Changing Her Heart

Bryce’s mouth dropped open. “What have you done?”

“Happy birthday!” everyone chorused behind him.

As Bryce disappeared from her side to go to the desk, Randy shuffled in to take Bryce’s place beside her.

Bryce picked up the large card, which Randy had set on top of the keyboard, and opened it. While Bryce read the card and responded to everyone as he read their comments, more people continued to squeeze into the small bedroom to watch.

The more the room filled up, the closer she and Randy had to move together, until he was pressed into her from her shoulder to her knee.

She looked up to his face to see if she could judge his response. Almost as if he could sense her movement, he turned his head and looked down at her.

His voice lowered to a husky whisper. “Hi,” he muttered, and at the same moment as he spoke, his fingers intertwined with hers, and he gave her hand a gentle squeeze.

Lacey blushed. She didn’t know what to do, and she didn’t know if they should be holding hands, but she didn’t want to let go. She also had to accept his action as a signal that something was happening between them, and that he felt the same way she did.

The room quieted as Bryce lowered the card. “Thank you, everyone. I don’t know what to say.”

Everyone started talking at the same time, offering their suggestions, mostly about taking turns using the new computer.

Lacey raised herself on her tiptoes and leaned toward Randy so he could hear her. “Do you want to show him how to work everything?”

He leaned back down to reply. “It’s just a standard computer. He’ll know what to do. I’ll help him set up his e-mail and configure the settings later, when he’s not the center of attention.”

“I don’t know. He looks a little flustered.”

Bryce chose that moment to look directly at Lacey. His lost expression made up her mind. She tightened her grip on Randy’s hand and led him a few steps forward, until they were standing beside the chair where Bryce sat.

“Bryce, this is Randy. He’s the one who helped me buy the computer.”

Bryce stood. As he caught a glimpse of their joined hands, he raised his eyebrows. He looked up and shook Randy’s free hand. “That must have been a challenge. Lacey is afraid of computers.”

“Am not,” Lacey retorted.

Bryce looked at her, but spoke to Randy. “She is.”

Randy grinned. “But she’s learning.”

Lacey released Randy’s hand and stepped back. “I should go help in the kitchen. Everyone is probably starving.” She pressed through the crowd and hurried to the kitchen, where her mother and her sister were busily removing the canapés from the oven and setting them on serving platters.

“Mom. Susan. It looks like we’re almost ready. Things are going really well.”

Her mother stopped fussing with the food, and straightened. “He was so surprised! And there are so many more people here than I expected. This is wonderful. But this means there are more people to feed.”

That so many had been invited was no surprise to Lacey. The rented home was small, the furnishings were worn, but everyone was always welcome, and her mother had a habit of being generous when inviting people for a celebration that involved food.

There had been many times in their family’s history when God had provided for them when they couldn’t provide for themselves. Now that their family was doing better, her mother did her best to provide for others, despite her humble means.

Lacey swept one hand through the air, above the table, which was covered with trays of food. “You still have enough for double the amount of people here. I don’t know why you do this.”

Her mother grinned, and reached into the oven for the second tray. “I can’t let anyone go home hungry.”

Lacey turned to Susan, who was pressing the candles into the cake. “I was thinking about putting the cake in the middle of the dining room table, but I don’t know if there will be enough room.”

Susan spoke without raising her head. “I’ve al ready moved the centerpiece. It’s fine.”

Lacey froze. Susan’s voice had been too quiet, and too controlled. Added to the fact that Susan hadn’t looked at her when she spoke, it gave Lacey a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach that had nothing to do with hunger.

“Susan, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Susan answered quietly without looking up, which was all the answer Lacey needed. Something was definitely wrong, and it could only be something to do with Eric.

Lacey struggled to remember if she’d seen Eric in the crowd. She hadn’t.

Lacey helped carry the food into the dining room. Her mother called everyone to eat, and after one of the men from her church paused for a prayer of thanks, the guests descended on the food like a swarm of locusts.

Out of the corner of her eye, Lacey noticed that Bryce and Randy filled their plates quickly and quietly, then disappeared back into the bedroom together.

Since they were obviously occupied, Lacey returned to the kitchen, where she found Susan, sitting at the table with her head bowed, picking more than she was eating.

Lacey sat beside Susan, speaking quietly and softly. “What’s wrong?”

Susan pushed at a mushroom cap with her fork. “Same ol’, same ol’,” she grumbled.

What was wrong didn’t take much imagination. Eric had obviously been drinking again, and done something to hurt Susan. The only unknown was that Lacey didn’t know if this time he’d spent too much money, dipping into the mortgage money to buy drinks for his friends at the bar, if he’d damaged the car, if he’d done something to hurt Susan’s feelings or all of the above. Since it was the weekend, it wasn’t likely that he’d lost another job because of his uncontrollable drinking habits. Unless he’d been out with his supervisor and started a fight with him.

Lacey didn’t want to ask, so she remained silent. She only wanted to be there for Susan, regardless of what Eric had done.

Susan started to sniffle, but she didn’t raise her head. “Do you remember Grampa’s old violin?”

“Yes. Especially when he used to put on that old hat and play those funny songs, just to amuse us. But I also remember times he played those sad, haunting melodies. I’ve never heard anyone play a violin like Grampa.”

Susan sniffled again. “You know that I’ve got his violin, right?”

Lacey nodded, her stomach dropping.

“I had it in the china cabinet, so when the kids are old enough to appreciate it, maybe they might take lessons.”

“That’s a sweet idea.”

A big, fat tear rolled down Susan’s cheek. “I don’t know why he did it, but Eric took the violin out of the cabinet this afternoon. I knew he’d been drinking, so I told him to put it back. He just laughed and started fooling around with it, pretending he was playing it. But it slipped out of his hands, bounced off the coffee table and then he accidentally stepped on it.” More tears flowed down Susan’s cheeks; a few dripped onto her plate of untouched food.

Lacey’s gut clenched. “Can it be fixed?”

“I don’t know. Even if it can, we don’t have that kind of money right now. Then, when Eric saw how upset I was, he got mad at me. He said I was trying to make him feel guilty. I told him it wasn’t his fault.” Susan sniffled again. “But he didn’t calm down. We had a big fight in front of the children, and I said a few things that I now regret. That’s something I told myself would never happen.”

Lacey held back telling Susan that regrets or not, whatever she had said was probably right. Lacey also wanted to tell Susan that Eric was never going to change, but that wasn’t quite true. Eric had changed in the past ten years. Every year he became steadily worse.

“I don’t know what to say.”