Home for Christmas (Willow Park #5)

by Noelle Adams

  The shower turned off. “Yeah.”

  “Just letting you know I’m back.” That wasn’t exactly true, but she didn’t want him to think she was so worried about him.

  He didn’t want her to feel sorry for him. He didn’t want her to think he was weak.

  “Okay.”

  She sighed and went to sit on the bed, kicking off her shoes and lying back on the mattress, with her legs hanging over the side. She wanted to go to sleep and wake up to a different world, one where Mark had gotten over the worst of the healing process, one where she knew what to do, how to love him for real.

  Mark came out of the shower with a towel around his waist. “What’s the matter?” he asked.

  “Nothing,” she said, sitting up. “Just sitting here waiting for you. That was a long shower.”

  “When did you get back?” he asked, rubbing a hand over his beard.

  She gave a half-shrug. “Twenty minutes or so. I closed the store early, since no one was coming in.”

  “You all did pretty well in the last few weeks, though, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah. It was a pretty good year. Definitely better than last year.” She wanted to bring up Roger’s phone call but didn’t know how to do so. “Anything happening here?”

  Mark gave her a sharp look. “No. Not really.”

  “Okay.” She cleared her throat. “Do you still want to go to that Christmas fair this afternoon?”

  “Sure. Why wouldn’t I?”

  “I don’t know. I was just asking.” She didn’t know why he seemed so prickly. She didn’t know why she felt rather prickly herself.

  “I’m ready as soon as I put on my clothes.”

  She watched him as he got dressed, realizing he’d finally started gaining some weight back. He’d been walking and running on the treadmill a lot too, so he’d built back up some of his muscle tone. His limbs were long and strong, and his body was masculine, attractive, solid.

  She loved him. All of him. His body and his heart and his mind and his spirit. She didn’t care if he was still damaged, if he never got back into a career. She loved him anyway.

  He pulled on a pair of jeans over his underwear and then pulled a clean black T-shirt out of a drawer and pulled it on over his head. It was cold outside, but he almost never wore long sleeves. He’d just put a coat on over the T-shirt.

  “Why are you so quiet?” he asked, looking over at her as he pulled on his socks.

  “Just thinking.”

  “About what?”

  “Everything.”

  “Well, if you’re worrying about me, I’d appreciate it if you stopped.”

  She sucked in a quick breath at the curt tone. She usually didn’t react with temper, but she was tired and confused and in a strangely glum mood today, and she didn’t appreciate his tone. “What makes you think I’m even thinking about you?”

  “Of course you’re thinking about me. You’re watching me like I’m some sort of lost puppy that you’ll never get back.”

  She didn’t usually get angry very easily, but she felt a surge of it rush through her. What the hell was his problem, anyway? She’d tied herself into knots trying to help him, trying to be there for him. And all he could do was snap at her. She clenched her jaw as she said, “That’s ridiculous. I’m not looking at you that way at all, and there’s no reason to be so mean about it.”

  “Do you think I don’t know what you’re thinking?” He appeared angry too. It was evident from the tension in his shoulders, in the muscles of his cheeks. “For God’s sake, even if I couldn’t see it in your face, how many phone calls do I need to expect, from all these people you’ve been nagging to give me a job?”

  She stood up, since she didn’t like how he was towering over her. He still towered over her, but a little bit less so than when she was sitting. “What are you talking about?”

  “You’ve evidently been calling everyone you can possibly think of who might be able to give your poor, pathetic, charity-case of a husband some sort of a job.” His dark eyes were flashing, but his expression was cold, the way it only was when he was very, very angry.

  She was angry now too. All her work and worry, and he was just throwing it back in her face. “I notice you haven’t bothered to even mention to me that you’ve gotten any calls. How many job possibilities do you have now that you haven’t said a word to me about? Do you think it doesn’t matter to me? Do you think you’re the only person who’s involved in that decision?”

  “Of course, I know it affects you! Why do you think it’s been so hard for me? How could I not know that it matters to you?”

  “Well, you sure haven’t been acting like you know that. You won’t even talk to me about it. It’s not just your decision to make, you know.”

  “It’s not just your decision either, and I don’t appreciate your trying to bully me into doing something.”

  “Bully? Bully?” She could barely breathe over her astonishment and outrage. “You think I’m bullying you? Tell me exactly when I’ve pressured you. I haven’t even said anything.”

  “And you think that’s a good thing?’ He’d raised his voice, something he hadn’t done since they’d been reunited. She couldn’t even remember the last time he’d raised his voice to her. “You think it’s better to go behind my back and try to engineer things on your own?”

  “I was trying to help! How can you not see that? I care about you, and I want things to be good for you. And I’m sure you’ll be happier when you get back into a job. I’m trying to help!” Her hands were clenched at her sides.

  He made a rough sound and turned away from her, evidently to control his expression. When he turned back, he said coolly, “I don’t know how to be any clearer about this. I don’t want your help. I don’t always want to need your help. That’s not what I want. That’s never been what I want. I don’t want your help.”

  His words had been perfectly clear. She’d heard them without mistake. And they hurt so much she couldn’t possibly keep her composure.

  It felt like they were ripping her apart.

  She turned her back to him, fighting to hold onto her control, at least long enough to end this conversation. “If you don’t want my help,” she managed to say, “then what are we even doing in this marriage?”

  He didn’t answer for what felt like an endless stretch of time. She was too distracted in holding herself together—not crying, not being weak when it mattered the most—that she completely lost track of time.

  Then finally he said, in a strange hoarse voice, “I don’t know.”

  That was the answer she’d been afraid of hearing since he’d come home. If he didn’t love her anymore, if he didn’t need her anymore, if he didn’t want her to help him, to share his life anymore, then why would he want to stay in this marriage?

  All those moments of hope, of closeness, had only been clouding the real issue—based on memories of the people they used to be.

  But it was clear now.

  If he didn’t want her, she wasn’t going to beg him to stay.

  “Okay,” she whispered, leaning over to pick up her shoes. “Okay, then.”

  “What are you doing?” Mark asked, as she slid on her shoes. He sounded weird, but she was too upset to look at him or figure out his tone of voice.

  “I’m leaving.”

  She’d fought as much as she was capable of fighting. She’d been as strong as she could be. Evidently, it wasn’t enough. She wasn’t enough.

  Maybe, one day, Mark would fully heal, but she wasn’t the one to help him do so.

  She had to get out of here before she broke down and sobbed. She went into the main room to grab her coat and purse.

  She heard Mark follow her, but he didn’t say anything. And he didn’t try to stop her as she opened the door and walked out.

  As she stumbled down the stairs, she realized she had nowhere to go. It was Christmas Eve. All of her friends would be busy with their families. She couldn’t show up on their doors,
bawling like a baby because her husband didn’t want her anymore.

  She went to her car and got behind the wheel. She had absolutely no idea where to go.

  So she just started to drive, relieved that—now she was alone—she was at least allowed to cry.

  ***

  She didn’t head to anywhere in particular. She drove through the downtown streets and then through a couple of neighborhoods. She passed Micah and Alice’s house, and she saw them outside in the front yard. Their daughter Cara was peddling what was obviously a new, pretty pink tricycle down the sidewalk.

  They all looked so happy. Plus, they had another baby on the way. Some people were able to come together in love, build families, share all the ups and downs of life.

  But some people weren’t.

  Some people ended up alone, even in their own marriage.

  She drove by, hoping Micah and Alice wouldn’t recognize her car. They didn’t appear to notice her at all, and soon they were out of sight.

  She ended up at the church. The parking lot was empty. It was far too early for anyone to have arrived yet for the candlelight service this evening.

  She was crying so hard now that she pulled into the lot and parked her car, her whole body shaking as the sobs overwhelmed her.

  She wondered what Mark was doing.

  She wondered if he’d expected this to happen when he woke up this morning.

  She wondered if he was relieved that finally it was all out in the open.

  She’d raised her hands to cover her face, crying into her palms, when there was suddenly a knock on the window of her car.

  She actually jumped, she was so startled. When she’d wiped away enough tears, she saw that Daniel was standing beside her driver’s door, leaning over to peer in at her. He looked worried.

  Of course, he was worried. She was a member of his congregation, and she was crying in her car in the parking lot on Christmas Eve.

  She opened the window.

  “What’s going on?” Daniel asked, still bending slightly at the waist to see in on her.

  “Sorry. Sorry.” She found a napkin in a pocket of her car and used it to mop up her face. “I didn’t know where to go, so I just parked here.”

  “I see.” Daniel’s expression was mild. “Then you better tell me about it. Can I come sit down?” He gestured toward the passenger seat.

  She nodded. She was embarrassed at being caught sobbing like that, but she desperately needed to talk to someone. Daniel was her pastor. Whatever she told him, he wouldn’t tell anyone. She didn’t want to do anything that would breach the privacy of her marriage, but she thought this would be okay.

  She felt all alone, but she wasn’t—not really. There were people who cared about her, and Daniel was one of them.

  He came around to sit in the passenger seat of her car.

  “I didn’t see your car,” she said, feeling awkward and needing something easy to say.

  “Jessica dropped me off. I had a little prep work to do for the service tonight, and she was taking Nathan over to visit her mother.”

  “Oh.” Sophie blinked, momentarily distracted from her own situation. “I didn’t realize her mother was nearby.”

  “She’s in a nursing home,” Daniel said quietly. “She doesn’t know who Jessica is most of the time.”

  Sophie started crying again, her chest aching at the thought of her own mother in a similar situation.

  “You better tell me what’s going on,” Daniel said. “Where’s Mark?”

  With a halting explanation, occasionally interrupted by more tears, Sophie told Daniel what had happened that afternoon. She’d kept the explanation fairly general, mostly focusing on her own feelings.

  “I don’t know what to do anymore,” she concluded, when she finally reached the end. “I’ve tried so hard to be strong for him, but I don’t think I’m strong enough to help him through this after all. I don’t know what to do. I think it might be over.”

  Daniel didn’t reply immediately. He’d listened carefully, and now he appeared to be mulling over what she’d said. After a while, he murmured, “If marriages were always over when we didn’t know what else to do, then I don’t think any of them would last.”

  She sniffed and tried to wipe her face with the napkin, but it was so wet now it didn’t do much good. “Maybe. But it sounded to me like it was really over.”

  “I get that. I get that it sounded that way. And I know how hard it’s been for you these last couple of years, these last couple of months. I’ve seen you stay strong and faithful and committed in unimaginably difficult circumstances, when so many people would have just given up. I’ve seen it, Sophie.”

  She was crying again. Helplessly crying. Now that she’d started, she couldn’t seem to stop.

  “Mark has seen it too,” Daniel continued. “I’m sure he has. He’s seen you be strong, when all he feels is weak.”

  The words surprised Sophie, and she stared at Daniel, wondering how he’d known that.

  Daniel paused again, turning away from Sophie and staring out at the cross on the front of the church building. Finally, he said, as if he were just reflecting to himself, “You know the Gospel is never what we assume it should be. It’s counter-intuitive in absolutely every way. He didn’t come to earth as the conquering hero whom everyone expected. He came as a baby. Have you ever thought about how strange that is, how wrong it feels—that the world would be fixed through that?”

  Sophie shook her head, trying to understand, trying to keep up.

  Daniel turned his head and smiled at her. “The Gospel has never been about coming with how good we are or how devout we are or how strong we are. It’s coming as we really are—in all our brokenness, in all our weakness. And being loved anyway. And being loved because of it.”

  And that she understood.

  She cried into her hands for another minute before she was finally able to wipe away her tears. “Thank you,” she said. “I think I understand.”

  Daniel gave her a whimsical smile. “Do you? Because I’m not sure I always understand it myself.”

  “I’d like to…” She cleared her throat. “I’d like to go back to Mark now.”

  “I guess that’s your way of kicking me out of your car.” Daniel reached over to pat her hand. “I’ve been wrong about a lot of things. Just ask Jessica. But I’m pretty sure I’m not wrong about this. Mark is sitting there now, praying that you’ll come back to him. In fact, he might be out looking for you.”

  Sophie took a ragged breath, praying and hoping and terrified, but desperately eager to talk to Mark again. “Thank you,” she said again.

  When Daniel was out of the car, he leaned over again before he closed the door. “Maybe he won’t have to run all the way home in the middle of the night to get to you. That’s what I did to get to Jessica.” He was grinning as he closed the car door.

  Sophie took a moment to wonder if that was true, that Daniel had run all the way to reach his wife.

  She really liked the image. As she pulled out of the parking lot and onto the street, she had the silly, random wish that she could run all the way home from the church to get to Mark.

  Even that, wouldn’t come close to embodying how much she loved him.

  Twelve

  It just took a few minutes for Sophie to get home.

  She didn’t pull her car into the private lot in the back of the building, where she normally parked. Most of the street parking was empty in front of the bookstore, so she pulled into a space there and ran upstairs to their apartment.

  “Mark!” She was calling out his name before she’d even managed to get the door unlocked. “Mark!”

  No one answered.

  She felt a moment of sheer panic when she realized the apartment was empty. Maybe Mark had taken his things and already left. She ran into the bedroom, stumbling slightly on the edge of an area rug, and almost cried in relief when she saw that his shoes were still on the floor under the window, his pajamas
thrown haphazardly in the general direction of the laundry basket.

  He hadn’t left her after all.

  But then where had he gone?

  She ran back to where she’d dumped her purse and dug through it, searching for her phone so she could call him. It wasn’t there.

  She scanned the room, realizing she had no idea where it was or when she’d seen it last.

  They didn’t have a landline in the apartment, since they always used their mobile phones.

  She made a growling sound of frustration. She could just stay here and wait until he got back, but the thought of doing that made her crazy.

  She had to find him.

  He didn’t have a car. Surely he couldn’t have gotten very far. Maybe he was just down the block getting a cup of coffee or something.

  She picked up her keys and purse again and ran back down to the sidewalk. She walked up and down the block, but most of the stores and shops were closed, and there was no sign of Mark.

  This was terrible. She had so much to tell him, and he seemed to have disappeared off the face of the earth.

  Having nothing else to do, she returned to her car, deciding she would just drive up and down the nearby streets until she found him.

  The sky was gray and some cold drizzle was starting to fall from the sky, but the temperature wasn’t cold enough for snow. She turned on the defrost setting in her car to try to clear her windows as she pulled into the street.

  She drove all through the blocks of the downtown area, but there was no sign of Mark.

  Where had the man gotten to? She hadn’t been gone for very long.

  She turned a corner into a residential neighborhood, but she couldn’t imagine Mark would have gone there, unless he was just walking for the sake of walking.

  Maybe that was all he was doing. Clearing his head. Taking some time to think.

  She’d driven down one block when she saw someone she recognized.

  It was Abigail, so pregnant she looked like she would pop at any moment. With her were Thomas and their daughter, Mia. Thomas was holding hands with both Abigail and Mia, and he was wearing a bright blue sweater with a big bunny appliqué on the front.