Home to Walnut Ridge (15 page)

“
And what have you named
your first baby?”

“
Oh. I completely forgot.
Silly me.” Tracey smiled. “Let’s see. It’s definitely a he and not
a she.”

“
Absolutely.”

“
How about Stanley? A
homage to his cute little legs.”

“
Hey, it’s your call.
Stanley sounds perfect.”

“
Stanley it is. Now what
shall I work on next?”

“
Wanna help me finish
Fredo here? He needs another coat of
Boxwood.
”

“
Ah, Fredo-the-Coffee
Table.” She pulled on her work smock. “Put me to work.”

Tracey settled in next to
her sister. “So, do you have favorites? Which of your
babies
did you like
best?”

“
I love them all, so I
can’t choose favorites. But there was a chest of drawers with a
curved front that I absolutely adored. It took several days,
waiting for it to speak to me and tell me what it wanted to be,
what color, that sort of thing. But I was patient. Then one day I
knew. She said her name was Beatrice, and she wanted a pale shade
called
Linen
on
top and a rich blue called
French
Enamel
below. And that’s what she got. I
distressed her more than I usually do, but she loved it, and so did
I. Then she let me know in no uncertain terms that she wanted glass
knobs and pulls. And she was so right. Oh Sis, she was just
beautiful.

“
And here’s the best part.
I haven’t mentioned this before, but I pray for each of these
babies while I restore them.”

“
You
pray
for them?
Okay . . .”

“
I pray for the people who
adopt them. But it was hard to let Beatrice go. Then one day my
friend Gigi stopped by. She teaches with me at school. She and her
husband were expecting their first child‌—‌a little boy‌—‌and she
wanted some decorating ideas for her nursery. Trace, the split
second she laid eyes on Beatrice, it was love at first sight! They
had just painted the nursery walls a pastel shade of blue that
matched the
French Enamel
just perfectly. And so it was that my Beatrice
went home to care for Gigi’s baby‍—‍”

“
Alex, are those tears in
your eyes?”

Alex put her brush down
and wiped her face. “Oh, sure. I can’t help it! Here I’d been
praying for Beatrice, having
no
idea she would go home with my friend Gigi and be
a part of her new baby’s room! I love when things like that
happen.”

Tracey shook her head. “Who but my
sister would see furniture restoration as a ministry? I love that
about you, Sis.”

Alex finished wiping her
tears and picked up her brush, dipping it into the
olive-gray-green
Boxwood
paint. “Think about it‌—‌why would God give us a
passion for something unless we could somehow use it for His glory?
But the whole idea of restoring something old and worn out into
something new and useful didn’t originate with me‌—‌God’s been in
the restoration business from the beginning of time.”

Tracey thought for a moment. “You’re
right. Just look at Dad. And the rest of the Elders, for that
matter.”

“
Speaking of which, tell
me about last night. Did you have a nice time with
Noah?”

Tracey couldn’t help smiling. “Yeah,”
she nodded. “Really nice.”

“
Evidently. He stayed long
enough.”

“
Well, we took a ride
first, so he wasn’t technically ‘here’ the whole
time. We went out to the river bluff. My first
time there, I might add.”

Alex turned, her paint brush in
mid-air. “Oh? Isn’t that where all the kids used to go to make
out?”

Tracey focused on her paint strokes.
“Yeah, I guess.”

“
You guess?”

“
Anyway, we just talked up
there for a long time, then‍—‍”

“
Did he kiss
you?”

“
What? You’re awfully nosy
this morning.”

“
Ah, so he
did
kiss
you!”

“
What is this, the
inquisition? I’m not in high school anymore, y’know.”

Alex busied herself painting again.
“You like him?”

Tracey didn’t answer at
first. Hearing her sister’s questions‌—‌well, it just felt weird.
Tracey wasn’t sure
she
was ready to let her mind go down that line of thinking, let
alone discuss it with her sister.

Alex sat up again and looked at her.
“Oh, dear.”

“
Oh-dear what?”

She returned to her work. “Nothing.
Don’t mind me.”

Tracey felt her heart flutter and
wondered why. Then, as she continued painting, she remembered Noah
and the bluff and his first kiss . . .

And she smiled.

Chapter 13

Noah had just returned from another
trip to the home improvement store when Buddy approached him on the
porch of the smokehouse.

“
Noah, I’m glad you’re
back. We just got word Mrs. Oglesby needs some help. That big ol’
black walnut tree in her back yard finally keeled over. Made quite
a mess of her garage.”

“
How can I
help?”

“
I’d like to leave most of
the guys here to finish dry-walling, but I thought I’d get Gristle
and Stump to bring their chainsaws and take care of the tree. You
up for some minor roof repairs? I thought we could patch it up from
the inside and get some shingles back on there before another storm
rolls through.”

“
Works for me. When do you
want to head over?”

“
Soon as we can. Let’s
grab some of those shingles we had left over from the Farley’s
roof. I think they’re in the barn if I’m not mistaken.”

Noah felt a catch of apprehension
knowing Tracey was probably at the barn working with Alex. He
hadn’t seen her since last night‌—‌well, this morning. He couldn’t
believe they’d stayed up half the night. He hadn’t slept much when
he finally got to bed, unable to get her off his mind. Over and
over, he wished he hadn’t reacted the way he did when she asked
about Melissa. He thought he’d finally started living again, that
the worst was all behind him‌—‌right up until Tracey asked him
about the wife he’d lost. He could only hope she understood. She
seemed to handle it okay last night.

He only wished
he
had handled it as
well. Instead, the images of his wife, the wreck, and all those
dark months he’d lost to grief played over and over like a
slideshow through his mind . . . and sprinkled among
them, flashes of Tracey’s smile and the memory of how good she felt
in his arms. He tried to shake it off before seeing her again.
Especially in front of Buddy and Alex.

A few minutes later, Buddy backed the
pickup to the barn door and they got out.

Buddy stepped into the barn. “How’s it
going, sweetheart?”

Alex dusted off her hands on her
smock. “Hi, Dad. Hey, Noah. What are you two doing
here?”

“
Just stopped by to pick
up some shingles.” As Buddy told her about Mrs. Oglesby’s roof
problem, Noah noticed Tracey coming from the back of the cluttered
barn. When she looked up and saw him, she smiled.

“
Hi, Noah.”

“
Hi, Tracey.”

He could almost feel the abrupt
silence in the air as Buddy and Alex just stood there looking at
them. By the grin on Alex’s face, he knew Tracey must have told her
about their evening together. But how much had she told
her?

Awkward.

“
Well, then,” Tracey
finally said, “what’s this about Mrs. Oglesby?”

Buddy explained the situation again
and the plan to fix her roof. “We’ll just load up some of those
shingles back here then be out of your way.”

“
You’re not in our way,”
Alex said. “In fact, take Tracey with you. She can help. Might be
fun for her to see you and the Elders in action.”

Tracey turned to her sister with her
back to Noah. By the tilt of her head, he could only imagine the
look she was giving Alex. Just as quickly, she turned back around
with an exaggerated smile plastered on her face. “I’d love to. Let
me get some gloves, and I’ll meet you in the truck.”

“
Good,” Noah said. He
returned Alex’s smile. “Good.”

“
You said that,” Alex
said.

“
I know. Well, bye for
now.”

“
Bye, Noah.”

An hour later, Gristle and Stump had
most of the tree limbs off the roof and had started cutting them
for firewood. After making the repairs inside the garage, Noah and
Buddy helped Tracey up onto the roof, and the three of them set to
work pulling off the damaged shingles. Once that was done, they
started hammering the new shingles in place.

At first, conversation had been
difficult with the chainsaws buzzing below. Eventually Gristle and
Stump finished and started stacking the logs.

Tracey reached for another shingle.
“How often do you all do this sort of thing, helping folks out when
they have emergencies?”

“
All the time,” Buddy
answered. “When I started getting to know these guys on the bike
trips, I kept feeling like I needed to do something.” He hammered a
few times and continued. “It felt like God was telling me to reach
out to them, but in a specific way. Problem was, I couldn’t figure
out what that meant. So for the longest time I just kept praying,
waiting for some kind of sign or direction from the Lord. Well, as
you are well aware, my dear daughter,” he said with a smile,
“sometimes I’m a little slow on the draw. It finally dawned on me
that one of the things that had helped me so much after my world
caved in was taking my eyes off my own troubles and looking for
other folks who needed a hand. Best medicine on the
planet.

“
And that’s when I decided
to give these guys a dose of that medicine. The Bible says that
helping widows and orphans in their time of distress is one of the
‘purest forms of religion.’ So I made a few calls, mostly to the
older residents here in Jacobs Mill asking them to let me know if
they had any odd jobs or projects they needed help with. I started
getting requests, so I made a simple offer to some of the guys
asking if they could help out. And little by little we got a
reputation for doing these jobs well and efficiently.” Buddy held
up his hammer. “I kept thinking, with every nail we hit or tree we
clear away, we’re demonstrating the love of Christ, pure and
simple.” He tossed her a wink and banged his hammer down to prove
his point.

Noah finished hammering a shingle and
looked over at Tracey. “I wish you could have seen some of those
little old ladies when we first rolled up their driveways on our
Harleys.” He and Buddy laughed. “I guess they thought the Hells
Angels had arrived. They’d peek out from behind their curtains,
probably convinced we were there to trash the place.”

“
Then after a while,
they’d warm up to us,” Buddy added. “Course, they all knew
me
, and let me know
right up front they wished I’d cut my hair and shave my beard.” He
shook his head as he smiled. “But God love ‘em, every single one of
them gave my guys a chance. Took a while, but they finally learned
to look beyond the loud motorcycles and shaggy appearances and just
accept them for who they are.”

Noah wiped his forehead with his
bandana. “You should have seen the day Mrs. Peterson tiptoed out of
her house carrying lemonade out to ‘her boys’ as she called us. You
could tell she was still nervous about us by the way the ice in
those glasses kept rattling‍—‍” Noah re-enacted the widow’s
trembling hands carrying an imaginary tray. “I thought she might
just die from fright then and there.”

“
Oh, poor Mrs. Peterson!”
Tracey chuckled. “But how sweet of her to do that, even though you
all must have terrified her.”

Buddy hooted. “Glory, by
the time we finished painting her house, she was sending
her boys
home with pecan
pies and watermelon and fried chicken‌—‌you never saw such a love
fest.” He paused, slowly lowering his hammer. “But I’ll never
forget the day Stump leaned
waaaay
down to give her a hug, then swept her right off
her feet and twirled her around in a circle.”

Tracey laughed so hard, Noah was
afraid she might fall off the roof. “Knowing Mrs. Peterson, I bet
she shrieked with delight!”

“
Oh, you should have seen
that dear old soul,” Buddy said. “To this day, she has a standing
invitation for Stump to come for Tuesday night dinner. Those two
are a sight to behold.” He paused for a moment, looking down across
the yard where Stump and Gristle were still piling the tree logs.
“But Tracey . . .”

When he paused, both Noah and Tracey
looked up at him. Noah could see the moisture in his eyes and the
slight tremble of his lips.

“
Tracey, what that woman
has done for that big giant of a man‌—‌well, I can hardly find
words for it. He came from such an
awful
background. No daddy. A mom
who didn’t want him. Kicked around from one orphanage to another.
And you can only imagine how all the other kids treated him, like
he was some kind of freak. A horrible life from the day he was
born. Stuff I won’t share because I consider it confidential as his
friend and pastor, but also because it’s the stuff of
nightmares.”