clean fiction

Special Saturday Fiction: The Farmer’s Daughter Chapter 14 Part 2

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 6 Comments

I added a little extra to the end of what I shared yesterday for today’s special Saturday fiction. If you want to see Part 1 of Chapter 14 you can see yesterday’s post. To catch up on the entire story you can click HERE.



Pulling up to the farm store, Molly sat outside in her truck, bleary-eyed and unmotivated. She’d barely been able to sleep last night, thinking about Alex and his . . . well, weirdness and about how much she did not want to come to the farm store this morning. She propped her forehead against the steering wheel and groaned. She was in no mood to be perky and she needed to be perky by the time the customers arrived. Some days she took on the motto “fake it until you make it.” Some days, face perkiness was the only way to make it through their day.

“Is this the only milk you have?” a woman had asked last week, looking at her over a pair of sunglasses, one eyebrow raised.

“Yes, ma’am. That’s the company the local farmer’s supply to.”

“Okay, because I’m a vegan and I need something that doesn’t come from a cow.”

“Oh. Well, then . . .”

Molly had had to pause because what she wanted to say was “If you’re vegan, why are you in a store that clearly sells cow milk?” but she glanced at the woman’s cart, full of vegetables and flowers, and decided to cut her some slack. At least she was supporting farmers in her own way.

“Then, I’m sorry,” Molly said. “We don’t carry non-diary options at this time. Maybe you can try the local Weis?”

“You know this little store needs to move with the times,” the woman said unloading the items from her cart to the counter. “Milk from mammals is a thing of the past. The only ones who should be drinking cows milk are baby cows.”

“Mmmm,” Molly responded adding up the items on the cash register. “That will be $75.50.”

If the woman hadn’t been spending so much Molly might would have told her to shove off, but the money was welcome and needed in a time when local farmers were struggling. The money from the Tanner’s store didn’t only benefit the Tanners. It also benefited several families who supplied inventory – from locally raised and butchered pork, beef, and chicken to eggs, homemade furniture and hand-sewn blankets and quilts. Losing customers could mean losing income for these families as well.

Thankfully the woman left without anymore comments, though a ‘thank you’ would have been nice.

Some days Molly wondered if this would be her entire life; sitting in her family’s story, being lectured by people who called themselves “woke” about what to eat and how to live. She wondered if she’d always be just the farmer’s daughter.

Walking into the store through the backdoor she heard her Aunt Hannah talking in the office.

“I am nervous about the meeting, yes. And I’m nervous because I don’t know how we are going to come up with the money to pay off this loan.”

Molly paused outside the closed door.

What loan?

“Let’s talk to Bill and see what can be worked out,” her Uncle Walt said softly.

“I would have talked to Bill a long time ago if I had known what was going on,” Hannah said curtly.

“Hannah, Robert told me he explained why —”

“I know,” Hannah interrupted, her voice less tense than before. “I’m sorry. I’m just anxious. I’ve been looking at the numbers this morning. They aren’t great. I’m worried we won’t be able to do this, Walt.”

Numbers? What numbers? Molly’s mind started racing. Was the farm in trouble? And if so, why hadn’t her parents told her?

Her hand hovered over the door handle and she thought about walking in and asking Hannah what was going on, but thought better of it. If her family wanted her to know what was going on, they’d tell her, and, to be honest, she felt too drained to add anymore to her mental que to think about.

She continued her path to the front counter where Ellie was already loading the cash register.

Ellie glanced up as she counted. “Fifty, seventy . . . Hey, Mol. You look wiped today. Eighty…rough morning in the barn?”

“No, just . . .tired.”

Molly didn’t feel like talking about all her worries with her brother’s attractive girlfriend, even though she’d known Ellie for years and they were only a couple of years apart in age and she considered Ellie a friend.

“Ninety. One hundred.”

Ellie shoved the final bill into the drawer and wrote down the amount on the sheet next to the register.

“Looks like a nice day ahead,” she said. “That will probably bring out the gardeners.”

Molly groaned. “Oh no. With gardeners come all the weird questions about which tomatoes I think are best and what kind of squash grows better in what month? You would think after all these years working here I would know.”

Ellie shrugged. “I don’t know either. I just refer them to your aunt.”

Molly’s aunt. That word sent her back to think about what her aunt had said, about the loan and numbers. She sipped the coffee she’d brought with her in a tumbler and sat on the stool behind the counter.

She wondered again why her parents hadn’t said anything to her about it all. Then she wondered if Jason even knew. Were they trying to shelter her? She didn’t need to be sheltered. She needed to be told the truth.

“So Jason is taking me out this weekend for our anniversary,” Ellie said, interrupting her thoughts.

“Oh yeah? Where to?”

“He won’t tell me.

Molly hated the look of excited anticipation in Ellie’s eyes. Every year on June 24th for the last four years Jason took her out for dinner to celebrate their night of their first date after he came back from college. And every year on June 25th, Ellie relayed how wonderful the night had been but in a tone tinged with disappointment. Molly still couldn’t understand what was taking Jason so long to propose to Ellie.

They were perfect for each other. Ellie and Jason were both farm kids, for lack of a better term, both Christians, both loved sappy romantic movies (though Jason refused to admit it), and both wanted to continue farming, either on a farm of their own or on the Tanner’s farm. Molly was tired of facing Ellie Fitzgerald’s forced smile overshadowed by sad eyes every June 25th. She needed to ask Jason what the deal was already. Why was he dragging his feet on proposing to the woman that Molly, and he, knew was the only woman for him?

***

Franny couldn’t get over the size of her grandson. He now towered over her when he’d once been small enough for her to sit on her knee and hear about his day. She guessed him to be over six foot now and maybe — she tipped her head and looked him up and down as he placed a box on her counter — maybe 210 pounds, with a good amount of that weight being muscle.

“So mom sent some of her famous chicken soup over,” Jason was saying, sitting a large sealed bowl on the table. “Biscuits and a side of carrots too.”

He might be big now and speak with a deep, mainly voice, but Jason was still Franny’s sweet boy and she was proud of him the same way she was of Molly.

“That’s very nice, hon’” she told Jason. “You tell Annie thank you for me. What happened? You get the short straw and had to take your cantankerous grandmother dinner?”

Jason laughed, bending down and kissing Franny’s cheek. “Now, grandma, you know I love coming to see you. Aunt Hannah has a PTA meeting tonight so mom offered to cook some dinner to you and I actually asked to bring it.”

Jason sat on the chair across from his grandmother and leaned back, stretching a long leg out in front of him. Franny braced herself. It looked like he was going to launch into a heart-to-heart and she wasn’t sure she was up to it this evening. He folded his hands across his stomach, and she was reminded again how much he looked like his father; her serious, thoughtful oldest son Robert.

And like Robert, Jason didn’t pull punches. “So, what’s going on with you, Grandma? You know you can tell me. I’ve noticed how down you’ve been and we’ve missed you in church.”

Franny avoided his eyes, stirring her spoon in the soup. “I’m fine, Jason.”

“You’re anything but fine. Out with it. Is it your eyes?”

Darn it, that Jason. He always was observant. To a fault in this case.

“How did you know about my eyes?”

“I’ve noticed you bumping into tables when I’ve been here, squinting through your glasses.”

She cleared her throat. “Well, yes, I am concerned about them.”

“Do you think it could be macular degeneration?”

“I don’t know. I’ve heard of that but I’m not really familiar with it.”

“Ellie’s grandma has it. Her eyesight is slowly detorating. But maybe yours isn’t that bad. We can go see Dr. Fisher and it could turn out you just need a prescription.”

“Ah, now. Speaking of Ellie —”

“Grandma, we’re talking about you right now.”

“We’ll get back to that. Let’s talk about Ellie and why you’re not proposing to her.”

“Grandma…”

“Jason, honey, she’s the girl for you. You believe that, right?

Jason laughed softly and cleared his throat. “Yes, Grandma. I really do.”

“Then what are you waiting for?”

Jason softly groaned and covered his face with his hands, leaning his head back. “Grandma. . .”

“Don’t let her get away from you, Jason. Do you hear me?”

Jason looked at his grandma, his face flushed but a smile tugging at his mouth. “Yes, ma’am. I do, but right now we are talking about your eyesight. I can drive you to Dr. Fisher. Let’s find out what’s going on. It may not be as bad as you think, okay?”

Franny sipped from her glass of water, a small smile flicking across her lips. “Okay. I’ll make you a deal, Jason Andrew Tanner. I’ll let you take me to Dr. Fisher if you agree to propose to that lovely Ellie.” She reached her hand out toward her grandson. “Deal?”

Jason tipped his head back and let out a deep laugh. He shook his head and chewed his lower lip for a moment, rubbing his chin as he looked at his grandmother’s hand. He couldn’t lie to himself; he was scared to propose to Ellie in some ways, but he knew his grandmother was right. Ellie was his best friend and the only woman he could imagine being married to.

“Yeah, okay, grandma.” He took her hand gently. “Deal.”

Fiction Friday : The Farmer’s Daughter Chapter 14 Part 1

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 3 Comments

This story is starting to consume my brain, folks. I have so many ideas, so many stories I want to tell and I know I’m writing a series so I can tell them later but oh man — this is my first series so it’s hard to know when to introduce certain characters and how much of their stories to share because I plan to share more of their stories in the next couple of books.

I like when a story consumes my brain in some ways, especially with the craziness of the world these days. When a story pushes its way into my mind, there isn’t room for too much else and that’s a nice break for my brain (well, except late at night when I’m mulling over a plot point and a scene idea comes into my head at 1 a.m., when I need to be asleep. Then my brain doesn’t get a break at all.)

To catch up with the rest of the story find the link at the top of the page or click here.

Sit-ups. Alex was actually doing sit-ups in his room. What was he even thinking? The problem was he’d been thinking too much since earlier that afternoon.

About Molly. About Molly at the gym and her skin glowing and her top pulled tight against her and ­– he lifted his upper body again, bending his torso to touch his knees.

“Fifty-five,” he gasped, the counting pushing away the images rolling around in his mind of Molly.

He hated working out. He didn’t feel the need to workout, just like he had told Liz, because he worked out enough doing his work on the barn. But Jason had mentioned once that working out helped get out frustrations and Alex was definitely frustrated. He was frustrated at himself for not telling Molly how he felt and he was frustrated with the images that played over and over in his head of grabbing Molly in that gym, yanking her to him and kissing her hard, his hands in her hair, showing her how he really felt about her. He’d imagined doing it so many times it was almost real to him.

He laid back on the floor, breathing hard, hands behind his head and closed his eyes, willing the images to go away. Under normal circumstances he would have shared his thoughts of romantic angst with Jason, but this wasn’t normal circumstances. He couldn’t tell Jason he was struggling with an incredibly strong attraction to his younger sister. Not if he wanted to live for more than five minutes.

His phone beeped and he reached for it, grateful for something to distract him from thoughts of Molly.

Hey, big bro. Still working at that farm?

It was his brother, Tyler.

Alex: Hey, little bro. Yeah. Still working at that office?

Tyler: Yeah. For now. Dad is making it hard though.

Alex: A real jerk, huh?

Tyler: You know he is.

Alex: Why do you stay there? It’s not going to make him care about you, you know.

Tyler: You’re not my therapist, Alex. Chill. Anyhow, I like the work here. Been on any good dates lately?

Alex: No. You?

Tyler: A couple. Actually, one really nice one. She’s a lawyer.

Alex made a face.

Alex: “Lawyer? Run away, dude. They’re black widows.

Tyler: Lol. Not this one, she’s a good one.

Alex: OK. If you say so.

Tyler: When you coming down for a visit?

Alex chewed on his bottom lip, thinking how to answer, knowing “when hell freezes over” was too harsh and would make it sound like it was his brother he was trying to avoid instead of his dad.

Alex: Don’t know. Busy season for the farm. Planting, cutting down hay and bailing it. You should come down and help bail. Be a good learning experience for you to get your hands dirty.

Laugh emojis filled the screen.

Tyler: You were the one who always liked to get his hands dirty, remember? Not me. Have fun, bro. I’ll text you when dad finally fires me.

Alex laid back on the floor and laughed at his brother and the fact he was still chasing after their dad after all these years. It seemed like Tyler would never understand that their dad would never care about anything except his business and the money and maybe an occasional mistress or two. Tyler had told Alex a month ago that their dad was dating someone new again, a blond younger than both his sons. It didn’t surprise Alex. He’d been dating women younger than him even before he had divorced Tyler and Alex’s mom.

There were few things Alex could count on in life but one of them was that his dad would always be in a new relationship. The other was that his dad would never care what was going on in his life. He’d heard from his dad four times since he’d moved in with Jason five years ago. Twice to ask him if working on a farm was really what he wanted to do. The last conversation hadn’t gone well at all.

“You have a degree in computer programing, Alex,” his dad had said over the phone in his familiar depreciating tone. “We could use you here in the IT department. And from there, maybe we can move you up into —”

“Thanks, Dad. I’m good here.”

“Farming, Alex? Really? This isn’t what I had in mind for you when —”

“When you what? Abandoned Tyler and I all those years ago?”

“That’s not what happened, Alex. When you get older, you’ll understand that life isn’t always easy.”

“Yeah, hey, have to go dad. Mr. Tanner needs me to clean some cow poop out of the stalls and I’d rather do that then talk to you.”

Most of Alex’s conversations with his dad ended in similar ways and many times he didn’t bother to pick up the phone at all, on the rare occasion his dad did call. He’d guessed the calls came when his mom nagged his dad to call and act like “a real father.” It was a conversation he’d heard over and over throughout his life.

“Act like a real father for once, Michael,” his mother would say on the phone, when she dropped the boys off for weekends with their dad, or when Alex got in trouble in high school or college.

But Michael Stone had rarely acted like a father and Alex never expected him to. What he’d missed out on in Michael Stone as his father, he’d gained in Robert Tanner.

Robert had shown Alex how to be a husband, a father, and a provider in the five years he’d known him. His tenderness with Annie, his fatherly love for Molly and Jason, the way he treated his livestock and his staff with respect. It was hard for Alex not to compare Robert’s successes in fatherhood and adulthood to the failures of his father. What wasn’t hard was knowing that he wanted to model his life after Robert’s instead of Michael’s.

It had taken Alex a couple of years to realize he wanted to be more like Robert, though, and until then he’d drank too much, flirted with too many women, and lived a life far from Robert’s. There were days he felt like he’d never live up to Robert’s life, though, and days he wondered if he was being stupid thinking he could change, be better and be worthy of the Tanners, especially Molly.

Jason’s voice outside the door startled him from his thoughts. “Alex? You in there? Ellie brought over some supper. You want some?”

Alex wasn’t about to turn down one of Ellie’s meals.

“Hey,” he said, opening the door. “Let me get a shower and I’ll be right down.”

Five minutes later he was sitting at the table with wet hair but more than ready for Ellie’s food.

“Hey, Alex.”

As usual Ellie was smiling and chipper, her long black hair pulled back in a braid down her back. She rushed around the kitchen, setting plates full of food and three plates around the table.

Not only was Ellie perky, pretty, and friendly, but she was an amazing cook. Fried chicken, mashed potatoes, biscuits, peas, and even gravy filled the dishes in front of Alex and Jason. He thought about leaning across the table and asking Jason to remind him again why he hadn’t proposed to Ellie yet, but he thought better of it. He wouldn’t be able to eat with a broken jaw.

Once the food was on the table, Ellie sat down with them and smiled her captivating smile.

“So, how was everyone’s day?” she asked.

Alex shoved a piece of chicken in his mouth, not interested in answering. He knew the question was really meant for Jason anyhow. He was the third wheel.

“Busy,” Jason said. “Still a lot of work to do before we start the haying next week, we have another delivery of the vegetables we have been able to harvest for the farm store, and we’re hoping the rain finally lets up so the corn will grow some more.”

“It really has been a tough year, hasn’t it?” Ellie asked. She reached over and laid her hand on Jason’s, compassion in her eyes. Her small, slender fingers looked almost comical against Jason’s massive, roughed hand.

“It has, but we’ll figure it out somehow,” Jason said, smiling back at her, his fingers encircling her hand, swallowing it.

Looking between the two love birds, Alex felt slightly sick to his stomach but also a pang of jealousy at their obvious devotion to each other. He hoped to have a relationship like theirs someday. Jason and Ellie had dated on and off since high school but exclusively since Jason came back from college. Both of them had grown up on farms, their parents knew each other, and Alex always imagined they’d met at a square dance. Or maybe it was on corn picking day. Either way, they were one of the most perfect couple’s he’d ever seen, which again, made him both sick and jealous.

Unlike the girlfriends of his other friends Ellie didn’t care when Jason hung out with Matt and Alex and didn’t try to push her way into their guys’ nights. She didn’t make fart jokes or participate in burping contests like Molly, but she was still a farm girl, not afraid to get her hands dirty and put in the hard work.   

Alex grinned as he watched them the rest of the dinner, both of them pretty much oblivious to his presence. He looked forward to harassing Jason about them making googly eyes at each other later when Ellie had left.

***

Pulling up to the farm store, Molly sat outside in her truck, bleary-eyed and unmotivated. She’d barely been able to sleep last night, thinking about Alex and his . . . well, weirdness and about how much she did not want to come to the farm store this morning. She propped her forehead against the steering wheel and groaned. She was in no mood to be perky and she needed to be perky by the time the customers arrived. Some days she took on the motto “fake it until you make it.” Some days, face perkiness was the only way to make it through their day.

“Is this the only milk you have?” a woman had asked last week, looking at her over a pair of sunglasses, one eyebrow raised.

“Yes, ma’am. That’s the company the local farmer’s supply to.”

“Okay, because I’m a vegan and I need something that doesn’t come from a cow.”

“Oh. Well, then . . .”

Molly had had to pause because what she wanted to say was “If you’re vegan, why are you in a store that clearly sells cow milk?” but she glanced at the woman’s cart, full of vegetables and flowers, and decided to cut her some slack. At least she was supporting farmers in her own way.

“Then, I’m sorry,” Molly said. “We don’t carry non-diary options at this time. Maybe you can try the local Weis?”

“You know this little store needs to move with the times,” the woman said unloading the items from her cart to the counter. “Milk from mammals is a thing of the past. The only ones who should be drinking cows milk are baby cows.”

“Mmmm,” Molly responded adding up the items on the cash register. “That will be $75.50.”

If the woman hadn’t been spending so much Molly might would have told her to shove off, but the money was welcome and needed in a time when local farmers were struggling. The money from the Tanner’s store didn’t only benefit the Tanners. It also benefited several families who supplied inventory – from locally raised and butchered pork, beef, and chicken to eggs, homemade furniture and hand-sewn blankets and quilts. Losing customers could mean losing income for these families as well.

Thankfully the woman left without anymore comments, though a ‘thank you’ would have been nice.

Some days Molly wondered if this would be her entire life; sitting in her family’s story, being lectured by people who called themselves “woke” about what to eat and how to live. She wondered if she’d always be just the farmer’s daughter.

Walking into the store through the backdoor she heard her Aunt Hannah talking in the office.

“I am nervous about the meeting, yes. And I’m nervous because I don’t know how we are going to come up with the money to pay off this loan.”

Molly paused outside the closed door.

What loan?

“Let’s talk to Bill and see what can be worked out,” her Uncle Walt said softly.

“I would have talked to Bill a long time ago if I had known what was going on,” Hannah said curtly.

“Hannah, Robert told me he explained why —”

“I know,” Hannah interrupted, her voice less tense than before. “I’m sorry. I’m just anxious. I’ve been looking at the numbers this morning. They aren’t great. I’m worried we won’t be able to do this, Walt.”

Numbers? What numbers? Molly’s mind was racing. Was the farm in trouble? And if so, why hadn’t her parents told her?

Her hand hovered over the door handle and she thought about walking in and asking Hannah what was going on, but thought better of it. If her family wanted her to know what was going on, they’d tell her, and, to be honest, she felt too drained to add anymore to her mental que to think about.


Fiction Friday: The Farmer’s Daughter Chapter 13

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 16 Comments

As I’ve mentioned here before, I usually make changes to the final product from what I share here on the blog. I move chapters around, add parts, delete parts, fix typos (as best as I can), try to fill plot holes and simply tighten the writing before I kick it to Amazon or wherever I choose to publish it. I made changes from what I shared on the blog to both of my previous books, more to the second than the first one. I already know there are going to be a lot of changes to The Farmer’s Daughter before the final publication in the Fall of 2020 (you know, if the planet doesn’t catch fire by then with the way 2020 is going).

I also know that The Farmer’s Daughter is going to be one in a series, but I don’t know how long the series will be yet. It’s going to be at least three books so far, with a possible novella about Franny and Ned when they were younger. The first is, of course, The Farmer’s Daughter, the second will be The Librarian (which I sneak peaked here on the blog, but the final book will definitely change from what I shared as an excerpt here), and the third will be The Pastor’s Wife. I’m not sure where else I’ll go from there.

I don’t ever expect to be a successful or best-selling author. Honestly, I don’t care anymore. I used to. But . . . well, things change. Life changes and what we think is important in life changes. I’m just having fun now. I hope some of you are having fun reading what I’m writing and even if only a couple of people let me know they’re enjoying it, I’m okay with that. Anyhow, enough rambling, here is Chapter 13. It’s pretty long this week, but I decided not to break it into two parts.

You can catch up with the rest of the story HERE or at the link above.

Annie looked at herself in the mirror attached to the oak vanity in her bedroom and frowned. Then she wished she hadn’t frowned because when she frowned more wrinkles cut into the skin between her eyes and around her lips and even under her chin and down her throat.

She jutted her chin into the air, remembering how her mom had once advised her to lift her chin this way every day to help stretch the skin there, keeping it supple, smooth, and free of sagging. She hadn’t been consistent in the practice over the years, which must have been why wrinkles were beginning to form there and remind her of her age.

Touching her fingertips lightly on the slightly graying tips of her dark hair, Annie was transported to a time when her hair wasn’t beginning to show gray and lines didn’t crinkle at the corners of her eyes. A time when Robert Tanner had swept her off her feet by riding a horse up the hill to visit her after school each day.

Soft, warm kisses were exchanged underneath the apple tree and plans for the future were made while sipping lemonade and swinging on the front porch swing.

“How many children do you want?” Annie slid one leg up under her on the swing and turned toward Robert, anxious for his answer.

“I’ve never thought about it much, but I’d say at least two.”

Hair a mix of blond and brown fell over his forehead and he swept it back with his hand and smiled, looking at her to see if his answer had been the right one.

“A boy and a girl?”

“Sure.  Or just two boys to work the farm.”

Robert was still obsessed with the idea of being a farmer like his dad, but at least he wanted two children, just like her. She wanted one of each, though, or even two girls.

“Girls can work a farm just as well as boys,” she told him.

He’d grinned and stolen a kiss. “I’ll be happy whatever sex they are and how ever many they are, as long as I have them with you.”

Three weeks after graduation, Robert had begged their parents to let them get married.  His parents had told him: “If you think this is right, then you have our blessing.”

He approached Annie’s parents next. “Mr. and Mrs. Bentley, I know I’m only a poor farmer’s son but I love your daughter and I would do whatever I can to make sure she is taken care of, financially and otherwise.”

Her father, a machine operator for most of his life, who knew what it was to be poor and wanted more for his daughter, had refused. Repeatedly.

Her mother watched them together on the porch one night when they kissed good-bye with a fast burning passion and knew she needed to change her husband’s mind — and fast.

She turned toward her husband with wide eyes. “I have a feeling we’d better let those two get married or they may have to get married.”

Annie’s father, Leon, had looked at his wife with a bewildered expression.

“What are you saying, Eleanor?”

“I’m saying those two are about to burn up with desire for each other and I would rather they do so within the bonds of marriage.”

Leon had been shocked, embarrassed, and ready to grab Robert Tanner by the collar of his shirt and toss him in front of a combine, but he’d finally agreed with his wife. A wedding was set for the end of the summer.

Annie’s mom had been right. Three months after their wedding night, Annie was pregnant with Jason and at the age of 19 they were parents already. Molly came five years later after a couple of miscarriages that dashed the Tanners hopes of having a large family.

Those years had been tough years, of course, but Annie never regretted marrying Robert or having children at such a young age. She was grateful that Robert and God had been with her through it all. Annie pulled the pins from the bun she’d put on top of her head earlier in the day to keep the back of her neck cool. She let her long black hair fall around her shoulders and reached for the wrinkle cream she knew wasn’t really working but at least made her skin feel nice and soft.

She could hear how tired and sore Robert was even before she turned from her vanity mirror to look at him. His steps had faded to shuffles, each shuffle followed by a sharp intake of breath.

She exchanged the wrinkle cream for the pain ointment squirting it into her hand as she turned to face him.

She gestured toward the bed. “Sit on the edge over here so I can get this on your back.”

Robert grimaced as he lifted his shirt over his head and did as he was told. “Yes, ma’am.”

He winced, arching his back when cold lotion touched his skin. His muscles relaxed, though, when Annie’s hands pressed expertly in all the right spots, as if she could read his mind on where the pain was.

“Oh, that’s it. Right there,” he said, closing his eyes, enjoying the feel of her hands on his skin.

“You work too hard,” Annie said, her hands warm across his skin.

Robert laughed. “Is there such a thing as working too hard for a farmer? We don’t have a choice.”

Annie frowned as she rubbed the ointment into the skin on the back of his neck. “The news about Larry really shook me you know.”

Robert nodded, his eyes still closed. “Yeah. Me too.”

“Robert . . .” she slid her arms slowly down his shoulders and upper arms “You’d talk to me if . . . I mean, before you ever . . . if you ever get that down you’d —”

Robert turned quickly to face Annie, opening his eyes. “Annie. I’d never do that to you and the kids. Never. I’m not blaming Larry. I don’t know what was going through his mind that night, but I’m not doing that to you and the kids.”

He was startled to see moisture in Annie’s eyes as she studied his. “Sometimes when people are depressed,” her voice caught with emotion. “they do things they never thought they’d do.”

The skin on Robert’s palms were rough against her cheek but his touch was gentle as he cradled her face.  “Annie, I’ll never leave you that way. I promise. Do you hear me? I’ll never leave you that way.”

Annie nodded, tears spilling from her eyes, down her cheeks. Robert’s thumbs gently wiped the tears. He pressed his mouth against her forehead.

“I love you, Annie.”

“I love you too.”

She managed a smile and then closed her eyes to try to gather her emotions. His mouth warm and soft on hers was a pleasant surprise and she kept her eyes closed, reveling in a moment they found little time for anymore. She opened her eyes and smiled as he pulled away slightly, then flushed warm at the look of desire in his eyes, passion igniting where it often smoldered these days.

When his mouth was on hers again, his hands sank into her hair, pushing it back from her face. She leaned into him as the kiss deepened, hands against his chest, finding comfort in his bare skin as one hand slid down her back, resting in the small of it and the other roamed where the hands of long-time married men roam when they want to show their wives how much they still love and need them.

***

Molly’s breaths came out in short gasps as she pushed down on the pedals of the elliptical. How in the world did she let Liz talk her into this? Her muscles ached. Sweat pooled in places she didn’t even know she had places for it to pool. Her chest was constricting, but she was pretty sure she wasn’t going to die. Pretty sure anyhow. At least not yet. Thirty more minutes of this, though, and she would probably be leaving the gym in an ambulance.

 Liz, on the other hand, working out on the same equipment next to her, was smiling as she walked, watching some morning news show offering advice on “the latest fashions for the rest of your summer.”

Liz’s long dark hair was pulled back into a cute ponytail that bounced as she walked. Other parts of Liz were bouncing too but they were all the parts of a body that should bounce on a woman, unlike Molly who hated the way the extra weight on her bottom bounced as she lifted and lowered her legs.

Molly glanced to her right and caught sight of town librarian Ginny Jefferies, brilliant green eyes focused straight ahead, a determined expression on her face as she pedaled ferociously on a stationary bike. Molly couldn’t help wonder why she was at the gym. Tall and slender, Ginny seemed in better shape than most women her age, which Molly guessed to be between 50 and 55.

Maybe Ginny had gained a little weight in her belly and hips that only she could see, but it didn’t seem to Molly like she’d gained enough to be pedaling with so much drive. Then again, not everyone worked out to lose weight. Some wanted to maintain their weight or – Molly looked at Ginny’s scowl and tight jaw – simply get their frustrations out.

“How you doing?” Liz asked, barely out of breath.

“Just fine,” Molly gasped out.

“Pace yourself,” Liz offered. “You haven’t worked out in — how long has it been?”

Never, thought Molly.

“A while,” she gasped out loud.

Glancing in front of her, slightly to the left, she watched a barrel-chested man lift weights, his muscles rippling and straining with each curl. His workout tank was stretched tight against his bulging pecks and rippled six pack.

He was huge.

Too huge.

Molly didn’t like men whose muscles were so big they had to turn sideways to fit through a door. Jason was almost there, but not yet, thankfully. Alex wasn’t anywhere near that muscular. Sure, he definitely had well-toned biceps and his chest and back were sculpted in the image of near-pure masculine perfection as if they had been hand carved by an expert stone carver  —

Molly shook her head. Where had that come from? One minute she was wondering if this workout was going to kill her and the next moment she was remembering that day last week when Alex took his shirt off while lifting hay bales in the barn and she’d been unable to look away. She definitely needed to take a break and drink some water. She was beginning to lose her mind.

Snapping the top of the plastic bottle, Molly sat on a chair behind Liz and sucked half the bottle down. The water tasted more amazing than water had ever tasted to her before. In front of her, Liz’s tiny bottom was practically at Molly’s face level. Molly rolled her eyes, internally grumbling about how Liz had never struggled with her weight in the entire time they’d known each other.

Reflections of sunlight bounced across the gym equipment as the front door opened and someone walked in. Molly was too tired to see who it was. She tipped her head back and closed her eyes, wiping her face with the towel the man at the front desk had handed her when she’d signed in.

“What did Liz do, talk you into torturing yourself too?”

She opened her eyes and jerked her head up at the sound of Alex’s voice, her heart pounding. What was he doing here? Standing with the gym equipment as a backdrop, wearing a pair of dark sunglasses, a faded pair of jeans, a faded-white cowboy hat pulled down low on his head, and a black t-shirt that fit him amazingly he looked like he was on his way to a magazine shoot. He was insanely gorgeous, if she did say so herself and she was mortified that he was seeing her while rivulets of sweat traveled down her skin and onto her clothes.

 She didn’t want Alex to see her this way, even though he’d probably seen her just about as fat and sweaty as she was now when they were working in the barn together on those hot summer days. She stood and self-consciously pulled at her workout t-shirt as if she could pull it down enough to hide her bulbous bottom and thighs.

“Yeah, I guess,” she answered weakly, looking quickly at the floor. “It has been a bit torturous.”

She couldn’t see his eyes when she raised her gaze, but she felt him looking at her through the sunglasses. He propped his hands on his hips. “So, is this going to be a normal thing from now on? You working out?”

Molly shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe. It’s a good thing to get in better shape . . . I guess.”

Liz stepped off the elliptical, snatched her towel from the chair next to Molly’s and smiled. “Hey, Alex. I don’t usually see you here. What’s up? Here to work out?”

Alex snorted. “Yeah right. The only time you’ll see me exercising is if I’m running from something. Jason left his sunglasses here this morning after his workout. I was heading to the hardware store, so I told him I’d swing in and grab them.”

He looked back at Molly, slid his sunglasses off and hooked them in his shirt’s front pocket. “So, what? You’re doing this so you’ll look like a twig like Liz?”

“Hey!” Liz cried. “Unless saying I look like a twig is compliment, I take offense to that.”

Alex smiled sheepishly, a soft pink shading his chiseled cheekbones. “Sorry, Liz. You look great. Really. It’s just. . . well, not every woman has to look the same.”

Molly swallowed hard as Alex’s gaze returned to hers’. Her breath caught at the tone of his voice when he spoke, soft and tender. “I think you look fine already, Molly Tanner.”

He reached over and pushed a strand of hair that had fallen from her ponytail behind her ear, his expression serious, his fingertips grazing her cheek. Molly’s skin buzzed where his skin touched hers. She could barely speak, suddenly flustered.

“Well, it’s – it’s not all about looking different. Sometimes it’s just about feeling better.”

Alex laughed, the sunlight catching his sparkling blue eyes. “Do you feel better? You don’t look like you feel better. You look exhausted.”

Molly smiled weakly. “Well, I will feel better . . . eventually.”

Alex’s grin faded into a more somber expression. “Then keep it up, by all means.” He took a step closer to Molly and the intensity in his expression startled her as much as his earlier comment.

 “Just do it for yourself, okay?” he said softly. “Not for anyone else.”

Molly nodded, still trying to figure out why his tone had faded from teasing to serious. “Okay.”

Alex smiled again his eyes focusing on hers for a few seconds before he turned toward the front desk. “See you ladies later. I’d better get Jason’s sunglasses back to him before he goes blind in this sunlight.”

Molly’s heart was pounding and she knew it wasn’t only from the workout. Liz stood between her and her view of Alex.

“What was that?” Liz mouthed the words with wide eyes.

Molly shook her head and shrugged at the same time. “I have no idea,” she mouthed back.

And she truly had no idea. What alternate universe was she in right now?

“See you at the barn, Molly,” Alex called as he opened the front door. He slid his sunglasses back on, flashed a grin and waved quickly before walking onto the sidewalk. Molly’s eyes followed him as he walked toward his truck, losing sight of him when a delivery truck paused at the red light and blocked her view.

“Molly!” Liz practically screamed her name, though at a lower volume than an actual scream. “What. Was. That?!”

Molly rolled her eyes. “Oh, Liz. You know Alex. He’s just a huge . . .flirt, or goof, or however you want to say it.”

She turned to pick up her water bottle. Alex was a flirt. But why was he flirting with her?

Liz grabbed Molly by her shoulders as she turned back around. “Molly Tanner! That man is hitting on you! I heard him. He said you look fine. Like fine fine.”

“Liz . . .”

Liz waved her hand at Molly then held it a few inches from her face. “No. Not this time. You can’t explain what just happened away. Alex Stone was trying to tell you something.” She winked. “Like, for one, that he likes you just the way you are.”

Molly laughed at her friend, but had to admit the exchange had been . . . how would she even describe it? Odd? Strange? Tantalizingly awesome?

“Liz, I’m sure it was nothing. Alex is just super friendly and a big joker. I think he was just —”

“He was clearly hitting on you, Molly,” Ginny Jefferies interrupted as she walked by, water bottle in one hand and towel the other. She didn’t look back, opening the water bottle and drinking it as she walked to the front counter to sign out.

“See?” Liz said. “Even Ginny can see it and she’s — well, experienced and full of wisdom.”

Ginny laughed as she turned to face Liz and Molly, patting the back of her shoulder length, dirty-blond hair. “Good save, Liz. I was pretty sure you were going to say ‘old.’”

Liz laughed. “No, actually. I might have thought it, but I wasn’t going to say it.”

Ginny smiled and looked at Molly. “Molly, he’s hitting on you. From the limited amount I know about him, I don’t know if that’s a good thing, so — and let me get all motherly here for a moment — just be careful, okay?”

Molly nodded. “Thanks, Ginny. I appreciate it.”

Molly knew Ginny and her mom were around the same age and Ginny had daughters of her own. Her opinion may have been tainted by maternal tunnel vision, but she meant well.

“What do you know about Ginny?” she asked Liz when Ginny had left. “She seems so, ‘put together’ for lack of a better word. Most of the time anyhow. Lately, though, something seems off. She seems sad, or melancholy, or … I don’t know how to explain it.”

Liz waved her hand in front of Molly’s face, bringing her gaze back from watching Ginny walk down the sidewalk to Liz’s wide-eyed expression. “Don’t change the subject, Molly. What are you going to do about Alex?”

“I’m not going to do anything about Alex. I’m going to go home, take a shower, head to work at the farm store and later I’m going to go work with him in the barn like I always do.”

Liz sighed. “Molly. Molly. What am I going do with you?”

Molly smiled. “You’re going to buy me a cup of coffee before I head home. That’s what you’re going to do.”

Liz rolled her eyes. “Fine. But if I do that then you’re going to consider that Alex Stone may actually be interested in you as more than simply someone who can help him hook up the cows for the milking each day.”

She looked at Liz as they walked.

“Well, if you insist on making me talk about Alex, I’m going to make you talk about Matt. Are you going to go out with him again or what?”

Liz opened the door to the coffee shop and sighed. “I’m just friends with Matt. It’s not like that. He’s easy to talk to and I like hanging out with him but — he’s Matt. I just always think of him as a brother more than a boyfriend. Maybe because he is friends with Jason and I just remember him as that weird military obsessed guy from high school.”

“He’s a nice guy, Liz.”

“Yeah, I know, but he’s also a cop. I don’t know if I can date a cop. I mean, what if I develop more feelings for him and then I’ll just worry about him out there on the streets . . .”

Molly snickered. “On the streets of Spencer? Where what — he might get punched by a drunk guy down at Mooneys or get kicked by a cow?”

Liz turned from the list of coffee flavors behind the counter and tipped her head at Molly. “Molly, you really are naïve about what happens in this county aren’t you?”

Molly shrugged. “Probably, but I prefer being clueless.”

Liz ordered herself an herbal tea with honey and a dark chocolate mocha for Molly.

“I’ll make you a deal,” she said handing Molly’s coffee to her. “You agree  to talk to Alex about the firemen’s appreciation banquet and I’ll consider going out with Matt again. Deal?”

“Liz . . .”

“Molly . . .”

Molly rolled her eyes. “Fine. I’ll talk to him. But do more than consider going out with Matt. Just go out with him already.”

Liz finally agreed, but on her way back to her car she knew she couldn’t keep her promise to Molly. She couldn’t tell Molly the real reason she didn’t want to go out with Matt. It had nothing to do with him being someone she’d known in high school or even with him being a police officer. It had everything to do with the mistake she’d made and didn’t want Matt, or even Molly, to know about.

And Molly knew she couldn’t really talk to Alex about going to the firemen’s banquet. She didn’t want to risk the relationship they had – an easy-going, teasing friendship that she knew might evaporate if she made it look like she was interested in him in way other than a friend and co-worker.

A Special Fiction Saturday: The Farmer’s Daughter Chapter 11 Part II

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 3 Comments

I shared the first part of this chapter yesterday. You can find the rest of the chapters HERE.


And, guys (ladies mostly), let me tell you something! I just noticed on Amazon that I got my first negative review on my first book! It’s like a right of passage. I have a feeling I’ll get more because, well, I’m not the best writer ever, but I don’t even care. I know, you’re thinking: “What is wrong with this woman? She’s happy she got a negative review???”

Well, not necessarily, no, but I’m happy that it doesn’t bother me like it used to. In the last few years (especially since I lost my aunt in 2017) I have realized what is most important in life and what others think of me isn’t one of those things. I see the fact I’m not too worried about it and laughed while reading it as progress in my life.

As I read his words out loud to my son I just kept laughing: “It was free and it still cost too much.” I should be crushed, but everyone has different tastes and I’m just learning about all this writing stuff so I’m good with it. So thanks, Anthony, I needed that and the rest of your review (which went on a bit too long, if you ask me.) The fact I drove someone to sit and write a review, even a negative one, makes me smile. I do wish he’d given me a little more constructive criticism than it wasn’t worth his time, but, oh well, I’ll hope for a more passionate negative review in the future.



Alex breathed in deep the smell of hay and the musty smell of female cow as he leaned his head against the cow’s side while he hooked up the milking machine the morning after the rummage sale. Growing up in an urban area outside of Baltimore, he never thought he’d enjoy the comfort of a cow, the warmth of a barn on a crisp spring morning.

He didn’t have to look up to know Molly had walked in behind him. He clearly recognized her footsteps, something he had memorized, much like the way her nose crinkled slightly when she laughed and the way she blew her bangs out of her face when they fell across her forehead while she was working in the barn.

Her footsteps stopped behind him.

“So,” she said and he heard a tinge of aggression in just that one word. “What was that with Ben yesterday?”

Alex shrugged, keeping his eyes on his work.

“I was just harassing him.”

He stood, rubbed some dust off Daisy’s side, his back still to Molly.

“He seemed like a real jerk so I wanted to mess with him.”

Molly cleared her throat. “Well, yes, he is a little jerky – sometimes. I guess.”

She stopped short of asking him why he had acted as if they were dating. She felt the conversation they were having was awkward enough.

“Okay,” she said. “I need to start the milking on the other side, so . . .okay. And thanks for fixing the truck and driving it back to the house.”

Alex reached for the udder cream, not looking at her as he treated Daisy. “Yup. No problem.”

Molly turned away from him and rolled her eyes to the ceiling, silently mocking her anti-climatic exchange with Alex. She had intended to find out not only what the deal with Ben had been but what the recent change in his behavior toward her was about, especially since Liz had been pestering her with questions about it since yesterday during the rummage sale.

“Was he trying to act like you two were dating?”

“I don’t know.”

“Are you two dating?”

“No!”

“You would tell me if you were dating right?”

“Liz . . .”

“Well, would you?”

“Yes, Liz, but we’re not dating.”

“So, what was —”

“I have no idea, Liz.”

“You’re going to ask him, right?”

Molly had slapped her forehead against her hand while Liz watched her with wide eyes. “Yes. I will.”

And she had asked him.

He’d given her his answer and now she was going back to work in the barn. She was letting it go. She wasn’t going to push the issue.

Pausing at the bottom of the hayloft she leaned back against the ladder and let out a long breath.

She knew no matter how hard she tried she wasn’t going to be able to let it go, at least in her mind. She knew she’d keep wondering what was changing between her and Alex and if he noticed it too.

Fiction Friday: The Farmer’s Daughter Chapter 11 (Part 1)

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 4 Comments

Yes, Chapter 11 is broke up into two parts for the blog this week because, to me, this chapter is too long for a blog, but not too long for a book. No idea what I’m talking about? Me either, but I rambled about chapter size last week on the blog and still couldn’t decide how I feel about long chapters.

I will be sharing part two tomorrow because, quite frankly, some of my readers need a good, light distraction right now (and luckily my fiction isn’t too hard hitting.)

Anyhow, if you would like to catch up on the story, you can find the other chapters HERE. There are links to my other works of fiction at the top of the page, as well, including The Farmer’s Daughter, Quarantined (a short story), Rekindle (the start of another story story), and links to my two books for sale on digital platforms.

Alex woke from a sound sleep to someone pounding on the front door. It was his morning off from the barn. The morning Taylor Bundle came to help out and Alex got to sleep in but missed out on joking with Molly.

“Jason! Are you in there!? If you’re sleeping in, well, get up!”

Alex rubbed his eyes, listening to Molly yelling from the front porch. He threw the covers aside, hoping something hadn’t happened at the farm.

He staggered down the stairs in a pair of old sweatpants and it wasn’t until he had unlocked the door and swung it open that he remembered he’d forgotten to grab a shirt.

A strange rush of energy pulsated through the center of Molly’s chest at the sight of a bare-chested Alex standing groggily in the doorway.

“Hey,” he said, mid-yawn. “What are you doing here?”

“Um. Oh. Hey.”

Molly’s mouth was suddenly dry, and she felt a rush of warmth in her cheeks as she struggled to remember why she was standing on Jason and Alex’s front porch at this time of the morning. She seemed to have forgotten who she even was for a moment.

Good grief. Alex even looked good yawning. Her eyes fell on a small tattoo on the skin just below his tanned collarbone. An eagle sitting on a globe. All these years working with him and she’d never noticed he had a tattoo. She’d seen him with his shirt off before, but she’d never let her eyes linger. Why had she never let her eyes linger? She might have enjoyed the hard work in the barn more if she had.

She noticed he was looking at her, his hair ruffled, one eyebrow cocked, waiting for her to answer his question. He’d asked her a question. What was it again?  

“Oh. Yes. I was — I mean, I’m on my way, or I was on my way to the rummage sale but the truck broke down down the road and I didn’t want to, — well, Jason was closer than going back to get Dad so I was hoping I could talk to Jason.”

Alex yawned again and leaned against the door frame.

“He took Ellie out antiquing or something. I don’t remember what he said, exactly. I was sleeping. Or trying to. You want me to look at it?”

“No. Well, yes, but actually I need a ride to the rummage sale first. Mavis has me on the baked goods tables this morning and I don’t want to listen to her scold me about being late if I don’t show up on time. Any way you could drive me to town?”

Alex rubbed his fingers across his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose, willing himself to wake up more. Alone in the truck with Molly. While groggy.

This might be fun.

“Uh . . . yeah . . . just let me throw on a shirt and I’ll be right out.”

No need to throw on a shirt, Molly thought.

“Yeah, sure,” she said out loud. “No problem. Take your time. I’ve still got a bit before I’ve got to be there.”

Molly turned back toward the road as Alex shut the door and let out a long breath.

Take your time. Getting a shirt on. Covering up all that beauty.

What a way to start a day. First, a broke down truck, which was a bad start, but then seeing Alex shirtless, a definite improvement.

“Why would a woman from church scold you for your truck breaking down?” Alex asked when he climbed into his truck next to her ten minutes later.

He pushed his hand through his hair and, unfortunately, had pulled a t-shirt on. He was eating a piece of toast as he shifted the truck into drive and pulled onto the dirt road.

“What do you mean?”

Alex shrugged. “I mean, she’s a Christian. Shouldn’t she be all nice and stuff? And forgiving?”

Molly looked out the window and leaned against her hand. “Well, yeah, she should but . . . well, sometimes human nature gets in the way I guess.”

Alex shoved the last piece of toast in his mouth, talking with his mouth full. “She sounds like she should read her Bible more.”

Molly laughed. “A lot of us should read our Bible more, but yeah, she should.”

Fencing and cow pastures rushed by and Molly thought about how even she should be reading her Bible more.

“You should get rid of that truck, you know.”

Alex shifted topics of conversation as quickly as he did gears, and it made Molly smile as she looked at  him.

“Why?”

“It’s a piece of junk.”

“I like my piece of junk.”

“You could get a nice sedan or something.”

“Out here? And why? Because I’m a girl? So, you think girls shouldn’t drive trucks. Is that it?”

She smirked at Alex, waiting for his response. He looked out through the windshield, his arm hanging lazily over the steering wheel, grinning. She recognized that look well; a look that said he was about to roast her like he often did in the barn.

“You know it’s not because you’re a girl,” he said, not taking his eyes off the road. “You’re one of the manliest girls I’ve ever met.”

Molly didn’t even hesitate to ball her hand into a fist and smashing it straight into his upper bicep, her eyes narrowed and her jaw tight, but a small smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.

He laughed loudly. “What? You are! You burp louder than most guys I know, and I know women say they don’t fart but that time you blamed it on the cow? Yeah, I didn’t buy that for a second.”

“I didn’t fart!” Molly cried through the laughter. “It was Betsy!”
Alex was laughing harder now.

“That poor cow,” he said. “She gets blamed for so much of your gross behavior.”

“My gross behavior? You spit loogies on the ground all the time.”

“It’s not my fault I have an abundance of phlegm.”

She laughed and pushed at him gently with her hand.

“I didn’t need to know that, Alex Stone.”

Alex smiled, glancing at her, enjoying the sound of his name when she said it. They laughed for the rest of the drive, harassing each other about various sounds they’d made while working in the barn, or jokes they’d passed back and forth that probably shouldn’t have been said at all.

Molly wiped tears of laughter from her eyes as Alex pulled into the parking lot. She opened the truck door as he parked it in front of the basement door.

“Thanks for the lift,” she said climbing out. “I can get a ride home after I’m done.”

“I don’t know. Maybe I should come in and see if they’d have anything I’d want.”

Molly shut the truck door and leaned on it to talk through the window. “I doubt it, unless you need a new purse or some heels”

Alex shrugged. “I don’t need those, no, but Jason said they have some electronics this year. Maybe I’ll come check it out.”

“Okay,” Molly said, turning toward the church basement door. “I’m heading in. I’ll see you there.”

Alex leaned his head against his hand, smiling, watching her walk away for a few moments before pulling his truck into a parking space.

Inside, the baked goods table was already half-filled and the rest of the tables were set up and ready for customers.

“There you are!” Maddie whispered loudly when Molly approached the table. “I was afraid you weren’t coming and then I’d be stuck listening to Mavis complain all morning about your failure to keep commitments.”

Molly rolled her eyes. “She’d already started that speech, huh?”

Maddie nodded. “Of course. I’m heading back to the children’s section. Pray for me.”

“I definitely will.”

Molly straightened the cakes and cookies, displaying them along the table, separating each kind of cookie and each style of cake and then propping up the pies so people could see them better. She waited for the first customers of the day and watched Alex walk through the electronics aisle, looking over old computers and stereos.

On the tables spread across the basement, various items sat on tables for sale; old televisions, lamps, pots and pans, dishes, books, sunglasses, toys, video games, and even a motorcycle helmet. A few early birds were already perusing the merchandise that, if sold, would help the church with various projects throughout the year, including putting a new roof on the church.

Molly had attended the Spencer Valley United Methodist Church since she was a child up until a year ago. Her parents and grandparents had always attended the church. Molly, however, had fallen in love with a church across town that featured more upbeat music and a younger congregation over all. Even though she no longer attended the church she continued to help with fundraisers and other events, which was why she couldn’t avoid Mavis’ overly critical eye.

She liked the church and the other people who attended, though, including Maddie and the new pastor and his wife. Joe and Emily. They had arrived at the church a little less than a year ago, shortly after her grandfather passed away and about the same time her grandmother had stopped attending church.

Molly liked Pastor Joe’s easy going demeanor and outgoing personality and Emily’s sweet nature. Molly couldn’t pinpoint why but she felt a sadness in Emily when she talked to her and she wondered it was because Emily still felt out of place in her fairly new surroundings.

“Well, hey, I didn’t expect to see you here today.”

The familiarity of the voice made Molly turn her head to see if it could really be him. It could be and it was. Ben Oliver was standing in front of her with a broad smile, looking surprisingly even more handsome than the last time she had seen him five years ago at his grandmother’s funeral.

His hair was cut high and tight, his dark brown eyes sparkled, and a small dimple pricked the skin next to his mouth when he smiled.

She now wished she hadn’t rushed out of the house so quickly, throwing on a Confederate Railroad t-shirt and a pair of jeans and pulling her hair back into a loose ponytail on top of her head.

She tried to act non-plussed by his presence. “Ben, hey. What a surprise. Jason said you were in town.”

“Yeah, just came back a couple weeks ago.”

Molly decided to look busy. She straightened the cookies and stacked a couple of the pies. “Staying long?”

Ben nodded, watching her work. “For good actually. I’m opening a law office in Waverly.”

Waverly was a half an hour from Spencer Valley. And half an hour away from Molly, which she was fine with.

“Oh. So, you’ll be living there then?”

“I’m not sure yet. For now I’m living with my parents while I look for a place, either here or there. Actually, I’m here today with my mom.” He laughed. “She’s looking for a new purse.”

He smiled and picked up a bag of cookies. “Hey. You always made amazing cookies. Chocolate chip if I remember right.”

Yes, Ben, I did make cookies. For you. Like it mattered.

“Yep. I used to. I don’t really make cookies anymore.”

A woman with dark brown hair hanging down her back and a strained expression on her face approached the table. Two young children hopped up and down beside her while she held their hands tightly.

“I want the chocolate ones!” A little girl with blond curls cried.

“I want peanut butter!” Her brother said loudly as he hopped in place.

Molly guessed their ages to be about four and them to be twins. Their mother looked exhausted as she let go of their hands and struggled to open her change purse. “I’ll take one of each.”

Molly slid them across the table and accepted her money, watching them shove cookies into their mouth as they darted toward the toy section.

“Wow,” Ben said watching the children leave. “That was – well, a lot of energy.” He smiled at her and she felt the old familiar rush of warmth travel from her stomach to the top of her head.

“Did you make anything on this table?” he asked.

“Just some cakes with my mom. They’re the ones over there.”

“Oh man. Those are your mom’s cakes? I’m definitely getting one of those. Her cakes are one of the highlights of my youth.” He walked to the other side of the table and began to look through the cakes. Over his shoulder Molly saw Alex studying a laptop, his eyebrows furrowed in concentration.

This is insanely awkward, Molly thought to herself, unable to shake the memory of Ben’s comments about her the day in the convenience store. Stop pretending to be nice, Ben.

She was grateful to see Liz walking toward her a few moments later, a broad smile on her face, an attractive pink bag hanging over her shoulder.

“I told you I wouldn’t leave you to deal with Old Battleax on your own.”

Molly tilted her head toward Ben, her eyes wide.

Liz looked at Ben, back to her and then mouthed. “No way. Ben? What is he doing here?”

Molly shrugged and rolled her eyes. Liz flung her purse on the chair next to Molly and placed a hand on each hip. “Well, well, well,” she said loudly. “Benjamin Oliver. Surprised to see you show your face here in Spencer Valley again.”

Ben smiled broadly as he looked at Liz, the container carrying one of Annie’s chocolate cakes in his hand. “Liz! Hey! You look great!”

“Ben, hey. You still look like a jerk.”

“Liz!” Molly hissed.

Ben laughed softly and shook his head. “It’s okay, Molly. Liz has never liked me, if you remember.”

“Liz has never trusted you,” Liz shot back with a scowl. “And rightly so, I’d say.”

Ben slid the cake across the table toward Molly. “People can change, Liz. Learn from their mistakes.” He smiled tightly. “Don’t you think? Hey, how’s Gabe doing?”

Molly winced internally. This was getting messy.

“I left him,” Liz said coldly.

“Oh, well, see we do learn from our mistakes, I guess.” Ben smirked and Molly shook her head because it was apparent he still had his quick tongue.

Molly placed the cake in a bag, watching Liz and Ben watch each other, feeling the tension in the air.

“That’s $4.50,” she said quickly to interrupt the stand-off.

Ben’s charming smile had returned as he turned toward Molly, handing her a $5 bill. “Keep the change,” he told her. “It’s for a good cause. And listen, Molly, I’d really like to talk to you sometime. If you have time? I didn’t expect to see you here today, but I had planned to track you down at some point.”

Molly nodded outwardly but shook her head inwardly. “Yeah, sure, that would be fine. I’ll be around.”

Out of the corner of her eye she watched Alex sauntering toward the table, a used laptop under one arm and a cowboy hat propped on top of his own. As if the awkward moment couldn’t get even more awkward.

“Well, you were wrong,” he said to her cheerfully. “It turns out they did have a couple things I wanted.”

His gaze traveled from Molly to Liz’s tense expression and then to Ben standing awkwardly with a bag of cake in one hand and his wallet in the other.

“Oh, hey, did I interrupt something?” Alex asked.

“No, not at all,” Liz said. She tipped her head at Ben. “Ben here was just leaving.”

Ben? Alex looked Molly’s ex-boyfriend up and down, taking in his light blue polo shirt, tan khakis, brown leather belt and dark brown loafers. He wanted to laugh out loud. This was the great Ben Oliver? He definitely looked like a lawyer – overdressed, sneaky, and weak.

“Ben,” he said with a forced welcoming smile. “Nice to meet you. I’ve heard a lot about you.”

Ben looked surprised. “Oh? You have? I’m sorry. You are . . .”

“This is Jason’s friend Alex,” Molly said quickly. “He works for Dad.”

She cleared her throat and focused on some crumbs on the table, brushing them away.

“Ah, a farm boy, eh?” Ben grinned and looked from Alex to Molly. He winked. “Does he say ‘As you wish?’ to you?”

Molly’s face grew warm. She knew what Ben was referring to, especially because The Princess Bride had been her favorite movie to watch with him when they had been dating. Wesley, the farm boy, would always say “as you wish” to Buttercup, the farmer girl, when she’d ask him to fetch something for her, and in the book the author wrote that “as you wish” was code for “I love you.”

Ben had never said “as you wish” to her.

Molly started to speak, but didn’t even know how to respond. Was Ben mocking her? Was he mocking Alex? She wasn’t even sure at this point.

Alex laughed and slapped Ben on the back with one solid movement of his hand. “Oh, Ben. You’re just as witty as Jason and Molly described you. Of course, that’s what I say to Molly. I mean, who wouldn’t be honored to travel through the Fire Swamp with someone like Molly? Right?”

He smiled at Ben a little longer than Molly felt he needed to. She caught Liz smirking on the other side of Ben.

Ben laughed a laugh that sounded slightly nervous. “Right. Of course. Very funny.”

“Well,” Alex said with an exaggerated sigh. “I would love to stay here and talk more but I’ve got manure to shovel, cows to milk, hay to fork into the stables. You know, all those ‘farm boy’ things we ‘farm boys’ do.”

He turned quickly toward Molly and slid his hand under her elbow, leaning close to her. “I had fun this morning. See you later okay?”

He winked, brushed his mouth against her cheek, and walked through the door, leaving her and Liz staring at him in bewildered surprise.

“Oh,” Ben said after a few moments. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know you two were …”

“He’s just a co-worker,” Molly blurted.

Liz smothered a snicker behind her hand and sat in the chair behind the table.

Ben nodded and shrugged. “Oh, okay, well —”

“Molly, there are more cakes in the kitchen that need to be brought out.”

Mavis’ spoke over Ben and Molly was grateful for the interruption.  

“No problem, Mavis. I’ll be right there.” She turned to face Ben. “I’m so sorry. Duty calls. Catch up later?”

Ben nodded. “Yeah. Yeah. Sure. No problem.”

Molly walked quickly back toward the kitchen, her face ablaze with shock, embarrassment, and confusion. First, seeing Ben out of the blue and then Alex acting weird.

What in the world was Alex even doing? Was he trying to make it look like they were dating? For what purpose? For whose benefit? For hers? For Bens?   . . . for his? She didn’t know what he was doing but she knew she was going to have to talk to him about it later at the barn. And Molly knew Liz was going to want to talk about it as soon as she arrived back at the table with the extra cakes

Fiction Friday: A New Beginning, Chapter 2 Part I

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 6 Comments

Just issuing a “warning” again: If you haven’t read the first part of Blanche’s story, A Story to Tell, you might not want to read A New Beginning, which is the second part of her story. You can find the first part of Blanche’s story on Kindle or in Paperback, on Amazon (after December 17 it will be on all ebook readers and on other paperback sellers). However, you don’t have to read the first part to be able to enjoy A New Beginning.

As always, this is the first draft of a story. There will be typos and in the future, there will be changes made, some small, some large and as before I plan to publish the complete story later as an ebook. Also, sorry about the lack of indentations at the beginning of paragraphs. I can’t seem to figure out how to make that happen in WordPress.

Light, Shadows & Magic (2)Chapter 2

Standing on the front steps of the church, Daddy was sliding his fingers into his front shirt pocket while he looked out over the parking lot and pulling them out again. He looked lost and I knew why. He missed the pipe Mama had talked him into giving up three months earlier, and was reaching for it out of habit. I’d seen him do it many times before.

He was still struggling with what to do with himself when the women in his life left him waiting. In the past, he’d pass the time loading the tobacco, lighting the pipe and puffing away, starring into space and thinking, or if he was at home, reading a book or the paper. I almost felt sorry for him. Mama had recently read in Life Magazine about smoking being dangerous and she wasn’t about to watch him smoke his way into an early grave, she told him one night after dinner.

I watched from the church lobby as John Hatch walked through the front door and stood next to Daddy, sliding a cigar from his front shirt pocket and sticking it in the corner of his mouth as he dug in his jacket pocket for a lighter.

“Still no pipe, eh, Alan?”

“Nope.”

“You know you can stand up to your wife, right? You are the man of the house.”

“Yeah. I know. I just – well, I don’t want to. Plus, she’s probably right. Smoking probably isn’t healthy, like those doctors have been saying.”

John flicked the lighter and held the flame to the end of the cigar. He sucked in a long drag, blew a plume of smoke from his nose and mouth and let out a long, contented sigh.

“There are few pleasures left in life at our age, Alan, and no one is going to tell me what I can’t smoke or drink. Besides, all those studies are usually bunk anyhow. They’ll come out with a new one next year that will tell us all that smoking is actually healthy. Those scientists and doctors are always changing their minds.”

Daddy watched John with what looked to me like an envious expression.  He nodded as John spoke.

Someone bumped against my arm and I watched as John’s wife Barbara stepped briskly through the front door, snatched the cigar from her husband’s hand and tossed it over the stair railing.

“Are you out here smoking on church property?” she asked indignantly.

“Well, I – well, I –“ John stammered.

“John Hatch! Really!”

Barbara shook her head and shot John a scolding scowl on her way past him.  “That’s so disrespectful,” she mumbled as she stomped down the stairs.

“You know, John, you can stand — ” Daddy started.

“Yeah, yeah. Well, sometimes it’s just not worth the battle. Have a good day, Alan.”

Daddy winked at me through the doorway as John walked down the stairs looking defeated and I smiled back at him, shaking my head as I tried not to laugh.

Jackson tugged at my hand.

“When we going to Aunt Emmy and Uncle Sam’s?” he asked. “I’m hungry. That preacher just kept going on and on and – “

“That’s enough Jackson,” I said, glancing up at Pastor Steele, who was standing by the door, watching Jackson and stifling a laugh behind his hand.

Mama walked toward me, her purse looped over her arm, her Bible tucked against her chest under the other arm. “Are we ready to head on over to Emmy’s for some lunch?”

I felt my stomach tighten. I truly hoped the planned afternoon lunch at Emmy’s was nothing more than her attempt to introduce her cousin to some people in town and not to “fix me up” in some way. She’d promised me it wasn’t, but maybe she’d changed her mind since then.

Emmy’s parents, James and Ellie Stanton, were already at Emmy’s house when we arrived.

Ellie, her greying hair cut short and curled in a tight perm, hugged me as I walked inside. “Blanche, sweetie, so happy you could make it.”

She ruffled Jackson’s hair. “And look at you, you’re getting’ so big!”

“Hey, Mrs. Stanton! I’m six now!”

“I know you are! I can’t even believe it. Just three more months and you’ll be in my class in school! I can’t wait to see you every day.”

Jackson grinned and then darted past Ellie to pet the Stanton’s aging terrier.

Ellie was the kindergarten teacher at Dalton Elementary. She’d taken the job shortly after her family had moved here from North Carolina when her husband took a job at the local DuPont plant. When James was laid off three years year after they arrived, he started a construction business, relying on the skills he’d learned as a young man when he had worked for a local construction company in high school.

“Emmy’s in the kitchen and I’m sure Edith and Jimmy will he here soon,” James said as he closed the front door behind us.

In the kitchen Emmy was standing at the counter, slicing carrots for the salad. When she saw me, she laid her knife down and walked over to hug me, then gestured to a tall, broad shouldered man leaning against the counter. I hadn’t noticed him until I’d stepped all the way through the kitchen doorway.

“You remember J.T., don’t you, Blanche?”

The man standing before me looked nothing like the little boy I remembered from my childhood. I remembered a scrawny child with a long neck and narrow chin, reddish brown hair that stuck out in all directions, and a face that begged to be slapped. This man was muscular with a square, masculine jawline. The blue eyes were in sharp contrast to dark brown, almost black hair. His smile was inviting and warm, far removed from the childish smirk I remembered.

He held out his hand. “Hey, Blanche. I go by Judson now actually. J.T. is what my family still calls me though.”

“Ah, yes, family nicknames,” I said as I took his hand. “Always a challenge to shake.”

His hand was warm around mine, his palms rough from what I imagined were years of working construction.

“Actually, I’ve seen you since we were kids, but you probably don’t remember,” he said.

He was right. I didn’t remember meeting him since we were older. I was sure I would have remembered him if I had. That charming smile, coupled with a well filled out chest and arms weren’t something that could easily be forgotten as far as I was concerned.

“Oh?”

“At your sister’s wedding. We had a deep conversation about the lack of diversity in the desserts of our respective regions of the country. I was up visiting for a couple of weeks with my parents and Emmy had invited me to tag along.”

Suddenly I remembered the exchange – an exchange held when I was in the midst of one of the most confusing times of my life, imprisoned in a loveless, abusive marriage and unsure what to do about it. My distracted mindset would have accounted for my failure to notice Judson’s appearance at the time.

“Yes, we did!” I said. “Cottage cheese fruit salad for us up north and red velvet cake for the South.”

I chose not to add how I’d admired his sweet personality and his smooth Southern accent the day I had briefly spoke with him at Edith’s reception, wishing my husband had been as sweet.

Judson laughed. “That’s right. See? It was very memorable and deep.”

I laughed and then realized we were still holding hands. I pulled my hand away and out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw Emmy watching me with a sly grin. I refused to look at her fully, promising myself that if she was watching me for the reason I thought she was, I’d bow out of this lunch early and give her a piece of my mind later.

“Do you need any help in here?” I asked Emmy.

She tossed the carrots into the salad bowl with the lettuce and turned to check the roast in the oven. “I’ve got everything under control for once. Why don’t you two head out to the living room to visit with Sam and everyone else?”

Emmy’s husband was already entertaining my parents and his in-laws with stories from his job as a deputy for the county sheriff department. His brown eyes were glistening with the exhilaration of regaling friends with his occupational escapades.

“I’m not even kidding,” he said, shaking his head. “I pulled up to the accident and the guy is just sitting there on the ground, empty beer cans all around him. He’s bleeding from the head and I said, ‘Sir, have you been drinking tonight?’ He looks up at me and in a slurred voice says, ‘No, sir, officer, sir. I don’t even drink. Not me. Noooo, sir.’ Meanwhile he wreaks of alcohol, I’m crunching empty beer cans under my boots, and his motorcycle is wrapped around a tree.

“He can’t even stand up for the sobriety tests, he was nowhere near his nose and he was zig zagging everywhere. I said, ‘Sir, you’re sure you haven’t been drinking? It would be easier if you just told the truth.’ He says, ‘Sir, I am a staunch teetotaler. I would never, ever, ever…’ and that’s when he tripped and blacked out at my feet. We loaded him into the back of the squad car and threw him in the cell for the night to dry out.”

Edith and Jimmy arrived in the middle of Sam’s next story. After everyone was introduced, Emmy’s roast with steamed potatoes and carrots was served.

Emmy stood at her chair at the end of the table and our gazes all shifted to look at her as the meal finished. “So, everyone, I’m sure you’re wondering why I invited you all today and yes, partially, I invited you to meet J.T. and welcome him to our little town, but I – we –“ She reached for Sam’s hand before continuing, squeezing her fingers tight around his. “also have some other news I want to share with you. Sam and I are . . . expecting!”

An audible celebration filled the room and hugs were given. I was elated at the idea of my best friend having a baby, but I also felt a twinge of sadness, knowing the news might be difficult for at least one person in the room. From across the table I saw Edith’s smile fade briefly as she swallowed hard and I knew she was trying to hold back the tears. The smile returned as quickly as it had faded, though, as she stood to hug Emmy.

“I’m so happy for you!” Any sign of the tears were now gone, and I knew she was happy for Emmy, but I also knew there was an ache deep inside her.

After dinner, Emmy served her mother’s famous double chocolate cake and then everyone stood and stretched, patting bellies, and settled in the living room to resume discussions they’d started around the table. Jackson settled in the middle of it all, on the floor with the toy trucks he’d brought with him. The soft hums of pretend engines acted as background noise for conversations about memories of the year before when President Kennedy had been shot, the Civil Rights movement and Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s latest speech.

I carried my glass of lemonade onto Emmy’s front porch for some fresh air, sitting on the porch swing to admire the afternoon sun glistening off the surface of the stream running alongside Emmy and Sam’s front yard. Next to the stream was a small path that led to a gazebo where Emmy and Sam could sit and overlook their property, complete with a small chicken coup out back and a barn to house a horse and a few pigs.

Emmy and Sam had moved to this small rural homestead two years ago, opting to live outside of the small-town atmosphere where Emmy had spent most of her junior high and high school years, living with her parents in a large home on Main Street. She was now living in the country, five miles away from my parents’ home, and we were as close friends as we’d been before I’d left with Hank. We spent our evenings either on the phone or taking a walk in the country to talk and laugh. During the days, Emmy visited me at my shop on her breaks from her job as the secretary for her dad’s construction company or we had lunch at D’s Diner down the street.

She was the main person I had relied on for support during the darkest days after I left Hank, other than Miss Mazie and my friend’s Hannah and Buffy, who I had called often since I’d left.

“Do you mind if I join you?”

I looked up to see the sun hitting Judson’s blue eyes as he stepped onto the porch with a glass of lemonade.

“Of course, not. There’s plenty of room on the front porch.”

Judson smiled and I felt an odd rush in my stomach. Shifting my gaze back to the stream, I willed the feeling away. I didn’t know anything about the man Judson was now and I refused to be swept up by physical attraction like I had been with Hank all those years ago.

Judson leaned back against the railing of the porch and took a sip of the lemonade. “So, tell me Blanche, what have you been up to all these years?”

How did a divorced single mom who’d run away with an older man two weeks before her senior year of high school answer such a question? Lie or be honest? I chose to be what I hadn’t been for so long – honest and blunt.

“I dropped out of school, ran away with an older man, got married, had a son and got divorced. Now I live with my parents and my son and work as a dressmaker. I also write a column about smalltown life for the local newspaper.” I paused to sip from the glass of lemonade, winking at Judson over the edge of the glass. “That’s my Rebel Without a Cause story. So, how about you, J.T. Waignwright. What have you been doing all these years?”

I pronounced Judson’s name with an over exaggerated Southern accent and a slight wag of my head, grinning.

Judson choked back a laugh and I thought he was going to spit lemonade out his mouth and nose. He coughed and then grinned. “Well, okay then. That’s one way to fill me in. I can tell that you’re no longer the shy little girl I remember from my childhood.”

I laughed. “Definitely not shy. Sometimes life forces us to change to survive.”

Judson studied me for a moment, then smiled as his eyes trailed from my face down the rest of me and back to my face again. “You’re also not the scrawny wisp of a girl with the big hair anymore. I remember Emmy telling me at the reception who you were, and I didn’t believe it. You had definitely changed –.” His grin widened. “For the better.”

I felt my muscles tense at his comments. I hoped he wasn’t trying to flirt. I wasn’t interested in flirting. I leaned my head against my hand, my elbow propped on the arm of the swing, remembering how tough my life had been at the time of the reception. “I wasn’t in the best place in my life back then.”

Judson nodded. “You didn’t look very happy that day.” His eyes focused on mine, his expression serious. “But you still looked lovely in that lavender dress with the purple lilies tucked in your hair.”

Warmth rushed from my chest into my cheeks as I lifted my head and studied his face for a few moments before abruptly looking past him at the oak tree in the front yard. I hoped my cheeks weren’t showing the embarrassment I felt. How had he remembered what I was wearing that day or what kind of flowers were in my hair?

“Thank you,” I mumbled, unsure how to handle the compliment.

Judson cleared his throat and sat up on the porch railing, leaning back against the support post.

“So, what about me? What have I been up to, you asked. Well, I played football in high school. It knocked that obnoxious attitude I’d had as a young kid out of me – I’m sure you remember that attitude from the summers I spent here with Emmy. I was named quarterback of the year for the state of North Carolina my senior year. My dad was sure I was on my way to play college ball, complete with scholarships.

“He already had my life mapped out for me. He was sure I’d have a stellar football career, earn my business degree and then follow him into the world of supermarkets – opening them, running them and making sure his chain grew. I got that scholarship, started playing ball at the University of North Carolina, and I even started business school, but I realized pretty quickly it wasn’t what I wanted. None of it. I hated football and I hated business school. I quit the football team and dropped out of college. I thought Dad was going to have a stroke.”

He laughed at the memory and took another drink of lemonade.

“I wanted to go to a trade school to learn how to build things, like Uncle James. It was a hobby of mine in high school that had started to become more of a passion. Daddy kicked me out of the house, so I got a job at a tobacco farm and moved into a run-down apartment over some guy’s garage. I paid my own way through trade school. When I wasn’t in class, I was in the fields and when I wasn’t in the fields I was in class or studying. It was a two-year program and when I was done training, I was offered a job with a local construction company. I worked there about a year, but when I told Uncle James about my interest in running my own construction company one day, he offered to let me come up here and work with him for awhile, learn the ropes. Since my dad was barely talking to me, I took the offer and here I am.”

He spread his arms out, bowed slightly and smiled.

“That’s my story and I’m sticking to it,” he said.

“Well, welcome,” I said. “I hope it all works out the way you hope.”

He sat next to me on the swing, leaned back and draped his arm over the back of the swing.

“So, what’s everyone do for fun around here?” he asked. “I’m not sure I’ll have much time for fun with all the jobs Uncle James has lined up in the next few months but if I do, I’d like to know what I can look forward to.”

I snorted out a laugh. “This is Bentley County. There isn’t much to do for fun. You could tip some cows I guess.”

Judson grinned. “Tipping cows sure sounds like a good time to me, unless one gets tipped on me. But come on. There must be a theater, a dance hall or two, something like that.”

“Yes, there is a theater and sometimes there are dances at the fire hall. And there is a drive-in about an hour north in New York state.”

Judson turned his body toward me and leaned forward slightly.

“So, tell me, Blanche Robbins, what do you do for fun?”

I barely had time to even ponder the question, let alone answer it.

“Mama?” Jackson’s voice called to me from the living room. “Aunt Edith says to ask you if I can have some ice cream.”

I smiled and winked, nodding toward the front door. “Fun? What’s that? I’m a mama. There’s no time for fun.”

“Yes!” I called through the open screen door. “Tell Aunt Edith you can have some ice cream.”

Judson was still watching me, still smiling. “Well, Blanche, if you ever find that you do some time for fun, I’d be much obliged if you’d let me know so maybe we can search this county high and low for something fun to do together.”

There was no question now Judson T. Waignwright was flirting with me. I cleared my throat and stood.

“I think I’ll have some ice cream with Jackson.”

I left Judson sitting on the porch swing, hoping he took my departure exactly as I meant it – a signal to him that I wasn’t interested in any romantic gestures he might be making.

Fiction Friday: A New Beginning Chapter 1

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 9 Comments

This is a warning: If you haven’t read the first part of Blanche’s story, A Story to Tell, you might not want to read A New Beginning, which is the second part of her story. You can find the first part of Blanche’s story on Kindle or in Paperback, on Amazon (after December 17 it will be on all ebook readers and on other paperback sellers). However, you don’t have to read the first part to be able to enjoy A New Beginning.

As always, this is the first draft of a story. There will be typos and in the future, there will be changes made, some small, some large and as before I plan to publish the complete story later as an ebook.

You can find links to each chapter HERE, or at the top of the page.

 

Light, Shadows & Magic (2)Five years later I could still vividly remember the moment I broke Hank Hakes’ nose with my foot after he broke mine with his fist. I still heard the sick crunch of his bones under my heel like it was yesterday and could still clearly see in my mind his glazed eyes before they closed and his face fell into a pool of blood on the carpet.

I knew if I didn’t remember how Hank had beat me and I had fought back, I might let my walls down, and then my son and I would be left vulnerable again. I wasn’t about to let that happen.

Maybe that’s why I was so uncomfortable when my best friend Emmy Lambert said she couldn’t wait for me to meet her cousin from North Carolina. The truth was, I had met J.T. Waignwright years before, when we were both children, and the memory wasn’t one that overwhelmed with me an interest to meet him again. He’d been a scrawny kid with big ears, messy brown hair, and freckles all over his dirt-smudged nose. He had also been loud, obnoxious and downright rude. Imagining that in a 27-year-old man wasn’t making the meeting any more appealing for me.

“This isn’t an attempt to set you up, Blanche, I promise,” Emmy insisted. “J.T. is moving up to work with daddy in his construction business and I just want to introduce him to some people up here. I’ve invited your sister and brother-in-law and your parents too.”

I finally agreed to attend the dinner, hoping Emmy would change the subject.

Emmy tapped her finger against her chin, her eyes focused on the ceiling. “But, if I was setting you up, J.T. would definitely be a good one. He’s handsome, well-built, a former football player, and Southern, which is always a plus. . . .”

I knew Emmy had added the Southern reference because she was originally from North Carolina as well.

“Emmy, you know I’m not interested in dating anyone.”

“Okay. Okay. I was just saying…in case you change your mind.”

“I can assure you, I won’t, Emmy.”

Emmy sighed. “Blanche, you have to get back on the dating horse some day.”

“Do I really? Jackson and I are happy the way things are now. We don’t need anyone messing things up for us.”

“But what if a man simply adds to your happiness? Not every man is like Hank, you know.”

I handed Emmy the papers Daddy had asked me to drop off for Emmy’s father and smiled. “That’s something we can discuss another time. I’m meeting Edith back at the shop for a dress fitting.”

Stepping out onto the street into the sunlight I paused and smiled, shaking my head as I laughed at how Emmy had tried to “sell me” on her cousin. I knew she meant well and wanted to see me happy, but I was among the few in my life who didn’t feel I needed a man to make me happy.

Not long after my conversation with Emmy, I was in my small sewing shop with my older sister while she tried on the dress I had made her.

“Oh, Blanche! I just love the dress!”

Edith twirled in front of me, the bottom of the dress swirling around her in a blur of dark red.

She slid her hands down the front and resting them on her hips, she admired herself in the full-length mirror. “Do you think Jimmy will like it?”

I stuck the pin I had been holding between my lips into the pincushion next to the sewing table and stood, admiring the view of my older sister filling out the dress I’d made for her. I didn’t have to look at how it fit her to know her husband was going to love the dress she was wearing.

“He likes anything you wear, you know that. You could wear a garbage bag and he’d fall all over himself trying to get to you.”

Edith tipped her head back and laughed, dark curls spilling across her bare shoulders. “You think so? Even with all this weight I have on my hips?”

“I know so.”

Edith turned, admired herself in the mirror by looking back over her shoulder, eyes traveling down below her waist.

“It doesn’t make my – “

“Your bottom is fine,” I said with a laugh. “But I can loosen the fabric a little in that area if you like.”

Edith wrinkled her nose and tipped her head to one side as she studied her reflection. “Nah, I think this is going to work fine for our anniversary dinner. More than fine. You’ve done such a beautiful job, Blanche. Thank you so much.”

Edith had always been beautiful, but she never seemed to believe it. As a teen and young adult, she’d always needed some sort of reassurance that she was beautiful and wanted. At one time in our lives that reassurance came from the attention of boys – lots of boys. But six years ago, Edith began to see herself through the eyes of someone more important than the next boy in line – God. When she realized God loved her for who she was – faults and all – her opinion of herself shifted and she began to understand that she was loved – not for what she did or how she looked, but for who she was inside. Even with that realization Edith still had days she worried about her appearance. What was different now was that she worried exclusively about how one specific person saw her – her husband, and one-time high school sweetheart, Jimmy Sickler.

I unfurled a roll of fabric, spreading it across the cutting table. “Allie Davenport wants a summer dress in this fabric, what do you think?”

Edith snorted, tipped her chin up slightly and looked at herself in the mirror, pulling the top of the dress slightly down to reveal her shoulders

“I think Allie should worry more about the fact that everyone in town knows she’s running around behind Larry’s back with Jason Taylor than a summer dress.”

“Edith! That’s awful!”

“I know it’s awful. Larry proposed to her only a month ago – she’s going to break his heart.”

Edith had changed a lot since we were children, especially after she had started attending church more and even more so when she married Jimmy, but she still possessed a tendency to gossip and judge.

“God’s still working on me,” she liked to remind me.

I knew what she meant. God had been working on me as well in the last five years and he still had a lot of work to do. There were many days I looked at myself in the mirror, measuring tape hanging around my neck, pencil tucked behind my ear, and laughed at the irony of someone who had once hated sewing now working as a dressmaker. As a teenager, I couldn’t thread a needle, let alone create an entire fashionable outfit for the women in town or hem pants for the men. While I had once silently cursed the idea of attending sewing classes with my mom and sister, sewing was now supporting me and my 6-year old son Jackson.

“So, why do you think Emmy wants you to meet her cousin?” Edith asked, still admiring the dress in the mirror.

“She says she just wants to reintroduce him to us so he knows some people in town now that he’s moved up here to work with her dad,” I said. “But she’s probably like everyone else who thinks Blanche needs a man to fix her life.”

Edith frowned as she turned to look at me, then pursed her lips together in a disapproving expression. “Everyone? I’ve never said you need a man to fix you, so not everyone says that.”

I sighed as I folded the fabric for Allie’s dress and laid it on a shelf behind me. “Well, Mama and Daddy and Emmy then. Not you. Still, I don’t know why they all don’t understand that I like life the way it is right now. I’m content. Jackson is happy. We’re doing well.”

Edith folded her arms and leaned back against the sewing table, a smile tugging at her lips. “And you don’t have to let anyone in and risk being hurt again. Good plan.”

I playfully tossed a rolled-up piece of tissue paper at her. “Hush your mouth, as Emmy always says.”

Edith laughed. ‘Well, it’s true and you know it is.”

The front door to the shop opened and our father stepped inside, briefcase in hand, grinning as he saw Edith trying to reach to unzip the dress from behind.

“Well, you look nice, Edith,” he said. “Special occasion?”

Edith smirked and shook her head, tugging at the zipper. “Daddy…you know it’s Jimmy and my anniversary next week.”

“Oh? Is it? You’ve only mentioned it ten times in the last few days. I must have forgot.”

Edith playfully slapped her hand against Daddy’s shoulder as she walked past him toward the changing room. “Very funny, Daddy.”

“You ready to head home, kid?” he asked me. “Mama’s making fried chicken for dinner and I bet she’d love a break from that crazy kid of yours.”

I laughed, knowing my mama never called my son crazy and loved the days she was able to spend with him, playing with him, cooking him lunch and helping him prepare for Kindergarten, which he would start attending in a few months.

“I’m anxious to see him,” I said, gathering my measuring tape, scissors, and extra thread spools and shoving them in the top drawer of the sewing table. “But I doubt Mama wants a break from him.”

Daddy smiled. “I have to agree. She does love that boy.”

Edith stepped out of the dressing room in a button-up pink shirt and a flared light blue skirt, hooking her long, curly hair into a ponytail. “Speaking of being anxious to see someone, I’ve got a husband to head home to and cook up some dinner for.”

She hugged me quickly and kissed Daddy’s cheek. “Thanks again, Blanche. I’ll swing by next week to pick it up. I don’t want Jimmy to see it until that night.”

Locking the door to the shop, I thought about how I’d spent the first year after my divorce floundering, trying to get my footing as a single mom at the age of 20. I stayed home with Mama, helping her cook and clean and care for Jackson, but rarely left home, even for church, keeping myself emotionally locked up in the solitude of shame. Eventually, I took a part-time job at the library, began attending church again and visiting the sewing circle meetings with Mama on Wednesday nights. I also started writing a column for the local newspaper.

I’d left the library job when Doris Thompson asked me if I’d be interested in helping her in the sewing shop. I agreed and a year later Doris semi-retired, working three days a week at first and then one day. Six months ago, she’d signed the business over to me and remained on as landlord only, collecting a reasonable monthly rent from me.

“I have to stop and drop my column off to Stanley before we head out,” I called to Daddy over my shoulder, walking down the sidewalk and sliding a folded stack of papers out of my handbag.

Daddy grunted and looked disgusted as he opened the driver’s side door. “I’ll wait for you in the car. I can only feign politeness for so long with that man.”

I grinned as I walked, remembering Daddy’s dinner rant a few months ago about editor Stanley Jasper’s editorial about the war in Vietnam.

“What’s that fool even talking about, saying we should get involved in the conflict over there?” Daddy said, fuming as he read the paper. “There is no way we should be sending our boys over there. Who does that man think he is? Moves in here from the city and then acts like he knows it all. I am telling you – I have half a mind to go into that office and tell that editor what an ignoramus he is.”

And Daddy did go into the newspaper office, but he came out even angrier than when he’d gone in. Stanley’s name was off-limits most days and Daddy wasn’t thrilled with me submitting a column to the newspaper but said maybe my lifestyle column would help to offset the drivel Stanley typed out on the opinion page each Sunday.

The newspaper office was buzzing with the noise of reporters on the phone, typewriter keys clicking, the press in the back running, and sports reporters commenting on the latest home run by Mickey Mantel.

“Latest column, Blanche?”

Reporter Jerry Simms looked up from his typewriter, sliding a pencil behind his ear. He jerked his head toward Stanley’s office door on the other side of the office. “You know the drill. Hand it to Stanley so he knows it’s here.”

Stanley wasn’t originally from Dalton. He’d grown up in Philadelphia and was a transplant, referred to by many in the county as a “flatlander,” a term used affectionately when people agreed with him and with a sneer when they disagreed with him.

Stanley’s brown hair was speckled with gray and disheveled, as usual. His jawline was unshaven, circles darkened the skin under his eyes, and his clothes were wrinkled, his shirt untucked.  He was sitting where he usually was when I come in to drop off my column, behind his desk in the middle of a cloud of cigar smoke. Leaning back in a large leather chair, his feet were propped on top of the desk, a sheet of paper in one hand, the cigar in the other. He moved the paper to one side as I stepped inside the door and stuffed the cigar in the corner of his mouth.

“Good column last week, Blanche,” he said around the cigar. “I never thought I’d get so caught up in the story of a pregnant cat.” He shrugged and pulled the cigar from his mouth, holding it between his index finger and thumb. “Small town people eat that stuff up. Who knew?”

I wasn’t sure if the comment about small-town people was meant to be a compliment but I chose to accept it as one since it was as close as Stanley was probably going to get about a column he saw as “soft news.” In journalism lingo, soft news was considered low priority and traditionally thought of as inferior to the harder news. From what I could see, though, it was often the “soft news” that created more of a buzz at the local diner in a small town each morning.

“Well, this week we have an update on the cat and her kittens,” I said. “I’m sure the small-town folk you speak of will love that too.”

The newspaper’s typesetter Minnie Wilkes sashayed her way into the office and snatched the column from the top of Stanley’s desk.

She turned and looked at me with bright green eyes and long, dark eyelashes, made even darker by heavy, black eyeliner and brown eye shadow. “Hey, Blanche. I love typesetting your column. It’s way more interesting than the political stuff Stanley writes.”

Stanley rolled his eyes. “Thank you, Minnie. Your opinion is duly noted, though not asked for.”

Minnie winked at me as she walked out of the office again.

Stanley stuffed the cigar back in his mouth and moved the stack of papers he was holding back in front of his face.

“Keep up the folksy stuff, Blanche. It sells papers. And that’s what we’re in the business of doing, selling papers.”

Outside the office, standing in the sunlight I looked out at the town I’d gone to high school in and sighed. In front of me was the town square, a gazebo in the middle of it. Behind it was one of the oldest banks in the state, Community State Bank, and next to the bank was the Dalton Theatre, built-in 1893 and only slightly renovated since then. Down the other end of the street next to me was Bert’s Pharmacy and a few blocks over was Holden’s Supermarket. Across the street from the supermarket was the post office and two blocks away from the post office was the building where I’d spent many of my days after school, waiting for Daddy to finish at the office and drive us home  – The Dalton Public Library.

I’d never felt like I’d fit in at school or in this town and that feeling was even more prominent after I’d left Hank and returned. There were days I was sure I could feel the judging eyes of people on me when I walked into Bert’s Pharmacy or Holden’s Supermarket when really the feeling was probably something I’d conjured up in my own mind. Since coming home I had earned a General Education Diploma, started attending church again, was running my own business, writing for the local paper, and slowly working my way back into the community.

I still struggled with feeling out of place, still kept my eyes downcast most of the time, but more and more I was able to raise my eyes and see kind expressions and nods of greeting. It was beginning to feel like maybe I wasn’t the outcast I’d always thought I was.

“So, Blanche. . .”

Anytime Daddy started a sentence with “So, Blanche. . .” I knew he was about to suggest something I needed to do or should have done.

“Yes?”

“I’ve been thinking . . .”

I knew then the conversation was going to be an uncomfortable one. A ‘So, Blanche’ and an ‘I’ve been thinking….’ in less than thirty seconds? This was going to be interesting.

“Yes?”

“I think I should teach you how to drive so you can have a little more freedom.”

I let my breath out in a heavy sigh.

“You’re almost 25, Blanche,” Daddy continued. “You’ve been home five years now. I don’t mind driving you where you need to go, but I think it’s time you start, you know, spreading your wings a little bit, gaining some independence. I love having you and Jackson living with us, you know that but someday, well, you will – or you could – you might – meet someone and . . .”

“Daddy . . .”

“Well, you might. I mean there are plenty of eligible, good men in this county and it is possible you will, you know . . . Ah. You might want to drive out and meet him somewhere or – “

I could tell Daddy was nervous by the high number of “you knows” he was uttering. I knew he and Mama were “old school” and felt Jackson needed both a father and a mother, but I wasn’t willing to marry someone just to look good to others or fulfill my parents’ wish that I be a married mother instead of a single one.

It was hard for me to believe it had been five years since I had left Hank and returned home with a one-year-old on my hip and a heart full of hurt.  In the same way, I could remember the night I fought back, I could still hear the gunshot echoing in my parents’ house the night I thought Daddy had killed Hank.

“Y-you could have killed me, you crazy old man!” Hank had sputtered in disbelief, looking at the ground in front of his feet in shock.

“I could have, and I still can,” Daddy told him. “Now go before I have to.”

When the taillights faded into the darkness that night I closed my eyes against the tears and wondered if Hank would try to come back again someday. He never did. His mama told me one day when I took Jackson to see her, like I did every week, that she’d got a letter from Hank a year after I’d left him, saying he was moving out west. That was the last she’d heard from him. I knew it broke her heart that her oldest son never contacted her, but I could tell that seeing Jackson helped relieve the pain. I’d seen Hank once before he left to go out West, but he hadn’t seen me, and I never told my family about it. I didn’t know if I ever would.

“I’ll think about the driving lessons,” I told Daddy, hoping he would change the subject now.

“Well, you know, that’s all I can ask, I guess,” Daddy said, clearing his throat, looking at the road in front of him.

I looked out at the road too, watching as the paved road faded to dirt, dust billowing around the car as Daddy turned down the road that would take us home. I closed my eyes, tired from the long day, but also fighting back thoughts and emotions I had tried to bury for five years.

I was still consumed with an inability to forgive Hank or myself for all that had happened after I’d run away with him at the age of 17. I despised myself for letting him abuse me with his mouth and his hands. The times Hank shouted me down or tightened his hands around my wrist or arm seemed to finally give him the power his abusive father had stripped from him during his childhood.

The night I left him, he’d shoved me against a table, dragged me by my hair and tried to stop me from leaving our apartment with our son by grabbing my leg and yanking me to the floor. When I fought back and broke away, I ran to my friend Miss Mazie’s house and never looked back.

More than fighting to forgive myself for leaving with Hank, I couldn’t seem to find a way to forgive myself for the danger I’d put Jackson in by staying with Hank; how I’d caused Jackson to have a life without a father.

In that first year after I left Hank, life unfolded around me like a movie I was a part of but had no say in. I came home to my parents, a father who had barely spoken to me in three years, and a mother who welcomed me with open arms but somehow blamed herself for my smashed in nose and bruised face. I pushed the emotion of those years with Hank deep inside me and the darkness of it all lingered in the darkest caverns of my heart for two years, eventually leaving me in a state of emotional numbness.

Slowly I began to feel again – laugh again, trust again, hope again, at least when it came to my family and my future. I had no interest in a romantic relationship of any kind, though and still didn’t. I wasn’t about to let anyone break down the walls I had built around my life and heart, walls to protect me, but more importantly Jackson. I had exposed my son to darkness and pain once before. I refused to do it again.

I wouldn’t let my guard down for someone who could shatter the life I’d built for us like Hank almost had. Protecting Jackson, giving him a life free of hurt was my only goal and I made sure I stayed away from anyone who could threaten our security.

Oh. So that’s why writing book two has been such a challenge.

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 8 Comments

I have been having a hard time writing the second part of Blanche’s story and I think it is because I had so much fun sharing the first part on my blog and interacting with some of my readers about it as I went along, and I haven’t been doing that with this book.

A-Story-to-Tell

I was able to go back and make changes before I published the book on Kindle, but sharing it in pieces and receiving feedback as I wrote it, was fun. I’ve heard this is similar to how Wattpad works, but I don’t know if I’m really interested in sharing it with that many people. I don’t mind sharing it with the few people who read my blog, however, because my blog readers are cool people, with similar tastes, who aren’t afraid to give me polite pointers.

I’ve also been struggling with Blanche sharing with me the second part of her story like she did the first part. I’m fairly certain I just heard many of you say to yourselves: ‘I’m sorry what? You think your character is talking to you? How many drugs are you on?” I know. It sounds weird but, yes, sometimes I feel like my characters tell me their stories in bits and pieces and I wake up (because they don’t tell me when I’m awake apparently) and jot down what they’ve shared with me, flushing it out later.

The first part of Blanche’s story came out pretty quickly, but now I’m struggling with what happens since she’s (SPOILER ALERT IF YOU HAVEN’T READ THE FIRST STORY) left Hank and come home to live with her parents. I already have plenty of ideas and a few chapters in rough draft form, though, so it is coming together. The second part of the story will introduce a few new characters but also continue the story of other characters in Blanche’s life.

Will Hank find redemption, like my dad is vying for? Or will he disappear completely from the scene? We will have to wait and see – including this writer who hasn’t totally decided what will happen with Hank yet.

And what about the arrival of Blanche’s friend Emmy’s cousin? What role will Judson “J.T.” Waignwright play, if any? And then there is Edith, Blanche’s older sister. How is married life (and parenthood?) treating her? When we left her she was expecting. Hank’s mom was also on scene, hoping to have a relationship with her grandson, and searching for her own healing from her own abusive marriage.

What will happen to Emmy and who is Stanley Jasper?

We’ll see every Friday, starting this Friday when I start sharing chapters from “A New Beginning,” the sequel to “A Story to Tell.”

When people support you even when you feel like you stink

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 11 Comments

I put a notice on my blog Facebook page yesterday that I had some paperback copies of my book because a couple of people I know had asked about them. I wasn’t thinking about it as an advertising opportunity, I simply wanted to find a way to let those people know I had a few copies.

More people asked for books than I had so I had to order some more, but that’s not the point of today’s post. Today’s post I thought I would talk about how hard it is for me to put myself out there. I don’t like to be seen. I like to hide. I don’t like to share. I like to keep it all to myself. I don’t want to be famous and pray every day I never am. I never feel what I have to offer is as good as what someone else has to offer. In other words, I’m human.

A Story to Tell, my first attempt at a novel, isn’t a masterpiece. I actually wish I had taken a little more time to work on it before I put it out, but I wanted to throw it out on Kindle by my birthday to simply say I accomplished a goal. Because my self-esteem swirls around a toilet bowl half the time, I handed my books out today with apologies for it not being the best it can be. Yes, I apologized for them buying my book. I know. I’m such a weirdo.

I told my brother people were probably buying my book because they felt sorry for me. Isn’t that awful? It may be true, or it may be true that they don’t expect the book to be good, or blow them away, but they are simply trying to support me. Apparently, the idea of people supporting me is a foreign concept, but it shouldn’t be since people have done so in the past. The last couple of years have been a little lonely, yes, but people have still supported me and that’s what was happening with requests for copies of my book.

I told myself today, ‘They are buying it to support you and even if the book stinks, at least they said: “Hey, you tried and we’re recognizing that.””

Maybe it isn’t that some of my friends see something great in what I wrote but maybe it is that they see potential and they want to support it.

Now if only I could see my own potential. If only we could all see our own potential.

So often others see potential in us that we don’t see.

So often God sees potential in us that we don’t see.

We see rejection.

We see failure.

We see fell short.

We see we should be further.

We see not enough.

But God sees: “I’m trying.”

God sees: “I put myself out there.”

God sees: “I obeyed and displayed the gifts God gave me and each time I do it, I pray he helps me to get better.”

God sees us as enough.

God sees as we are right where we need to be.

God sees what will be even when we see only what isn’t.