He grinned, his eyes twinkling with amusement. “What kind of man would I be if I complained about a few blisters? It felt good to be outside working, instead of sitting around at home. I should come out here every day, then maybe I’d get some real muscles.” He flexed in a comical gesture and shot me a sad face.
I giggled, kissing the palms of his hands in the process. “You look fine to me.” I grinned, squeezing his bicep with appreciation.
Our faces sobered as we both realized the space between us had diminished. I felt my pulse jump as I stared boldly into his eyes, focusing in on the rings of gold that shone in the depths of brown. Silently, I dared him to make a move, unsure if I had the guts to do it myself.
Slowly, Travis raised his hand to caress my face, running his fingers down my cheek and entangling them in the hair at the nape of my neck. Shivers of expectation coursed through me, his gentle touch leaving me aching for more.
Travis waited, watching my face for some sign to continue. “I won’t do anything, Sarah, unless you want me to. I don’t want to rush you into anything.”
I resisted the temptation to throw myself on him. He sat still as a statue, holding me as though I were a delicate vase. I yearned for him to touch me; the beginnings of a fire in the pit of my stomach spread to my cheeks, warming them as if I were in front of a fire. I recognized the dazed, fuzzy feeling taking over my senses as an intense need took over, my body becoming focused on just one thing – Travis’s touch. What was he waiting for? Did I smell? Of course I smell. Everything around here smelled. If he doesn’t kiss me soon, I might scream.
Emotions tumbling out of control, I could barely appreciate the irony of the fact that just minutes ago, I hadn’t wanted to send Travis the wrong idea – the idea I was ready to progress to a physical relationship.
I couldn’t remember the last time I had taken a breath. I held everything in, waiting for Travis to move. Searching his face, my eyes wide and expectant, I took in every detail of his face; from the eyelashes ringing his dark eyes to the tiny dip above his lips.
Travis leaned in, and I felt my mouth part into the tiniest shape of an “o”. He seemed to be inching his way so slowly that, impatiently, I dipped my head forward to brush his lips with mine.
He responded instantly, his reserve crumbling as the desire he’d held in check took over. Instead of a punishing, crushing kiss, as Dave would have done, Travis’s kiss was gentle in its exploration.
Pulling Travis over me, aching to bring us closer, I found myself arching my back into his touch, my senses exploding with urgency. His hesitant, innocent touch drove me almost mad with frustration.
The intensity of my emotions scared and thrilled me all at the same time, the escalation of the moment driving me into reckless abandon. I felt safe with Travis, too safe.
To my surprise, Travis pulled away, shaking himself, as if clearing a fog in his head. “I better go,” he managed to get out, his voice low and uneven.
Trying to appear nonchalant, even as my euphoric high came to a crashing halt, I shrugged my shoulders and kept my eyes to the ground. Inside, I felt sick with a mixture of disappointment and humiliation. I could only guess what had made Travis pull away. Trying to keep my feelings in check, I trailed Travis to the door.
He hesitated, pausing as he reached for the knob. He turned to me and grabbed both of my hands. “Will you be all right? Until your mom gets home, I mean?” Again, his eyes full of concern, felt like they were trying to see into my soul.
Trying to sound confident, I barked out a quick laugh. “Sure… I think the hard part is over.” I couldn’t bear to meet his gaze, afraid of what I might see.
Travis sighed. “Look, Sarah, about tonight. It’s not…”
“Wait, let me guess. It’s not you, it’s me, right?” I repeated the cliché dryly, trying to save us both the discomfort of the excuse.
Travis looked taken aback. “Well… yeah, I guess you could put it that way.” He frowned then, noting the hurt in my eyes. “I don’t know what you want from me, or what you expected. I just… I just don’t want to hurt you, Sarah. I thought it would be safer if I left before it got any heavier in there. I don’t have much strength to resist you. I know what I would like to do, but I want to go slow. Treat you right. I don’t want you to think you have to do anything for me, like I expect it.” Travis pulled me close, burying his face into my hair. “You don’t know what this is like for me… having you. It’s like a dream come true. I’m going to do everything I can, not to screw this up.”
A small smile crept onto my lips and I breathed a sigh of relief. “I thought you were leaving because I’d done something wrong. Or I was a horrible kisser. And I know I look like a wreck, but…”
“You’re beautiful, Sarah. Don’t ever let anyone tell you different.” Raising my hand, he brushed his lips across my knuckles, stealing my breath away. “I’m going to treat you like a princess,” he whispered. “See you tomorrow.”
Travis turned, shoved his feet into his shoes and stepped into the screened porch. Like a scene from a horror movie, his hand never touched the porch door, but it swung open anyway, screeching into the night. I could hear Travis swear under his breath.
“Funny seeing you here. Trying to get another notch on your belt, Travis?” a voice mocked.
I froze. The familiar voice brought back images of violence, the feeling of suffocating, of helplessness. Grabbing the wall for support, I hid behind Travis’s lean frame.
Travis didn’t budge, placing his arms across the door’s width, blocking Dave from entering the house. “It’s no concern of yours, Slater, what I’m doing here. From what I understand, you’re not exactly welcome here any more.”
Dave Slater’s powerful, broad shoulders filled the screen door, but somehow his face stayed hidden in the shadows of night. Ice prickled the base of my neck and the hairs on my arm stood on end. The porch light, which usually cast a brilliant glow over the farmhouse yard, had been broken, a jagged shell of a bulb all that remained.
Dave had planned this and planned it well. He hadn’t counted on Travis being here, the only hitch in his plan. Goosebumps popped up on my skin.
“Actually, Travis, I was asked to be here. Mrs. Christenson called me to check on Sarah and the rest of the family. We’re close. I’m practically one of them,” Dave mocked, hinting at his long time relationship with the Christensons.
“Well, Sarah doesn’t need your ‘help’. She’s got me now, and you’d better get used to that. There’s no need for you to be hanging around, waiting for Sarah to be alone so you can harass her. I can be out here so fast, it would make your head spin.”
Dave clenched his hands into fists and I held back a moan. There was no way Travis could beat Dave in a fight. Dave easily outweighed him by thirty pounds.
Travis stood his ground, not showing the slightest flinch. “I suggest you leave, Slater. I’m not going anywhere until you do.” Travis puffed out his chest and raised his chin a notch.
A laugh came from the darkness, chilling me to the bone. “You have no idea what you’re getting yourself into, Travis. Sarah and I, we have unfinished business. You hear that, Sarah?” Dave called out, craning his neck to see over Travis’s shoulder. “We aren’t finished yet.” The simple statement rang true for what it was, a serious threat.
I could picture his beautiful face marred with an ugly sneer and I willed myself to talk. “You need to go, Dave. I have nothing left to say to you.”
A snort of frustration came from Dave. “I’ll leave, but this isn’t over. You’ll be back, Sarah, when this boy’s done with you. He’ll use you and break your heart. Then see who you come running to, to pick up the pieces. It’s the same thing every time. One of these times, I won’t be there any more and you’ll be all alone.” Backing away from the porch, Dave added, “You took my mother’s ring. You promised forever.”
Dave’s shadow disappeared into the night, easily getting lost in the wooded fields behind the garage.
Travis and I breathed a collective sigh of relief. The turmoil of the day collapsed on my shoulders, combined with the frightening fact Dave was out there, watching me. My knees turned to jelly, quivering and soft, and I slumped against the wall. Travis caught me up in his arms and carried me to the living room.
“How will I be able to sleep now?” I groaned, knowing the twins would be up at five a.m., looking for their first meal.
“Shhh,” Travis whispered. “I’ll stay. You rest, and I’ll stay.”
“But what about...?”
“No arguments,” Travis cut me off mid-sentence. “Nothing’s going to happen. We’ll stay fully clothed and I’ll sit in the rocking chair. You sleep on the couch. I can’t leave you, Sarah, not when I know there’s a monster out there.”
Exhausted, my eyes felt as though heavy sandbags had been tied to the lids. I raised my arm, signaling Travis to come closer. My mind ran fuzzy and I forgot where I was, who I was. There was only Travis. Travis and me… alone in a house overnight. What would Gran think if she saw Travis here? He can’t stay. There would be trouble. Even as I thought these things, I curled tighter into the cracks of the worn couch, pulling a rainbow-colored quilt over my shoulders to block the chills that kept coming.
“You have to go,” I tried again, but Travis leaned over and covered my lips with his own. The simple gesture sapped the last of my energy and I gave myself over to Travis’s promise of protection, taking the easy way out.
The kiss was all Travis took before taking his place, as he promised, in the mustard-yellow recliner in the corner of the living room.
I heard the creak of the recliner as he rocked carefully, methodically, and the repetitive squeak followed me into a dark, deep sleep.
Travis waited until sunrise, when Rodney staggered home carrying Louise over his shoulder like a sack of grain. The two exchanged places as though it were the changing of the guard; Travis finally satisfied the house would be safe.
Rodney didn’t ask any questions.
Chapter Ten
Wrong Side of Town
Bobby suffered second and third degree burns over most of his chest and upper arms. I spent the first two weeks of Bobby’s arrival home tending to his wounds and changing the dressings. Every time I pulled the sticky dressings from his reddened, bubbly flesh, he screamed like a baby, and I cried; we made quite a picture, the untrained blubbering nurse and the wounded “soldier”.
Travis came every day, and gradually everyone adjusted to the “townie” being around. To Gran, he was just another mouth to feed, to Rodney, he was Bobby’s bungling replacement in the fields, and to the rest of the siblings, a formidable wrestling partner and piggy back giver. To me… he was everything.
I found myself waiting anxiously for his arrival every day, passing by the kitchen window five or six times, hoping to catch a glimpse of his brown Ford truck lumbering down the road. Travis made each day seem effortless, simply by being there. And I had almost forgotten what life was supposed to be like, my thoughts so caught up with Travis. My daily grievances over missing Dad and Corey had lessened as my feelings for Travis grew stronger, monopolizing my mind.
Early one morning, I flew down the steps and through the kitchen, hurrying to beat Dean to the barn. If I beat Dean to the barn, he owed me a Shasta soda. Never in a million years did I ever think I’d race to be up before dawn – especially for a soda.
Clutching a piece of day-old homemade bread, I struggled to pull on the long rubber work boots for the barn while balancing on one foot at a time. A rooster crowed mightily, its piercing tone so sharp and unexpected, I jumped. Stumbling, I lost my balance and crashed into the refrigerator, knocking the few magnets, newspaper clippings, and calendar to the floor. Replacing it all quickly, I launched through the doorway, certain I had heard Dean thundering down the stairs.
Three steps from the front porch, my brain caught up with my feet and I skidded to a stop. Scrunching up my face, I thought back a few paces to the picture that niggled in the back of my mind. The calendar. When I’d re-hung it, the bold letters at the top showed we had reached August, had actually been in August for some time, according to the slashes that marked out the days gone.
August. The time had come.
Dean flew by me on the path, crowing just as the rooster had done minutes ago, but his was a crow of victory. Approaching the barn, his face lost all boastfulness and became sober as he realized I trailed behind, not in pursuit.
I climbed the first railing of the nearest stall and plopped down on top, resting my chin in my hands. Confused by my moodiness, Dean climbed up next to me, placing his arm around my shoulder.
“We can share the soda, if you want,” he offered, not understanding the sudden change.
I raised my brow in acknowledgement but couldn’t answer for the knot in my throat.
After a while, Dean gave up waiting for me to say something, and hopped down to begin the milking. “Are you lovesick?” he called out between pings of milk hitting the pail, his eyebrows arched with concern.
Managing a laugh through my tight throat, I grabbed a pitchfork hanging on the wall and headed up to the loft. Is today the day I go back to the future? Will I ever go back? Does this mean I’ll lose Travis? Questions vied for position in my brain, each one pushing to be at the front like a bunch of first graders in a line for the water fountain at school. When would it happen? How would it happen? Would I have to jump back through the hatch? Did I have to wait for a storm?
Consciously, I stopped just as my head entered the opening of the loft, my eyes even with the piles of loose hay on the floorboards. Wavering on the ladder, a thought hit me like a punch to the stomach, a thought so sickening and frightening it made my knees as weak as wet noodles. Even if I avoided the rapids and managed to save Aunt Sarah from drowning, would I still have to die anyway, a victim of fate? Could I really change the outcome?
Scrambling up the last few rungs of the ladder, I heaved myself into a thatch of loose hay and held my stomach, refusing to get sick. Thoughts of death flooded my brain, images of floating bodies and mangled limbs; all a product of the horror movies I was forbidden to watch, but watched anyway.
I thought of sweet Travis and how far we’d come in such a short time; how I needed him sometimes like I needed to breathe. He showed up every day without fail, fighting through the physical labor just so we could spend a few precious moments alone. I looked forward to those times, when we’d sneak off to the woods, Travis finally letting go of his formal demeanor and becoming his true, warm self. In the safety of the woods, away from watchful eyes, Travis would cling to me, holding fast as though he were afraid I would disappear on the summer breeze. He would whisper in my ear how much he loved me, and how he was planning our future together, and I believed every word.
Sometimes I found myself wishing, against all reason, that I would be stuck in the past forever. The dark cloud of the unknown followed me every time I was with Travis, the guilt and worry I felt knowing I might soon be gone tainted even the most special moments. Each kiss ended slightly bittersweet, and I hated myself for ruining what little time I had left.
Throwing the hay through the hatch in a daze, I climbed back down the ladder and rested my head against the smooth, stripped wood of a barn pole. A stream of milk struck me in the cheek, startling me in my drunk-like stupor. I flinched, wiping the warm drops from my face. “What was that for?” I demanded, eyeing Dean, who hid low beneath a cow’s bulky stomach.
Dean peeked out from around the udders, a mischievous glint in his eyes. “I was trying to snap you out of it. What’s the matter? You’re walking around here like you’ve seen a ghost or something,” he said, frustration plain in his little boy voice.
Grabbing one of the wooden milking stools, I sat down at the edge of the stall, staying plenty clear of the cow’s rear legs. “Sorry, I guess I woke up on the wrong side of the bed,” I finished lamely. I watched him continue working, already missing the relationship
we had developed over the summer. We were closer now, in our backwards ages, than ever. I wished I could tell him the truth, that he could understand the craziness of my situation. How was it, that in such a large family, I still felt alone?
The rest of the day passed in a foggy haze. It wasn’t until supper had come and gone before I realized Travis hadn’t come.
I waited on the porch, listening to the chirp of crickets and the droning sound of buzzing flies. Fireflies lit up the yard, their incandescent lights blinking like beacons, calling to their mates. Peace seemed to settle like a blanket over the farm; even the animals were calm and ambled through the fields in a drowsy, slow manner that comes with late summer.
On the outside, I feigned calm, but my insides were raging and bubbling like molten lava. I was close to bubbling over and spilling my secret. I was going crazy with the knowledge that Sarah’s death, which was now my death, loomed on the horizon. Wouldn’t it only be fair to tell the family? To warn them?
In the distance, Travis’s truck pulled into the driveway, stopping for a moment while he unlocked the cattle gate. I felt my heart jump even as tears pricked the corners of my eyes.
Carrying a handful of wildflowers, Travis walked up the sidewalk, a beaming smile across his face. He handed the springy bunch of purple and yellow wildflowers to me and kissed me lightly on the forehead.
“Sorry I’m so late, but I have a surprise for you. I talked to your mom and she said you could have the night off! It’s about time we went on a date. A real date,” he emphasized.
I looked down at my soiled jeans and dirty hands. “But I’m not–”
“Go get changed,” Travis ordered. “No objections! March yourself in there or I’ll be forced to take you in your barn clothes,” he threatened, moving as if he were going to sling me over his shoulders.
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