The Barefoot Believers (23 page)

“Really?”

“Yeah. Really.”

“Year after year for all this time you've looked back at what happened in your family and wished that?”

“Yes.”

“Jo—”

“Because in the aftermath I became invisible. Like a toy on a shelf the day after Christmas.”

“You're breaking my heart.” It could have sounded cruel but somehow in the midst of the families just trying to get a meal for their kids, it didn't.

“Mom clung to Kate. For the rest of our lives, she depended on Kate. And Kate never failed her.”

“Is that why Kate didn't marry Vince?”

“I don't…” She moved to the second portable griddle and started to pour again, then stopped. “I never thought of that.”

“Did you ever think that maybe if Kate could do it all over she would wish she wasn't ‘chosen'?”

Jo set the batter down with a clunk. “I just wanted to be somebody.”

“Believe me, I've
been
somebody. It's not as great as everyone says it will be.”

“I know that, too. I was something of a hotshot with my company until…”

“Until you let your vanity over getting that Powers guy's interest push you into a deal, that not-so-hot deal, huh?”

“It was all false pride and poor self-esteem, wasn't it? And now I have this half-finished house in Atlanta with a payment due in a couple weeks and…” She looked at him. The old Jo would have used this moment to press her case, to ask for help, to close the deal.

Instead she turned to the pancakes. To the simple task before her and found comfort in doing it. She turned them, poured more on the second griddle then checked the serving pan and the crowd to see if she should be slowing down production.

She looked out at all the people. She thought of all
their
stories. Then she looked at Travis.

At this moment, she felt a tug to choose. The life she had once thought of as her only way to “be somebody” or to stop living a lie and start actually being herself.

It was not as difficult a choice as she would have thought a few days ago.

“If I can't raise the cash quickly, I am going to take a huge financial loss on it.” She spoke honestly, and without embarrassment. She'd messed up; it wasn't the worst thing in the world. She sighed. “Then I will go broke, have to move out of my pricey apartment and have to start over somewhere else.”

Please ask me to start over here,
she thought, looking up into his kind, understanding eyes.

“If all that's going on, why are you here?” He asked a question he had posed once before. “Why aren't you back in Atlanta trying to fix things?”

“Because Kate needed me to come here.” The answer surprised her. She thought she had come to sell the house, but even more than that, she had come because…“Kate needed me.”

“
Perfect Kate?
Needed somebody?”

“Well, maybe she's not exactly always one-hundred-percent perfect.” In saying that, something broke free inside Jo. She felt lighter.

“And when she wasn't perfect, you were the one she wanted to help her.”

Jo thought of their struggle the first day just trying to get from the car to the apartment building. “
Wanted
might be a bit strong.”

“Well, she chose you.”

“Yeah, she did, didn't she?”

“Who else could have done what you have for her?”

Not their mother. In fact, their mother had done this to her. Kate had no real friends, only staff that she had not wanted to get too close to because she knew she might have to let them go. “You are very good at this.”

His eyes twinkled. “Maybe I should be a minister.”

“Maybe.” She looked at the huge mess he had made around them before she'd taken over. “Because you are never going to make it as a short-order cook.”

“Well, maybe the Lord will send me somebody who can do a better job at this kind of thing than I can.”

“Somebody?”

“Not just anybody. A real somebody,” he said softly.

Jo's heart swelled. She flipped a pancake with ease and expertise she hadn't realized she possessed, then smiled at him. “You know, as services go, this might have been one of the best ones I've ever attended.”

T
he nurse on duty had taken one look at the flush-cheeked child and listened to Kate's brief summary of symptoms before she'd shuttled them straight back to the examining room. Kate wanted to think they could thank her credentials, which she'd all but shouted as they'd rushed in through the automatic glass doors, for the quick response. But after a moment's reflection, she realized the nurse had recognized the small family and had pulled their file, probably when she'd seen them hurrying through the parking lot.

That left Kate and Gentry alone for the first time in sixteen years.

Sixteen!

She didn't feel that much older, really, but he had grown into a tall young man with brown wavy hair, a closely clipped beard and watchful, wary eyes. He stood in the entryway, jangling his keys in a way that suggested he might be using them soon. Very soon.

Kate recognized that restlessness, that urge to bolt when life got too overwhelming,
too real.
She also knew that if the kid ran now, he'd regret it and so would she.

She put her hand on his arm, just barely at first, then when he did not withdraw, more firmly until she had given his forearm an encouraging squeeze. “I am proud of the way you stepped up and took care of Esperanza and the baby, Gentry.”

“Stepped up? I can't own that, Kate.” He gave her a sly look and in his lopsided smile she could still see something of the kid she had once known and, to her surprise, still cared about. He twirled his key ring around his index finger. “I didn't step up so much as I was given a verbal kick in the pants to get me moving.”

“It was more of a nudge to your conscience,” she said.

“No, trust me, from my end of the phone conversation, it was not a nudge.”

“Fine. Whatever. It got you over to the house.”

“Yeah.”

Suddenly Kate felt all maternal—and a bit ornery and in need of lightening the mood. “And what do we say when someone gives us a kick in the pants to jumpstart us in the right direction?”

He grinned and looked all of six again. “Thank you, Kate.”

“I knew you'd do the right thing.”

“I haven't so far.” He dropped his head and looked at her from the corner of his eye. “But I guess you figured that out.”

“I don't think I have anything figured out anymore, Gentry.” Kate patted his arm then moved around to put herself squarely before him. “But I wouldn't have called you at all if I had thought for one minute you didn't have it in you.”

He stood quietly.

She had heard it said once that we would be amazed at what would pour out of people's hearts if we weren't all so anxious to fill every silence with words.

So Kate waited.

Finally Gentry lifted his head, gazed off in the direction of the exam room and whispered, “We got married without really knowing each other. Her folks didn't approve. Dad didn't approve.”

“But you were in love.”

He nodded, glanced down, then nodded again. “Everyone told us that if we were really in love, it would wait. We would still be in love in another year, even two. Give her a chance to get her certification as a dental assistant, let me get my degree.”

She felt a swell of pride and relief to know his life had taken that positive course. “You went to college?”

“For three years.” He held that many fingers up and peered at her just over the tips of them. “Got the basics down but then couldn't choose a major. I thought changing schools would make me focus but, well, you probably can guess that the schools weren't the problem.”

It would have been so easy to lay blame then, but Kate held her tongue.

He shrugged. “I always meant to do better. To try harder but then things got tough and…”

“And your dad rushed to your rescue?”

“He meant well. And let's not pretend I'm not responsible for my part of it. I knew my dad carried a lot of guilt that I didn't have a mom. And because he moved me down here to this place where I had to make new friends every season. He only did what he did to try to make up for all that. And it was easy to let him do it. At least at first.”

“Then the cost of always being rescued got pretty steep, didn't it?”

He gazed steadily down the empty hallway, his eyes intense. “I
do
love them, you know.”

“I could tell that the second I saw you all together.”

“I just…They…” He shuffled his tennis shoes, curled his keys into his fist then clenched his jaw. “The commitment of being a father, them both being dependent on me for so much, doubting myself, not knowing what the future holds, it all scares me. Sometimes I just have to get away.”

“I know that feeling.”

His expression shifted from anxiety to disbelief. “You do?”

“Yeah, a lot of years ago a little boy scared me like that,” she murmured.

“Me? I don't recall any trip to the emergency room with you, Kate. Was I sick?”

“No. But you were hurting. You were vulnerable. You looked to me to help make it all better and it terrified me.”

“I didn't think you were ever scared of anything.”

“Are you kidding? I was petrified.”

“Of what?”

“Of the chance that I might lose you.”

“You mean that you might lose my dad?” he corrected, all cynical and so much older than his years suggested.

Kate recognized that feeling. It broke her heart and healed it all at once. She had made something of her life and Gentry could, too.

“No. This wasn't about your dad and me.” She paused to gather her thoughts, then pressed on, determined not to hedge or hide anything. “I wasn't afraid of a grown-up relationship failing. I guess I thought that if that happened we'd both have played a part in it, we'd both have options all along the way. But you didn't have any choice and because you weren't mine by birth, that meant I wouldn't have any choice, either.”

“You thought that if you admitted you loved me that I wouldn't be the only one left vulnerable.” He pegged it.

Kate nodded. “I wasn't able to take that risk. I couldn't love you enough knowing you could be taken from me and I would be helpless to stop it.”

“So…you're saying…you didn't love me?”

Promise you will always love me, Kate. Promise you will always be my mom.

The words the young Gentry had said to her that had sent her running so long ago came back so clear in her mind that she could hear the break in his young voice, the rasp of breath he'd taken before he had uttered the thing he longed for most in the world,
mom.

“I told myself that for so long. That I'd merely been infatuated with your dad and just a little charmed by his son.” Kate fought to hold the tears back. She sniffled. “But I can tell you, honestly, that I have thought of you both so often over the years. Wondered what became of you. Even prayed for you.”

“Yeah?” The doubt in his face began to fade.

“Yeah.” She gathered her composure and found it in herself to say what needed to be said. “I am so sorry, Gentry. I should have been up-front with you even when you were a kid. I should have told you when you asked me if I would stay and be part of the family that that was what I wanted more than anything. And that I was afraid because things don't always work out the way we want them.”

“Wow. You know my dad had other girlfriends after you.”

“I'm sure he did.” Even as she said it, she wondered if she had been sure. In her mind, Vince and Gentry had stayed frozen in time, the two of them living like some TV sitcom duo playing along the beach, learning and growing and trying to make do without her by their side.

“I only say that in case it alleviates some of that guilt, you know, about you leaving me without saying that stuff.”

“Oh.”

“It would have been cool and all.”

“If I
had
said it?”

“No, Kate.” His mouth set for a moment, then twitched and his voice barely rose above a raspy whisper as he said, “If you had stayed.”

Kate nodded because if she had said anything just then it would have come out choked and ended with a sob.

“But I don't want you to think that Dad couldn't have changed things sooner. Or that I couldn't have changed things these last few years. I mean, not that I had a bad life or have done bad things. But this whole going from school to school, job to job then just getting married, having a baby and now my wife getting sick of my refusing to grow up and moving on without me, I don't want you to think that's your fault, even in a small way.”

“I appreciate your saying that.”

“And I appreciate your calling me.
And
kicking me into gear.” He looked again down the hallway, took a few steps in the direction of the exam rooms, then turned back to talk to Kate. “I would have come if Pera had asked. Any time day or night. But she hasn't asked, so I've been staying away.”

“The problem with waiting for someone else to make the first move is that they may think they already have.”

“By leaving?”

Kate tipped her head to one side.

“Is that what you did with Dad?”

“Not as a game or a test. I really was scared. I really couldn't see what else to do but if he had come after me and asked me to be a part of his family, not just his wife…”

“Family,” he echoed softly. “Scary, huh?”

“The scariest. And the best thing that can happen to a person. That is why I so want you to do the right thing for your child—because I know what it means to live with the regret of having let fear drive you away.” She reached out to touch Gentry's cheek when a voice from behind her startled her.

“And just how do you imagine you have any right to say something like that to
my
kid?”

She whirled around. “Vince!”

“Dad? What're you doing here?”

“Dr. Lloyd's nurse just called me to okay billing me for some antibiotics for the baby. That's how I found out the baby was sick, not from my daughter-in-law, not from my son and not from someone who used to be…a friend.”

Used to be a friend? What did that mean? She flashed back to that long-ago argument where Vince had made clear that Gentry was his family, not hers. She had tried to amend that today, tried to make up for not standing up for the boy and for her rightful place in his and Vince's lives. But now, seeing Vince here with a chill in his gaze and hearing the disappointment in his voice, she wondered if she had made another miscalculation. Maybe she hadn't matured as much as she needed to where this matter was concerned?

“It's not that big of a deal, Vince.” She tried to placate him, beginning with a calming reassurance. “Babies run fevers all the time. Hardly the kind of thing that you call around getting people worked up over without more information. It's probably just a—”

“Haven't you interfered enough? I don't care what you and I were to each other a lifetime ago. We are virtually strangers now. And strangers do not stick their noses into family business.”

Apparently it was not her who had failed to mature here. Vince had cowed her with that protective daddy act years ago but she would not slink away from it now. For once, Scat-Kat-Katie would hold her ground. “I'm not a stranger, Vince, I'm a doctor. It made sense for Esperanza to bring the baby to me first.”

“And for you to take it upon yourself to call my kid?”

She shifted her weight off her aching foot but did not retreat a single step. “To call the baby's father. Yes.”

“To do the ‘right thing,' as you put it?”

She planted her cane firmly between them. “Yes.”

“Dad!” Gentry stood shoulder to shoulder with Kate, even though his was considerably higher up than hers.

Vince ignored the gesture.

Kate understood it completely. This wasn't about Gentry. This was about Kate coming back to town and acting as if she had a place here, a place in his family.

“So that brings me back to my first question,” he said. “Where do
you
get off telling my kid what the right thing to do is?”

“Calling him and expecting him to take responsibility for his wife and child was the right thing to do, Vince.” She tried to infuse her words with empathy and encouragement. She needed him to know she had not blasted back into town and immediately jumped to the conclusion that he was a failure as a father. “Any fool could see it.”

He jerked his head to one side. “Did you just call me a fool?”

“No. I…” Had she? That was exactly what she wanted to avoid. Why didn't anything between the two of them ever come out the way she hoped? “I…I think I just called myself one.”