A Scarlet Cord (11 page)

“Maybe …”

The silence that followed was not the comfortable quietude they’d come to enjoy with each other. Joel shifted in his seat and fidgeted with the edge of the table. Melanie mentally kicked herself for bringing up the idea of a trip to New York. But Joel’s next words surprised her.

“My memories of … of back home aren’t the greatest, Melanie.”

“You mean because of your parents?”

“Not just that …”

“Oh? What else?” She’d learned not to push him, but hope bounded in her heart because he finally seemed on the verge of opening up to her.

“I just … I don’t like to dwell on the past. I’m happy now. I’d rather concentrate on that.”

“But Tim’s there. Don’t you ever go visit him?”

“I have,” he hedged. “But usually he comes to see me. He travels quite a bit anyway.”

“I’m so anxious for you to meet Matt and Karly. And their kids.” She put a hand on his arm. “You know, they say the best way to erase bad memories of a place is to create new memories there. Maybe—”

“Maybe sometime, Mel …” Joel shook his head. “Just not … not right now.” A hard edge had come to his voice. “Do you … want to talk about it?”

“Maybe sometime,” he said again.

He seemed glum, and she was ready to apologize for pushing him when Joel reached for her hand across the table. “Tell me about Rick, Melanie.”

Relief washed over her. Maybe this was why he’d seemed so quiet and evasive. Thinking about the husband. She could imagine how that must feel. If Joel had been married before, she would have worried that he was making comparisons. Most dead spouses had been nominated for sainthood. She tried to read Joel’s expression in the semidarkness. “Dead husbands aren’t exactly the topic of choice when you’re trying to fall in love with someone else.”

“Are you?” he asked, raising an eyebrow, his gaze piercing her. “Trying to fall in love with me?” His tone held a trace of—was it hope?

Until now, she’d been afraid to let him know just how deep her feelings for him ran. But seeing him with Jerica today, something had given way inside her, and she could no longer think of a reason to hold back.

“I didn’t have to try too hard, Joel. You make it pretty easy …”

He scooted his chair closer to hers so their shoulders were touching. His hand found hers again, and he brought it to his lips and kissed the soft skin on her knuckles. The air had cooled a bit, and all around them cicadas chirred a happy melody.

“So what exactly are you trying to say, Ms. LaSalle?” She heard the amusement in his voice, but he brushed his thumb roughly over her fingers.

“I’m not
trying
to say anything. I
am
saying it.” Her voice quavered. “I … I think I’m in love with you, Joel. There, it’s out. Are you happy now?”

He leaned forward in his chair and squeezed her hand, planting
a kiss in her hair. “You have no idea, lady,” he whispered. “No idea at all.” He took a ragged breath and untangled his fingers from hers. Brushing her hair off her face, he kissed her tenderly, then drew back to gaze into her eyes. “I love you too, Melanie. More than you can possibly know.”

Her heart soared. She hadn’t realized until now how she had longed for them to exchange these words, how she longed to be the reason for his happiness.

Joel stayed late, and they talked for hours.

“Do you ever wonder why God allowed things to happen the way they did … in your life?” Joel asked, looking up toward the cream-colored moon that had risen over the trees.

“All the time. Sometimes none of it makes sense … Rick dying when I—when
we
needed him so much. I used to wonder why God allowed me to get pregnant when he knew I wouldn’t have Rick to help me raise Jerica. We weren’t even trying to have a baby. But I look at Jerica and think how much it helped me to have her then. And how precious she is to Jerry and Erika—the only connection they have to their only child—and I realize all over again that God knows what he’s doing.”

“I had the same thoughts when Mom and Dad died. I don’t suppose I’ll ever know what God’s purpose in that was, but I do know that some good came from that horrible time in my life.”

She tilted her head and looked up at him. “Like what?”

“Well, for one thing, I can empathize with people who are going through similar tragedies … because I’ve been there. There was a kid in one of my classes at Langston who lost his dad his freshman year. It was hard to watch, because it brought back everything that had happened to me, but I was looking at it with a few years’ perspective behind me, and I really think I had something to say to Seth that nobody else could. Very few others could honestly tell him, ‘I know exactly what you’re feeling.’ ”

“That’s so true,” Melanie said. “I’m sure he’ll never forget that either. Do you still keep in touch with him?”

Joel shook his head and looked away. “No. That happened the first year I was at Langston. But … there were other kids like Seth through the years.”

“Sounds like you were as much counselor as you were teacher.”

“Sometimes. My department head always told me that would get me in trouble one day. But Barbara didn’t practice what she preached.” He laughed softly. “She always had a string of kids in her own office pouring out their hearts to her too.”

“I wish I’d had a confidante like that when I went away to college.”

“Yeah. Me, too.”

Melanie wanted the evening to last forever. She felt honored that he had chosen to tell her the stories of his past that he’d shared tonight. And yet there was still so much she didn’t know, so many missing pieces of the life he’d led before she met him. She wanted to spend a lifetime getting to know him.

Later, when Joel took her face in his warm hands and caressed her cheek with such exquisite tenderness, when his kiss eagerly claimed her lips, the promise of all that lay in store for them filled her to overflowing. She realized that she hadn’t known such happiness since she had loved Rick—and been loved by him.

After Joel left, Melanie shut the door behind him and stood with her back against the door frame. She closed her eyes and pressed her fingers to her lips as though she could somehow preserve his kiss. A warm flush of happiness washed over her, and she smiled to herself. Finally, with a little sigh, she went down the hall to check on her daughter.

Jerica had thrown off her covers and was sprawled on her back, arms over her head, her breath coming so gently it was almost undetectable.
Oh, to know such peace and security
, Melanie thought, brushing her hand over the cherubic cheek. She swallowed the lump
of joy in her throat and pulled a light blanket up over the slight form.

She closed Jerica’s door and walked through the house, turning off lights and checking the locks. Then she went to the bathroom off the master bedroom to take a quick shower. She slipped into a nightshirt and robe, ran a brush through her hair, and flipped off the bathroom light. Going to her closet, she hung her robe on a hook. But as she turned to close the door, the faint scent of Rick LaSalle seemed to waft from the shirts that hung at the far end of the closet. A veil of bittersweet longing fell over her.

She sighed. It was time.

Before she could change her mind, she gathered Rick’s shirts into an unwieldy bundle and pulled them off the rod. Flopping them across the foot of the bed, she took them from their hangers one by one, fingering each sleeve and carefully folding each shirt into a neat rectangle, the way Rick had folded them when he was packing for a business trip. The act seemed almost sacred, and her tears came easily.

“I loved you, Rick,” she whispered, stopping to bring a shirt to her face one last time. “Oh, how I loved you, darling. But I have to move on. It’s time for me to let you go.” For a moment the pain was as raw as the night he had died. But she knew she was only doing what she should have done long ago. She allowed herself a good cry then. It hurt to say such a final good-bye. But she slept under a blanket of peace that night and awoke to the sound of a mourning dove’s familiar, plaintive cooing in the tree outside her window.

Ten

Joel leaned back in his chair, propped his feet on top of his desk, and leafed through the notes he’d scratched out on a yellow legal pad. Pastor Steele was surprising his wife with a weekend getaway, and he’d asked Joel to preach the sermon Sunday in his place. Don had begun a series on the psalms, and Joel accepted the assignment with enthusiasm. But that was before he’d read the Scripture passage Don Steele wanted him to highlight: Psalm 101. Now, two pages into his first draft, Joel was stumped. He wasn’t sure he could look his congregation in the eye and preach on these verses. He reached for his Bible and read the words again:
I will behave myself wisely in a perfect way.… I will walk within my house with a perfect heart
. His eyes traveled down the page, each verse piercing deeper.
He that worketh deceit shall not dwell within my house: he that telleth lies shall not tarry in my sight
. Joel rubbed his eyes with his fists, suddenly feeling as though the metaphorical log were blurring his vision.

Putting his head in his hands, he whispered, “Lord, how can I deliver a message like this when I am a deceiver above all things … when I am
living
a lie? It doesn’t seem right—”

A rap on the door interrupted him. In one smooth motion, he sat upright and put his feet on the floor. “Come in.”

The door opened a crack, and Darlene Anthony stuck her head
in. “Sorry to bother you, Joel. Bill Randolph is here to see you … something about the building fund. Do you have a minute?”

“Sure.” He stood and came from behind his desk.

Darlene put up a hand. “I can send him down.”

“That’s okay. I need a change of scenery anyway. I’ve been sitting here too long.”

He followed Darlene down the hallway to the front office. Somehow Bill Randolph always seemed to be the bearer of bad news where the building project was concerned. Joel hoped that wasn’t the case today. A new wing for the youth had been on the church’s wish list for years now, and they’d finally gone through the process of hiring an architect, but one thing after another had conspired to thwart the actual construction of the addition. Last week it had been major problems with the architect’s drawings, and the week before that, a scare about the zoning of the land the addition would occupy.

Joel spotted Bill at the end of the hall. “Thanks, Darlene.” Joel nodded at her as he hurried by to greet the man.

“Morning, Joel.” Bill shook his hand. “I hope I’m not catching you at a bad time.”

“Not at all. What’s up, Bill?”

“Not bad news this time, I promise. I just need your signature on a couple of checks.”

“That, I can probably handle.” He indicated the front office. “We can use the desk in here …”

Joel bent over the desktop to sign the two checks Bill presented.

“I didn’t count on a simple addition being so much trouble,” Bill said. “Did you ever work on anything like this in your last position?”

His pen stopped in midscrawl. As always, Joel found himself weighing his words carefully. “You mean the building project? No … This is my first experience with anything like that—and I hope my last.”

“Oh, that’s right,” Bill said. “I forget you weren’t in church work before you came here. Taught English or something, wasn’t it?”

Joel nodded. “Not much experience with architects in that line of work, I’m afraid.”

“You know, my daughter teaches English. Used to teach high school, but she just took a job at a junior college in Iowa. Seems to like it a lot. Whatever made you decide to quit teaching and take on a job like this? It sure wasn’t the pay.”

Joel forced a laugh, then tensed and rubbed the toe of his shoe over an invisible spot on the carpet. “No, I just … needed a change. Say, Bill, have you had a chance to look at those revised blueprints?”

Bill harrumphed and launched into an account of the most recent meeting with the architect. When the older man left fifteen minutes later and Joel headed back down the hall to his office, it struck him anew how ingrained his evasiveness had become. Four years ago it would have been the most natural thing in the world for him to eagerly compare notes with Bill about his daughter’s teaching experience and to explain in detail his reasons for changing jobs.

But then four years ago he’d had nothing to hide.

Melanie absently plucked a yellowed leaf from one of the geraniums on her front porch and looked at her watch again. “Do you think his flight was delayed?”

“He’ll be here, Mel,” Joel said from his seat beside her on the stone step. “Just be patient.” But Melanie thought there was more than a twinge of concern in his voice.

“I’m hungry, Mommy,” Jerica whined from her perch on the porch railing.

“I know, honey. We’ll go eat just as soon as Joel’s brother gets here.”

Tim’s flight was to have arrived in St. Louis at ten o’clock, and he was renting a car and driving to Silver Creek. But it was almost noon now, and Melanie watched Joel’s eyes anxiously scan the street beyond her cul-de-sac. She had been rather surprised to find that Joel
didn’t intend to meet his brother at the airport. But he brushed her off, saying something about Tim wanting to have a car to drive while he was in the area.