On Blue Falls Pond

Praise for
Susan Crandall

Promises To Keep

“FOUR STARS! Crandall once again tells a heartwarming story of the Boudreau family.”

—Romantic Times BOOKclub Magazine

“Touching, well-written.”

—FreshFiction.com

“An appealing heroine . . . [an] unexpected plot twist . . . engaging and entertaining.”

—
TheRomanceReader.com

“Heartwarming . . . Crandall deftly takes up where she left off in
The Road Home
.”

—Booklist

“Another fantastic story by Susan Crandall.”

—RomanceReviewsMag.com

“This is one book you will want to keep to read repeatedly.”

—
MyShelf.com

Magnolia Sky

“Emotionally charged . . . An engrossing story that affirms the best of what families are made, not born, to be.”

—BookPage

“A wonderful story that kept surprising me as I read. Real conflicts and deep emotions make the powerful story come to life.”

—Rendezvous

“An engaging contemporary romance starring two scarred souls and a wonderful support cast . . . Fans will enjoy.”

—Midwest Book Review

The Road Home

“A terrific story . . . with warmth and an instinctive understanding of the heart, this is a book you will want to keep to read again and again.”

—
RomRevToday.com

“The characters . . . stay with you long after the last page is read.”

—
Bookloons.com

Back Roads

“Accomplished and very satisfying . . . Add Susan Crandall to your list of authors to watch.”

—
Bookloons.com

“An amazingly assured debut novel . . . expertly drawn.”

—
TheRomanceReadersConnection.com

“A definite all-nighter. Very highly recommended.”

—
RomRevToday.com

B
OOKS BY
S
USAN
C
RANDALL

On Blue Falls Pond

Promises to Keep

Magnolia Sky

The Road Home

Back Roads

In loving memory of my dad, Vic Zinn,

who, as a youth, scorned school and still managed to hold passion for books.

Acknowledgments

T
HROUGHOUT MY EXTENSIVE RESEARCH
into macular degeneration, autism, and service dogs, I came to know and respect a whole new world. I’d like to thank all those who shared their experiences and expertise with me as I wrote this book. As always, any errors or variances for fictitious purposes are my own.

I appreciate the patience of those in the MD Forum who answered my countless questions about coping with macular degeneration, especially Dan Brown, Jan Hancock, and Kathy Grant.

Thanks to my friends at NINC Link who shared their knowledge about autism and its treatments: Jeane Weston, Kelly McClymer, and Sabrina Jefferies.

My greatest understanding came from discussing the reality of raising a child with autism with their loving parents. Thanks to Janna Bullough and Joanne Markis for all their stories and insight. I stand in awe of these families.

Thanks to Dr. Mona Gitter for helping me with my research on service dogs (and for being such a great vet for all of my critters!).

And, as always, thanks to Indy WITTS, the greatest support and critique group in the universe: Alicia, Brenda, Garthia, Pam, and Sherry. And to Karen White, who has been with me since the beginning.

Prologue

Granny Tula insisted with all of her Jesus-loving heart that God’s hand was in everything. She held the deep conviction that, although it might not be readily seen, there was a divine reason for all that transpired in His earthly kingdom; even the terrible derailment of Glory’s life. But Glory Harrison didn’t possess her grandmother’s unwavering faith. Glory had spent the past eighteen months on the run and had never once seen a glimmer of God’s hand in any of it.

Tragedy, a dark and unexpected assailant, had robbed her of her home, her husband, and her unborn child. Drowning in grief, Glory had fled Tennessee. Small towns could be a comfort during times of disaster and misery—but they could also hold your heart forever in that place of loss. The piteous looks and well-meant platitudes were going to do just that, keep her heart a bloody mess that would never heal.

Granny had never understood Glory’s need to leave. Luckily, Granny did not hold that incomprehensible need against her. She might not understand Glory’s choice, but kin was kin—and that meant she would hold on to you no matter how far from the hollow you roamed. More than once, Gran had said, this family tree was oak, not poplar; and its roots went deep into the bedrock of eastern Tennessee soil. She lived her life by a simple rule: In the face of adversity you raised your chin, stiffened your back, held on to your faith, and marched forward on the very path that had become littered with your broken dreams. Certainly, Granny had trod on the splinters of her own life often enough. But Glory had not been able to force her feet to crush the fragile remains of who she used to be. So she left it all behind and tried to reinvent herself.

Unfortunately, new Glory bore the same heavy sadness as old Glory, just in different climates. It had become clear that no matter how far she ran, the pain, deep and cold and fathomless, would follow her like a shadow. Sooner or later, she realized, you have to either accustom yourself to its presence or stay forever hiding in the dark.

The time was fast coming to step into the light.

Chapter One

G
LORY’S KEY STUCK
in the old lock on her apartment door, refusing to turn; refusing to slide back out. She gritted her teeth, gripped the doorknob, and shook until the door rattled on its hinges, fully aware that her response was overreaction in the extreme. This lock had recently become an unwelcome symbol of her life: stymied in a dull and disconnected present, unable to move toward her future. She knew it was wrong, this hiding, this pretense of living. But she’d buried herself here and couldn’t find a way to claw back out.

Taking a deep breath, she tried to use more delicate force against the lock. Her nerves had been raw and on edge all day long. Her job at the veterinary clinic normally had a soothing effect upon her, allowing her to focus on something outside her own aching hollowness. But today she couldn’t shake a nagging feeling that something was wrong. It was an insidious awareness that she just couldn’t quell. Maybe it was simply her own growing understanding that she was running from the inescapable. But it seemed heavier than that; she was anxious to get inside and call Granny, just to ease her mind that the feeling had nothing to do with her.

For all of her life, Glory had had an inexplicable connection to her grandmother. Time and again she’d call and Gran would say, “I was just about to call you.” Glory didn’t share that mysterious connection with anyone else. When she was young, Granny would wink and lean close, saying they came from a long line of spooky women. Back then it had made Glory think of witches and spells. But now she understood; there were some people who were knit more tightly together than just by family genetics.

The telephone began to ring inside the apartment.

Glory jiggled the key with renewed vigor. Finally, on the telephone’s fourth ring, the key turned, and she hurried inside.

“Hello,” she said breathlessly as she snatched up the phone.

“Glory, darlin’, are you all right?”

Granny’s slow Tennessee drawl immediately soothed Glory’s nerves.

“Fine, I was just coming in and had trouble with the lock.” She pushed her hair away from her face. “You’ve been on my mind today, Gran. How are you?”

There was a half-beat pause that set the back of Glory’s neck to tingling before Granny said, “Fine. Busy. Had Charlie’s boys here for the weekend.”

“All of them?” Glory’s cousin Charlie was getting a divorce and had taken to foisting his five little hellions off on Granny when it was “his weekend.” It really burned Glory, his taking advantage like that. Granny was seventy-three, and five boys under the age of thirteen was just too much.

“’Course. We had a great time. Hiked back to the falls. They can’t get enough swimming. Travis caught hisself a snake.”

Glory closed her eyes and drew a breath. The very idea of Granny alone with five rambunctious little boys—swimming, no less—a two-mile hike from help made her stomach turn. Blue Falls could have a wicked pull at the base.

“Everyone all right?” Glory tempered her question; Granny’s feathers got ruffled if you treated her like an old person—overprotection was a sin not to be forgiven. Any allusion to aged infirmity quickly drew pursed lips and narrowed eyes.

“’Course. Them boys all swim like fish.”

“Charlie shouldn’t expect you to take the boys all of the time.”
Careful, don’t make it sound like it’s because of her age.
“They need to spend time with their father.”

Granny made a scoffing sound. “Keeps me young. It’s only a couple of times a month. Charlie sees ’em plenty.”

Glory sat on the rest of her argument; she’d be wasting her breath. After a tiny pause too short for thought, she said, “I’m thinking about moving again.” Even as the words tumbled out, she surprised herself. She’d been skirting around the idea for a few weeks now, but didn’t have any solid plan laid out.

A knowing
hmmm
came over the line. “Where?”

“I don’t know yet. I can’t imagine staying in St. Paul through winter. The snow was fun for a while—but the thought of a whole winter here makes me depressed.”

She heard Granny take a deep breath on the other end of the line. It was a telltale sign of trouble.

“What? Is something wrong?” Glory couldn’t keep an edge of fear from her voice. She’d known something was happening.

“Not wrong. It’s just . . . I had a little episode with my eye—”

“Why didn’t you call me?” Glory’s heart leaped into her throat. Her all-day foreboding now honed in on its source.

“I just told you.”

“So have you seen a doctor? What happened? Is someone there with you?”

“Calm down. I’m fine enough. I saw the doctor this mornin’. He said it should clear up this time.”

“This time? Have you had other episodes?” A few years ago Granny had been diagnosed with macular degeneration, a disease that would most likely rob her of her central vision, altering her life immeasurably. But so far Granny had been lucky. This was the first time Glory had heard a hint of a problem.

“It was a tiny broken vein. He wants to see me again next week.”

Glory forced herself to ask, “Can you see?”

“Right eye’s fine.”

“But the left?”

“Eh.” Glory could see her grandmother dismissing it with the lift of a sharp-boned shoulder.

“So the condition is getting worse.”

“Not necessarily. But, darlin’, you know it’s just a matter of time. I been luckier than most. Time’s come to take note.”

Glory couldn’t swallow; emotion had closed off her throat.

“I was wondering . . . could you . . . could you come home?” Granny rushed on, “Not permanent. I just want to see your face clear one more time.”

This was the first time in Glory’s memory that Tula Baker had asked
anything
of another human being. A cold sweat covered Glory from head to foot. “I’m on my way.”

Twelve hours later, Glory had her car packed with her few belongings and was headed south. She barely noticed the miles and the hours passing as she wrestled with emotions that were quickly becoming a two-headed monster. It certainly wasn’t difficult leaving St. Paul; she’d been inching closer to that decision every day. For the past eighteen months she’d thought of herself as “trying on” different places, like one would search for a new winter coat. She’d left Dawson with the firm conviction that there was a place out there that would act as a balm, a salve to her soul; and she could bask in it like a healing Caribbean sun. But the climates changed, population fluctuated, and Glory still felt as if she were an empty vessel, insides echoing her barren life like a bass drum. East, West, cities, small towns, suburbia . . . nothing brought peace.

No, leaving Minnesota was easy—but the very thought of returning to Tennessee brought beads of sweat to her upper lip and a sickness deep in her belly. What if Granny’s sight didn’t return? What if this truly was the beginning of the end of her independence? Glory’s heart ached for lost time and uncertain futures. A part of her could barely force herself to press the accelerator for the dread of seeing her hometown again; yet another part of her could not reach her grandmother’s wiry embrace fast enough.

Before she knew it, she was a mere handful of miles from the Tennessee state line, less than two hours from Dawson. Her grandmother lived a few miles beyond that, deep in Cold Spring Hollow, nestled in the verdant, misty foot of the Smoky Mountains.

The rolling lay of the land in Kentucky seemed to be priming Glory for that inevitable moment when she would cross into the lush hill country that had nurtured her for her first twenty-six years. As her car chewed up the rapidly decreasing miles, she assured herself that there would not be a great crashing wall of memory that would overcome her at the state line. Months of therapy had suggested perhaps there would be no memories—ever.

Still, Glory doubted the professionals’ opinions. True, she had no “memory” of that night. But she did possess an indefinable sense of gut-deep terror when she turned her mind toward trying to recall. Which told her those memories were there, lying in the darkness, waiting to swallow her whole.

Could she face Dawson and all she had lost there? Could she actually
live
there again? If Granny needed her, of course she would. Still . . . one day at a time. First thing was to get home and assess the situation.

She rolled down the driver’s-side window. The roar of the wind at seventy filled her head. She glanced at the graceful rise and fall of the green pastures beside the interstate. She drew deep breaths, as if to lessen the shock by easing herself home, by reacquainting her senses gradually to the sights and smells of hill country.

As a child, Glory had loved visiting the wild of the deep hollow where Granny Tula had lived since the day she was born. Life in the hollow was hard, but straightforward—understandable. People of her grandmother’s ilk had no time or patience for dwelling on the superficial. They accepted whatever life handed them with a nod of stoicism and another step toward their future.

Hillbillies.
That’s what her in-laws called folks like Tula Baker. Of course, they would never say anything like that directly about Granny—but the thought was there, burning brightly behind their sophisticated old-money eyes. What they had never understood was that neither Glory nor her grandmother would have been insulted by the term. Glory’s mother, Clarice, on the other hand, would have been mortified. Clarice, the youngest of Tula Baker’s seven children, had struggled to separate herself from the hollow and all it implied.

As Glory watched the terrain grow rougher and the woodlands become increasingly dense, she didn’t feel the tide of panic that she’d anticipated.

I’m going to make it.
The thought grew stronger with each breath that drew in the mingling of horse manure, damp earth and fresh grass.
I’m going to make it.
. . .

The instant she saw the large sign that said
WELCOME TO TENNESSEE
Glory’s lungs seized. All of her mental preparation disappeared on the wind rushing by the open window.

Suddenly light-headed, she pulled onto the emergency lane of the interstate. As soon as her car stopped moving, she put it in park, fearing that she might pass out and start rolling again.

The car rocked, sucked back toward the racing traffic when an eighteen-wheeler whizzed by going eighty. Miraculously, the truck was gone in no more than a blur and a shudder, and Glory’s four tires remained stuck to the paved shoulder out of harm’s way.

She concentrated on her hands gripping the steering wheel—hands that could no more deny her heritage than her green eyes and thick, auburn hair. Sturdy, big-boned hands that somehow remained unsoftened by the cultured life she’d led. Hands that reminded her of Granny Tula’s. That thought gave her strength.

After a few minutes, the cold sweat evaporated, the trembling in her limbs subsided, and her head cleared. She put the car in drive and rejoined the breakneck pace of traffic headed south.

Eric Wilson left the fire station in the middle of his shift—something he would have taken any of his firefighters to task for. But he was chief, and as such frequently had business away from the firehouse. No one questioned when he got into his department-owned Explorer and drove away.

But this was far from official business. This was personal—very personal. He and his ex-wife, Jill, shared amicable custody of their nearly three-year-old son, Scott. But Scott’s increasing problems were something that the two of them were currently butting heads over. In Eric’s estimation, Jill was in denial, plain and simple. And lately, it seemed she was doing as much as she could to prove Scott was just like any other boy. Part of that strategy was
not
hovering by the telephone worrying if today was going to be the day for trouble.

Whenever he mentioned the idea that she should get a cell phone, she took the opportunity to remind him that she couldn’t afford one. Which was a load of bull. She worked as a medical secretary and made decent money—comparable to Eric’s fire department salary. It was more convenient for Jill to be unavailable—especially on Wednesdays, her day off.

This was the third time since the summer session began five weeks ago that the preschool had called Eric at work because they couldn’t locate her. It had been a familiar message; Scott was having a “behavior problem,” causing such disruption that the teachers requested he be taken home. Jill had responded to a similar call on at least four occasions.

The staff at the church-housed preschool were sympathetic and had made every effort to help assimilate him into classroom activities; but, they repeatedly explained, they had to consider the other twelve children in the class.

As Eric pulled into the rear parking lot of the Methodist church, his stomach felt as pocked and broken as the ancient asphalt. Weeds of frustration sprouted through the numerous cracks, filling his middle with something poisonous to all of his hopes for his son. This summer preschool program was intended for children who were going to need extra time and attention to catch up; children who would benefit from not having an interruption in the development of their social skills by a long summer break. Even so, it seemed Scott was on a rapid backslide. Eric couldn’t help the feeling of terror that had begun to build deep in his heart, as if he were locked high in a tower watching his son drown in the moat outside his window—close enough to witness yet helpless to save him.

For a long moment, he sat in the car, staring toward the forested mountains shrouded in their ever-present blue mist. In a way, Scott’s mind was concealed from him just like the detailed contour of those mountains. He wished with all of his soul that he could divine the right course to lead his son out of the mysterious fog. The local doctors had varying opinions; from developmental delay (a catchall phrase, he’d decided), to mild autism, to he’ll-grow-out-of-it, to it’s-too-early-to-tell.

Eric was willing to do whatever it took to help his son—if only there was a definite answer as to what that was.

He slammed the steering wheel with the heel of his hand. Then he took a deep breath and tried to exhale his frustration. He would need all of the calm he could muster to deal with what awaited inside.