Nine months to the day after Alan and Jobeth were bonded in marriage, Joanna, named after Jonah, was born. They had found a small village and made their home just outside the town. It was quiet and the people were kind.
Shawna stopped having nightmares and returned to her cheerful self. Life was good. No one could ask for more.
Two years after the birth of Joanna, Constance, named after Jobeth’s mother, was born. Joanna was two, Mara-Joy was three and Shawna was twelve years old.
Late one summer afternoon, Jobeth was working hard in her garden. She loved working her hands in the soil under the sun. Constance, who was three months old, was in a sling comfortably tied to Jobeth, shaded by her mother’s body. Mara-Joy and Joanna were sitting on the shady grass just beside the garden, playing with wild flowers. Shawna was at school and would not be home for another hour. The heat of the sun was pounding down on Jobeth.
Kneeling in dirt, she sat up straight, adjusted the baby and moved a strand of hair out of her face. In the distance she could see Alan and another man heading up to the house. She squinted to see who the stranger was. He seemed familiar to her but she couldn’t put her finger on it.
“Mara-Joy, Joanna, come into the house. Quickly now,” Jobeth said, heading toward their small home. The two little girls stood up from their tasks and began to follow their mother.
Both girls were adorable. Mara-Joy had long black curly hair with piercing blue eyes, much in contrast to her creamy complexion. Joanna, on the other hand, had long straight, sandy blonde hair with the most amazing green eyes. Her skin was a golden brown color from hours of playing in the sun. They both began to run toward Jobeth. Joanna stumbled and fell but was on her feet in no time chasing after her sister.
Inside the house Jobeth quickly cleaned herself and the children up. She didn’t want whoever was with Alan to see her and the children in a state of mess.
“Jobeth?” Alan yelled from the doorway. “You will never guess who is here with me.”
Jobeth couldn’t help but notice Alan’s voice was strained. Almost nervous.
She felt her blood turn cold. It had been over three years since any dilemmas had arisen in their lives. There was too much at stake now to deal with problems. The children just could not be uprooted. Jobeth shook her head, annoyed at herself. She always feared the worst.
“Don’t be silly . . .” she mumbled, whipping Joanna’s grimy face. But she couldn’t help herself. The feeling of foreboding kept creeping up on her.
Joanna chimed nonsense in her small voice. Jobeth looked into the little child’s tanned face. Alan’s cat eyes stared back at her.
“I wasn’t talking to you . . .” Jobeth said absently.
Joanna bent her eyes to the floor. Had she done something to upset her mama?
“Come along, children.” Jobeth shepherded the girls into the other room where Alan stood stiffly with the foreign man.
“Pappy! Pappy!” Mara-Joy cried out when she spotted Alan. She ran full speed into his arms and he hugged her small frame close to his strong body.
“Did you bring me candy?” Mara-Joy squealed in Alan’s loving arms. Joanna was jumping up and down around Alan’s feet begging to be picked up and cuddled too.
“Me too, Pappy!” she said in her childish voice. Alan bent down and scooped her easily into his free arm. Both little girls, who looked so different from each other, smothered Alan with kisses. Alan laughed, delighted. His daughters were his pride and joy. He treasured them all deeply.
Jobeth cautiously looked to the dark-haired man standing, admiring Alan.
The attractive fellow looked somewhat familiar to her, but she could not quite place him.
Alan deposited the excited girls down on the floor and walked over to Jobeth. He took Constance from her arms and nuzzled her into his neck. The baby cooed, snuggled in her father’s embrace.
“Jobeth, honey,” he seemed skittish. “You remember Oliver, don’t you?”
Jobeth’s mouth dropped open. Of course--the dark hair, the handsome good looks. She glanced into his deep blue penetrating eyes. The same penetrating eyes Mara-Joy possessed. How could she not remember the man who had helped to create her dear daughter? If it had not been for Mara-Joy coming into their lives, who knows what would have happened? Alan and Jobeth might never have married and been so completely happy all these years.
She closed her mouth and glanced over at the man who unintentionally had changed their lives. Oliver looked older.
He was no longer the boy she remembered. He was much more handsome.
Jobeth blushed, unable to help the flutter of butterflies in her stomach. How could someone be so good-looking?
Out of the corner of her eye, Jobeth noticed Mara-Joy standing beside Alan, sucking on a red stick of candy. She had Tamara’s fiery black hair and creamy complexion, but it was Oliver she resembled - an interesting combination of the two of them. Mara-Joy was a beauty; Just like her birth mother and father.
“Of course I remember Oliver,” Jobeth said anxiously. She nervously went and embraced the man who could destroy her life. He smelled of the outdoors and horses. The combination that was very masculine and becoming. “Of course, Oliver. Excuse my rudeness when you first came in, but it has been so long.” She pulled away from him and stood beside Alan who still cuddled Constance in his big arms.
“Jobeth,” Oliver said in a serious voice, not in the least bit disturbed by Jobeth’s behavior, “you still look as pretty as ever.”
“I see you are still the same sweet talker,” Jobeth smiled, trying to act normal in front of the unshaven man.
Oliver chuckled and turned to look at Mara-Joy and Joanna. Jobeth and Alan couldn’t help but notice how his eyes skimmed past plain little Joanna, whose face was now smeared with red candy, and rest firmly on Mara-Joy.
“Oliver!” Jobeth nearly shouted. She didn’t know what to say. She just knew he had to stop looking at her child. All eyes turned to Jobeth, including the eyes of Mara-Joy. For a moment Jobeth thought she saw anger flare in the little girl’s face--almost as though she were upset that the center of attention was no longer her. Jobeth pushed the thought from her mind. How could a three year old know the difference?
“I hope you will be staying for dinner?” Jobeth asked, praying he wouldn’t. She wanted him to leave, now. Never to see Mara-Joy again.
Mara-Joy scowled, her arms tightly crossed over her small chest.
“Well if it ain’t--I mean isn’t any bother--I would love to stay.” Oliver stared at his shoes, not budging. The tension in the air was so thick you could almost see it.
“No bother at all. You are always welcome in our home. You are family,” Jobeth said without emotion. Joanna began to whimper, rubbing her grimy hands into her eyes. Jobeth absently looked to her and noticed the child had wet herself. She instantly went into Mommy mode and began to peel the wet clothing off Joanna who stood sobbing. Alan placed little Constance down into her baby basket that was always left in the main room.
“Thank you, Jobeth. It means a lot to me,” Oliver replied, avoiding looking at her.
Joanna’s cries became louder with embarrassment over wetting herself. Alan coughed nervously, it was beginning to get hectic in the closed room and he could tell Jobeth was not happy with the turn of events. He didn’t blame her for her feelings in the matter. He was not exactly jumping for joy at Oliver’s arrival either.
“Why don’t we go outside and clean up for dinner? Jobeth will settle the children and we can all talk at supper.”
Oliver nodded and followed Alan outside.
Joanna shrieked loudly into Jobeth’s ear, annoying her. Mara-Joy danced behind the two men, following them outside. She looked back at Jobeth and gave a big smile and waved.
Jobeth returned the look with warmth. Mara-Joy was so beautiful, such a gift that she and Alan had been given.
Fear began to tingle through Jobeth’s veins. I wonder if Oliver has come to take Mara-Joy away! Stop it! she screamed in he
r mind as she went through the motions of cleaning up Joanna’s mess. The little girl continued to cry and hiccup, her face a wet muddle of tears, snot and red candy. Jobeth paid no attention. Her mind was miles away. What was Oliver doing here after all this time and what did he want? There was nothing to worry about. Oliver didn’t know Tamara was pregnant--let alone that she had given Jobeth and Alan the child. Oliver’s child. She pushed the thought from her head. Mara-Joy was not Oliver or Tamara’s child. She was Alan and hers--their daughter, and no one was going to take their child from them.
“You two went and got married,” Oliver laughed later that night at the supper table. Jobeth had cooked roasted chicken with mashed potatoes, garden vegetables, stuffing and homemade bread. Oliver claimed it was the best meal he had ever eaten.
Shawna was home and she could not stop staring at the dark-haired Oliver. She was completely entranced by his dazzling good looks. Oliver seemed to relish Shawna’s attention, winking whenever he could across the table when he thought no one was looking. She blushed a deep red as she tried to stifle her giggles behind her slender hand.
Jobeth knew Shawna had an instant crush on Oliver the moment she laid eyes on him. After she arrived home from school and found out Oliver was staying for dinner, Shawna ran to her room and brushed her long blonde hair till it shone like pale gold. Alan reintroduced Shawna to the devilishly handsome man, finding himself a little amused. He had never seen Shawna behave like this, her crush so plain to see. You would have to be a blind man not to notice the way the girl was beside herself with glee over Oliver’s arrival.
“Alan, I remember Oliver,” Shawna said with a twinkle in her eye. She remembered him all right. She remembered how handsome he was and how he had smiled at her so many years ago. Even then she had found Oliver irresistible.
“And I remember a little girl in pigtails, not much taller than my knees. This ravishing beauty before me cannot be that little girl all grown up!” Oliver said, smiling at the adolescent. He reached for her hand and gently kissed the top of it, his lips lingering on the soft flesh for just an instant.
Shawna turned crimson red, hiding her mouth with her other hand.
“It’s me, Oliver. I’m not a little girl anymore.” Shawna beamed, unable to contain herself.
“Well, you aren’t a grown woman yet either.” Jobeth piped in as she set the table for supper. Shawna bent her head, mortified. “Shawna, I need you to help with dinner please.”
“Yes, Jobeth,” Shawna glanced up quickly at Oliver, hoping he had paid no attention to Jobeth’s outburst.
“You look like a grown woman to me,” Oliver whispered softly into Shawna’s ear as he followed Alan into the dinner room. She grinned from ear to ear, her face burning with fire, and ran off to help Jobeth set the table.
“Yes,” Alan replied across the table from Oliver. “It has been about five years now.”
Jobeth and Shawna both glanced at Alan over their plates of food. They had only been married for a little over three years, not five.
Jobeth knew immediately what Alan was doing. If Oliver knew they were married for just three years, he would figure out that Mara-Joy had been born before they were husband and wife. Jobeth bent her head so that she could face Shawna’s confused look. She gave the young girl a look that told Shawna to keep quiet. Shawna obeyed, lowering her eyes and busying herself, eating her mashed potatoes and gravy. If Alan and Jobeth didn’t want Oliver to know when they were married, Shawna wouldn’t offer him the truth.
“You have three very beautiful daughters,” Oliver announced while eyeing Mara-Joy. A cold bolt shot up Jobeth’s spine as she spoon-fed Joanna some shredded chicken and potato in her highchair. Some had dribbled down Joanna’s chin. Jobeth spooned it up and popped it into the child’s waiting mouth. Joanna usually fed herself, getting most of the food on her, rather than into her mouth, but Jobeth had wanted dinner to go smoothly. That meant she didn’t want Oliver to witness her child decorated in chicken and mashed potatoes.
“Do you think I am the most beautiful?” Mara-Joy tittered in her childish voice.
“You are very beautiful,” Oliver replied warmly to the little girl, his blue eyes mirroring the child’s.
“What do you think of our Shawna?” Jobeth interrupted. She did not like the way Oliver stared at Mara-Joy. It was a searching look. A trying-to-place something . . . examination. Even though she didn’t want to encourage Shawna’s crush on the much older Oliver, it was better to distract Oliver with Shawna than to have his attention focused on Mara-Joy.
The little girl glared at Jobeth and stuck out her bottom lip in a pout.
“The last time you saw Shawna, she wasn’t much older than these children,” said Jobeth, feeling sick. She did not like the way Shawna was mooning over Oliver and here she was using Shawna’s idolization for her own benefit.
“I remember a little frightened girl with large blue eyes hiding behind your skirts, Jobeth,” Oliver turned his attention back to Shawna who would willingly worship the ground he walked on.
“You have grown into a beautiful young lady, as I have already said.”
Shawna’s face became flushed, once again. She was about ready to burst with delight. She could not help herself. Oliver made her stomach flutter and her heart race. She hated it and loved it all at the same time.
Mara-Joy’s eyebrows furrowed together angrily. She reached for her glass of milk and let it slip from between her fingers. It hit her plate and spilled into her food. Everyone turned to Mara-Joy and her milky disaster.
“My food is all yucky!” She wailed at the top of her lungs. Large tears welled in the corners of her eyes and streamed down her face.
“I’ll get you another plate, dear.” Jobeth said, standing up and reaching for the ruined dish of food.
“Jobeth, sit and eat, I’ll do it,” Alan said getting up and retrieving the plate, careful not to spill the milk onto the table.
Shawna frowned at Mara-Joy. She was now smiling with all eyes on her. It seemed to Shawna that whenever the attention was taken off little Mara-Joy and put on someone else, the child had one of her accidents.
Alan returned with a fresh plate of food and placed it in front of Mara-Joy.
“Any sons for the future?” Oliver asked changing the subject.
“Hopefully.” Alan laughed, patting Mara-Joy on the back. She grinned up at Alan as she daintily took a bit off her fork.
“I want a little brother,” Mara-Joy said, as she chewed her food.
“Do you now?” Oliver bit into a hunk of meat, keeping his eyes focused on his meal.
“Well, Oliver buddy . . .” Alan sat back and pushed himself away from the table, his plate polished clean. “When do you plan to settle down and get married?”
Shawna’s eyes lit up. Jobeth noticed and laughed to herself. Shawna was only twelve years old. Still a child. Much too young to think of marriage, let alone marriage to Oliver. If she remembered correctly, he was a year older than she.
Jonah had told her Oliver’s age years ago when they lived in the rundown house together. That would make Oliver twenty-two years old. Nearly twice Shawna’s age. Jobeth couldn’t imagine Shawna thinking of marriage. She still thought of the girl as a little child.
Oliver cleared his throat. “Well that’s why I’m here.” He coughed again, feeling uneasy for the first time since he had arrived.
“I never thought I would run into you folks. Should have seen my face when I saw Alan working in the mill! Almost like seeing a ghost from the past.” His brows furrowed with lines.
“Guess I did see a ghost.” He stopped speaking and stared into space, remembering the past. He had been so alone the past four years, wanting so much to have the love of a family. When he had seen Alan earlier in the day, hope had filled him. At last familiar faces--someone who was home. But Alan and Jobeth’s reception of him seemed frigid, almost as though his presence threatened them.
“Anyway,” his eyes cleared, “I?
??ve been searching for Tamara for the last four years.”
Jobeth and Alan looked to each other, shocked, not knowing what to do. It wasn’t what they had expected Oliver to say. Looking for Tamara? He was supposed to have abandoned her.
“I love her and want to make an honest woman out of her. I’m ashamed to say I treated her badly,” Oliver said, frowning. Jobeth looked to Shawna. The blonde girl was rigid, her face crestfallen. One moment, Oliver shined glorious light on her and the next, he had destroyed its fragile beginnings.
“I know it’s the reason why she left me,” he continued, despite the unhappy faces of the people in front of him. “I wanted to start a family.” Jobeth took a huge drink from her glass of milk and eyed Oliver. The fear she had felt when first seeing Oliver was not in vain. He had come to take Mara-Joy away.
“You mean you didn’t leave her?” Alan asked, amazed. He looked as though the wind had been knocked out of him; his face was a grisly grayish color.
“No, I would never leave her.” Oliver stood up, searching the stunned faces around him. “She just up and left one night while I was sleeping. I swear it’s the truth.” He looked imploringly from one face to the other. “Have you heard from her?”
Jobeth was speechless.
Shawna sat quietly, not able to look at Oliver’s frustrated face. The memory of Tamara swinging from a beam was still fresh in her mind. It was something she would never forget, just as she would never forget her sister Donna’s violent murder.
“Jobeth, I think it is time the girls went to bed.” Alan stood and picked Mara-Joy up in his arms. She began to wiggle in protest.
“Pappy no, I don’t want to go to bed. I want to stay up.” She pushed against his chest angrily.
“You just sit still till we come back, Oliver,” Alan said, walking out of the room, Mara-Joy still protesting.
Jobeth stood, collecting Joanna out of her high chair. She paused. Oliver’s head fell into his hands and he sat back down in his chair with a thud. Jobeth’s lips tightened together. What were they going to tell him?
“Shawna, keep Oliver Company while we settle the girls?” Shawna nodded, not saying a word. Jobeth left the room abruptly. She followed Alan down the hall and into the small room with two beds waiting for their owners.
“What is wrong, Mama?” Mara-Joy asked. Jobeth’s bottom lip began to tremble. She could not bear to lose her precious Mara-Joy.
“You and Pappy look scared.”
“Nothing is wrong, baby,” Alan, whispered into her tiny ear. He placed her on one of the beds. Shelves decorated with dolls bordered the walls. The room was painted soft pink and white. The twin beds were identical with matching pink and white quilts. Handmade toys littered both beds.
Jobeth placed Joanna on her bed and quickly tucked her in. She brushed a kiss on the child’s warm forehead. Joanna grabbed her favorite teddy bear and snuggled under the covers. She felt sleepy with all the excitement of the day. Jobeth slipped over to Mara-Joy’s bed and kissed her flushed cheek. Alan went to Joanna’s bed and gently pulled the covers above her shoulders, kissing and hugging her good night. Jobeth could hear Joanna giggle at her father’s attention and proceeded to copy Alan’s actions with Mara-Joy.
The girls settled down quickly. Alan blew out the light and took Jobeth by the hand. She squeezed his fingers tightly as she followed him out towards the kitchen.
“She is our daughter,” Alan choked back, knowing what he was going to do. “Tamara did not want anyone but us to raise her. She is ours now.” Jobeth trembled, her mind racing. Alan stopped her in the hallway before they reached the kitchen. He held Jobeth in his arms securely. She felt his strength seep into her and her nerves began to subside a bit.
“Everything will be okay,” he whispered. Jobeth nodded, believing him because she loved and trusted him.
Chapter 17 —