In Search of Eden, page 35
“My dad’s gonna be all right,” she said, and it was obviously a question rather than a statement.
“Your dad is a wonderful man,” Miranda said, meaning it from her heart. “His Jesus is helping him.”
Had she said that? She was surprised, but Eden was comforted. The words seemed to bring her great joy. She threw her arms around Miranda’s waist and squeezed. Miranda kissed her head and looked up to see Sarah watching them, obvious pain on her face.
“Joseph is on his way,” she said. “Ruth wanted me to tell you.”
Miranda nodded, embarrassed, feeling suddenly as if she had walked into a maze of relationships and divided loyalties and had complicated them further. She gave Eden a final pat, and the girl went over to stand beside her father.
“Don’t hover, Eden,” Sarah said sharply. “Give him room to breathe.”
“She’s all right,” David answered, giving his wife a warning look.
Vi rescued her. “Miranda, would you come out and help me bring in my pies?”
She hurried to help, and by the time they’d transferred the four pies, Joseph was pulling into the driveway. Miranda fairly flew out to meet him.
He came around the truck, smiling, and took her hand. “Well, that’s a nice welcome.”
She smiled brightly. He gave her a wise look. “Is it that bad in there?”
“It’s . . . strange.”
He nodded. “Welcome to my world.”
She said nothing more, even though she wanted to tell him all about it.
“Shall we go in?” he asked.
She nodded and they walked in together.
Things were better when dinner was served. Carol Jean arrived. The table was loaded with delicious-looking food, and finally they were all sitting down, a spot cleared for David’s chair. They prayed. They ate. Miranda answered questions and made conversation. She watched Eden hang on her father and ignore her mother. She watched Joseph sit stiffly and saw the pain on Ruth’s face. It was then that she realized something. Through the years she had thought her own family unique in their brokenness. Now she saw that they were not. And she knew then with certainty that if she could peer into Hector’s past and into Vi and Henry’s and even into Ruth’s, she would find disappointment and failure there, too.
After supper she and Sarah were left alone together. Vi and Henry and Carol Jean had gone home. Joseph was finishing up a game of Rook with Hector and Eden and David. Ruth was doing the dishes and refused her help. “Go sit down and talk to Sarah,” she said, then whispered confidentially, “She could use some cheering up.”
So Miranda had dutifully walked into the family room and sat down on the flowered sofa. Sarah looked up from the game show she was watching and turned off the television.
“You don’t have to do that on my account.”
“That’s all right,” she said, smiling stiffly. “I shouldn’t watch so much. I got into the habit at the hospital. There wasn’t anything else to do. Some of the other wives there did needlework, but I’ve never been good at it. How about you?” she asked.
Miranda felt sorry for her. She was obviously trying very hard to make conversation when she’d probably much rather be alone. “Some,” she answered. Now did not seem the right time to talk about her hobbies. “I’m hoping to take one of Ruth’s quilting classes. She taught me how to make a block, but I’m afraid that’s as far as I’ve gotten.”
Sarah smiled. “Ruth’s a very talented and capable woman. She makes everything look easy.”
Miranda agreed and wondered how it felt to Sarah to enter the family as she had and then try to follow in the footsteps of competent, kind Ruth.
“I imagine you’re looking forward to getting back to your own home,” Miranda said, “to sleeping in your own bed.”
Sarah smiled but her eyes were veiled. “I am,” she said.
“I’ve enjoyed getting to know Eden,” Miranda said. “She’s a wonderful girl. You must be very proud of her. She’s so lively and full of creativity.”
“She is a wonderful girl,” Sarah said.
Everything seemed to have a subtext, an undercurrent. For now the tone was sadness. She was a woman of layers and moods, Miranda could see, and then she immediately rebuked herself. Sarah had been through horrors this past year. Anyone might have an emotional backlog after such an experience.
She tried one last time. “I know Eden is glad to have you here. She’s missed you terribly.”
Sarah smiled, a bit bitterly. “She missed her father,” she said.
Miranda teetered then as she decided whether to let Sarah push her away or whether to keep trying.
“She missed you, too,” Miranda said, determining to be kind. “Every child wants their mother.”
Again Sarah gave her a look she couldn’t read.
“Yes,” she said. “You’re probably right.”
chapter 49
*
The next few weeks passed slowly for Miranda, probably since Eden was preoccupied with her father and no longer her constant companion. Miranda missed her, but the realization made her uncomfortable. She didn’t like to become overly dependent on anyone for her happiness. They would inevitably leave, or she would, and then where would she be? But she had to admit she missed Eden’s bubbling presence. She was energetic and creative and downright entertaining.
She saw Ruth a time or two. “Come and visit me,” Ruth invited, but Miranda thought of Sarah and David there, trying to knit their fractured family back together, and decided it would be better to wait.
She saw Joseph more frequently. They took walks and talked, and the more she knew about him, the more she respected him. She rode along with him to his work once on her day off, and she saw the passion he had for keeping the town calm and safe. She saw the open cases on his desk. And the closed ones. He had tracked down one bunch of Irish Travelers—arrested one Pete Sherlock and three of his sons. He showed her his life: where he went to grade school, high school. He introduced her to old friends. She visited his home one Saturday, and he took her fishing, rafting on the river, and then they barbequed steaks. They hiked in the woods, and he showed her some elementary tracking principles. How to identify animals by the length and width of the tracks, the number of toes or claws, and whether or not there was a heel. He showed her how to tell whether the tracks were from a front leg or a back and how to determine the speed and type of gait.
“Follow the tracks, and you’ll find out where the animal lives,” he said, “in a tree or burrow, the water or deep woods. That’s another clue to identification. Follow the tracks long enough and well enough, and sooner or later you’ll find the animal itself.”
She only wished the advice applied to people.
Joseph talked more about David, and she knew he had gone to visit his brother several times. “We’ve gotten so we can sit in the same room and not be tense,” Joseph said.
She felt hope that there would be complete reconciliation between them soon.
As the days passed she knew it was her turn. It was time for her to share her life with him. She made a start by fixing him a dinner in the tiny kitchen of her apartment. They ate picnic style on a blanket in the tiny backyard. A meager effort, but even so, she was afraid. She was beginning to feel her feet dragging when she walked, tangling around the roots that were beginning to tie her to Abingdon. Part of her wanted to cheer, to say, Yes, this is where I will put down my roots. This is where I’ll bear my fruit. But another part that sounded like her mother asked her who she thought she was. Reminded her that if she stayed here, paradise would no longer be perfect.
She saw David and Sarah several times but never together. She crossed paths with Sarah once when she went to look for Eden at St. James on food bank day. The food bank was closed, though, and as Miranda sat on the church steps enjoying the sun, Sarah came out, eyes red, obviously having been crying. Miranda assumed she’d been talking to Pastor Hector. She felt as if she were invading Sarah’s privacy by witnessing it, but Sarah barely noticed her. Just said hello, then got into her car and drove away—not in the direction of Ruth’s house.
Miranda saw her another time out on the trail, just walking. She had said hello and smiled warmly, but Sarah just acknowledged her and kept on going. Obviously now was not a good time for making friends. She felt a deep compassion for the little family.
It was a few days later that Miranda saw David. He came into the Hasty Taste for coffee one morning just after Joseph had finished his breakfast and left. David wheeled his way across the restaurant, stopping to visit with several people along the way. It seemed he knew everyone, and there was much pressing of hands and earnest conversation. He finally settled at a table. She took him a glass of water and greeted him warmly. He still looked subdued but not quite as strained as he had the first night at Ruth’s house.
“I didn’t know you were working here,” he said.
“Temporarily. Elna is due back in a few weeks.” Saying it made her realize the clock was ticking. Was her time in Abingdon drawing to a close? “I haven’t seen Eden in a while,” she said. “And I must say I miss her.”
David smiled, and Miranda saw genuine love on his face. “That girl’s the light of my life,” he said.
She felt a flash of something then. A longing for her own child, she supposed, but she quickly realized the one had nothing to do with the other. She would not begrudge David his daughter’s love.
“She and Grady had plans today. Grady’s father is taking them fishing. I was invited to go, but I have something else I have to do. Have you met Grady’s dad?” he asked.
She shook her head.
“He seems like a kind man,” David said. “My mother thinks the world of him.”
“Your mother is a very good judge of character,” Miranda agreed. “Can I get you a menu?”
“Two, please,” he said. “I’m meeting Hector.”
She got the menus and another water. Hector arrived. She served the men their meals and kept their coffees full. They were talking intently, and she felt very glad that David had Pastor Hector to encourage him. She thought about the Hound of Heaven again. She had been feeling Him nudge her, gently pull her. Sometimes she felt as if He walked silently beside her, waiting for a chance to speak. Waiting for her to turn her gaze upon Him. She felt longing then, but it didn’t last long. For instance, it seemed He was tugging right now, but she wiped tables and made a fresh pot of coffee and her mind was distracted.
Venita sidled up to her and nodded in David’s direction. “They say that wife of his has run off. Sorry thing,” she said, shaking her head in disapproval.
“Sarah left?” Miranda was shocked to the core. It almost felt like a physical tremor passing through her.
Venita nodded. “I heard she went off day before yesterday. Said she was going to see her folks—they bought a place down near Gatlinburg, but . . .” She shrugged and made a disgusted face.
“Maybe she’ll come back,” Miranda said and realized she really hoped so. “She’s been through a very hard year. Maybe she just needs to get away for a little while and rest.”
“Maybe,” Venita said, but she gave her a skeptical look.
The two men sat talking for a long time. After Hector left, David stayed and pulled a thick stack of papers from the pack on the side of his chair.
“Do you mind if I take up space for a while?” he asked when she refilled his cup.
“Not at all.”
He worked, reading and scribbling and shaking his head in frustration. She refilled his coffee until he told her he’d had his quota for the day. After an hour or so he came up to the register and paid his bill. The stack of papers was in his lap.
“It looks as if your project is a big one,” she said.
“It’s a book I was writing,” he said, and he didn’t look happy.
“Wow. I’m impressed.”
“Don’t be.”
“What’s it about?”
“It’s about what I used to think I knew. David Williams expounds on the meaning of life.” He smiled, and she saw a shadow of bitterness.
“I’d like to read it,” she said boldly, surprising herself with her words.
He looked at her for a moment, then shrugged. “Take it,” he said. “You’d be doing me a favor. Tell me what a fresh, unindoctrinated pair of eyes sees.”
“Seriously?”
“As a heart attack,” he said.
She laughed. She liked David Williams very much. She felt a little guilty because of that fact, a little disloyal to Joseph, but again, what had the one to do with the other?
She took the manuscript gratefully. “I can’t wait,” she said.
“Take your time,” he mumbled on his way out the door. “I’m in no hurry.”
She finished her shift, went to the Laundromat, tidied her small apartment, and completed her funeral home chores. Joseph called at suppertime to postpone their plans for the evening. He was busy on a case. She told him to be careful, then feeling slightly uncomfortable, realized she was glad for the opportunity to read David’s book. She took a blanket out in back of her apartment and sat on the grass to read. There was a slight breeze. Not enough to blow away the pages, but enough to cool her. She was quickly drawn into David’s book.
As she read, the things she had heard a hundred times growing up suddenly stopped being dry facts and became a drama of cosmic proportions. There was the benevolent, righteous king. There was a near perfect member of the court, trusted as a son, who became evil through envy. There were treachery and revolt. A coup that ultimately failed, but not before battle and shouts and the sound of war. There was the aftermath, the violent expulsion of the rebels, who now ruled planet Earth where the good subjects fought bravely against them. There was the prince who had given his life to redeem the kingdom. And there was a promise that someday each rebel would be hunted down and destroyed and that peace would be restored to all the farthest reaches of the kingdom.
Her eyes were damp and the light failing when she finished reading. The story was not complete, but her mind was full. She understood now. She had a choice. She could cast her lot with the resistance, or she could go on as she had and pretend she’d never heard.
She set the book aside finally and lay back on the blanket till it was dark. Gathering up the manuscript, she went upstairs to bed, but it was a long time before she slept.
She read David’s book through again and took it back to him several days later. She knocked softly on the screen door. After a moment she heard the whirring of the chair’s electric motor, and David himself came to the door.
“Welcome,” he said. “Come in. I’m afraid Ma and Eden are over at the church, getting things ready for the Highlands Festival.” He didn’t mention Sarah, and she didn’t ask.
“Actually, I came to see you,” she said. “I read your book. Twice.”
“Really!” He seemed surprised.
She nodded.
“Well, do you have time to tell me what you think?”
“I don’t need time,” she said. “I loved it.”
He smiled. “Now, that’s the kind of constructive criticism I can use. How about a glass of iced tea or a cup of coffee?”
“Sure. I’ll have some tea.”
He whirred into the kitchen, then returned with the two glasses tucked into a holder on the side of his chair. “Here you go,” he said, handing her one. “Shall we sit on the porch?”
“That would be perfect. I think there’s a breeze.”
Miranda sat in one of Ruth’s ladder-backed rockers, David in his chair.
“I’ve never heard anyone talk about all of this the way you do,” she said. “It’s not boring.”
“That’s high praise. Thank you.”
She thought she saw a flicker of interest in his eyes. She looked down at the chapters and scanned the progression he had drawn. The cosmic battle. The expulsion from Eden, the struggle to find the way back—those chapters had caught at her heart.
“It was like you knew me,” she said. “All the places I’ve gone and the things I’ve done to try to make things . . . I don’t know, right, I guess.”
“Did you succeed? In making them right?”
She shook her head. She thought of her child, lost to her. Her mother, never known. “But then the book just sort of quit.”
“You noticed that.”
“Yes, I noticed, but you can’t leave things there. It’s like closing a story before the happy ending. Like ending a movie three-quarters of the way through, at the dark moment.”
“The dark moment?”
“You know, the moment when the hero and the heroine are all upset with each other and the worst thing has happened and it looks like they’ll never be together.”
He nodded. Soberly.
She could see the sorrow in his eyes. And then she understood. His life had become the dark moment.
“I can’t see my way past it,” he said.
She took a deep breath. Who was she to counsel the counselor? But she felt she must try, so she spoke. “You know the way,” she said. “You know it even in the dark.”
He looked up at her, his eyes shiny with tears. “Do you think so?”
“I know it,” she said, and she put her hand over her heart, as if making a promise.
They sat silently for a while. She set down her glass and stood. “Call me when you finish,” she said. “I’d like to read the whole story.”
chapter 50
*
By the last week of July, the town seemed to have shifted into high gear, and Abingdon’s streets were full of bustle and activity. The Hasty Taste was busier than usual. Venita said the craftspeople and the first tourists were trickling in. Apparently the Virginia Highlands Festival was quite an event, with musical performances, a quilt show, arts and crafts, lectures, plays, spinning and weaving, nature tours, and food.
