Far Country (25 page)

           
His eyes wandered to the childish script on his leg brace. Gracie had printed
her whole name. ‘Sarah Grace Bolton’, and wreathed the words at either end with
little silver hearts. Sarah Grace Bolton. It fit, really. And Gracie was so
like Sarah, he thought. It was amazing that he had not made the connection
immediately.  The gray eyes and thick black hair…! Steve shook himself.
Gracie had said she was five and born in February. He counted back in his head,
recalling the one time, after the cast party for Oklahoma, when they had lost
control. It had been unplanned, unexpected and so sweet….
but it was just the
one time! Was it even possible?

           
Yes, it was.

           
Abruptly, Steve lurched to his feet and limped to the door.  He couldn’t
sit here and he couldn’t go back there, where Mrs. Bolton and Gracie waited to
see the doctor. Not right now. Not with the things that he was thinking! He
eased himself into the station wagon and slumped dazedly in the seat. 

           
Could I have a daughter?
The possibility of it swirled in his brain,
almost making him dizzy.
Could Sarah’s poor broken body have borne a child?

           
After a time the mounting heat of late spring in North Carolina forced him to
start the car and crank the air conditioning.  Slowly he drove back to the
house.

           
When his mother came home from work an hour later, he was sitting in the living
room, sipping a glass of iced tea. “Oh good, you’re awake!” She said, smiling
fondly at him.  “I didn’t want to holler in case you were taking a nap.”

           
She poured herself an iced tea and joined Steve on the couch, studying her son.
Her heart fluttered a little. The dark, moody expression on his face didn’t
seem to herald good news at all. Would he need surgery after all? She had
thought he was doing so well, too! Mrs. Williams steeled herself for the worst.
“So,” she prompted gently. “What did the doctor have to say?  Was it bad
news?”

           
Steve shook his head, setting the glass down on the coffee table coaster. 
“I didn’t see the doctor today, mom.  Something happened and I had to
leave.”

           
Mrs. Williams caught her breath. “Did you wreck the car?” She asked,
apprehensively.

           
Again, Steve shook his head, wry smile on his lips at her initial
reaction.  “The car’s fine, mom,” he assured her. “But look at this.”

           
He pointed to the crooked silver letters that wobbled across his leg brace.
Mrs. Williams leaned forward and frowned as she read the words. “Sarah Grace
Bolton,” she breathed softly in surprise.  “Did Lee Ann Bolton actually
talk to you , then? Was she civil to you?  I’m so pleased! You know she
struggled with depression over what happened for years, but having little
Gracie around has helped her so much. Isn’t she a sweet child?”

           
Steve stared at his mother as if he didn’t know who she was. “You knew about
Sarah Grace, and you didn’t bother to tell me?” He questioned her in an
accusing tone.

           
Mrs. Williams blinked, taken aback by his tone of voice.  “It didn’t occur
to me that you would care to know, Steve. The Bolton’s’ took Gracie in when she
was little more than a baby. David’s cousin in Memphis died in a wreck about a
year after your accident. Gracie has lived here ever since.”

           
Steve was caught off guard. “David’s cousin? What cousin?” He asked sharply.

           
Mrs. Williams shrugged, bewildered.  “I don’t know, really. I don’t recall
meeting her,” she admitted to Steve.  “I’ve heard that she was a single
mom, and that the father of the child had left her before Gracie was even born.
A tragedy, to be sure, but they were happy to get the baby.  It helped to
take their minds off of what was happening to Sarah.”

           
Steve took a deep breath and frowned, trying to recall David and Sarah’s
‘cousin’ in Memphis.  They DID have an uncle there, but had there been
cousins too?  The uncle, though, he had visited once.  Steve recalled
that he seemed very old, compared to David’s father, and he’d been sick – with
a portable oxygen tank.  Steve thought that it might have been emphysema.
There had been no mention of cousins!

           
“Steve?” Mrs. Williams prodded her son back to the present. “Steve, where did
you see Lee Ann and Gracie?”

           
Steve sighed. “We saw each other, but we didn’t speak. Gracie has a broken
arm.   She picked up my pen when I dropped it and we started talking
in the waiting room.  Mrs. Bolton was sitting on the other side watching
the TV, so I had no idea who she was with. Mrs. Bolton didn’t know I was there
until she got up to take Gracie back for her appointment.”

           
“What happened when she saw you?”

           
Steve shrugged.  “Nothing, really.  She looked upset at first, then
kind of scared, actually.  She hurried Gracie to the back without speaking
to me.

           
Mrs. Williams sat back on the couch, stretching her legs out in front of
her.  “I’m sure it was unsettling, to see her so unexpectedly. You said
that Gracie had a broken arm, though?”

           
Steve nodded. “Fell off of her tire swing.”  He was quiet for a long
moment. “Mom, she looks a lot like Sarah,” he told her abruptly.

           
Mrs. Williams shrugged. “They’re family, Steve. It may seem disturbing, the
resemblance, but it’s not so uncommon for cousins to have similar features.”

           
Steve struggled to accept the possibility, but in his heart, he felt certain
that he knew the truth. Gracie was not the child of some distant Memphis
cousin. He and Sarah had made a child that night, and that child was Gracie.

           
“Mom, Sarah and I…” He took a deep breath. “I believe that Gracie is my
daughter.”

           
A dead silence hung in the room as mother and son stared at each other. Mrs.
Williams shook her head suddenly and stood up. “No. Steve, no,” she said
firmly, every move she made repudiating the whole idea.

           
 “Don’t start this, now. You’ve obsessed about Sarah for years, don’t ruin
the rest of your life making hysterical claims about Gracie Bolton.  Even
if it were possible, Steve, it can’t be!”

           
“Yes, mom, I’m sorry, but it could be,” Steve said, cutting her off flatly. “It
was only once, but we didn’t plan to…it...just happened. We didn’t even think
about protection.”

           
Steve looked at his mother, but her face was impassive. “It was after the cast
party, in May,” he continued nervously. Gracie told me she was born in
February, and that she was five years old.” Even though she didn’t speak he
knew that his mother was doing the calculations in her head.

           
Steve studied the floor. “I didn’t know.  I doubt that Sarah could have
known, even. But, mom, it is definitely possible.”

           
Mrs. Williams was silent for a long time. “Steve,” she began finally. “Even if
she had been pregnant – think about it. The accident, the drugs the trauma to
her body! She would have miscarried, surely.”

           
“Maybe,” Steve conceded. “Or, maybe not. If they did a routine pregnancy test,
they would have known not to use certain drugs.”

           
Mrs. Williams slowly returned to the couch and sat down next to her son.

           
“Steve,” his mother said in a gentle pleading voice. “You’re just grabbing at
straws! This is just one more attempt to hang on to a part of Sarah.”  She
took his clenched hand in her own and stroked it. “Honey, think about it,” she
begged. “If you start making wild claims about Gracie, you will reopen old
wounds that will never heal.”

           
Steve opened his mouth to speak but Mrs. Williams interrupted him. “Haven’t
there been enough victims from that wreck?” She said in a shaking, vehement
voice. “Don’t make her a victim, too, Steve! And please don’t destroy the
little peace that the Bolton’s have found with this child!”

           
Steve’s eyes were haunted. “You didn’t see her, mom.”

           
She paused, her eyes wet with emotion. “I have seen her,” she reminded him.
“You’re right that Gracie looks a little like Sarah Bolton, but that does
not
make her Sarah’s daughter - or yours.”

           
Steve looked into his mother’s eyes. His face pained was incredulous. 
“She could be your grandchild, mom. Are you willing to let that go?”

           
Mrs. Williams’ face grew hard and angry. “You are talking foolishness, Steve! I
can not
believe that she is my granddaughter. When
are you going to let this sick obsession go? Sarah is dead, Steve! There was no
baby!”

           
Steve could only stare at his mother in shocked silence. “But what if there
was?” He said softly.

           
Steve Mrs. Williams stood up stiffly. “I’m going to fix us some dinner.” She
paused in the doorway to the kitchen and studied the stubborn expression on
Steve’s face. When she spoke her voice was tired and heavy with grief for what
that night had cost them all.

           
“It is time for you to let go of the past, and let everyone get on with their
lives. Enough is enough. Please. Let it go!” She turned abruptly and walked
quickly from the room, her heels clicking angrily on the tiled floor.

           
Steve remained hunched on the couch.  He continued to stare at the
childish silver scrawl on the knee brace. Gently, he traced the letters with
his finger.

                                               
w
Sarah Grace Bolton
w
 

           
Was
he clinging obsessively to a dead past? Or reaching out to a living
future?

           
Steve slouched sullenly in the easy chair across from Pastor Graham.  This
meeting was not going the way he had envisioned it. Pastor Graham was no more
enthusiastic about the idea that Gracie might be his daughter than his own
mother had been!

           
“Why is it so hard for you to see this?” Steve demanded.  “She is the
spitting image of Sarah!”

           
“Yes, there is no doubt that the child is a Bolton,” Reverend Graham agreed
calmly. “But there is doubt that she is yours.”

           
“But
I 
know
it!” Steve shot back emphatically, leaning
forward as his emotions flooded his voice.

           
Reverend Graham smiled sadly at Steve’s passionate statement.  “You don’t
know
it. You
want
it to be true,” He corrected Steve.

           
“God!” Steve pounded his clenched fist on the desk that rested between them in
his frustration. “How can you say that? Why don’t you believe me?”

           
“Hold on,” said Reverend Graham firmly.  “I never said that I didn’t
believe that
you
believe it, Steve.  But this is not a revelation
to be taken lightly.”  He leaned toward Steve. How long were you in the
waiting room talking to Gracie before the nurse called her name?”

           
Steve collapsed back resentfully.  He shrugged.  “I don’t know. 
Ten, maybe fifteen minutes, tops.”

           
“So if it is so self evident that Gracie belonged to you and Sarah, why did it
take  hearing her name spoken aloud to make you realize it?”

           
Steve was silent a moment.  Why hadn’t he realized it at first, and why
was he so certain now?  “Reverend,” he responded slowly, “why didn’t the
disciples recognize Jesus after the crucifixion? It had only been three days
since they had last seen him, and they had spent nearly every day of the last
three years in his company.  They didn’t know him, until he told them, but
once their eyes were open, they never wavered in their belief again.”

           
Reverend Graham settled back in his chair and smiled ruefully. “At least I know
that you have been paying attention in Bible Study all these months,” he
responded with a sigh.

           
 “All right, I’ll agree that until you heard her name, you never really
looked at the child with that thought in your head.” He took a deep breath,
letting it out slowly.  “Still, you don’t know. You can’t know if Lee Ann
is telling the truth about Gracie’s parentage, or telling a lie to hide the
truth.”  He paused, thinking and chewing on his bottom lip.

           
“Steve, I’m going to say something to you that you are not going to want to
hear, but I hope you will at least think about it before you fly off the
handle.  Will you at least hear me out?”

           
Steve eyed the pastor apprehensively. At last he relaxed a little and nodded.
“Shoot,” he said.

           
Pastor Graham formed a steeple with his fingers, taking his time to find the
words he needed.  “When you saw Gracie, was she healthy? Apart from her
broken arm?”