Your Dream And Mine

“No, it’s all right. The tests were routine. The lab called this morning, and the results were fine. But it was a wakeup call, Tommy Rose.” His bony throat wobbled. Tears gathered as he added, “I may be a stout-hearted old cuss, but I’ve got enough gray matter left to know it isn’t land or barns or a house full of trinkets making each day worth getting up for.”

Thomasina made a big business of studying the inside cover of her paperback. Her eyes were too full to read while he fought for control.

“The girls have families of their own now,” he said finally. “Will’s married to that lumberyard of his, and Mary agrees if we don’t make some decisions soon, the kids’ll end up doing it for us. It goes down the hatch a lot easier, makin’ them myself. Even hard ones. Like I said…” He trailed off a moment, then began anew, his voice growing stronger for the oxygen boost. “Seem to be spending a lot of time at doctors and pharmacies these days, so I reckon we’ll find a place in Bloomington where everything’s close by. An apartment, maybe where the upkeep is somebody else’s headache. Or a retirement village where they do the cooking and everything. Make it easier on Mary.”

“Sounds nice,” murmured Thomasina.

“A regular second honeymoon.” He checked the tear coursing down his seamed cheek, and beckoned with a gnarled finger. “I want you to look up some addresses and write them down for tomorrow, Tommy Rose.”

Milt went on to give her a list of retirement facilities, plus a real estate agent he had contacted. Mary came in a while later and went over the whole thing again with Thomasina. Obviously they had given the decision a lot of thought. Thomasina listened without comment, except to say she’d help in whatever way she could. Mary thanked her for giving up her Saturday, sweet-talked Milt into taking a bath, then left herself to get ready for bed.

Silence settled over the house. The loss of Saturday would set Thomasina’s moving behind a bit. But she wasn’t pressed for time. Thomasina sat by Milt’s bed, thoughts flitting from pillar to post in an attempt to hold at bay the biggest thought of all. She thought about Trace inadvertently touching her shoulder, and Winny asking her if she was moving in with Trace. Out of the mouths of babes. Was her decision to move impulsive? Had she been in such a red-hot hurry, she hadn’t even prayed?

She prayed now. For Milt and Mary, too, making hard choices not only for the sake of their family and of each for the other, but because they trusted God with their future.

As did she. But she would not pray about the thought, the dream. She couldn’t. Not when Milt lay a foot away, relinquishing with pain and raw courage what had been his for a lifetime. It seemed callous, irreverent even, the line between dream-seeking and covetousness—a slim, slippery treacherous one. God’s will. God’s will. Even that seemed dangerously close to vindicating her right to prayerfully dream while he slept on his losses.

Thomasina rose and stretched and wandered the room on soundless feet. The lamp left burning in the living room shed shadowy light on photographs that affirmed lives built on Until death do us part.

Milt in a suit, broad brown hand slicking back a full head of black hair as he traded smiles with his white-veiled bride. Milt astride the tractor seat, a muscular arm snaked around a fair-haired toddler. Milt holding a framed diploma as he and Mary flanked their cap-and-gown-clad twin daughters. Milt clowning for the camera, giving Mary rabbit ears as they posed at their fiftieth wedding anniversary party.

The deep waters of a verse about times and seasons under God’s heavens soothed heart sores and guilty pangs. Thomasina thought on these things.

Later, Mary slipped into the room. “You go on and get some rest, Thomasina,” she whispered. “I don’t want you wilting on me while we’re house hunting tomorrow.”

“What about you?”

“I’ll be fine.” Mary took off her slippers and sat down on the bed. She looked at Thomasina with a spark of dismissal in her eyes. Thomasina took her paperback book and went out into the living room. When she tiptoed in later to check on Milt, Mary was tucked under his arm, next to his heart, fast asleep. They both seemed small and frail, yet enduring. Dear souls. Thomasina touched her fingers to her lips and blew them a misty kiss.

Trace got off work at two on Friday night and went right to bed. Recently he had signed papers on a small, run-down two-bedroom bungalow a block past Liberty Flats Community Church. It needed a lot of work, and he wanted to make the most of his Saturday.

He was awake before the alarm. It took him a moment to realize the sound of running water was coming from Thomasina’s side of the house. He’d heard her come in a couple of hours earlier, and knew she couldn’t have had much rest. Must be bent on getting an early start on the rest of her moving.

Trace showered and shaved and pulled on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt before going downstairs to plug in the coffeepot. The sun was shining through the carpenter’s lace, making patterns on the freshly painted floor as he went out on the porch to retrieve the paper.

He scanned the headlines and was on his way inside again when Thomasina stepped out of her apartment into the shared foyer. She juggled a lidded cup, her pocketbook and an armload of empty boxes.

“Nice morning,” he said.

Thomasina jumped and fumbled her boxes.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.” Trace stepped out of the line of fire as the lidded cup bounced after the boxes. “Burn you?”

“I don’t think so.” Her whole face disappeared beneath a wide-brimmed straw hat as she ducked her chin, checking her dress.

Trace was checking it, too, though with a different view in mind. A womanly dress, as opposed to those loose-fitting shapeless things that seemed to be all the rage. Eggshell white. Sleeveless with a modest neckline and a fitted bodice. The hem brushed shapely calves, with a slit to the knee for an unencumbered stride.

“It takes a full cup before I get my equilibrium,” she offered by way of explanation.

“You better lay off the coffee. You’re awful jumpy,” he countered.

“Me?” She tipped her face. It glowed a pearly pink in the straw hat frame. “Couldn’t have a thing to do with you slipping up behind me in your sock feet?”

“Just getting the paper.”

“Honk next time, and I promise not to throw boxes at you.”

“Deal.”

She returned his grin with a upsweep of lashes and a chocolate-eyed twinkle, then stooped to pick up the cup just as he was leaning down to do it for her. Her face disappeared under the hat again as his hand closed on the cup the same moment as hers. He let go with a studied nonchalance, and gathered her boxes for her.

“Thank you. I’ll take them now,” she said.

“Let me. You’ll get your dress dirty.” Trace angled her a sidelong glance. “Who’s helping you move, anyway, the queen of England?”

“Beg your pardon?”

“The tea party hat. The dress. Couldn’t help noticing you’re…”

“Overdressed?” She smiled. “Moving is on hold for the day. Mary and I are going to town.”

“Milt’s Mary?”

Thomasina nodded, but didn’t elaborate. Before he could pursue it, she asked, “What about you? You’re not thinking about chopping down the cherry tree, are you, George?”

It took him half a second to realize she was chiding him about the oak tree out at Milt’s. “No, ma’am.” He played along. “You’ve scared me off that project. I’m pulling a porch off an old house instead.”

“Here in town?”

He nodded. “On Church Street just down from Liberty Flats Church. Stop by and I’ll show you around. Not that there’s much to see. It’s kind of an eyesore right now.”

“But with potential?” asked Thomasina, as they neared her car.

“Something like that.” He waited while she unlocked the door.

“Just throw the boxes in the back seat,” she said, and thanked him.

The Penn children raced across the yard as he ambled back to the porch. Trace was about to duck out of sight when he realized Thomasina was the attraction. Thinking they were too late, Winny and Pauly stopped short, disappointment lining their faces.

If it’d been him, he would have pulled away without a second look. But Thomasina rolled down the window and beckoned to them. Trace took his paper inside, poured a cup of coffee, drank half of it and wandered to the front of the house just as Thomasina was pulling away. The children stood on the curb, waving to her. She tooted her horn and returned the gesture.

A regular glutton for punishment. Trace wagged his head, and went back for a refill.

Chapter Seven (#ulink_8e70e474-50de-532d-937e-e043b3fda155)

Thomasina admired the composure with which Mary conducted herself throughout a morning of nest hunting which took them to more houses and apartment buildings than she cared to count. They took a break for brunch at a teahouse, then visited retirement complexes until midafternoon. Seeing Mary’s strength waning, Thomasina suggested pie and coffee before starting home.

While they were waiting for their order, Will Chambers strolled past their table. A square-jawed fellow with neatly clipped red-gold hair and his mother’s blue eyes and Nordic good looks, he gave Thomasina a passing glance and would have walked on by except that Mary reached out and caught his hand.