The Widow of Saunders Creek (4 page)

I sat on the swing and shoved back, then let loose, looking up at the new chain and hooks. They would hold.

Jarrod should have been here helping with this kind of stuff. He hadn’t even really wanted to join the army, but September 11 brought out the patriot in him, and he dropped out of his second year of college to enlist.

I had known better than to try again. Even with a war on, they didn’t want guys like me. I stared at my twisted leg. With the naked eye, you couldn’t see anything wrong. The problem was under the skin and muscles, in the bone, where my horse had fallen on me during a race with Jarrod. We were only eighteen years old at the time, a week and a half away from graduation. I was only two weeks away from boot camp. I’d signed up and was just waiting for graduation. I already had my orders and was headed for Fort Sill, Oklahoma. And then the accident changed everything.

According to the doctor, I should thank my lucky stars and Jarrod’s quick thinking that I’d even kept my leg. I’d landed hard, and my thigh slammed into a stray log. As I tried to clear my head enough to figure out what had just happened, I watched, horrified, as my horse slid down onto his side. I couldn’t react. I heard the snap as my leg broke, and I went into some kind of shock. I barely felt the pain until later. I’d have a limp for the rest of my life. Jarrod had coaxed the lame horse off me, helped me up the ravine, draped me over the bare back of his horse, and hopped up behind me. He rode like a twister all the way to town.

I had Jarrod to thank, all right. For whipping his horse around me on that narrow, muddy path, knowing the horses could easily miss a step. I had Jarrod to thank for my horse losing his footing and sending us both sliding down the steep hill to the bottom of the holler, where I lay pinned while Jarrod carefully made his way down the hill.

He had indeed shoved and coaxed the wounded horse until I was able to wriggle free. But then he had paced and panicked, trying to figure out how to get me back up the steep incline. I would have punched him if I could, but in the end I was forced to yell at him to shut up and get the rope from my horse.

He helped tie the rope around me—thanks to our Boy Scouts training, we both knew how to create knots that wouldn’t come loose. He crawled back up the embankment and started to pull, while I used all the upper-body strength I possessed and dug my elbows into the ground. If the path had been wider, we could have had Jarrod’s horse pull, but we both knew that with the mud, it was likely his horse would plummet as well, so I crawled my way to the top while Jarrod tugged on the rope.

I can only imagine the spectacle we made entering Saunders Creek. By the time we rode the thirty minutes to town, I’d passed out from the pain. Jarrod was declared a hero. After several surgeries and a medical release from the army, I watched as Jarrod deployed with his unit from Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri.

I never really knew how much I resented my cousin all these years until his funeral six months ago. A hero’s funeral; a hero’s life. Sure, he was a hero, but Jarrod had always been reckless and impulsive. His last impulsive action had cost his life.

I stopped the swing and sat without moving for a while, taking in
the sunny, breezy spring day. There was no place I’d rather be than sitting right here on Granny and Pop’s front porch as I had during my childhood. Pop smoked a pipe, but Granny didn’t allow it inside, so every time he got a hankering for a smoke, we’d come here. I could almost smell it now as I remembered our talks on summer nights.

I spent most of my vacation nights here with Pop. Granny was always partial to Jarrod, with his love of old movies and TV shows, but I wanted to be outside experiencing things for myself, just like Pop. It’s amazing that I grew up to be the one to go to seminary while Jarrod did the macho thing.

I reached forward and rubbed my aching thigh. The pain told me we’d be in for another afternoon or evening storm. Nothing new for springtime in the Ozarks, but boy did it ever keep me popping the Advil.

The door opened, and I turned to find Corrie, pale as a ghost and still shaky. She had wrapped her blanket around her, and she seemed so small and alone. If there had been a way to transfer my strength to her and take some of that pain away, I would have gladly done so. I scooted over so she could sit on the swing next to me.

A wan smile came to her pretty lips as she glanced up at the new chains. “You fixed it. Thank you.” She sat abruptly, as if she was about to fall.

“How you feeling?”

A shrug lifted her tiny shoulders. “Better than earlier, but still not so good. I don’t see how social drinkers can function.”

I couldn’t help but laugh a little at that. “What you did last night was a little less ‘social’ and a little more ‘binging.’ ”

“That stuff sneaks up on you.” She closed her eyes. “Can we stop swinging before I barf?”

I planted my foot and the swing halted. “What made you decide to sleep on the couch?”

She shrugged. “The bedroom doesn’t feel right to me.”

“Do you want me to wait to start on the upstairs bathroom? I was going to take out the floor and replace the rotted boards this afternoon, but it’ll be noisy because I’ll be nailing.”

“Do you mind waiting until tomorrow?” she asked. “But I can tough it out if it’ll throw off your schedule.”

“My schedule is your schedule, boss.”

We had spoken on the phone a couple of weeks ago and mapped out a plan for how the renovation would proceed—what needed to be done, what had to be taken care of first. The plumbing, for instance, had been finished over six months ago, before Jarrod died. Now there were brand-new pipes fitted throughout the house. The electrician would have to come and rewire the entire house, but the soonest we could get him in was a month away, and that was iffy. It would be okay for a little while, as long as Corrie didn’t run too many appliances at once.

“Where do you live, Eli?” she asked. “I’m ashamed that I never bothered to ask you before. Close by, I assume, since most of the family lives on land your grandparents owned. Right?”

The question caused a bittersweet response in me. I’d honestly always believed Granny and Pop would leave me this house and the land above the river. I loved it best and spent a lot more of my time here before and after college than Jarrod ever did. But Pop went first, and
Granny made the decision to give it to Jarrod once his dad passed. Uncle Fred decided to go ahead and pass it on. There was a lot of grumbling right now among members of my vast family that Jarrod had passed the land and house to Corrie rather than his parents, who would have for sure kept it in the family.

Sitting next to Corrie now was the first time I didn’t begrudge him the inheritance, though I knew there were some in the family who were livid over her decision to come back to Saunders Creek and move into the house. What right did she have to live on Saunders land without Jarrod, or at the very least a Saunders child? I understood their fear. What if Corrie married an outsider and raised a bunch of non-Saunders in the house? I didn’t like the way that looked either, but I certainly couldn’t begrudge her the home Jarrod had given to her.

I smiled at her. Poor thing looked so miserable. “I live down the hill and a jog to the right. Go a couple of miles, and I’m the two-story brick. If you keep going a few miles, you’ll run into Aunt Trudy’s place. Her grandson, Ray, lives with her. If you turn left instead of right at the end of the hill, you’ll come to my mom’s, and past that is Jarrod’s parents.”

She nodded. “I remember where Liz and Fred live. We came a few times over the years. Just not enough for me to keep my directions straight with all these back roads. Let’s see, though. If I go straight, that road takes me into Saunders Creek, right?”

“Yep.” I pointed in the other direction, away from the road, and her head turned so her eyes could follow my finger. “If you’re ever out walking, you can get to my place by crossing the covered bridge down yonder. Take the trail beyond it, and it curves around so you come up on the backside of my property. That’s where the cabins are.”

“Hmm, okay.” Corrie squinted, trying to see where I was pointing, and I knew from my own teenage experiences with too much beer at our riverside parties that she was having a hard time with the sun. I reached into my shirt pocket and pulled out my sunglasses, a ten-year-old pair of Ray-Bans.

“Here. They won’t win you any fashion awards, but they’ll keep the sun from stabbing your eyeballs.”

“God bless you and your descendants,” she said, and I smiled, unbelievably charmed by her. How could Jarrod have signed back up after his first tour? If Corrie were my wife, I’d have gotten her pregnant as soon as she was willing, kept her that way for as long as she would have it, and filled a home with beautiful kids that looked like her. I’d have happily spent my life doing everything in my power to keep her happy.

Not that I was in love with my late cousin’s wife. But I liked her. A lot. And it wasn’t hard, even for a knucklehead like me, to see how lucky a guy would be if she surrendered her heart to him.

“Did you say something about cabins?” she said, resting her head against the new chain.

My mind worked for a second to catch up, then I remembered. “I run a summer camp for military kids.”

“Really?” She lifted her head and observed me. Or I guess she did. The glasses were pretty dark. “That is so cool. How’d you get into that?”

“I went to seminary with an army chaplain. He was telling me how at loose ends a lot of the kids are. They move every couple of years when Mom or Dad gets reassigned, and there are so many with at least one parent, sometimes both parents, deployed. Summer camp is a place for them to come and feel special.”

To be honest, I was a little surprised she didn’t know about the camp. I had spoken to Jarrod about it when he was stationed at Fort Leonard Wood the last two years. I asked him and Corrie to come and be part of it. I guessed he never said anything to her. But I wasn’t going to tattle on a dead guy.

“Jarrod told me you went to seminary,” she said. “I’d forgotten about that. He called you parson, like an old-time preacher.”

“Yeah, no respect for the cloth.”

She grinned. “Seriously, though. If you went through all the years of seminary, then why did you go into contracting?”

The truth was, I’d been given the opportunity to preach in large churches, in small churches, and as part of missionary programs, but my heart was here, in the Ozarks. I’d never be happy anywhere else, and unless I felt strongly that God was leading me, I’d never leave these hills. “I can’t leave my mom alone, for one thing,” I said, which, of course, was the short answer. “I do preach, though. I pastor a very small rural church just down the road.”

Her eyebrows went up above the rim of the glasses. “I didn’t know that. I’ll have to come and hear you. I guess I especially need to after last night’s drunken pity party.” She laughed. “But I guess God understands, huh?”

I gave her a wry sort of smile and shrugged. “I personally think God’s grace is all over situations like the one you are in. But given the choice, He would much rather you turn to Him for comfort than anything else.”

Her face grew a little red, and I felt bad. I hadn’t meant to shame her.

Corrie nudged me and looked toward the direction I’d indicated for the camp. “So, this camp of yours,” she said. “How long does it run?”

Relieved to change the subject, I dove into the new topic. “Six weeks. Different age groups, one week at a time. It’ll take most of my spare time between now and mid-June to get things ready.”

The wind picked up a little again, and a cool pocket of air floated up from the creek. She grew quiet. I respected the silence and kept quiet too.

She nudged me. “Hey, Eli?”

“Hmm?”

“Is there a store close by that sells porch swing cushions?”

Okay, so we were going to completely change topics. That was okay. I respected that too. “Lowe’s down in Springfield, I imagine.”

“Well, I need to get some. This wood swing might look pretty, but it’s too hard. My behind is protesting.”

I chuckled because, now that I thought about it, I reckoned she was right.

“Can you drive me in?” she asked.

“You mean now?”

“I’d have to stick my hair up in a clip and put on some mascara, but yeah, since we’re not working on the bathroom anyway.” She paused. “Unless you have someplace else you need to be?”

“Nope. I’m just surprised you feel like making a trip to anywhere but bed.”

“I’m feeling a little better, and I’m afraid if I go to bed now I’ll be up all night. I’d rather not get my days and nights mixed up. With remodeling going on in my house, I’ll never get any sleep.” She shrugged
and looked up at me. “But I could probably drive myself if you don’t want to go.”

I waved aside her comment. “It’s okay. I could use a couple of things from there anyway. So it’ll kill two birds with one stone.”

“Okay, thanks.” She stood, clutching the light blanket around her. “Be back in a sec.” She slid the sunglasses from her face and handed them to me. “Thanks for these. I have some inside.”

Her eyes were starting to lose that dull, pain-filled look, and I could see a little of the spark I admired.

The door slammed hard behind her, and I heard her gasp.

I stood and got to her as fast as my limp allowed. “You okay?” I asked. I decided not to remind her that the frame on the screen was fragile.

“Yeah, the slam just surprised me. I didn’t realize it was so windy.”

I knew then that the door hadn’t slammed itself, and she hadn’t slammed it either.

A frown crossed her features, and she looked out at the tree line, presumably looking to see branches swaying—but they were still. “It’s really not windy, is it? Sheesh. I best be more careful.” She shrugged. “Be right back.”

I hated to acknowledge what had slammed the door and turned over my thermos earlier today. Half the family believed in ghosts and thought the strange things that had happened around this place for as far back as I could remember could be attributed to an ancestor—or more than one. I sensed something was here too, but as I told Corrie earlier, I didn’t believe people were allowed to come back as ghosts.