John Riley's Girl (13 page)

She had been right.

John pulled back and then rubbed his thumb across her tear-stained cheek.

“Come back to the house with me. I can unload these calves, and maybe we’ll be in time for lunch. I don’t want to let you go yet.”

“John, I’m not sure this is a good idea—”

“Liv. Just today. I’m not asking for more than just this day.”

And to that, how could she say anything other than yes?

A
T THE FARM
, John pulled the truck in front of a fenced-in lot, then backed the tail end of the trailer up to the gate. Flora ran across the yard to greet
them, pigtails streaming behind her, the golden retriever right at her heels.

“Daddy!”

John got out of the truck and scooped the little girl up in his arms. “Hey, sweet pea. What have you been up to?”

“Hank let me ride Peaches this morning.”

“He did?”

She nodded. “And we loped around the ring three times.”

John’s eyes widened. “Three times?”

“Uh-huh.”

“I’m impressed. Flora, you remember Miss Ashford?”

Olivia had gotten out and was standing just to the side of father and daughter.

Flora nodded. “Hi,” she said, a little shyly.

“Hi, Flora,” Olivia said.

“Why don’t you two take Charlie for a swim at the pond while I find Hank and get these calves unloaded?”

“Okay! Come on, Olivia.” Flora reached for her hand.

“That’s Miss Ashford, unless she’s said otherwise,” John chided.

“I’d like it if you called me Olivia, Flora.”

“I’ll be about twenty minutes?” John’s gaze met hers.

“Take your time,” Olivia said, feeling the
changes between them. She wasn’t sure how to act, what to say. With warm cheeks and a slightly off-beat heart, she took the hand Flora offered her, and they set off for the pond.

Charlie led the procession, tail wagging.

“Are you and my daddy dating?” Flora asked when they were halfway between the last barn and the pond.

It was not a question Olivia had expected. Several seconds passed before a reply made it to her lips. “Umm, no. We aren’t, Flora.”

“Are you friends?”

Even that, Olivia had no idea how to answer. She wanted to be honest with Flora, and yet, she could already see the can of trouble ahead of her just waiting to be opened. “I hope we are.”

Flora gave her a long, assessing look that Olivia considered entirely too all-seeing for someone her age. But the answer seemed to satisfy the child, and she sent their conversation off in another direction, now telling Olivia about the treehouse her daddy was building her in their backyard. It was clear what kind of father John was through the way his young daughter spoke of him—with a kind of awe and reverence that left no doubt to anyone listening how much she adored him. Olivia was glad that John had turned out to be exactly the kind of father she had once imagined he would be.

When they reached the dock on the pond, Flora
opened the lid on a wooden storage box where life jackets and a float or two were stored. She dug around for a moment before pulling out a purple Frisbee and calling, “Here, Charlie. Come on!”

Charlie spotted the Frisbee and bolted toward them as if she’d been launched out of a rocket. Flora ran to the end of the dock, her boots thwacking against the wood flooring. She sent the Frisbee flying. Charlie sailed off after it, making a gigantic splash in the still water and then, like an otter, swimming after it.

Charlie returned with the Frisbee in her mouth and climbed up the wooden steps. Once she’d handed it over, she shook and sent water flying. “Charrrlie!” Flora laughed.

For the next fifteen minutes, Olivia and Flora took turns tossing the Frisbee until they ended up as wet as Charlie. And Olivia thought what a beautiful child Flora was, features still round with only a hint of the angles to come. She would be lovely, this Olivia could see. There was her father in her face, dark eyes, smooth skin with its high color in the cheeks. And the reflection of her mother as well, in the straight, even brows, the full pretty mouth.

But there was something more to her appeal. If Olivia had ever had a child of her own, she would have wanted her to be just like Flora. And there on the dock with the sounds of splashing and laughter ringing out against the heat of a June afternoon, she
was struck by a feeling of pure happiness for a perfect day, but also by a keen sense of longing for what might have been.

T
HEY WERE HEADED
back across the field with a dripping, exhausted dog when John appeared from behind the barn and called out, “Sophia said if we didn’t bring you up to the house for a sandwich, she’d take the apple pie she baked this morning to the church supper tonight instead of serving it for lunch. I’ve known her long enough to know she means it.”

Olivia smiled. “Guess I’ll have to take pity on you then.”

Flora ran to meet him. “Daddy, we threw the Frisbee for Charlie!”

“You sure you two weren’t the ones going in after it?” John laughed, swinging Flora high off the ground.

Watching them, Olivia’s heart did a little twist. The same gnawing ache she had felt at Lori’s house yesterday nudged her.

John looked at her now. “I see she kept you entertained.”

“We had a great time,” Olivia said.

They walked to the house, Flora now between them, Charlie lagging behind.

At the back door, John called out, “All right, where’s that pie, Sophia?”

“Warming in the oven,” she said, meeting them at the kitchen entrance, her kind face beaming. “Well, he did mind his manners and bring you up, after all, Olivia.”

“Hi, Sophia. It’s wonderful to see you.” And it was. Sophia was a barely older version of the woman Olivia had known. Her welcoming smile had not changed one bit.

“Wonderful to see you, child,” she said, touching a hand to Olivia’s arm. “Come on in here. We’re just so pleased to have you.”

Sophia led the way to the kitchen. This part of the house had changed very little. The walls were a different color, a soft, warm green and there was a thick wool rug of golds and taupes beneath the harvest-style kitchen table which Olivia did not remember. Laura’s touches, she was sure. And she felt a new wave of compassion for the woman who had spent years making this house a home.

“Now, Flora, go wash up,” Sophia said. “And in fact, why don’t you take Olivia with you? I bet she’d like to get cleaned up since I understand John’s had her hauling cows around all morning.”

John shook his head as if to say, “What are we going to do with her?”

Flora giggled and reached for Olivia’s hand. “Come on, Olivia. I’ll show you.”

They washed their hands in the half bath down the hall. Olivia listened while Flora told her about
Bible School, which was due to start on Monday night, and how they got to make stuff out of Play-Doh, and how on the last night of the week, the teachers took everybody to Dairy Queen for ice-cream cones. She liked hers dipped in chocolate and extra tall. And while Olivia absorbed this delightful child, the daughter of the man she had once loved, she listened on another level to the sound of John’s voice from the kitchen, low and rumbling. The words, she could not distinguish; they didn’t matter, anyway. It was the sound that gave her pleasure. And the knowledge that he was so close.

On the way out of the bathroom, Olivia glanced at the living room to her left and thought of how many times she and John had sat in front of the fireplace doing schoolwork, how he’d brought her here on Friday nights to watch a movie on TV and eat popcorn with too much butter.

Now, a picture on the wall to the right of the fireplace caught her attention. A portrait in a gold frame. Olivia stopped, unable to help herself. She recognized the woman at once, her pretty features so like Flora’s.

“That’s my mommy,” Flora said, following Olivia’s gaze across the room.

“She was very beautiful,” Olivia said. “You look so much like her.”

“Do you think so?” Flora asked, and Olivia heard the wistful note in her voice.

“Yes, I most certainly do.”

“Daddy says a part of her will always live on through me.”

“He’s right. And that makes you very special.”

“Come on, girls,” Sophia called out from the kitchen. “Lunch is ready.”

Olivia put her arm around Flora’s shoulders, and they trailed back down the hall and into the kitchen. While they were gone, Hank had appeared and was already seated at the round table by the window. When he saw them, he got up, crossed the room and gave Olivia a warm hug. “It sure is good to see you,” he said, his voice still sandpaper-rough, and like Sophia’s, making her feel welcome.

“You, too, Hank. Time must stand still around here. You and Sophia have hardly changed.”

“I’d agree with you as far as Sophia is concerned—she’s as pretty as ever, but I’d have to argue with you about myself. Starting to look like a retread.”

“You might have a few miles on you, Hank,” Sophia threw in from across the kitchen, “but hardly that.”

And Olivia would have sworn there was a hint of color in the woman’s cheeks.

“Now, y’all sit down and let’s eat.” Sophia hid her fluster among a bustle of double-checks for the salt and pepper shakers, vinegar for the cucumbers, ice for the water glasses.

The table was set with a huge platter of sandwiches in the middle and an assortment of bowls scattered around it filled with sliced cucumbers, tomatoes and green beans from the garden.

Charlie had found a spot in the corner of the kitchen and was curled up fast asleep, apparently worn out. Olivia thought how good it felt to be here, how right, and wondered how that could be when just yesterday, she had never imagined that she and John could ever reach a point where this might be possible.

Sophia and Hank both wanted to know about her work, thought it awfully exciting and said how proud they were of her. They were good, warm people. And this was now, as it had once before been, a place where Olivia felt wanted and welcome.

Of everyone at the table, John was the quietest, directing only a sentence or two at Olivia throughout the meal, more out of politeness, she thought, than anything else. But there were things being said between the two of them that needed no words. Vibrations of feeling that did not pretend to have any basis in reason. They had begun last night when Cleeve had thrown them together on the dance floor, had picked up intensity throughout this morning, demanded recognition when he’d held her in the circle of his arms just a short while ago.

They topped the wonderful meal with Sophia’s apple pie, which in and of itself, was memorable,
strips of crust crisscrossing the top of the glass dish, the center still bubbling hot. Sophia circled the table, topping each of their plates with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

The men were profuse with their compliments, and Olivia could see that Sophia’s role in this family was vital and valued. “Best lunch we’ve had in ages,” from John. “Sophia, you’ve outdone yourself again,” from Hank.

And the chastising, “How am I supposed to believe you two when that’s what you always say?” from Sophia was issued with amused appreciation.

Olivia thought how different her own daily life was from Sophia’s, with deadlines, expectations, pressures. And although it had its rewards, she did not believe for one moment that her life provided half the satisfaction Sophia’s provided to her.

After they’d finished eating, Olivia insisted on helping Sophia with the dishes. Olivia dried while John and Flora put them away.

Once they were done, Sophia said to John, “I promised Flora a trip to Caswell’s Five & Dime this afternoon.”

“Yaaayy!” Flora said. And then explained to Olivia: “There really isn’t hardly anything in there you can buy for a nickel or a dime, but Mr. and Mrs. Caswell don’t want to change the name.”

“If it were my store, I wouldn’t change it, either,” Olivia said.

John looked at her and smiled. “Since these two are headed off to town, any interest in going for a ride?”

“If you don’t mind that it’s been over a decade since I was on a horse.”

John’s gaze was steady on Olivia’s. “I won’t let you fall off,” he said.

Bittersweet

T
HEY HEADED
for the barn. At one of the pasture gates near the house, John whistled, and five horses at the other end of the field came running. They came to an amazing dead stop right in front of them.

John reached in his pocket, pulled out a handful of sugar cubes and gave them each one. “Caught,” he said.

“Just don’t ever try to act like you’re not a softie,” Olivia said, smiling.

He pointed at a galvanized can with a lid on it just to the right of the gate. “Grab a couple halters out of there, and we’ll take two of these girls.”

Olivia pulled off the lid and handed him two halters with lead ropes attached.

“This is River,” John said, as he haltered a pretty little gray mare with big, kind eyes. “And Ellie.” He tipped his head at the bay, who was obviously the boss, judging from her irritation at the other horse for getting too close.

John handed River’s lead to Olivia, and they led the two horses down to the barn where they got them saddled up and spritzed with fly spray. John went into the tack room and came back out with a pair of leather chaps. “You’re welcome to wear these over your shorts, if you want. Otherwise that saddle might have a little bite to it.”

Olivia remembered enough about riding to know he was right. Bare skin against saddle leather equaled major discomfort. “Thanks,” she said, taking the chaps from him and zipping them on.

They led the two mares outside the barn. John held River’s reins until Olivia was in the saddle, a not exactly graceful undertaking. “You’ll pretend you didn’t see that, right?”

John smiled. “Yes, ma’am.”

They walked from the barn, John’s mare slightly leading.

A stray cloud weakened the early afternoon sun. Everything around them was green and teeming with life. Considering how long it had been since she’d last ridden, Olivia felt amazingly comfortable in the big Western saddle, the leather reins soft and well oiled in her right hand. The mare had a nice, rhythmic walk, her ears perked forward in calm interest at their surroundings. Olivia relaxed and set her gaze on the wide shoulders of the man in front of her. She marveled that the two of them were here in this
space of time, going out for a ride together the way they had so many times when they’d been kids.

With the barn out of sight, they turned onto an old dirt road that wound through a patch of woods. The trees, enormous old oaks and maples, threw criss-crossed shadows across the lane, providing them with instant shade.

“You all right back there?” John called over his shoulder, slowing his mare to let Olivia and River catch up.

“Perfect,” she said.

They walked side by side for a minute or two before John said, “Remember this path?”

“It leads to the orchard, right?”

He nodded, looking pleased that she had not forgotten.

But then forgetting such a place would have been impossible. Her stomach knotted at the thought of seeing it again, at allowing back into existence some memories that had no equal.

They rode on for a bit. “Flora is a special little girl, John,” Olivia said after a length of silence.

“I’d be the first to admit my prejudice.” He kept his gaze on the dirt road before them. His expression changed, the lightness gone. “But that’s how a father should feel about his daughter, and if he doesn’t, then he doesn’t deserve the privilege of having her.”

The words were heartfelt. Olivia saw it in the set
of his strong jaw. Flora was a lucky child to have a father who loved her as this man did. And for the first time in her life, Olivia felt pity for her own father and all that he had missed by letting his anger at the world color everything around him so black that he could not see it for what it was.

“You’re a wonderful father, John. And hearing Flora talk about her mother, I know she must have been a fine person. Flora obviously loved her very much.”

John looked across at her, glanced back ahead and then said, “Flora was the world to Laura.”

It was a surprising conversation for the two of them to be having, considering their past. Considering that just a few weeks ago, neither of them would have imagined ever seeing the other again. Considering that the woman they were discussing had been married to this man with whom Olivia had once thought she would spend the rest of her life.

But then so many things about this weekend had surprised her.

“Care to pick up the pace?” John threw her a look of challenge, his tone lighter, as if he needed to put them back on softer footing.

“I’m game if you are.”

He sent Ellie into a nice, easy trot. Olivia gave River a little squeeze with her legs, and they followed, the gait so easy to sit, Olivia actually man
aged to look as if it hadn’t been a decade and a half since she’d been in a saddle.

They went from jog to lope. That easy, Quarter Horse lope, smoother, even, than the jog. They went up a short incline, leveling out onto a straight shot that opened into a clearing where John’s grandparents had planted a fruit orchard forty years before.

Olivia’s throat tightened. “Oh, John, it’s still beautiful.”

“You always loved it up here,” he said, his voice rimmed with what sounded like the same emotion now squeezing her heart.

Before them stood rows and rows of fruit trees. Apples, peaches, pears. On the far right of those were several arbors of grape vines. The sweet scent in the air was almost intoxicating. “It hasn’t changed,” she said. “It must be so much work to take care of it.”

“Worth it though. I could never let it go,” he said, not looking at her.

Could it be that, he, too, cherished the memories they’d made here? Olivia wondered.

“Take a look?” he asked.

She nodded, not trusting her voice.

They dismounted, and John ground-tied both mares. They stood patiently in the way of a well-taught horse, nibbling at the green grass beneath them. John led the way through a row of peach trees,
the gnarled old limbs heavy with small to medium-size fruit.

“They should be ready mid-July,” he said.

“They smell incredible. What kind?”

“Some yellow. Some white.”

“I love the white. They’re so sweet.”

He sat down against the trunk of one of the old trees. Olivia sat on the grass beside him, and for a little while, they said nothing. They just sat in strangely comfortable, compatible silence, as if neither of them could quite imagine they were actually here in this old retreat together, able to talk about everyday things. It was shocking to Olivia. She realized it didn’t pay to think you had too much of this life figured out.

“Tell me about Laura,” she said, her voice soft. “Who was she?”

John looked at her, surprise widening his eyes. He dropped his gaze, picked up a twig and rolled it between his palms. He didn’t answer for a good while, and just as she was beginning to think she shouldn’t have asked, he said, “She was someone who took care of the things life gave her. She loved to read. Usually kept two or three books going. She liked to plant things. Those fig bushes over there,” he said, pointing to their left. “She was so proud of getting those things to grow, and the first year they had fruit on them, we had fig everything.”

He stopped for a moment, and she waited, wanting to hear more.

“She made these great cakes. Big, tall three-layer things with an inch of icing on top. She was a good woman, a good person. She was sick for a long time.”

“That must have been really hard,” she said, feeling the insignificance of the words in light of the reality of such a thing.

“It was. For her. For all of us. Wanting to do something to make it different and not being able to do a damn thing.”

Olivia put her hand on top of his and squeezed, as if she might soak up some of the pain so obviously still there. “I’m really sorry for what happened to her, John.”

“So am I,” he said. “Sometimes, I—”

She waited for him to go on, sensed there was some burden in what he was about to say. She removed her hand from his. “Sometimes what?”

“Sometimes, I think I wasn’t the husband I should have been,” he said, his voice somber. “When you left here, Liv, I never imagined anything could hurt that badly. When I met Laura I guess I was looking for some way to replace you, to make me feel something other than the grief I’d been feeling all those months. I didn’t marry her for the right reasons. But from here, from where I sit
today, I can’t regret any of it. We made a good life together. And Flora—”

“Is everything.”

“She is.”

The guilt in his voice held the weight of steel. Olivia’s heart throbbed, for him, for Laura, for all of them. “You wouldn’t have been anything other than a good husband, John.”

“A man ought to be able to start a marriage with a heart that’s free and clear of anyone else. I didn’t do that.”

Maybe there should have been some satisfaction in knowing that through all these years, he had not forgotten her. But all she felt was sadness, the threads of which were not easily identifiable, entwined as they were with the awareness that another person’s life had been affected by the chord that had never been fully severed between John and her.

Because wasn’t it true of her own life as well? What she and John had known with one another had been the comparison for every relationship she’d had since.

They sat there a while longer, absorbing, feeling their way forward.

Olivia spoke first. “I don’t know why we end up in the places we do, but there was a reason for you and Laura to be together.”

Another width of silence took up space between them, the sounds of the afternoon standing out in
bold relief: the hum of a tractor in the distance, the plaintive moo of a cow calling for a wayward calf.

“I guess I have to believe that, too,” he said.

“Your life is what I always pictured it would be. Solid. Stable. You matter. To your family. And to this farm. To me that’s what gives a person’s days meaning. Knowing that if you weren’t here, it would matter, you would be missed. From what I see, Laura’s life had meaning. She mattered. She’s missed by her family. That’s something I envy.”

“Why?” he asked, looking surprised.

She shrugged. “Maybe it’s just the nature of what I do. There’s always someone else waiting to knock you off the ladder. Step over you to get to the next rung.”

“Sounds pretty cutthroat.”

“It can be.”

“Is it what you want to do for the rest of your life?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I used to think so. The important thing just seemed to be reaching the next level.” She looked down at her lap, smoothed a thumb across the knee of the leather chaps he’d given her to wear. “I’m up for a promotion. A pretty big one, actually. And I’m not sure I want it.”

He didn’t say anything for a few moments and then, “What do you want, Liv?”

“To matter. To not be expendable.” She an
swered quickly, honesty propelling the words from her.

“Liv, you matter. Good grief, even some of the people we went to school with get tongue-tied around you.”

She shook her head. “That’s not what I mean.”

He studied her for a moment, weighing her words. “People look at someone like you with a life like yours and can’t imagine it not being perfect.”

“It’s not perfect. I’ve pretty much put work before everything else.”

“And now?”

“Now, I keep asking myself what’s missing.”

“It’s easy to spend too much time tending one area of your life. Eventually, the weeds take over the rest, and then all you’re left with is that one little well-tended spot.”

And that was exactly how Olivia saw her life now. The simple metaphor was John to the heart. He said everything she had been feeling.

“It’s been really good spending time with you today, Liv.”

A response welled up inside her, uncensored.
I’ve wanted this for fifteen years. Just an hour with you the way it used to be. I never hoped for an entire day.
But the words were too revealing. So she said, simply, “You, too, John.”

They sat a while and let those admissions settle between them.

“Remember that afternoon we rode up here and got caught in a thunderstorm?” There was something like reluctance in his voice, as if this memory led down a road he wasn’t sure he wanted to take.

“And our horses decided to go back to the barn without us?”

“Can’t say that I blamed them.” He smiled.

It had been a horrific storm, lightning flashing in every corner of the sky. Olivia had been terrified, and John had held her tight against him inside the old tool shed at the corner of the orchard. The thunder sounded as if it were right on top of them, and with every clap, she had shivered like a soaked kitten.

She remembered clearly now, John’s kiss, his assurance that they would be all right. She’d kissed him back, and they had ended up making love there that late afternoon with the thunder and lightning playing out its symphony around them. And Olivia hadn’t been scared anymore, aware that the storm’s music was somehow the perfect echo to the feelings of pure love John brought to life inside her.

She looked over at him now, saw that he, too, remembered. It pulled at them. Olivia felt the force of it, knew he would reach for her, thought she might die if he didn’t.

His hand found the back of her neck and eased her to him. And when their faces were only inches apart, he looked down at her, his eyes revealing a
tumultuous blend of longing and confusion. They were the same emotions at war in her and there was no doubt which would win out. “I’d be a dishonest man if I denied the reason I brought you up here today.”

“And what was that?” she asked, her question barely audible.

“For this,” he said.

He leaned in and kissed her then.

Olivia forgot to breathe. Forgot everything, except the man next to her and the fact that no one had ever kissed her the way John once had. And it was exactly the same. Except better somehow. Better, maybe, for the loss of all the years that had passed since the last time he’d held her this way. Better, maybe, for the fact that she was in the arms of a man she had once loved, and as a grown woman, knew the potential emptiness of such gestures without the feelings that could accompany them.