Only Through Love: A Cane River Romance Novella
Read Only Through Love: A Cane River Romance Novella Online
Authors: Mary Jane Hathaway
Only
Through Love
A
novella
by
Mary
Jane Hathaway
All rights reserved. © 2014 by Gumbo Books and Mary
Jane Hathaway.
Cover art provided by Kim Van Meter
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment
only. This ebook may not be re-sold. Thank you for respecting the hard work of
this author.
The title of this book comes from the Sara Teasdale
poem called Child, Child. I’ve added the full poem to the end of the book under
Novels, Illustrators, Poets and Poetry That Play a Role in This Book.
All characters in this book are fiction and figments
of the author’s imagination.
www.virginiacarmichael.blogspot.com
There is no fear in
love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.
The one who fears is not made perfect in love.
1 John 4:18 (NIV)
This book is dedicated
to those who have ever loved too much. May you always have a soft heart. The
world needs you.
One
Heart, we will forget him!
You and I, tonight!
You may forget the warmth he gave,
I will forget the light.
― Dickinson
Charlie
Soule glanced up from her paperback and squinted into the bright August sunlight.
By the Book was unusually quiet for a Wednesday. She hadn’t noticed the hours
slipping by until the late afternoon sun hit the front desk like a floodlight. On
her right, a large gray cat stretched from tail to nose, the papers under his
paws shifting with a whisper. Morphing into an upright position, he fixed her
with a sleepy look. Van Winkle had been a resident of the old bookstore for as
long as Charlie had been around. He was like a paperweight, but less mobile.
“If
you don’t like the sun, you should sleep elsewhere.” She was wasting her breath
since Van Winkle was as much as part of the desk as the cash register. Setting
down Mary Shelley’s original
Frankenstein
, Charlie crossed the gleaming
checkerboard foyer and pulled the blinds down as quietly as possible. As she
came back around the desk, she paused to look into the playpen set up between
the two antique office chairs. Sprawled on a light cotton blanket, arms
outstretched as if ready to embrace the world, was three-month-old Aurora Olivier.
Charlie leaned down, admiring how the baby’s dark curls were touched with
highlights, how her long lashes curled against her flushed cheeks, and how her perfect
mouth was open just enough for the softest breath to pass as she slept. She was
wearing little pink shorts and a tiny white T-shirt that read “The Book Was
Better”. Her temples were damp with sweat, but the temperature in the hundred
year old building inched downward now that the room was cast into darkness. Charlie
inhaled, wondering why Aurora always carried the sweet scent of strawberries.
“Sedgwick
said babies are alike as biscuits in a pan,” Alice said from somewhere behind her.
“I
didn’t hear you come in.” Charlie straightened up and wondered how creepy she’d
looked, hovering over Alice’s tiny baby.
“I
came through the back door.” She tenderly ran her fingers through Aurora’s fine
dark hair, soft as corn silk. “I have to assume Sedgwick didn’t know many
babies personally. They all look so different to me. And of course my own baby
is the most beautiful of all.” She looked up. “Don’t correct me if I’m wrong.”
“She
certainly smells like a biscuit,” Charlie said. “I mean, she smells real good.
Like something delicious.”
Alice
cocked her head and smiled. “She does have the sweetest breath, I do believe. Now,
I hate to do it, but I’d better wake her up or her schedule will be all cattywampus.
I’ve got that new tenant and even though the walls are thick, I wouldn’t want
him to hear her up at all hours.”
Charlie
nodded. Alice and Paul lived above By the Book, even though Paul had been
making noises about buying a big farmhouse outside of town. He said he wanted
somewhere on the river where he could teach Aurora to fish, which always made
Charlie imagine the little baby wearing infant-sized waders and a hat decorated
in lures. The apartment next door had been left empty after the last tenant,
the pretty historian Henry Byrne, had married Gideon Becket and moved to his
place out by Lac Terre Noir. Last Christmas Charlie felt as if everyone she
knew had paired up, like the animals before the flood, and she was going to be
left behind. Now the thought didn’t bother her a bit. It would be such a relief
to be left alone with her bruised heart and broken spirit.
“You
should meet him,” Alice said, “before you head back to school.”
“Who?”
For a moment, she thought Alice said “meet with him” and her heat skipped a
beat.
“Austin,
the man renting my apartment. The new tenant.” She shot Charlie a worried look.
“Are you okay?”
“Sure
am.” Charlie turned to shuffle a few papers on the desk, her heart still
beating hard. She’d been avoiding Alice’s husband, Paul, all summer.
Tell
her now.
It was nearly September. She didn’t know why she was so afraid,
since she and Alice were good friends, maybe best friends. Charlie had started
working in By the Book when she was just a teenager, and she’d come back to
work in the little antique bookstore every summer and holiday throughout her
college years. Now she was headed into her last year, the home stretch, the
final push to getting her degree. Or she should have been.
“He
graduated from University of Louisiana and works down at the Juvenile Justice
Center as one of their counselors. Cora Jeunesse says everyone loves him. The
kids respond to him when they won’t listen to anyone else. It’s like he always
knows exactly what to say.”
Charlie
didn’t respond. Once upon a time she’d given her heart to someone like that.
Alice
leaned over and ever-so-gently lifted Aurora into her arms. The baby was as
limp as a cooked strand of spaghetti for a moment then started to stretch.
“When he moved in, he mentioned how glad he was that the apartment was wired
for cable internet because he plays Ultimate Voyager several hours a day. You
can imagine how happy Paul was to hear that.”
Charlie’s
stomach flipped over. Paul created Ultimate Voyager, one of the biggest
multi-player online games, and Charlie used to be completely dedicated to the
game herself, besides being Paul’s biggest fan. She’d spent nearly five years
with the same character and nearly four years with her guild. That little group
had been like her family and she’d thought those friendships were rock solid.
All that was gone and just hearing about the game made her sick to her stomach.
Aurora
scrunched up her face and made unhappy sounds. Alice rubbed her back in gentle
circles, saying, “He really reminds me so much of you. Smart, young,
passionate, loves technology and gaming, cares about people.”
“Right.
I’m sure he’s very nice.” She heard the flatness in her own voice and forced a
smile. She didn’t feel smart, or young, and definitely didn’t care all that
much about people. She didn’t care all that much about anything. She couldn’t
afford to now.
“And
when he moved in, he brought in one suitcase full of clothes and about fourteen
boxes of books. I think he chose the apartment just for all the built-in book
cases.”
Charlie
caught herself before she could ask if Alice had seen what kind of books he’d
brought. Meeting another book nerd used to give her happy bunny feels but not
anymore. “Alice, I wanted to ask you something.”
“Of
course.” She sat down and maneuvered Aurora into the crook of her arm with a
practiced motion. “Let me change Aurora and I’ll feed her while we talk. She’s
so sweaty. Can you pass me the diaper bag?”
Alice
quickly stripped the baby down and changed her diaper. “Hm. She goes through so
many clothes. I thought people had sent us more clothes than we could possibly
need but if she changes her outfit five times before noon, then we have just
about enough. Or I could do laundry all day instead of run a bookstore.”
“You
could always put a washer downstairs in one of the back rooms.”
Alice
gave her a look of horror. “I thought you were going to suggest I pay someone
else to do the laundry. I’m definitely not moving out books to make way for the
washer.”
She
smiled. “Yeah. You’re right. Makes no sense.” For Alice, money was no option.
She was happy for her. At the same time, she could see how it had changed the
way she approached life.
Alice
gently dressed Aurora in a tiny red capris and a shirt that said “I Read Past
My Bedtime”. Grabbing a little blanket, she settled into a chair. Charlie stared
at the ornate cast iron lights as Alice helped the baby latch on. She wasn’t a
prude but the nursing still seemed weird to her. It was so… personal. She’d
never noticed babies nursing before. Now they seemed to be everywhere. It
wasn’t really the nursing itself that bothered her, it was more the crushingly
tender look Alice got in her eyes, the one that said almost everything she
loved in the world was right there in her arms.
“Mrs.
Gaskell, I can’t hold you right now.” Alice wiggled her foot in the long haired
tabby cat’s direction. “And you two, don’t you have somewhere to be?” Mr.
Rochester, looking as rough and scarred as ever, took up a position near the
desk, and Jane Eyre gracefully settled herself beside him.
Charlie
glanced around and let out a snort of laughter. Darcy, the large black cat who
lived high up on the top of the ranges, was perched at the end of the poetry
section and seemed to be coldly observing the situation. Miss Elizabeth trotted
toward the desk, eyes bright and mischievous as usual. Mrs. Bennet, a vocal
and persnickety Siamese was close behind. “You ever get the feeling they’re
critiquing your mothering?”
“All
the time. I think if I let Aurora wait another five minutes, we might have a
riot on our hands.” After a few seconds, Alice relaxed in the chair, the baby
tucked against her. “Now, what was it you wanted to ask?”
Charlie
paused and ran a hand over her hair, surprised again when she felt the silky
strands end near her jaw. Having long hair had been perfect for cosplaying the
dragon queen, and when she switched from bleached blonde to cotton candy pink
last year, it seemed to match everything she wore, right down to all her gamer
T-shirts. Now she didn’t care what she looked like, and for simplicity’s sake
had cut it off, letting the color slowly leach away until it looked like yet
another stupid mistake she regretted making. It had reverted to the same dark
brown in all her baby pictures, but she didn’t remember herself that way, and
every time she looked in the mirror, it felt like a shock.
Ask
her now.
“I know you don’t really need that much help around here, but I
was wondering if you had any hours extra available this Fall.”
“Before
you leave? Of course. You’re welcome to put in as many hours as you want all
the way until the last day. And come back during Christmas break.” Alice nodded
for emphasis. “You’re always welcome here, Charlie. You know this store as well
as I do and you know the fantasy section much better. Bix does what he can, but
with his eyesight, he just can’t help the customers like you can.” She leaned
forward a little. “I really appreciate you. Maybe I don’t say that enough, but
I do. You’ve been my right hand girl… woman… for years and years. Way back when
I was struggling to keep this place afloat, you and Bix worked hard to bring in
new customers and I’ll never forget it.”
Way
back when.
Charlie looked down at her battered Converse. Before Alice
married Paul, Alice had worried about money. Charlie hadn’t worried about money
because Charlie’s parents had put aside thousands every year into a college
account, planning for the day that their only child would go off to college.
While Alice fretted about keeping the bookstore afloat, Charlie had acted like
the selfish teen that she was and worried about reaching the next level in
Ultimate Voyager. Now Alice never had to count her pennies again and Charlie
was scared to death when she thought more than a few weeks ahead.
“I
meant this fall. You know, before Christmas.”
“Wait.
You want to stay here Natchitoches instead of going back for your senior year?”
“Right.
And it doesn’t matter how many hours you can give me. I don’t expect to work
full time. I know Bix does a lot around here, too.” The elderly man was legally
blind but he did a lot of welcoming customers and straightening the shelves.
Alice
switched to Creole, her voice soft. “
Sha
, why would you want to do
that?”
She
lifted one shoulder and let it drop. Whenever Alice spoke to her in Creole,
Charlie answered in English. It was the way it had always been. In Louisiana,
quarter of a million people spoke some form of Cajun or Creole French but it
the practice was fading away.
Alice
was young, but she acted like someone from her grandparents’ generation, stuck
to the traditions of the Cane River people. Charlie had gone along with Alice’s
funny projects and plans, but had always felt like being Creole set her apart
in a way she didn’t want or need. Today she spoke it right back, hoping that
she could head off all Alice’s questions.
“Just
don’t feel like going back.”
There
was a long silence, punctuated by the soft sound of Aurora’s little foot
brushing against the desk, back and forth, back and forth.
“Did
something happen? I noticed you’ve been different this summer. I haven’t wanted
to pry, but I saw…” Alice’s sentence trailed off and Charlie wondered what
Alice saw in her now. Maybe the hardness she felt around her heart somehow
translated to her eyes.