Sweet Annie (31 page)

Annie
sewed beside the fire, comfortably settled in her new upholstered chair,
turning out shirtwaists and dresses and dressing gowns ordered by the women of
Copper Creek and even several customers from surrounding towns as word spread
of her expertise with a needle and thread.

The
following month she made enough on her own to pay the bank note and had never
experienced such a sense of pride and worth. She rode to Fort Parker with Luke,
and he insisted she be the one to enter the bank and present the payment. She
returned to him on the boardwalk, the receipt clasped in her gloved hand.

"Thank
you, Luke," she choked, the frigid December wind freezing tears on her
lashes.

"Don't
thank me always," he said, pulling her against the thick wool of his coat.
"We're a team, Annie."

She
nodded against his neck.

"I have the list we
made," he said, pulling a scrap of paper from his pocket. "Shall we
make our purchases?"

"I want something
special for Diana's baby. And there's something else I want," she told
him. "A gift I want to give my mother, and I think I remember where to
find it."

"Okay. Let's shop and
then have a nice lunch at the hotel."

Luke drove the wagon, laden
with packages and supplies, home through swirling flakes of snow. A pristine
white layer covered the ground around their house, the cottonwoods blanketed in
the sound-absorbing fluff, the aspens still bright yellow in contrast.
"Isn't it beautiful?" Annie asked, in awe.

The sound of the horses'
hooves and the creak of the wagon seemed loud in the peaceful winter air. The
horses blew great gusts of white through their nostrils as they trudged into
the yard. "Can you get the fire going while I put up the horses and fork
down some hay?"

"Of course. Help me
down and I'll carry packages."

She prepared a light supper since they'd eaten a
big meal in town. Luke brought harnesses in to repair while they enjoyed the
warmth of the fire. In the weeks that followed, Annie used her evenings to work
on gifts for Christmas, and had completed something for nearly every member of
the family, amazing Luke with her speed and skill.

Something had begun to
bother her, and it wasn't until she made a trip into town and called on Glenda
while the girls were in school that the puzzle came into place in her mind.

That
evening Luke sat at the table with a cup of coffee and the ledger books that
held his records of the stock while Annie finished the dishes and started a pot
of beans soaking for the next day.

Stomach fluttering, she
studied Luke bent over the pages in concentration. She loved watching him,
loved spending their evenings together, and appreciated that they didn't have
to keep a constant flow of conversation going to be comfortable with each
other's company. Annie practiced the words in her mind.

"Luke?" she began.

"Hmm?"

"I have something to tell you."
"Okay."

"You might want to look at me when I say
it."

He raised his head and set
the pencil down, turning his full attention on her. "Okay."

She brushed her hands over
her skirt nervously. "I know we haven't been married very long, barely two
months, and we enjoy our time alone together..."

He raised a brow in curiosity.

"I hope you're going to be happy about
this..."

"We won't know until you tell me."

"Yes.
Well." She cleared her throat. Thinking better of her position at the
side of the table, she stepped closer, right up in front of him.

"Annie,
this is very mysterious," he said with a grin. “What is this secret?''

"It's
not a secret, really. It's something I only learned today."

"In town? What is it?"

She
took a deep breath. "I'm going to have a baby."

Chapter Fifteen

There, she'd said it. Her
ears hummed with the rush of nerves, waiting for his reaction.

He stared at her, his blue
eyes wide and unblinking.

"I
haven't had a monthly since we were married, and I talked to Glenda today, and
she asked me a few questions. I went to Dr. Martin's office and he confirmed
that there's a baby inside me. Isn't that amazing?"

He laid down his pencil.

"Are you happy?"
she asked, hopefully.

"My
God, Annie," he said, rising from the chair. He placed his hands on her
upper arms and stared into her eyes. A smile broke across his handsome features
and he hugged her against him. "Of course, I'm happy!"

He
spun her around in a circle, then held her close to his heart. Annie clung to
him and allowed her pleasure to flow through her mind and fill her already
bursting heart.

Luke
pushed her away far enough to gently kiss her lips. "I'm very happy,
Annie. I love you. What more could a man ask for?"

"I
wonder—do you think I'll be able to take care of him the way he'll need to be
taken care of? The doctor didn't seem to think I would have any problems
physically. He said I'm healthy and everything's normal. But I suppose I could
see a doctor in Fort Parker."

"I
have no doubt that you're healthy and normal," Luke assured her firmly.
"But if you want to see another doctor, I want you to do whatever you're
comfortable with. You'll be able to take care of a baby. Why wouldn't you?
What have I told you a hundred times?"

"I
know, I know, but this is...well it's a little scary."

He
hugged her again. "There's nothing to be afraid of. We're together, you
and I. It has never mattered to us what people said or thought or that they
doubted. We found each other and we've made a marriage and a life together.
This is part of that. A very wonderful part of that. Don't let doubts spoil
it."

"Oh,
Luke, sometimes I don't know how I could be any happier or how my life could be
any better, but it just keeps getting more and more full."

"I
know," he said, his voice low and husky with emotion. "I know,
Annie." He touched her face with tenderness, gazing into her eyes as if
she were the most precious thing on earth. He had so much love to give, and he
was incredibly generous with himself. He would be a wonderful father. How had
she been so fortunate?

Still, she had so many
doubts. "I've been remembering all the times I wasn't allowed to hold
Will when he was a baby, as though they didn't trust me with him."

"If
I've learned anything about your father and brother," Luke said, "it's
that
you
are their main concern. If
they didn't allow you to hold him it was because they worried for your sake,
not the baby's. Just like they don't trust me to care for you properly. It's
you
they care about. Even if their thinkin' has been wrong in the
past, they're coming around."

"I've never even held a baby!"

"You'll know how to
hold our baby when he gets here. Annie, I'm so proud of you—of both of
us." He chuckled. "But you. You are the perfect wife and you'll be a
perfect mother."

"I hope so," she
said on a sigh. "Are we going to tell my family?"

"About the baby?"
He blinked. "Would you let them think you're bakin' too many apple pies?
They'll notice eventually."

She laughed. "I'm silly, aren't I?"

"You're silly, but I love you just the way you
are."

Annie grew still and silent
in his arms, thinking. "Do you suppose that's what's wrong with my mother?
She loved me the way I was, and she can't accept me now?" She inspected
his expression. “Would you still love me if I changed?''

He stroked her shoulder
through her shirtwaist. "You can't always figure everything out," he
told her calmly. "Don't upset yourself tryin'."

She knew he was right. She
gave too much thought and concern to her mother's rejection. She couldn't go
back to being that girl, and if her mother couldn't accept that, Annie would
have to build a life without her. But it would hurt.

In the days that followed,
she concentrated on thinking about the good things that were happening, loving
her husband, planning for their baby.

Annie
anticipated Christmas like a little child. She finished two linen shirts for
Luke, using his one good shirt as a pattern, and bought him a box of writing
stationery and an ink pen. She hid those gifts in the bottom of one of her
trunks and wondered if he had something hidden for her.

On
Christmas Eve she left a pot of savory stew bubbling on the stove and bundled
up, wearing a pair of his boots that she practically walked out of with every
step in the foot-high snow, and accompanied him to select a tree from the
hillside behind their house.

The
tree they selected was too big, because they didn't have any ornaments, but
they both loved the size and the shape, so he set it up in the comer of the
room and Annie popped popcorn and
Strang
it
until her fingers were sore from threading the needle.

They
ate the stew and thick slices of buttered bread on the floor in front of the
fire. Annie cleaned up the dishes and rejoined him.

"It
smells wonderful." She inhaled the heavy fragrance of their first tree.
"Next year we'll have ornaments."

"Next year we'll have
a baby," he replied softly.

The
wonder of it still amazed her. She leaned against him with a sigh. "What
shall we name him? What was your father's name?"

"John."

"John's
a good name."

"What
if it's a girl?"

"Mmm.
Johanna?"

"People
might call her Jo."

They
discussed names until they agreed they didn't know what they wanted to name
their baby and laughed, because they had so much time to think about it.

Annie
went to her trunk and returned with her gifts for Luke which she'd wrapped in
tissue paper and ribbon. Luke retrieved a small package from his coat pocket
and handed it to her. "Mine isn't as pretty," he said.

Annie
accepted the gift wrapped in brown paper and string and thought it was
beautiful.

Luke
opened his shirts and ran his fingers over the delicate stitches in amazement.
He got up, slipped out of his flannel shirt and shrugged into his new one. He
stroked the sleeve. "I've never had shirts so nice. Thank you."

"You're
welcome."

"I'll
wear one to dinner tomorrow."

She
held up his other package. "Open this one now."

He
unwrapped the stationery, ink and pen. "Thank you."

"A
businessman should have nice paper on which to write his customers."

"You
want me to write their bills on this nice paper?"

She nodded. "It's
professional. Soon we'll have letterhead printed for you."

"Sounds pretty
fancy," he said with a smile.

He leaned against her and
kissed her lips.

Annie closed her eyes, but
pulled back. "Shall I open mine?"

"Unless you don't
wanna know what it is."

"I do!" She
pulled the string away and peeled back the brown paper. Inside was a red satin
box with gold braid trim and a tassel. Annie opened it to discover a pair of
jade earbobs and a matching bracelet on the ivory lining.

"I
picked those because you look so pretty in green," he said. "I didn't
think you had any."

"I
don't, I mean, I didn't." Come to think of it she didn't have more than a
simple gold locket besides the pearls her father had given her. "I'll wear
my green dress for you tomorrow."

He
kissed her again and this time she laid her gifts aside to enjoy his loving
attention. No gift could ever be as wonderful as the gift of his love. His
accepting, undemanding love.