Chapter 4

© Copyright 2007 by Elizabeth Delayne



Rachel dropped down on her bed and stared up, at the long planks of wood that made up her roof. It was simple construction, placed together more to take care of needs than comfort. Still, she needed to feel warm. It seemed more often than not she was cold. So very cold.

She pulled up the edge of her layer of quilts and curled them around her and watched the small flame dance in the wood stove.

Why had James Forester been the one asked to do the repairs? He was a farmer, a horse ... rancher or breeder or some other word she wasn’t familiar with. He wasn’t a carpenter, anymore than any other man in town.

Well, that she knew.

More importantly, why hadn’t he told them no, instead of turning on her? He obviously didn’t put much stock in what she thought of him.

And plenty of what the town thought.

She was shaking. She was so upset, she was shaking, even under the cover of the quilts. Too much, too many emotions. One on top of the other. She couldn’t deal with it right now.

Not with him.

Not with his iodic sense of self worth.

As if there wasn’t other women in town with their eyes on him. Widow Myers, for one, had recently lost her second husband and had three children to care for. She was actively looking for someone to help her raise them. According to Millie, she thought James Forester was a prize.

He’d do more to worry about Widow Myers.

As if a woman could pine for a man so egotistical, so ... so hateful.

He was nothing like his father. Or his son.

Rachel let herself fume.

James Forester wasn’t doing anyone any favors. It was too easy to see that like father, Matthew was sad. Like father he wanted to cling. James Forester to the past, Matthew ... to her. Did it matter that she was homesick? Did it matter that she missed her family like crazy?

No ... he just wanted to make it clear that he didn’t want her to be part of his family.

Part of his son’s life.

As the sun began to set, Rachel picked up her Bible. But all she could do was hold it to her.

First she’d had to deal with the punch in the gut of learning Rebekkah was expecting. Then she’d had to deal with James Forester.

Marriage.

Yes ... yes, she wanted it. She wanted a family, a child of her own. Children, a home, with her own kitchen and her own curtains and a kitchen table where she could sit in the morning and watch the sun rise through the window while she prayed for her family as she waited for them to awake.

She could see it now, more of a western dream formed from visiting the homes of people in town than any dream she had while growing up. Her husband would come in from morning chores and smiling, join her at the table. Maybe they would reach across, hold hands.

And then one of their children would run in.

Maybe it was a silly vision. Maybe it wasn’t the way things worked. Her parents were quiet in the morning, but there was a ... silent communion between them.

She could still remember her father sitting at the table with his newspaper and her mother hovering over the stove, but there had not been time for sitting and smiling and along chats in the early morning. Even in the east.

She missed them, though. Missed the morning ritual and the evening discourse. Missed the easy relationship she shared with her mom and dad and Rebekka. So, of course she wanted a family of her own.

But she didn’t need to be reminded that she didn’t have one.

She didn’t need to be reminded that she wasn’t wanted.

Not that men in town hadn’t been presumptuous enough to ask. Some had been a little too presumptuous. In the first few weeks she’d fended off proposals that seemed to come out of every doorway and campsite in and around town. Trappers, a few older farmers, lonely men, some with children.

It wasn’t that she wasn’t willing to consider their proposals, but she’d only just arrived in town. She had a contract. She was hear to teach.

And she was a little uneasy at being the center of the marriage attraction. With people she didn’t know, in a town so far away from her mother, father and sister.

In the end, if she found a husband out here, she wouldn’t have their oppinion.

She wasn’t sure she wanted to live so far away from them for the rest of her life. She wanted a family, but she hadn’t come west to get one. It had not been that kind of decision. She’d come west because staying home, and watching her sister build her own family ... it had seemed too pitiful.

Their entire lives they had shared everything.

But they hadn’t shared falling in love.

Maybe she should make a sign, like the one Millie hung on the store door. Her’s would say: CLOSED to all marriage proposals.

God! she cried out.

She was so tired. She just wanted Rebekkah. Rebekkah would know what to say. They’d always known what to say to each other.

Then Rebekkah had married.

And Rachel had headed west.

For the first time in her life she didn’t have her sister.

And the tears finally came.

* * *

Gregory watched his son pace the kitchen floor.

“You all right?”

He watched as James’s fist clinched and unclinched.

“I’m fine.”

“No you’re not.”

“Pa.”

“You got somethin’ on your mind?”

“Nothin.”

“James.”

“Pa.” he turned his brown eyes on him, then just walked at the door and let it slam behind him.

Gregory sighed and lifted his eyes to heaven.

Is it a good think Lord, to delight in the suffering of one’s bullheaded child? he asked. Even if James was silent on the matter, Gregory knew that the Reverend had asked him to fix the roof on the school teacher’s new house.

But if James felt anger, frustration, or whatever mix of emotions had triggered his angst, at lest he felt something.

He’d just become numb. Numb to even his sorrow. For so long he’d just drifted day to day. Not dealing. Not doing the living he was meant to do.

“Grandpa?”

Gregory turned to find Matthew in the doorway, looking sleep rumpled in his long johns and dragging behind him the quilt his mother had sewn for him the previous Christmas. His dark brown hair was askew and his face held the marks of deep sleep.

Gregory sighed. James must had woken the boy up when he’d slammed the door.

He held out a hand to his grandson.

“I need another story,” Matthew said as he climbed into his grandfather’s lap. “The other one ran out.”

“It did? But that was such a good story. Daniel and the lions and how God calmed the lions so Daniel was safe.”

“But I need another one.”

Gregory laughed as he gently brushed his grandson’s hair out of his eyes.. “You need, do you?” he said dramatically, as dramatically as his grandson.

He set Matthew on the floor and slowly pushed himself to his feet. His little boy was getting too big to carry in his arms.

Or he was getting to old.

Age was wearing on him. He didn’t have much time.

And he wanted his family stronger before he had to go.

He held out a hand to his grandson, even as he glanced toward the door where his son had gone.

“Come on, boy,” he said with an exaggerated grown as he began walking Matthew back to bed. “I think your old Grandpa has another story for you.”

Matthew giggled and the sound eased a few of the aches away.

HEY! and don't forget to e-mail me if you have a comment!




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