Chapter Nine

During Advent, we wait. Wait for the coming of a promise. Wait for the fulfilling of a yearning. We know that this world is not everything and that there is a promise of other things to come.” Pastor Evans glanced around the congregation, his hands clutching the pulpit, his expression earnest.

Emily knew she should be paying closer attention, but she couldn’t help glancing to the side where her friend Ashley sat.

With Ryan and Ryan’s sister.

Emily wanted things back to the way they had been. She and Ashley hanging out, sharing gossip and sharing clothes. Not sharing time with her boyfriend. She had so much she wanted to tell Ashley, but she hadn’t had a chance.

Last night she’d tried to call her, but her mom had said she was out with Ryan.

So she had hoped she could talk to her this morning. At church. All the stuff with her dad was still rolling around in her head, and she wanted—no, needed to talk to her friend.

Emily shot another look at Ashley, trying to figure out what was going on. On Friday, at school, Ashley had worn a tight T-shirt and low-cut pants, the kind of clothes Emily used to wear more often when she first came here. The kind Ashley told her made her look cheap.

And today she wore a pile of makeup and giggled with Ryan’s sister Malinda as if they were best friends.

Things were just getting too weird in her life, Emily thought, slumping farther down in her pew.

“You’re supposed to sit still,” Madison said from beside her.

Emily tugged playfully on her cousin’s hair. Madison could be a pain, but Emily had learned not to take her too seriously.

She tried to turn her attention back to Pastor Evans, but she’d lost where he was going. The last thing he’d said was something about yearning and waiting.

Well, there was one thing she didn’t need to wait for anymore and that was for their dad to come back. He was here now.

Last night, after Grandma and Grandpa came back from visiting him, they didn’t say much except that he was taking them out after they visited Anna in the hospital.

She wasn’t so sure she wanted to go.

Yesterday, after she, Sam, and Christopher had had their little talk, she’d been turning things over and over in her head. Why had their dad come back now? What did he want?

She thought of the farm, thought of her friends. Did she really want to go with him? She barely knew him.

Not that long ago, Sam had run away to find their dad, and now it seemed he didn’t know what he wanted. And Emily was even less sure. Should she go along with Sam? Should she make up her own mind? What if Sam wanted to go and she didn’t? What if Christopher didn’t want to go and she did?

Emily sighed and smoothed her hands over her new skirt. She’d had such fun making it and had looked forward to showing it to Ashley.

It all seemed so unimportant now.

Beside her, Madison was standing up, and with a start Emily realized the service was almost over. They sang a song, listened to the minister give them a blessing, telling them to go in peace and to take the peace of Christ out into the world this week.

She waited as long as she thought was polite and then scooted past Sam to catch up to Ashley. She really wanted to talk to her friend.

“Hey, Ash. How are you?” Emily asked, tucking her one arm into Ashley’s, trying to act as if everything was normal. “Hey, Malinda.” She leaned forward a bit, trying to catch Malinda’s eye, but she was looking somewhere else.

Ashley squeezed her arm. “I’m good … sorry, Malinda, what did you want?”

Malinda whispered something in Ashley’s ear. “Oh, you’re just being silly,” she said with a fake laugh.

“Sorry.” Ashley turned back to Emily. “Hey, you finished your skirt. I really like it.”

“Thanks. Did you get my message?”

“Message?” Ashley frowned, and then giggled as Malinda whispered something else in her ear. “I told you, forget it.” She giggled again and turned back to Emily.

“What were you saying about a message?” Ashley asked, her cheeks flushed and her eyes bright. Then she giggled again and gave Malinda an elbow in the side. “Quit yakking at me. I’m trying to talk to my friend.”

Ashley let go of Ryan’s sister and focused on Emily. “Now, tell me about your message. Obviously my mom forgot to tell me. She’s been kind of distracted lately.”

“Don’t take too long, Ash. We’re supposed to be meeting up with Ryan and Ashton in a couple of minutes.”

Ashley rolled her eyes at Emily’s questioning glance. “Some kind of double date.” Ashley shook Emily’s arm. “So. Spill.”

Emily gave Ashley a tight smile.

Right. Like she was going to spill everything here and now as people milled around them, talking and chatting, moving past them to get out.

“That’s okay. I’ll catch you later. Have fun this afternoon.”

“What are you doing after church?”

“Going to visit Anna. She had her baby.”

“Really?” Ashley squealed, sounding like her old friend again. “That’s so cool!”

“A little boy.”

“Ashley, are you coming?” Ryan called over the noise of the departing congregation.

“Just wait.” Ashley turned back to Emily. “So, have you seen him yet?”

“No. I told you. We’re going to visit him right now.”

“Right. Sorry.” Ashley gave her an apologetic smile and then squeezed her arm. “So what was the message?” she asked as she tossed a quick glance over her shoulder to where Ryan and his sister were waiting.

Emily wanted nothing more than to tell her friend about her dad. To spill out all her confusion and worry. To ask her what she was supposed to do.

Ever since she’d moved here, Ashley had become an even better friend than her friends in San Diego. She’d always felt she could tell Ashley everything or ask her anything.

But not anymore.

Right now Emily could tell that Ashley was getting fidgety. She was just being polite, asking questions and pretending to pay attention to her.

“I just wanted to … see … how you were doing,” Emily said.

“I’m great. Just great.” Ashley gave her a quick smile. “I’ll give you a call later on. You home tonight?”

“I don’t know.” She had no idea how much time her father expected to spend with them or when they’d be home.

“Okay, then. Maybe at school tomorrow.” Ashley fluttered her hands in a good-bye. “Later.”

And then Ashley was gone, leaving Emily feeling all alone in a crowd of people.

“I THINK LITTLE WILL looks like me.” Pete bent over the tightly wrapped bundle in Anna’s arms and pushed his cap back on his head and grinned at Anna, as if checking to see what she would say.

Charlotte noted that Anna wasn’t even looking at him. Her entire focus was on the baby she held close to her.

“I think he has Madison’s nose,” Anna murmured, touching the tip of his tiny nose with her finger.

“But he’s got Jennifer’s cheeks,” Bill put in from beside his wife, his arm curled around Anna’s shoulders, his entire attention on his son.

The serene look on his face made Charlotte’s own heart ache just a little. Her mind so easily flashed back to Bob, holding each of their babies after they’d been born. He’d had the same expression on his face that Bill had now.

What dreams she and Bob had woven around each of them. Bill. Denise. Pete.

She looked back at Bill, now a father himself. Responsible. Important.

She let her mind linger on Denise a moment, but thinking of Denise led her to Kevin, and she didn’t want him to spoil the moment.

And Pete, standing across from her, taller than Bob, was making plans to get married, and perhaps thinking of becoming a father himself one day.

“And now, the poor kid has his father’s and his grandfather’s names,” Pete put in, shooting a teasing glance toward Bill.

But his brother was oblivious to his jibes, so taken was he with his young son.

“I want to see my cheeks on my brother again.”

Bob lifted Jennifer up so she could see better. “He is adorable,” Jennifer said with a theatrical sigh. “Can I hold him?”

Anna glanced from Jennifer to Charlotte, as if unsure of what to do.

“Why don’t you wait until you and your mommy and your little brother are at home,” Charlotte said. “Then you can sit on your couch and hold him properly.”

Jennifer’s mouth shifted into a pout as she rubbed her eyes and her bright red cheeks. “I want to hold him now.” She looked tired—and no wonder. Pete had had them on the go all yesterday afternoon, trying to keep the children’s minds off Kevin’s visit. Cutting the tree down, dragging it home and decorating it. She figured that Pete had given in to the girls’ demands to stay up just a bit longer while she and Bob were talking to Kevin.

And then church this morning and now here.

“If you hold your brother, then I don’t get to hold you,” Bob teased giving her a tight squeeze.

“You can hold me anytime you want, Grandpa,” Jennifer said.

“Even when you’re thirteen?”

“Yeah,” she said, as if she couldn’t imagine not being held in her grandfather’s arms.

“You would be big,” Bob returned.

“But I would still be your little girl, right?”

While Jennifer and Bob teased each other, Charlotte drew nearer to Anna, and with the tip of her forefinger, gently nudged the flannel sheet aside so she could see her newest grandson better.

His nose was a tiny button, his eyes just two folded wrinkles of eyelids, and his mouth formed a tiny little bow.

“How precious,” she breathed, a gentle awe filling her at the sight of this very new grandchild.

“Do you want to hold him?” Anna shifted the soft bundle toward her.

Charlotte glanced at Jennifer, who was giggling at something Bob was telling her, and nodded. She didn’t want to upset her granddaughter, but it looked as if she was busy for now.

Charlotte carefully drew the flannel bundle out of Anna’s arms and gently adjusted him to hold him close to her. Then she bent over and drew in the gentlest breath, drawing in the delicate, slightly spicy scent of the new baby. Her heart stuttered for a moment as her memories sifted back to her own babies. Remembered so clearly their blue, unfocused eyes, the pursed lips with their tiny bubble of milk from nursing, the gentle warmth of them all bundled up in her arms.

“So precious,” she murmured. “Grandma already loves you so much, little man.” She gently laid her cheek against his as her mother’s heart formed a prayer of protection for this fragile and amazing new life. “He is so beautiful,” Charlotte said, nuzzling him again.

“Can I hold him, Grandma?” Emily asked, a soft smile curving her lips.

Babies, thought Charlotte, bring out the mother in all young girls.

“Of course you can,” Charlotte said, moving around to where Emily stood.

“Are you sure she should?” Anna asked, fluttering her hands as if to take Will away from Charlotte.

Charlotte frowned slightly. “Emily is very careful.”

Anna pressed her lips together, glanced at Emily, and then nodded.

“It’s okay, Grandma. I don’t need to,” Emily said.

But Charlotte gently shifted the precious bundle over to her and smiled as Emily curved her arms around the baby, as if she had been doing it all her life.

Emily glanced at Anna, who was still frowning. Then Emily looked down at Will. A gentle smile curved her lips.

“He’s so cute,” Emily said, bending over to breathe in his newborn scent.

Charlotte stood beside her granddaughter and put her arm around her shoulders. “Pretty precious, isn’t he?” she asked, giving her granddaughter a squeeze.

“His fingernails aren’t any bigger than a grain of rice,” Emily said with a note of awe in her voice. “And look, his eyelids are even smaller than my pinky nail.”

She bent her head over him, holding him close.

Charlotte chanced a quick look at Anna and caught her daughter-in-law looking at Emily with an expression of such tenderness that it hooked on her heart.

Anna and Emily had not always gotten along so well in the past, so to see her usually uptight daughter-in-law smiling the way she was gave Charlotte hope for both of them.

“What’s going on? There are too many people in here!”

An imperious voice from the doorway broke the silence, and Anna’s mother strode into the room. Today she wore a long white coat, black leather boots that matched her purse, and leather gloves.

She tugged her gloves off, finger by finger, as her blue eyes flicked from Charlotte to Bob to Pete and then Sam and Christopher, who were already sidling toward the doorway, as if knowing what was about to descend on them.

Charlotte tried not to look at Emily but couldn’t help catching her indiscreet eye-roll.

“My daughter just had a baby,” Mrs. Adlai spoke with a calculated crispness, as if addressing a group of teenagers. “I assumed that the only visitors allowed were grandparents and siblings of the child?”

“The child being Will,” Pete said in a laconic voice.

“Don’t you think there are too many people in here, Charlotte?” Mrs. Adlai asked, her voice even but with an edge that made Charlotte feel uncomfortable.

“They can stay,” Anna protested. “I already cleared it with the nurse.”

“My dear, the nurse obviously can’t see how worn out you look.” Mrs. Adlai tugged the bedspread straight and smoothed out a couple of wrinkles. She moved aside the flowers Charlotte, Bob, and the children had brought and pulled a huge bouquet of rust-and-orange-colored roses to the front of the table.

“You should rest, my dear,” Mrs. Adlai said, inserting herself between Charlotte and Anna. “And when you wake up we can freshen up your hair.”

“I’m rested, and my hair is fine.” But in spite of her protests, Anna lifted a hand to her head and tucked a wayward strand of hair behind her ear.

Charlotte was reluctant to leave, but she decided it would be better if she made things easier for Anna.

Mrs. Adlai glanced at Emily. “I’d like to hold my grandson, please,” she said with a smile that didn’t quite reach her voice. “My daughter and grandson need their rest.” Mrs. Adlai tucked Will into her arms as her glance shifted from Emily to Charlotte and then the boys. She didn’t say anything, but Charlotte could clearly read her expression. She wished everyone would leave.

“Well, we’d better be going,” Bob mumbled. He said good-bye to Anna and shot a quick glance toward Pete, who got the hint.

“Let’s make like a tree and leave,” Pete said.

“But we just got here,” Christopher complained. “And I didn’t even have a chance to hold my new cousin.”

“You will. Later. We gotta split, buddy. Now.”

“I’ll walk you to the door,” Bill said, clearly glad for an excuse to get away from his mother-in-law for a while.

Mrs. Adlai said to Charlotte, “If you’ll give me a moment, I’ll walk down with you, and I can get the girls’ suitcases.”

“I don’t want to go with Gran,” Jennifer said, clinging to Emily’s hand. “I want to stay on the farm.”

“Young lady …” Mrs. Adlai began.

“Can we please stay until tonight?” Madison added, turning to her mother. “Please, Mommy?”

Anna glanced from her mother to her girls and then, to Charlotte’s surprise, nodded.

“Sure, you can stay another day. If it’s okay with Grandma Stevenson.”

“It’s fine with me,” Charlotte said.

Mrs. Adlai frowned. “Anna, do you think it’s a good idea to let them get their way like that?”

“The girls love it on the farm, and they don’t get to spend nearly as much time with their cousins as they’d like. Besides, I could use your help here.” Anna gave her mother a steady glance, as if to challenge her.

“I’ll have to go to the farm to pick them up?” Mrs. Adlai asked, her voice prim.

“I don’t mind bringing them back,” Charlotte said, sensing this might be a problem. She looked at Mrs. Adlai. “Why don’t you give me your cell phone number, and we can make arrangements?”

Mrs. Adlai blinked as if she didn’t understand, but then she handed Will back to Anna, drew a gold pen out of her purse, scribbled her number inside a small leather book and ripped out the page.

Charlotte took the paper and gave her a smile. “Thank you. We’ll see you tonight.” And she put the paper in her pocket. “Jennifer, Madison, say good-bye to your mommy.”

Emily held them up so they could kiss Anna and say good-bye to their little brother.

As soon as she put them down, though, they scurried out of the room without looking back, as if afraid their mother would change her mind about them going back to the farm.

“Bye, Aunt Anna.” Emily gave Anna a quick wave. “We’ll see you again.”

Anna smiled at her and Charlotte took a chance, carefully squeezing past Mrs. Adlai to bend over Anna and kiss her forehead.

“Take care of yourself, my dear,” she said quietly, gently brushing a strand of hair away from her face. “We’ll come by the house once you’re settled in.”

Anna caught her hand and lowered her voice. “Bill said Kevin is back in town. Is that true?”

Charlotte nodded, not sure she wanted the entire family history spilled out in front of Anna’s mother.

But Anna only nodded. “You can tell me more next time I see you.”

Charlotte straightened, murmured a quick farewell to Anna’s mother, and then left the room.

“I really wanted to stay awhile,” Emily said, sounding wistful as they walked down the hallway. “I wanted to hold Will a little longer.”

“I probably should have said something, Emily. I’m sorry,” Charlotte said.

Emily glanced back at the room. “I guess I’ll get a chance some other time.” Then she sighed. “And now we get to see my dad. I wish …”

Charlotte struggled not to ask Emily what she wished. She wanted more than anything to give her granddaughter all kinds of advice about what to watch for, what to be wary of, but it wasn’t her place.

“I think it’s good that your father wants to be a part of your lives,” she said, choosing to be encouraging and posi-tive.

Emily shot her a puzzled look. “Really? I thought you didn’t like him.”

“He’s your father,” Charlotte said, struggling to formulate her thoughts in a diplomatic fashion. Yes, she’d had her troubles with Kevin. When Emily had found Denise’s diary and had shared it with her, Charlotte had struggled once again with feelings of mistrust, of anger toward Kevin. But the reality was, this man wanted to be a part of his children’s lives. “And I’m glad that he … is trying to be responsible.”

Emily looked a bit puzzled but didn’t say anything.

As they headed home, Charlotte couldn’t help but wonder what Kevin would tell the children when he came to get them. Would he let them know he was going to fight for them? That he wanted them to stay with him?

Please, Lord, she prayed again. Help him to keep his counsel for now. The children don’t need any false promises or false hopes.

And what if they weren’t false?

Charlotte couldn’t bear to think of that right now. One day at a time, she had told Bob, and she had to follow through on that.