Picture Perfect Family, page 13
“This is the fishing hole?” she asked.
“Trust me, I’m as surprised as you are,” Daniel admitted. “It sure wasn’t like this when I was in high school.”
A man fished with his children on the far side of the lake and a couple of families picnicked on patchwork quilts beneath the willows, which only added to the perfection of the setting.
“Wow,” Mandy whispered.
Daniel and Mandy hadn’t even gotten out of the truck before the door to Mr. Bowers’s cottage office opened and Jolaine Bowers, his sweet-natured wife, stepped out on the porch waving.
“Hello, Daniel,” she said. “James told me you were back in town and bringing Mandy to fish today. It’s great to have both of you here. He had to run to the square to pick up a few things from the store, but he’ll be right back. Y’all can head on out and find you a nice spot to fish.” She smiled. “James and I like that shady flat area under the first willow. The ground is soft for me, and there’s an old stump beneath the water about midway in the tree’s shadow that likes to play house for the crappie, or that’s what James thinks.”
“Sounds good,” Daniel said.
“I’ve got cold sodas and water in the store here if you need something to drink. And I’ve also cooked a few things if you haven’t eaten and want something for a picnic. That’s what most folks do nowadays.”
Mrs. Bowers was known for her cooking. Chicken fingers were her specialty. And her desserts were pretty amazing, too, particularly her chocolate pie and her banana pudding, both of which were traditionally piled high with fluffy white meringue. In fact, she was known for pretty much everything she cooked, especially at the church fellowship meals.
“You have chicken fingers in there?” Daniel asked.
“Of course,” she said, her dimples popping into place with her smile. “And I just pulled a chocolate pie out of the oven.”
“Then I believe you might be able to coax us into an impromptu picnic later—” Daniel looked to Mandy “—if that’s okay with you. I’d planned to go somewhere and eat after we finished fishing, but we could picnic here if you like.”
Mandy looked at the large cooler labeled Live Bait perched on the side of the building. “Do you have hand sanitizer, too?”
Daniel laughed loudly. “This is going to be fun.”
“Yes, dear, I have plenty. And good ol’ soap and water, too, if you’d rather.”
“Then, yes, I think a picnic will be great.”
“And speaking of those fish, I’m going to need to get a bucket of crickets, Mrs. Bowers,” Daniel said.
Mandy’s hand flew to her throat and her face made the same expression he’d seen when he and Kaden dipped their cookies in milk. “I do not want to touch a cricket.”
Daniel continued laughing, but Mrs. Bowers said, “Don’t blame you a bit. I say if a man wants a woman to go fishing, then he’s gotta be willing to handle all the yucky stuff. You’re just here for the pretty scenery and the nice breeze off the water…isn’t that right?”
“Yes,” Mandy said. “That’s definitely right. But I have to tell you, if I’d known how gorgeous it was out here I’d have come years ago. Maybe not to fish, but definitely to hang out by the lake and take photos.”
“It wasn’t like this years ago,” Daniel said.
“He’s right,” Jolaine said, chuckling. “It wasn’t much to look at a few years back. But as James started spending more and more time out here at the fishing hole, I decided if I was going to see him during our retirement years, I might as well learn to spend more time here, as well. But an old hole in the ground in the middle of a bunch of dirt wasn’t all that appealing, so I put a woman’s touch on it, and James actually likes it. Or maybe he likes the fact that his visitors have tripled since I fixed up the place.” She winked. “Seems people will come a whole lot more often if they’ve got something to look at and something to eat when the fish don’t bite.”
“Are the fish biting?” Daniel asked.
“Oh, biting up a storm,” she said with a wave of her palm. “It doesn’t hurt that James has been stocking the lake for nearly two decades now. Some folks say there are fish in there as big as your leg.”
Mandy’s hand went to her throat again.
“Oh, don’t worry, child. I’m fairly certain that’s an exaggeration. Unless they’re talking about the catfish. You never can tell about those catfish.” She smiled again, pointed to a stack of quilts on a shelf by the door. “Help yourself to a blanket. And you can get a bucket of crickets over there, Daniel. Just pay James when he gets back. He likes to think that he’s the money man,” she said with a giggle then disappeared inside the shop.
Daniel grabbed a blue-and-cream colored quilt from the stack. “This one looks good, don’t you think?”
“Yes, it does.”
The door opened and Mrs. Bowers peeked back out. “Mandy?”
“Yes, ma’am?”
“I’ll probably go pick up the grandkids when James gets back, so if I don’t get to see you again before y’all leave, I wanted to make sure and let you know how much we’ve missed you at church. You come back any time you like, you hear?”
“Thanks,” Mandy said, but made no promises.
The woman’s brows knitted slightly, but she gave Mandy a kind smile and said, “Well, we’d sure love to have you back,” then she ducked into the shop again.
Daniel and Mandy walked to the edge of the lake and then toward the willow tree, neither of them saying a word about the kind woman’s request for Mandy to return to church. Daniel knew that God had put it in Mrs. Bowers’ heart to ask, because that was exactly what Daniel had hoped to find out today. He now suspected that Mandy truly wanted to stay in Claremont and raise Kaden, but what he didn’t know was whether she planned on allowing God into her life for that endeavor.
Mandy waited while he put the bucket of noisy crickets and the fishing poles on the ground then handed her one side of the quilt. They let it catch the breeze, guided it to the ground and sat on the soft fabric.
“What’s on your mind?” He thought he knew, but he really wanted Mandy to broach the subject.
She rubbed her palms across the floral patches on the quilt and didn’t look at Daniel. “I don’t want to talk about it now, Daniel. It upsets me when people try to get me back to church, and I know that the missionary in you makes you want to talk about it now that Mrs. Bowers mentioned it. But can we not talk about it today?”
She looked up, dark eyes displaying a plea for him to hold off on the tough questions that he’d been planning to ask. The questions that he had to have answered in order to know whether he could have the future he now believed he wanted with Mandy. He yearned to have a deep, heartfelt discussion about the pain of the past and about how God could help her move beyond that pain, but Mandy didn’t want to talk about that today, and Daniel wasn’t about to ruin the opportunity to grow closer to her by preaching to her all afternoon.
“Okay, we don’t have to talk about it,” he agreed.
“Thank you,” she said throatily, and he saw that her eyes brimmed with unshed tears.
“Oh, Mandy, come here.” He scooted toward her on the blanket, wrapped an arm around her and eased her head against his chest. Then he stroked a hand down her ponytail and enjoyed the silky texture against his palm. She was so sweet, so precious and so afraid to accept God’s help, to accept His love.
God, help her learn to let You in, and please Lord, if it be Your will, have her let me in, too. I care for her, God. I’m fairly certain I’m falling in love with Mandy. But I need You there, too. You know that. Be with her now, and let her find a way to mend her heart from the pain of the past. Help her find her way back to You.
Mandy tilted her head, looked up at him and her eyes looked a little clearer. “You said you wanted to get to know me better.”
Finally. He could actually feel her relaxing in his arms. “Yep, that’s what I said,” he said, and smiled. “So let’s get started. Mandy Carter, I’m Daniel Brantley. It’s nice to meet you.”
She pushed away from him and poked his chest. “Very funny. Okay, smart aleck, how do you want to go about getting to know me better?”
“Like this,” he said, reaching for a fishing pole.
“Fishing?”
Daniel nodded. “Don’t worry. I’m going to bait your hook.”
“Oh, I never doubted that.”
He laughed. “And each time I catch a fish, you have to tell me something I don’t know about you.”
Her dark eyes squinted suspiciously. “And each time I catch a fish?”
“I have to tell you something you don’t know about me.”
“I’m not so sure this is going to be fair.” She eyed the water, where they could actually see several big fish swimming within the shadow of the willow tree.
“Why not?”
“Because this is my first time to fish. You’ve been fishing your whole life, I’m sure.”
“You have a point,” he said. “So we’ll even the odds. For every fish you catch, I tell you something, and for every two fish I catch, you tell me something.”
She tilted her head as she considered his offer then nodded. “Deal.”
“Now this is good ol’ cane pole fishing. You drop your line in the water, watch the bobber and yank the rod up when the float goes under.” He grinned. “Pretty, easy, don’t you think?”
“As long as you’re the one putting on the crickets and taking off the fish, then, yes, piece of cake,” she said, sliding off her tennis shoes, then pulling off her socks, as well. Hot pink glitter-embellished polish tipped each of her toes.
“Why are you taking your shoes off?”
“Just seems like if you’re going to fish, you should be barefoot. Every picture I’ve ever seen of kids fishing, they were barefoot, so if I’m going to do it, I’m going to do it right.”
“When it comes to the bare feet, you mean, but not when it comes to baiting the hook and taking off the fish.”
“My willingness to conform only goes so far,” she said, and Daniel laughed. Heaven help him, she was fun.
“All right, well, here’s your pole.” He handed her the end of the rod. “Hold it right there a minute while I bait the hook.”
She looked away. “Tell me when you’re done.”
He laughed, put a cricket on her hook. “Done.”
She glanced back with one eye open and squished her face at the messy cricket. “Ew. Big-time ew.”
“You won’t see it once you put it in the water,” he assured her.
She promptly flung the pole toward the water and nearly let go in the process. Daniel jerked toward her and grabbed it in the nick of time.
“Hang on there, we’re cane fishing. Not quite so energetic.”
“I thought there was casting involved,” she said.
“Casting? What do you know about casting?” he asked, baiting his own hook.
“I used to watch Bill Dance with Granddaddy,” she admitted.
“You watched Bill Dance? So you do know about fishing,” Daniel accused.
“I know about it. Doesn’t mean I actually participated. But I do plan to catch a few and learn a few things about my fishing partner,” she said and turned her eyes on her bobber. “Come on fishie, fishie, gobble up that cricket.”
“A minute ago I thought you felt sorry for the cricket,” he said, finishing his hook and plunking it in the water not far from hers.
“Nah, I just didn’t want to see it on the hook,” she said, as her red-and-white float disappeared beneath the water. “Hey, I got a bite!” She yanked the rod and pulled up a nice-size bream. “Look! Look!” she yelled, dangling the fish right in front of Daniel’s face. “I got one!”
He moved his own pole to the ground and pushed it under his leg to hold it in place, then caught the swinging fish. “Yep, you sure did.” He took the fish off the hook, tossed it back in the water and said, “For someone who’s never fished, it sure didn’t take you long to get the hang of it.”
“I paid attention when Granddaddy and I watched his fishing shows,” she said smugly. “So, a deal’s a deal. Tell me something.”
“Something,” he quipped, reaching for the cricket bucket and getting another one for her hook.
“Very funny. We made a deal, and you have to tell me something I don’t know about you.”
“Okay,” he said, releasing her baited hook. “I thought about playing baseball in college. Or I guess I should say that I turned down the chance to play baseball in college.”
She dropped her line in the water, but her eyes never left Daniel. “You mean you got a scholarship to play baseball?”
He nodded and pointed to her bobber, which had gone south…again.
Mandy yanked it out of the water, but she waited too long. The cricket was gone, but there was no sign of a fish.
“You weren’t fast enough,” Daniel said.
“That’s okay,” she said, moving the hook toward his face. “You can bait it again. What do you mean you turned down a scholarship. Where to?”
“Alabama.”
“No way!”
“Yes,” he said, smiling. “Way.”
“Why?” she asked, while he stuck another unlucky cricket on her hook.
“Because it wasn’t what I thought God wanted me to do. I wanted to go to a Bible college and follow my folks’ lead into mission work. They waited until Jacob and I graduated high school, then they left to go and spread God’s word in India. After I visited Malawi on that mission trip as a freshman in high school, I knew that’s where I belonged.” He shrugged. “So I passed up the baseball scholarship.”
“Ever regretted it?” she asked.
“Not once,” he said, as his bobber headed beneath the water. He pulled it up and smiled at the decent-size crappie on the end of the line. “That’s one.” He held up a finger.
“Takes two,” she said, holding up two.
“But I’m halfway there,” he reminded.
She rubbed her nose. “Was that a raindrop?” Then she glanced toward the water. “Oh, look!”
And while they watched, the water pebbled toward them as a gentle spring rain eased its way across the pond.
“I’ve never actually seen the rain coming before!” she said. “Look at it!”
“I am,” he said, “but as nice as it is right now, I have a feeling it’s probably going to pick up steam as it gets going.” He pointed toward the opposite side of the pond, where the family that had been picnicking now sprinted around the water’s edge to get back to their vehicle.
“Oh, wow, it is coming fast, isn’t it?” she said, and pulled her line out of the water…with a fish on the end. “Look!”
He laughed. “I see. Give it here and I’ll set him free.”
The rain did get harder, so he wasted no time getting the fish off the line and tossing it back into the water.
“Tell me something else,” she said, not making an effort to even put her shoes on until he gave her what she was due.
Daniel pushed damp hair from his forehead. “Something you don’t know about me?”
Water streamed down her face, and she wiped it aside and nodded. “That was the deal.”
“Okay, then. I’ve always thought you were the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen.”
Her mouth fell open, and Daniel’s bobber disappeared again. He reached down, pulled up yet another fish, freed it and tossed it in the water.
“Your turn, Mandy,” he said, raising his voice a little to be heard above the rain steadily pounding the water and the crickets chirping wildly in the bucket. “Tell me something I don’t know about you.”
She blinked several times, raindrops getting even harder now, and still made no effort to move.
Daniel placed the poles on the ground and stepped toward her. “I’m waiting, Mandy.”
“That night,” she said, her words also muffled by the rain beating all around them, “when I came and found you, and I asked you to marry me and take me away…”
Daniel’s heart thundered in his chest. “Yes?”
“I knew you didn’t love me.” She bit her lower lip, looked into his eyes and visibly swallowed. Then she added, “But I prayed that you’d learn to.”
“Oh, Mandy,” he said, and in spite of the fact that they were drenched completely and the rain was coming down harder, Daniel pulled her close, tilted her face to his and said, “I shouldn’t have turned away from you then.”
“You didn’t love me.”
“I didn’t think you knew what you wanted,” he said hoarsely.
She wiped wet bangs from her eyes. “You were probably right. I didn’t know what I wanted. I thought I did, but mainly I wanted you to be there for me, to help me through the hardest time in my life and maybe to eventually love me.”
He left the fishing rods on the ground, took her hand and moved beneath the willow to shield them from the now-pouring rain. “What about now, Mandy?” he asked. “Do you know what you want now? Because I know what I want.”
“What do you want, Daniel?”
“I want you to give me another chance.” He tenderly slid a finger beneath her chin, moved his face to hers and brushed his mouth across hers in a sweet, tender kiss. Her lips were soft, warm and perfect. Daniel lost himself in the joy of kissing Mandy.
He wanted to hold her here forever, to protect her from any pain, especially the kind of pain he’d inflicted that night long ago. But most of all, he wanted her to know how special and desirable she was, and how blessed he would feel if she’d forgive him for hurting her and consider the possibility of them together. He broke the kiss, looked into her eyes and said, “Please, Mandy. Give me another chance.”
