt a little like a show-and-tell project as Wesley dragged her from person to person telling them all how Bryn was her new mommy and they were having not one baby but two. The tone of her voice was evident. That topped all the stories of all the students, at least all the ones in the kindergarten class.

  “You must be Bryn,” a mid-thirties woman asked. She was slim and trim, her Christmas green dress hugging every delicious curve. Bryn used to have delicious curves, now they were just life-threatening slopes.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t believe we’ve met.”

  “Kristen Stringer. I’m Wesley’s teacher.”

  Great. The teacher that once upon a time Jake had crushed on. He was married to her, Bryn reminded herself. But she was as green with envy as Kristen Stringer’s party dress. Why couldn’t she have been frumpy and wear cat sweaters like any self-respecting kindergarten teacher should?

  “How much longer?” Kristen pointed toward Bryn’s very pregnant belly.

  “I’m hoping to make it to Christmas.”

  Kristen smiled, a pretty smile with even white teeth. Perfect honey-colored hair. “What a wonderful present for the holidays.”

  Why couldn’t she say something mean or stupid where Bryn would be fully justified in hating her? Or maybe she should be asking why she was jealous of someone Jake had a crush on when she was wearing his ring. She touched the stone with her thumb as had become her habit of late. She seemed terrified she was going to lose the ring, but her hands were so swollen she didn’t think it would come off now if she tried with soap and cold water.

  She felt that hand on the small of her back and inhaled his warmth and presence before he spoke. “It was a great program, Kristen.”

  Bryn leaned into him ever so slightly. It was childish, she knew, but she felt she needed to stake her claim, like her big belly wasn’t enough to prove that Jake was hers.

  “So glad you enjoyed it, Jake. I’m sorry I missed the wedding. I hear it was lots of fun.”

  Jake grinned. “You know Mama and Grandma Esther. If they’re not having a good time, no one is.”

  “Very true.” She looked off to a point somewhere on the other side of Jake’s right shoulder. “I see the principal waving. I better go see what he needs. Thank you so much for coming.”

  “So that’s her,” Bryn said after Kristen Stringer moved away.

  “What?”

  “Two truths and a lie. You said you had crushed on Wesley’s teacher. That’s Wesley’s teacher.”

  He frowned. “Yeah, I know.”

  “Didn’t you think that was a little awkward?”

  “Not particularly,” he said. “Was I supposed to feel it was uncomfortable?”

  “Jake, be serious. I’m not sure how I feel about that.”

&
nbsp; “Because I had a crush on Wesley’s teacher when we were in the sixth grade?”

  “Yes, I mean . . . sixth grade?”

  He nodded. “Sixth grade.” Then he stopped. “You feel better now?”

  The heat that rose into her cheeks could toast marshmallows.

  “Oh, so I’ve got one who’s the jealous type.” He grinned.

  “It’s not funny,” she said. She wished she could’ve crossed her arms for emphasis, but they would just lie on top of her belly and she would look all the more ridiculous.

  “I disagree. I think it’s quite funny.”

  She frowned at him.

  “You have a lot to learn about small towns, Bryn.” He scanned the crowd of parents and grandparents all milling around with the elementary kids. “There’s probably not a woman in this building tonight that hasn’t been kissed by a Langston.”

  “You?”

  “Me or one of my brothers.” He shrugged. “See, that’s the thing when your graduating class doesn’t reach triple digits. There’s not many to choose from.”

  “So you kissed all the girls.”

  “Something like that.”

  She thought about it a second, still not quite convinced. Her graduating class had nearly five hundred.

  “There’s nothing to worry about. I married you, did I not?”

  Something charged the air between them. And the seriousness and mock anger and his laughter all merged into something . . . more. It was as if someone had sucked the air from the room and she was standing there alone with him in a vacuum of awareness. No one else around. Just the two of them.

  “Yes,” she whispered in return.

  “Always remember that.”

  She wanted to protest, challenge him to stop putting up walls, tell him to break down the barrier that kept her from knowing the real Jake.

  She didn’t know how she knew it was there; she could just feel it between them. It was the only thing keeping them apart. She was afraid it had to do more with his grieving for Cecelia than it did any reason why he couldn’t love her.

  Chapter Nineteen

  I can’t believe it! You put an open invitation to come to the baby shower in the paper?” Bryn asked two days later.

  Grandma Esther shrugged. “I figured it was the easiest way to reach everybody. This way anybody who wants to come can come, and anybody who doesn’t just missed out.”

  Jake’s words from the night of the Christmas pageant came back to her. She didn’t know a lot about how small towns worked, but Grandma Esther and Evelyn seemed to think this was the perfect way to notify guests. Bryn secretly wondered if this was just another way for them to work through their party gene. They seemed to want to have a get-together for everything that happened. Then again maybe that was one of those small-town things that she just didn’t know about.

  Bryn shuffled into the VFW just behind Wesley and in front of Jake’s grandmother and mother.

  “Surprise!”

  The reception area was full of people. The majority of which Bryn had never met. But Cattle Creek was her town now and she supposed it was time to start meeting everybody.

  A blond-haired woman with a short ponytail and bangs shellacked firmly into place grabbed her hand. “Come sit down. Come sit down. I’m Darly Jo. It’s so good to meet you.” Her gaze dropped to Bryn’s belly. “Oh, my. I heard it was twins but . . . oh, my.”

  She shuffled away on wedge-heeled boots, and Bryn was left at the mercy of the next person in line. She met Wanda from Wag the Dog, Debbie Ann from the Chuck Wagon, Cora Mae from Cora’s Country Kitchen, and a host of other people whose names she would probably never remember.

  A table had been set up in the back and was piled high with presents wrapped in every color of pastel paper known to man. Balloons had been scattered about, along with the required crepe paper streamers. Plastic tablecloths covered all the tables in the reception area. It was the same place where they had held their wedding reception, and it seemed as if the same crowd had come back once again.

  “Isn’t this fun?” Grandma Esther clapped her hands. Wesley snuggled up beside Bryn and gave her a kiss on the cheek. Someone had made pink raspberry punch, and someone else had broken out the cookies and mini quiches from the wholesale club. It wasn’t fancy but it was friendly.

  Bryn looked around at all these people who had probably known Jake all his life. And she knew she had made the right decision to come to Cattle Creek. Her children would grow up in this celebration-loving small town filled with people who dropped envelopes off marked “college fund” and played a variation game of Yahtzee with dice the size of shoeboxes.

  Bryn sat back in her chair and watched. She laughed and drank punch as everyone partied around her. She had a wonderful time just sitting and getting to know the good citizens of Cattle Creek. Jessie, Ethan Davis, and Millie Sawyer, who used to live in Cattle Creek and had recently moved back. Everyone was welcoming and warm and somehow it felt like home.

  “Are you having a good time?” Evelyn sidled up beside Bryn, who had pulled a second chair over to prop up her feet and keep her ankles from swelling. “It’s wonderful.”

  “Are you getting tired?”

  “I think I could ask you the same thing.”

  Evelyn swallowed hard and looked out over the crowd of people. “I’m okay.”

  But Bryn could tell a lie when she heard one.

  “The treatments are going well, then?”

  Evelyn shook her head. “No. Not really. But we’re hopeful. The doctors want to try something new after the first of the year.”

  Bryn nodded. “It’s hard, you know. When it gets the upper hand.”

  Evelyn laid her hand on Bryn’s shoulder. She clasped it in her own, squeezing her fingers reassuringly. “You loved your sister very much.”

  “She was kind of like my own. Our parents died when she was only seven.”

  “And you raised her then.”

  “Of course.”

  “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “I believe you’ve already said that. It’s not necessary.”

  “It just hits home, you know.” Evelyn smiled, but her lips trembled. She no longer seemed like the strong woman that Bryn had come to know in those first weeks in Cattle Creek.

  “Just do me a favor,” Bryn said.

  “What’s that?”

  Bryn squeezed her fingers once again. “Never stop fighting.”

  “Don’t you know? A Langston never quits.”

  • • •

  Christmas Day dawned poignant and cold. Wesley hadn’t been able to sleep the night before; she was too excited to see what Santa would bring. She’d crawled into bed smack-dab in between Bryn and Jake somewhere around one a.m. He’d laughed and said he didn’t mind, and Bryn didn’t either. There would be a day when Wesley wouldn’t want much to do with either one of them, having grown up so much she didn’t need parents. So until then Bryn would relish all the little times like this.

  Bryn stirred awake as Jake rose from the bed. Wesley, who finally passed out from exhaustion, was snoring softly beside her.

  “Where are you going?” she whispered. He pulled on a flannel robe and pointed to the front room. “I’m going to build a fire. You have to have a fire on Christmas Day.”

  Bryn leaned back in bed. A fire on Christmas Day sounded wonderful and beautiful. Though Georgia wasn’t quite cold enough for a fire, even on Christmas.

  She lay back and settled down into the warm covers, but it just wasn’t the same without Jake. She rose from the bed, found her robe, and pulled it on before padding behind him into the front room.

  He just had the fire started when she came up behind him.

  The Christmas tree stood off to one side of the fireplace. The beautiful artificial tree had rope for garland and was decorated with tiny cowbo
y hats mixed in with random Christmas balls and homemade ornaments that looked as though Evelyn had been collecting them for years. Bryn supposed that she had.

  “Do you want me to make some coffee?” Bryn asked.

  He shook his head. “You sit down. I’ll do it.”

  Bryn laughed. “I’m not an invalid, you know. I’m just pregnant.”

  Jake’s gaze dropped to her belly. “Oh, I know.”

  “All right, cowboy, you’ll pay for that. One day, anyway.”

  Jake held up a hand to show that he was shaking. “I’m scared.” Then he headed into the kitchen to brew some coffee.

  Bryn sat down to enjoy the quiet moment. Christmas Day. Not her first without Emery and most likely not her last. But she said a little prayer in case Emery was watching from heaven.

  Jake returned a few moments later, a steaming cup of coffee in each hand. He handed one to her.

  “Only one, right?”

  “Only one,” she agreed. “Are we ready to have these babies?” she asked. She wasn’t sure where the question came from; it simply popped onto her lips before she had a chance to think about it.

  “Well, we have cribs in the room, and clothes hanging in the closet. Maybe not a lot of clothes. But once we figure out what the babies are, we’ll buy more. I think we’ve got two thousand diapers from the baby shower.”

  Bryn laughed. “You think so. In about two months you’re going to wish we actually had that many.”

  Jake reached out and grabbed her hand and interlaced their fingers. “So my answer is yes. We’re ready.”

  She certainly hoped so.

  “Do you want to open a Christmas present?” he asked.

  “Everyone would be so upset if we started opening the Christmas presents without them.”

  Bryn looked to the tree once again. There was one unwrapped present, a pink bicycle with white daisies, silver streamers hanging from the handlebars, training wheels, and a white basket attached to the front. It was the only thing Wesley had asked for. Though Jake had confessed that he didn’t know why she would want to ride a bike when she could ride a horse instead. But that was her cowboy husband. And Bryn knew why. It was just one more stab that Wesley could make at individuality.