Becca started Jemmy up the steps. Dan caught up and took CJ from her. She nodded a weary thanks and kept Jemmy climbing, though the stairs seemed to get steeper as they went. Finally they reached the landing, which opened onto a glaringly bare central hall with a window seat at the far end overlooking the backyard.
“Center door on the left,” Dan said. “My bedroom and second bath next. Two bedrooms on the right. Plus, garage apartment out back.”
Becca knew he was really saying that he had more than enough space for her and the kids and the Kinders, too, but that was a temporary solution beyond which she could not begin to think. She concentrated on taking care of Jemmy.
The bathroom was long and narrow, with a claw
foot tub at one end beneath a small curtainless window. A gas heater stood between the tub and the toilet, with the sink placed closest to the door. Everything was white except the hardwood floor, faucets and the oval mirror above the sink—even the trash can.
“Get some towels,” Dan said, walking across the hall to the linen closet positioned between the two extra bedrooms. As he carried the towels back to her, she saw that CJ was asleep on his shoulder.
“We’ll just be a minute,” she promised.
“Take your time.”
She helped Jemmy, then sent her out and took a turn herself. After she washed her hands and face and slurped some water as Jem had done, she felt better, and when she opened the door Dan was standing there alone.
“Abby’s here,” he explained.
Becca hurried down the stairs, Dan on her heels. Abby appeared in the wide living-room entrance, and Becca fell into her arms. Abby steered her back into the big comfortable room, where CJ slept in one corner of the sofa and Jem slumped in the other.
“Thank God you’re all right,” she was saying. “I was so worried about you! We didn’t know a thing until we woke up this morning and half the roof was off the house. We’ve been at the store packing ice into the freezers ever since. John reckoned it had missed you, and people were waiting
when we got there, wanting batteries and nonperishables.” She stopped and took Becca by the shoulders. “Dan says you got hit hard.”
Becca nodded, and the tears started to come. “It took everything, Abby, even Dan’s truck. If he hadn’t come to warn us…” She trailed off and shook her head.
Abby turned to Dan. “How on earth did you know? We slept right through it.”
“How
did
you know?” Becca asked, stepping forward and wiping at her tears with both hands.
Dan slid his hands into his pockets and shrugged. “Just woke up. Storm came, and I knew I had to get to you.”
Abby clapped a hand to her chest. “Divine intervention, that’s what it is.”
Dan nodded and looked at his feet. Becca covered her mouth with her hand and sat down in the nearest chair. She’d always suspected that God had a specific reason for bringing Dan Holden into her life, but it wasn’t at all what she’d thought! Suddenly the future seemed even more of a puzzle to her than ever.
Okay, Lord,
she prayed silently,
now what?
“So long as everybody’s alive and well, we can work everything out,” Abby was saying. “Logically, I guess the first thing is getting you settled.”
Dan said, “Here. I’ll move out to the garage apartment.”
“Oh, no, Dan,” Becca protested, looking up
sharply. “We can’t put you out of your own house.”
“Dan’s right, honey,” Abby said. “We’ve got no place for you now. The back porch is flooded, and everything in it is ruined. Plus, a corner of the kitchen is open, and we’ve got to fix that first or lose it, too.”
“The kids and I will rent your apartment,” Becca suggested to Dan, but he shook his head.
“Too small. Not finished. Just a bedroom, really.”
“Now you listen to Dan,” Abby put in. “We’ll figure out something else later.”
“Room here for you and John,” Dan said to her.
“No, no,” Abby said. “We’re fine where we are.”
He nodded. “I’ll help make repairs.”
“Thank you, Dan.” Abby accepted with heartfelt gratitude. “Gracious, we already owe you so much.”
“Settle for a ride to Duncan,” he said with a self-deprecating smile.
“You can take our car,” Abby offered instantly, but he shook his head.
“It’s better if someone else drives.”
“Becca can. I’ll stay here with the kids.”
“Becca’s tired,” he pointed out.
Abby looked at Becca and said, “I’ll take you, then.” Realizing that Dan couldn’t have caught that, she faced him and repeated it.
He nodded and walked over to Becca. Going down on his haunches, he laid a hand on her knee. She realized that she was letting him decide everything for her, but her brain felt dull and blank, and she could feel his certainty like a comforting blanket. Rejecting that required more strength than she could muster at the moment.
“Get comfortable,” Dan said deliberately. “Abby brought diapers. Help yourself to anything you need. Kids will be hungry.”
Jemmy perked up at that and struggled up onto one elbow. “Chocolate milk,” she pleaded, “and cookies.”
Dan rose, chuckling, and ruffled her hair. “Be back soon as I can,” he said to Becca. “Rest. Eat. Use anything you want.”
Becca felt close to tears again. She didn’t want him to go. It suddenly felt as if she couldn’t possibly cope on her own, but she knew that was just weariness and shock. She’d been on her own for nearly two years and much of the time before that. She looked up at him.
“Take care of what you need to,” she said, “and don’t worry about us.”
He smiled and walked out into the foyer, his heavy boots clumping over the floor. Abby kissed her cheek and followed.
Becca sighed and bowed her head, leaning forward until her forehead touched her knees.
You’ll take care of us,
she thought to God.
I know that.
But still I worry. Help me not to, and keep me from doing anything foolish.
When she sat up again, Jemmy was standing at her elbow expectantly. Becca looked to CJ, who was sleeping soundly in the corner of the couch. She didn’t have anywhere safer for him at the moment. She’d just have to trust that he wouldn’t wake in the next few minutes.
She’d just have to trust, period, she mused, and went to raid Dan’s kitchen.
J
ohn Odem wanted them to bring back as much bagged ice as they could carry. His stores were severely depleted due to the power shortage as people, like him, tried to save the contents of their refrigerators and freezers. As she aimed her ten-year-old sedan northward, Abby worried aloud about what was to become of Becca and the children, the cost of repairing their house and saving their merchandise and the plight of others hit hard by the storm. Dan didn’t mind. He only caught a word or two here and there, and his thoughts were preoccupied with a swirl of plans of his own. By the time they completed the forty-some-mile trip he’d decided on a definite course of action.
He had Abby take him by the insurance office first, where he filed a report on the truck and pretended not to notice Abby telling the agent how
he’d “saved” Becca and the kids. He was promised a visit by an adjuster within twenty-four hours and a check soon after. After leaving the insurance office, he and Abby drove straight to the bank, where he withdrew a sizable amount of cash. The next stop was the automobile dealership.
It didn’t take long to explain what he needed and why, choose a red, midsized, double-cab, short-bed pickup truck, tell the man what he intended to pay for it—cash on delivery—order the warning system, leave a significant down payment and insist that it be ready within three days. When the sales manager pointed out that he’d have to send a man to Oklahoma City to find the necessary equipment, Dan forked over another hundred bucks as an incentive and walked out while the man was still talking. He hadn’t thrown his weight around in quite a while, but he hadn’t forgotten how to do it, and in some ways being deaf actually made it easier. The whole transaction took less than ninety minutes, and he had little doubt that the truck would be ready when he returned for it, and if not, he’d know why. He didn’t have time to be patient or politic.
The final stop was the local discount department store. With Abby’s help he picked out whole new wardrobes for Becca and the kids, about a week’s worth of apparel, including dress clothes for Sunday. He bought nightgowns, shoes and a supply of baby goods, as well as a crib, high chair, car seat, diaper bag and a clever little monitor set with lights
that flashed when it picked up sound. In fact, he bought two of those.
The most personal stuff he left to Abby, who put together a selection of shampoo, conditioner, brushes, combs, clips, deodorants, creams, underclothes and such. While she was doing that, he wandered the toy section, entertaining himself with the amazing array of gadgets designed to teach and enthrall a kid. He had no idea that toys had changed so much, but the old favorites were still around, too, and he made sure to buy a combination of both new and familiar items, as well as half a dozen books.
His two final purchases were an inexpensive but feminine wristwatch and a Bible, a modern, fully annotated study version with a supple leather cover dyed rose-pink. He’d have liked to have her name embossed on the front, but they didn’t do that there, so he settled for a flowered bookmark with “Rebecca” printed on it in flowing script.
Abby fussed about the amount of money he was spending, but he pretty much ignored her. When he added 150 pounds of bagged ice to the total, she flat threw a fit, and he wound up letting her cover that part herself, then doled out cash for the rest with a sense of real satisfaction. Abby shook her head and informed him that his generosity was apt to get a different reception than he imagined.
“Our Becca’s a real independent little mite, you know. Comes from being the third of seven children growing up poor on an Iowa farm.”
He hadn’t known that about her, and it occurred to him that he hadn’t really bothered to find out. What Abby said about her objecting to him outfitting her and the kids was no doubt true, but he was willing to risk her disapproval in this case. It simply had to be done, and so far as he could see, he was the only one around who had the money to do it. She could kick up all the fuss she wanted, but in the end she’d accept his charity, for lack of a better word, because she really had no other immediate choice. Besides, he’d had more fun shopping for her and those kids than he’d had at anything in a very long time. She’d just have to swallow some of that pride. It wouldn’t kill her. That much he knew from personal experience.
By the time the old car was loaded down with everything they’d purchased, it was riding pretty low, and Abby had a time holding the thing on the road, but Dan was too tired to care. He kicked back and snoozed the whole trip home, coming awake again only when they pulled to a stop in front of Kinder’s Grocery. The lights inside the store meant, thankfully, that the electricity was on, and John Odem was as busy as “a June bug in August,” as he put it, which according to Abby meant two months behind and fading fast. Dan helped Abby move the ice with the assistance of a wheelbarrow, then he climbed back into the car and let her drive him to his house, where they began the process of off-loading the remainder of their purchases.
The box containing the unassembled baby bed was tied to the roof of the car with nylon twine, the knots of which had tightened to the point where they would have to be cut. Dan carried in as many bright blue shopping bags as he could manage, left the lot in the foyer and went to grab a utility knife from the small box of tools that he kept in a cabinet over the washer and dryer just off the kitchen. When he returned to the foyer, Becca was there, her hands on her hips, outrage clouding her drawn face. She was wearing one of his T-shirts, which was many sizes too large for her, and a pair of his drawstring gym shorts.
As he brushed past her and hurried back outside to finish the unloading, he noticed that she was barefoot and smelled of soap and water. Obviously she had bathed. He met Abby on her way in with a clutch of bags and told her that he’d take care of the rest. Wisely choosing to leave the remainder of the sacks on the front porch, he went back to cut free the boxed crib. Becca met him on the front steps, primed for bear.
“What do you mean, Dan Holden, by taking this on yourself? You might have asked me what I—”
He put his head down and moved right past her, hauling the cumbersome box with him and trying not to notice how fetching she looked in his clothes. As he shoved his way through the small mountain of discount-store shopping bags on the floor of his foyer, he mused that not being able to hear did have
some benefits, after all. No doubt she was giving vent to some choice words right now, but he didn’t have to acknowledge them as he manhandled the boxed baby bed upstairs and into the front room on the right.
This room had belonged to his uncle, his father’s older brother. Ted was a pipe fitter who’d spent the majority of his career working in the Middle East, socking back money for a retirement he was clearly unwilling to consider, despite being well past the age when most men hung up their welder’s masks. Never having married, he seemed intent on leaving Dan and his sister a minor fortune. Dan didn’t figure he’d mind having a needy little boy take up residence in his old childhood room.
Besides, it was time the room was cleared of its decades-old memorabilia and decoration. He’d hunt up some boxes tomorrow and clean out this room and the one next to it, which he intended for Jemmy. Every little girl should have her own room, he mused, or at least not have to share with her brother. In the meantime, he could make space for the crib by simply shoving aside some of the furniture. Becca could decide later what would stay and what would go. After opening the box and extracting the instructions, he figured out what tools he would need, then gathered up his patience and went back downstairs.
Becca was sitting in the living-room chair, her head in her hands. CJ was playing quietly on the
floor, dressed simply in a diaper. Dan asked cautiously, “Where’s Jem?”
Becca lifted her head to glare at him. “Out back playing.”
“Abby?”
“She had to get back to the store.”
He nodded. Time to pay the piper, then. “Want to go out front so you can yell at me?”
She cut her eyes to the side and folded her arms. Finally she shook her head. He dropped down to sit on the floor in front of her, one knee drawn up with his arm wrapped around it.
“Had to be done, Becca.”
“Doesn’t mean I have to like it,” she said, keeping her gaze averted.
He moved his toe back and forth, trying to think what to say to that. “Could be worse.”
She pushed her hands through her hair and glowered at him, saying, “Yeah, we could be charity cases with nothing more to our names than the clothes on our backs, a useless piece of land and a stock of canned peaches and pickled okra.”
He dropped his gaze and said, “I can help.” When he sneaked a peek at her, she was sitting forward with her forearms on her knees, mouth flattened, gaze level. She opened her mouth, but then her eyes filled, and she put her head back to keep the tears from falling. He gave her a moment, then got up so he could look down into her face.
“It’s been a long, hard day,” she said, mouth trembling.
He nodded. He was feeling it himself—the weakness that came with being emotionally drained. “It’ll get better,” he promised.
She sat up straight again, looked him in the eye and said, “Thank you.”
He shrugged. “You’re welcome.”
She sighed. “You must feel like God’s dumped us on you.”
He chuckled. He actually felt as if he was finally understanding why it had all happened, why God had brought him back here, what his real purpose was. He finally understood that being deaf was next to no hardship when all things were considered, that he’d traded his hearing and a career for a
life
and that he was no less a man than before. Maybe just the opposite.
Now was not the time to say these things, though. It wasn’t about him. She had been through a serious trauma. She needed time to adjust, to accept, to understand, and he needed time to work out some details and get everybody settled. The details, actually, were a good distraction.
He pulled the folded instructions from his back pocket and waved them at her, saying, “Now
I
could use some help.”
She took the paper from him, glanced at CJ and said, “Okay, but what about that mess in the front hall?”
He waved a hand. “Dig out what’s needed later. Leave the rest for tomorrow.”
Sniffling, she nodded. “Fine.”
Backing up, he said, “I’ll get the tools.”
“I’d better check on Jemmy,” she replied, starting to rise, but he pushed her back down.
“I’ll do it.” He was happy to do it. Just plain happy, in fact, which didn’t make a lot of sense because he really did hurt for Becca and all that she had lost. Furthermore, he knew perfectly well that more difficult days lay ahead before they could really say that they had weathered this storm, yet life suddenly felt right to him.
He found Jemmy in one of his old sport shirts, buttoned up to the neck and stuffed haphazardly into her shorts, sweeping the floor of her imaginary playhouse with a fallen tree branch. She looked up and smiled as he approached. He smiled back and instructed, “Stay inside the fence. Okay?”
She nodded and continued her play, talking and shaking a finger at some imaginary troublemaker.
Yes, he thought, giving a few more moments to her little drama, this was what life was really about, and he might never have known if left to his own devices. Like Uncle Ted, he might have awakened one day in a place far from home with the realization that his only heirs were nieces and nephews of whom he’d seen too little over the years. He understood now that he didn’t want to be like Ted, and a profound sense of gratitude washed over him.
With it came the whisper of an almost forgotten Bible verse.
“In everything give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”
In everything give thanks. Everything.
Even deafness, as incredible as that seemed.
Becca quickly realized that putting together a crib was a daunting process that in this case could have been a disaster. For one thing, reading instructions aloud to Dan proved less than efficient, especially when those instructions appeared to have been written by an individual with only a vague understanding of the English language. He simply couldn’t watch what he was doing with his hands and the movements of her lips, too. This necessitated much study of intricate diagrams and a good deal of trial and error.
If that wasn’t bad enough, CJ greatly complicated the procedure. He desperately wanted to get in on the act. Two adults down on the floor with an interesting array of wood and metal parts spread out between them looked like great fun to him. A situation tailor-made for bedlam. They spent at least half their time removing things from his reach or taking them away once he had gotten his hands on them. This naturally produced a series of infantile protests, complete with back arching and squeals of outrage.
Through it all Dan remained cheerful, patient
and—somehow—productive. Just when her own frustration or CJ’s reached fever pitch, Dan did or said something to lighten the atmosphere. Once he even pretended to skewer himself with a long, thin piece of metal, reeling about the room on his knees and finally collapsing on his back with arms and legs lifted toward the ceiling and jiggling like some insane cartoon character. CJ threw himself onto Dan’s belly with a shriek of delight, although a moment before he’d been screaming in demand of the dangerously long, thin metal piece, which Dan quickly passed to Becca before pitching the child into the air and catching him for a prolonged ticklefest. By the time he let the little urchin up for air, she had the rail guide firmly attached to the side of the bed and the conflict was forgotten.
As the parts disappeared into the whole, CJ began to lose interest in the process and realize that the result of the game was all about him, too. He knew a crib when he saw one, and he was ready to climb in well before it was safe to do so. Dan worked at a feverish pace then, having mastered the intricacies of the design, while Becca herself paced the floor with CJ in her arms, babbling a running dialogue on the delights of this new wonder. Once the mattress was installed, the casters locked and the side raised into place, she deposited her rambunctious son in the crib. CJ grasped the slender wooden rails and shook them with all his tiny might, as if to exert his mastery over his new abode.
It was then that Dan realized he hadn’t purchased the appropriate bed linens—as if she’d ever had any.