Bring Me Flowers (Garden of Love 5)

by Melanie Wilber

  ***

  Jon paid for the movie tickets at the booth and escorted his daughters into the bustling theater. The latest children’s movie had been released yesterday, and the line had been long. He was glad he decided to come early, or he may have had to look at two very disappointed faces.

  They got some popcorn, sodas, and candy from the snack bar and found some seats in the theater that had already begun to fill up. He didn’t mind the crowd, the long line, or his depleted wallet. He only wanted to make up for lost time with his girls. He loved seeing them smile and hearing them say, “Thank you, Daddy.”

  His hopes of spending much more time with them in the future had begun to soar. Things had been progressing nicely between Katie and himself, he thought. He had been taking things slow, not wanting to push her too much, but they’d spent several more evenings together, and he had also taken her out twice: for a nice dinner last Friday and to a Christian concert last night. The look on her face had been priceless when he had revealed their surprise destination to hear one of her favorite artists perform live on-stage.

  For a movie whose target audience was under the age of ten, Jon found himself enjoying it. Manda and Jamie loved every minute and talked about the different scenes and characters all the way to the house. Then they had to repeat the same funny moments to their mother.

  “Okay, you can tell me more while you take a bath,” Katie said, herding them into the hallway and going to start the water.

  Jon had told her he would change the oil in her car. He took his time, certainly not in any hurry to return to his empty apartment. When he stepped back into the house, the girls were done with their bath and getting into their pajamas.

  He went to tell them good night. Jamie begged him to stay and read them a story. Katie gave her nod of approval and disappeared from the room. Jon made the most of the extra minutes with his daughters, but he was anxious to spend some time with Katie. She looked really great in those new jeans she had on.

  ***

  Kathleen could hear Jon’s voice traveling down the hall as he read to the girls. He changed the inflection in his voice often to portray the different characters in the long story. Jamie kept giggling and inserting comments of her own as he read. Mandie kept shushing her little sister. But Jon read on, not letting their interruptions take away from his own enjoyment. He may not have wanted to become a daddy at such a young age, but he had always been a good one.

  Kathleen went to the shelf where she kept some photo albums and selected one she had put together exclusively of the girls. Since she was the one usually behind the camera, the amount of photographs of the girls with their father stood out. Oftentimes she had caught him playing dolls, painting, or making Play-Doh figurines with Mandie. One of her favorite snapshots was of him and Jamie making mud-pies in the back yard. They had given each other dark brown mustaches and big eyebrows.

  She turned the page and saw another one she had forgotten about. Jon, Mandie, and Jamie had on their rubber boots and were walking through a large pool of water on the sandy coastal shore. Looking at the photograph of Jon walking hand in hand with his daughters, she felt like the week-long vacation at the beach the final summer they had spent together had been only a few months ago rather than two and a half years.

  His time with them had been limited since then and his presence conspicuously absent in the most recent pages of the album. But for her daughters’ sake, and Jon’s, Kathleen was grateful he had been faithful to spend every other Saturday with them.

  Amanda and Jamie always returned with smiles on their faces, and tears had often flowed after he left. Deciding to take Jon back may be a risky thing for her daughters and herself, but denying him the chance to show them he was sincere wouldn’t be any better.

  Making this decision reminded her of the weeks she had spent considering his proposal of marriage eight years ago. She had thought he was crazy when he’d first suggested the idea two weeks before their high school graduation.

  “We could do it, Katie,” he said. “With both our scholarships we could afford to rent an apartment near the campus. By combining our room and board money we’d have plenty to live on.”

  She had shaken off the idea as one of his crazy whims, but he had been persistent. He even went so far as to buy her a ring to prove how serious he was. She had known she wanted to marry him, but the idea of getting married so young seemed crazy. Her family and friends all told her it was best to wait, but Jon had not given up.

  “I love you, Katie,” he said on the night of their senior class party. They had gone for a walk along the Columbia River outside the hotel ballroom when he surprised her with the simple diamond ring. “I don’t want to keep having to say good night to you at the door.”

  “You want to get married just so we can have sex?”

  “No, of course not,” he replied, closing his fist over the ring and and drawing her close. “I am looking forward to being with you, I won’t deny that, but I also want to share my life with you--to be there for you every day. To take care of you and be your husband, not just your boyfriend.”

  Unable to deny she wanted that too, she had brought an unforgettable smile to Jon’s face when she stepped back and held out her left hand.

  Her parents had tried to stop the wedding plans. Jon’s had been supportive once they heard how they had worked out the finances and saw their sincerity to commit to each other. They had been married in late August, three weeks before heading off to college at the University of Oregon. Kathleen had never regretted her decision, even when she had to quit school to have Amanda and when her plans to return were changed by a second pregnancy.

  With all they had been through, and even if Jon had not returned to her life, she knew without a doubt in her mind that if she had to do it over again, she would make the same choice. Aside from coming to know God, nothing else in her life could compare with the happiness she’d experienced as Jon’s wife and as a mother. Her heart began to beat faster thinking about the words she had to tell Jon when he finished tucking the girls into bed.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Jon read the final words of Sleeping Beauty and closed the book. Turning to Manda on his right, he kissed the top of her blond head then did the same to dark-haired Jamie on his left.

  “Good night my sleeping beauties,” he said and scooted off the double bed the girls shared. Pulling the blankets up to their chins, he gave them each a tap on the nose and wished them sweet dreams.

  He turned off the light and closed the door. Stepping down the hall, he was looking forward to some alone-time with Katie. He found her in the living room flipping through a photo album. Peering over her shoulder, he rubbed her neck gently and saw a picture of himself taken with both girls on his lap, one on each knee. Mandie appeared to be about four, Jamie two.

  “I’ve always loved that picture,” Katie said without looking at him.

  He walked around the sofa to sit beside her. “Wasn’t that taken on Christmas morning?”

  “Yes,” she said. “I love it because the three of you weren’t posing for the shot. I just saw you sitting there snuggling with them and decided to capture the moment.”

  Jon smiled and gazed at his wife’s profile. She had her blond hair pulled back into a clip, exposing her smooth cheeks.

  Her brown eyelashes blinked over her green eyes, and she looked so beautiful in the subdued light. Subconsciously she reached up and stroked her bottom lip with her forefinger as she turned the page in the album. A slight smile formed on her face once again.

  She pointed to a picture on the page and made a comment about the circumstance, but he didn’t shift his gaze. He couldn’t take his eyes off her.

  Slowly he reached for Katie’s cheek, turning her face toward him. Staring at him so innocently, she looked as beautiful as he’d ever seen her. He acted on impulse, leaning forward and kissing her mouth with as much tenderness as possible. He hadn’t kissed her this passionately since that night at the beach house. H
e’d been keeping them short and sweet so his desires wouldn’t take them beyond what Katie was ready for.

  She didn’t try to pull away, and he dared to continue, caressing her other cheek with his thumb and running his fingertips down her jaw line and into the soft hair along her neck.

  “We’re going to get through this,” he said. “We love each other too much to let anything, even my stupidity, keep us apart forever.”

  She appeared comforted by his words and yet apprehensive.

  “Tell me what you’re thinking,” he said, trying his best to get her to share her thoughts without being pushy. He reached for her hand.

  “I need to ask you something,” she said, allowing him to hold her fingers but not squeezing his in return. “Please don’t be mad, but I need to know.”

  He couldn’t imagine what she had on her mind. “I won’t be mad,” he promised, laying his other hand over hers. “What is it, baby?”

  She swallowed hard and took a deep breath. His heart ached seeing her so reluctant to talk to him. There was a time they had been completely open with each other about everything. They had lost that closeness. He had lost her trust, and he wondered how long it would take for him to gain it back fully, or if he ever would.

  “During the last two years, or--or even before that, has there been anyone else, Jon?”

  “Anyone else?” he asked, unsure of what she meant.

  “Have you been with anyone else?”

  “You mean another woman?”

  She nodded. Tears welled up in her downcast eyes.

  He reached for her and drew her close. “No, baby,” he whispered, finding it unbearable she had worried about such a thing. “That’s the honest truth. I’ve never even thought about it.”

  She remained quiet, and he held her, feeling unsure about what to do next. He wondered why she had asked. He felt certain his response would please her. But her body remained tense.

  Feeling confused by the pained expression on her face when he released her, he supposed she thought he was lying.

  “You don’t believe me?” he asked, wondering how he could assure her of his faithfulness, even during their time apart.

  Her eyes snapped up. “Oh, no. I believe you.”

  “Then what? Why do you look upset?”

  Her eyes dropped again, and she sighed. “I can’t say the same about me,” she whispered.

  Jon felt the color drain from his cheeks. Nothing could have prepared him for her words. He felt like he must be in the middle of a bad dream and told himself to wake up before his heart snapped in two, but he continued to sit there, listening to her fumble through the details.

  She had run into one of his old college friends at the mall last summer. Caleb Landers had lived in the apartment below them when they were first married. He and Caleb were both engineering majors and had several classes together. They also played intramural basketball on the same team and attended a men’s campus Bible study. They had lost touch in the last few years. Caleb had been from eastern Oregon, and Jon figured he had moved back after getting his degree. Apparently he was wrong.

  Caleb was a good guy, one of the best friends he’d had since high school, and Jon had a difficult time believing he had gone after his wife, even if they were separated.

  But Katie’s words told him otherwise, and Jon had to get up and walk around. The thought of his precious Katie in the arms of another man made him feel sick to his stomach. He didn’t want to believe what he was hearing.

  “I was lonely, Jon. It had been a year and a half since I’d had a man pay attention to me, and I liked that. He kept calling me and asking me out to dinner. He listened to me, and I needed that from someone besides Hannah.

  “I told him that I didn’t feel right about being anything more than friends because you and I weren’t divorced, and he understood.”

  Jon relaxed a bit and waited for her to go on. Perhaps he had let his imagination get away from him.

  “He never so much as touched a hair on my head until that weekend in August you took the girls camping.”

  Jon’s heart sank. He felt the room beginning to spin and grabbed onto the back of the sofa for support.

  “We had gone to a movie on Saturday night and got back late. He wanted to come in since the girls were away. They had always been my excuse before. I thought it would be okay. But the moment he stepped into the house I felt uncomfortable.

  “I didn’t want to be rude so I made us some coffee and planned to only have him stay for a little while. But he wasn’t that easy to get rid of. We ended up talking for a long time and then he started kissing me, and I let him.”

  Katie bit her lip and stammered out the next words. “It had been such a long time--”

  Jon felt nauseous, really nauseous. “You slept with him, Kathleen? Right here in our house? In our bed?”

  He bolted for the door. He didn’t want to hear how sorry she was. How could she have done this to him?

  “Jon, wait,” he heard her say, but he didn’t turn around.

  “I’ve heard enough, Kathleen.”

  She grabbed his arm as he flung open the door. He tried to keep walking, but she grabbed his other arm and lunged in front of him, blocking the doorway.

  “Jon, wait,” she repeated, pressing her palm into his chest.

  He took a deep breath and waited for her to speak her peace. But he wasn’t planning to listen.

  “Do you honestly think I would have done that to you? To us? You didn’t let me finish.”

  Her words got his attention and he waited, almost afraid to hope he had jumped to the wrong conclusion.

  “He started kissing me, and I let him--for about five seconds, Jon, before I realized that I wasn’t longing for him. I was longing for you. I wanted you to be the one holding me and touching me and kissing me.”

  He dared to look at her. A tear escaped down her cheek. She grabbed his trembling hand and held it firmly.

  “That’s all that happened?” he asked, feeling afraid to breathe. “He kissed you one time?”

  “Yes. I asked him to leave, and I haven’t seen him or talked to him since. I felt ashamed I’d let him kiss me in a way that I had only shared with you.”

  Jon took several deep breaths and stepped back inside, pulling her with him and closing the door. He placed his hands on either side of her face and kissed her--for much longer than five seconds.

  “If nothing happened with Caleb, why did you find it necessary to almost give me a heart attack?”

  “I’m sorry I made you think the worst,” she replied. “I didn’t mean to. I only wanted to be honest with you and get everything out in the open--even just one kiss. I didn’t want you finding out some other way in the future.”

  He knew she was right to have told him the truth. “Just remind me to have my pacemaker rewired at my next physical,” he teased.

  He bent to kiss her again, but she placed her fingers over his lips. “I have one more thing to say and then you can do that as much as you want.”

  He drew back and waited for her to finish.

  “I had to find out if you had been with anyone else and be upfront with you about Caleb because I wanted to resolve anything still standing in the way of us getting back together. I want you to come home.”

  ***

  Kathleen began preparing dinner the following Friday night at four o’clock. She had decided to make spinach manicotti, one of Jon’s favorite meals. After defrosting the chopped spinach in the microwave, she mixed the green vegetable with ricotta and shredded mozzarella cheese. Filling the uncooked pasta shells with the mixture, she placed them in a baking dish and poured her homemade marinara sauce over the top.

  “What’s that?” Amanda asked, peering into the dish with a scrunched-up nose.

  “Manicotti,” Kathleen replied.

  Mandie grimaced. “Do I have to eat it?”

  “Not if you don’t mind going hungry.”

  “Why can’t we have spaghetti?” />
  “Because we’re having company tonight, and this is more special.”

  “Who’s coming?”

  Kathleen tried to hide her smile. “It’s a surprise,” she said, tousling Mandie’s blond hair.

  “Mama, you’re acting weird,” she said, turning away and dashing back to the living room.

  Warmth flooded Kathleen’s heart, anticipating the girls’ reaction when they opened the door for their father. They were always happy to see him, but having him surprise them would be even better. She and Jon had decided to wait a week to tell the girls they were getting back together. Tomorrow they were planning to renew their vows in front of a small gathering of family and friends before Jon moved back home. That had been Jon’s idea, wanting to do things the proper way.

  As much as I’d love to carry you back to our bedroom right now, he had said after she had invited him to come home again, I don’t feel I have that right until I’ve recommitted myself to you properly. I never divorced you, but I did break my vows, and you deserve to hear me promise my unfailing love and devotion to you.

  As hard as it had been for her to wait one more week to have him here, she knew Jon was right. Now the long week was almost over.

  Kathleen placed the prepared dish in the preheated oven and set the timer for one hour. She hadn’t made this meal for more than two years. She had first made it on their one-year anniversary. Jon’s mom had given her the recipe, and she had decided to try it for the special occasion. She hadn’t been able to eat much herself because of her bulging belly. Nearly nine months pregnant with Amanda at the time, she had a difficult time imagining what their life would be like with a baby in the house. Despite how young she was, she remembered being giddy with excitement and knew Jon was looking forward to being a daddy too.

  Amanda had arrived the following Friday morning. Kathleen had been awakened by strong contractions at two a.m. and told Jon she felt they needed to get to the hospital immediately. By the time they arrived thirty minutes later, Kathleen felt like she needed to start pushing. She tried to wait like the emergency room nurse told her to, but by the time they got her upstairs to the delivery room, Amanda’s head was on its way out. Amanda had been delivered by a nurse.