God made the world round so we would never be able to see
too far down the road.
ISAK DINESEN
If Stephanie didn't know better, she might think nothing had changed in Kokanee Cove during the past several weeks. From where they stood on Blackwell Point, she and Michael could see the mailboat plowing through gentle waves on it's way to Lakeview, like always. If she bothered to count, she might have tallied a dozen fishing boats within sight and nearly as many sailboats. A warm wind carried across the waters and rose against the bluff, ruffling her hair in the gentle May sun. In the woods behind them, a warbler sang cheerily, probably trying to impress his mate.
Had anything changed? Maybe she should wonder if anything had not.
“I remember once I was sitting here on the bench praying.” Stephanie had probably already told the story, but Michael didn't seem to mind hearing it again. “Your mom startled me when she walked up. I think she liked the view up here.”
“How could she not?” Michael bobbed little Colleen in his arms like a pro, turned in a circle, and finally rested his gaze on Stephanie.
“What?” she asked.
“Nothing. I mean, I was curious about something, but it's probably none of my business. You never said, so I never asked.”
“You're not making any sense, you know.”
“Yeah, I know. Sorry.”
“Don't apologize. Just ask.”
“All right.” He sighed. “But you don't have to answer if you don't want to.”
“Would you cut it out? You're driving me crazy.”
The thought of marrying Michael had flashed across her mind, but they'd never talked about it openly. But the way he was acting now—he wasn't going to ask an important question, was he?
No, of course not. They'd known each other less than a year and had never discussed the matter, unless one counted his roundabout hints and her vague what ifs.
But why was he acting so strangely?
“All right,” he said. “I've been wondering ever since the morning Syd was born, when we carried Mom out on that stretcher, she whispered something to you. What did she say?”
“Oh.” She breathed a sigh of relief. She wouldn't have minded his asking the other question, but she was glad she didn't have to deal with it yet.
“I understand if it's a private thing,” he said. “I was just curious.”
“It's okay. She just said to take care of her hero son for her.”
He chuckled, as if it meant something to him this time.
“She knew, Michael.”
“That she wasn't going to make it?” He stared at the lake. “She always said she would! Or that we would…”
That they would stay together. He didn't have to say it.
“Yeah,” she said. “I think that's what she meant.”
“What do you think, Syd?” Michael wiped his eye and held his little sister close. He crouched by the large bag, close enough to see but not too close. He had a right to hide, to change the subject. Ever since his mom had died a month ago, they'd had enough tears to last a long, long time.
“Careful,” Stephanie warned them. “I wouldn't get too close with her.”
One never knew with wild birds. She reached into the bag with gloved hands and carefully pulled out the young kestrel.
“How long's it been?” Michael asked.
Since she'd rescued this beautiful bird? Since they'd met? Or since his mother's funeral? She looked up at him and tried to answer with her eyes. Long enough? Not nearly long enough? Kevin the kestrel struggled against his wraps, and she turned her attention back to the task at hand.
“Too long,” she finally answered. “We should have let him go a couple of months ago. But with everything else…you know.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Okay, then, let's do this.” She held the talons between her fingers, well away from her chest, and squeezed the bird's wings hard enough to hold it still. After months of slow rehabilitation, this kestrels time had come. He sensed freedom—of course he did—and jerked his head from side to side, even under the sock that kept him in the dark and relatively calm. “Can you yank the blind when I say?”
Michael nodded and reached for the tip of the sock. At her nod, he pulled it off the way a mother pulls a bandage offa child's elbow, then stepped back, sheltering little Sydney from the flapping wings with his arms. Sydney the angel—the perfectly healthy angel—gave a little startled yelp but did not cry.
“See ya, Kevin,” said Michael.
“Fly!” Stephanie released the bird and it flapped into the sky. That cold day when she discovered him injured in the snow must have faded from his memory. All he'd needed was time. Now it was his time to fly.
And he did, gathering height and circling as if in thanks, but not looking back or down. Kevin the kestrel took his rightful place in the thermals off the bluff, riding the warm air higher and higher, until they could hardly hear his lonely screech echoing against the side of the mountain.
“You think he'll find his family again?” Michael wondered as they craned their necks to watch the bird circle out of sight. “Hope he knows how to blend back in.”
A lot of questions today. Not many answers.
Stephanie gathered the hood and the burlap bag, then smiled and nodded. She slipped her arm into Michael's, and they made their way back down the path to the resort.
“I think he will,” she said., “Kestrels have a sense about those things, don't they?”
“Yeah,” Michael agreed. “I even prayed for the little guy.”
“You've been praying a lot more lately. I didn't think tough Air Force guys did that sort ofthing.” Bringing up the Air Force was sure to get a reaction, one way or another.
“You know better.” He chuckled, then slipped back to serious. “Just like I prayed for her…and Mom.”
He looked at his infant sister with a gentleness in his eyes, and for a moment, Stephanie thought he looked more like a father than a big brother. She could imagine her own father holding her in much the same way.
A dad? In a way it suited him, but Stephanie wouldn't tell him so. Not yet. She held on to his arm and let him talk as they continued down the path. Will needed some help with the docks this morning.
“What do you think happened to the miracle everyone was praying for, Steph?”
The question didn't surprise her. She'd wondered herself over the past month, more than she cared to admit to her parents, perhaps more than she cared to admit to herself. But she had wondered. After all the prayer meetings, all the people on their knees, all the well-meaning Christians who had written to say they believed God would provide a miracle… It had sounded so encouraging at the time.
“Your mom's healing, you mean?”
She was stalling and she knew he could tell, but he nodded as if he understood.
“I'm not yelling at God anymore, I guess,” he said.
“Did you ever?”
“Are you kidding? All the time. Especially when I was on duty. I would tell Him exactly what I wanted Him to do, and then when it didn't happen, I gave Him all kinds of grief.”
“I know it hasn't been easy.”
“No. I wore my game face a lot. My combat face.”
She studied him, wondering. He had the nicest smile, when he did smile. And those eyes… “That face—do you still wear it?”
He bent his head and touched his sister's nose with his own, Eskimo-style. Then he shook his head slowly. “Not since she was born, not anymore. But I still wonder.”
She let him talk.
“I mean, everybody in the church was praying for a miracle, weren't they? You were convinced.”
She nodded.
“It just seemed like a logical deal,” he said. “A no-brainer. Like God would get my mom through the pregnancy, and then she would get some kind of reward. He wouldn't let her die. Wouldn't that have been perfect for all the talk show attack dogs and the magazines and the newspaper columnists?” He raised a hand, as if framing a tabloid headline. “‘ Lunatic Idaho Woman Healed!’ You were right. That would have been perfect.”
The headline faded in a moment of silence as Michael dropped his hand and his gaze.
“If God had asked me,” he whispered, “I would have voted for that kind of ending.”
“Me too, Michael,” Stephanie said without hesitation. “Your mother was special.”
As soon as she'd said it, she realized how trite her words sounded. And while the sentiment seemed to satisfy him, it still didn't answer his question.
“Yeah, but I still don't know what happened to that miracle we were supposed to get.”
Stephanie didn't mind the question except that she wasn't close to finding an answer, either. Why did everyone always think she was a theologian?
“I guess…” she answered, not knowing what she would say, “I guess you're holding the miracle in your arms.”