Your Dream and Mine (15 page)

“I had lived in nine foster homes by the time I met Nathan and Flo. I’d quit expecting good things.”

Trace recalled holding his breath once, thinking that she was breakable, but was too distracted by her sampling the sauce on the stove to remember the circumstances. Her tongue flicked to the corner of her mouth.

“There was a wooden fence separating the yard from Nathan and Flo’s. I could see flowers through a knot hole.” She avoided eye contact, stirred the pot and resumed her account. “I noticed how Flo sang as she worked in the flowers.” A brief smile flitted over her face. Voice dropping, she added, “I know it sounds silly, but I began to think it was the flowers that made her happy. I thought I’d sneak over and pick a few. I dropped over the fence right at her feet. You’d have thought by her reaction that she’d invited me.”

“She sounds like a sweet lady.”

“Yes, she is,” said Thomasina. “I kept going back. Each time I did, Nathan disappeared into his workshop. I thought that meant he didn’t want me around. Then one day, he gave me the dollhouse and I began to see he liked me, too.”

Thomasina stopped and measured why she was sharing this with him. Maybe just because he was here, being kind when for weeks, she’d given him no reason to care. Leather jacket, dark shirt, dark trousers, kelly green tie, she took stock of him, shined and polished for an evening with someone else. The water on the stove was boiling. She took a box of pasta out of the cupboard. “I’d offer you some spaghetti, but I’m guessing you have plans.”

“I’ve got time.” Certain Tootsie was wondering about him by now, Trace slipped off his jacket anyway. “Where are the dishes? I’ll set the table.”

Thomasina made a salad, browned garlic bread under the broiler and heard his phone ring in the next apartment. “That’s your phone.”

“I know,” he said, but made no move to go answer it. Thomasina heard it ring again over dinner.

Trace ignored it and went on talking about his sister and his parents and what it was like, growing up in what seemed to her a Norman Rockwell-style family. “It was as much ‘rocky’ as Rockwell,” he said, and wadded his paper napkin. “What about you?”

“What about me?” said Thomasina.

“How’d you wind up in the foster care system?” he asked.

A familiar tremor started in the pit of Thomasina’s stomach. “It was just my mom and me. She was young. Even younger than Antoinette. Too young for the responsibility, I guess.”

“What became of her?”

“She ran away from home.” Thomasina thought she’d phrased it lightly. But it came out hard and silenced him. Her hands trembled as she gathered their dishes. He would think she was bitter. She wasn’t. God had more than made up for the losses.

“Your phone’s ringing again. You better get it. Someone may be worried about you,” she said.

Trace nodded. She saw as he uncrossed his legs that his socks were green too. It seemed incongruous with his conservative bent. He went, and came back again.

“You’re not standing someone up, are you?” she asked.

“No,” said Trace, sitting down again in her kitchen. “It’s my folks’ fortieth wedding anniversary.”

“The party is tonight?” she asked.

“You know about that?”

“Milt and Mary mentioned it this morning.” Thomasina’s
relief was short-lived. Just because it was a family affair in no way precluded the probability that Deidre was going with him. “I’ve been keeping you. Why didn’t you say something?”

“I’m in no hurry. The party is at the lodge on the lake. Touch football, hay rack ride, bonfire and a late dinner. It’ll go on for hours.” He darted her a glance and made her heart jump. “Would you like to come along?”

She shook her head. “That’s sweet. But no thanks.”

“Why not?” he insisted.

“It’s a family function,” she said. “And besides, I’ve kept you too long as it is.”

“Would you do one thing? Would you tell me the rest of the story before I go?”

Confused, she said, “What story?”

“About your mom.”

Her face lost all expression. “She left with a man she’d been dating. I hope she found what she was looking for.”

“You never heard from her again?”

“No.”

“What was the boyfriend like?”

“Tattoos and gray eyes. That’s about all I remember. Except what he said when he told me to go back to bed. Four words, without raising his voice. Some voices you know you have to obey. I did, and Mom left, and that was that.”

Trace remembered then when it was he’d thought her breakable. It was over Winny, and Antoinette’s boyfriend, Fred.
Oh,
she’d said, and hung on to Winny so tightly, he’d thought she’d never let go. “Then the foster homes? How many was it—nine?”

She nodded. “But I found a real home in Nathan and Flo.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Nathan and Flo?”

“All of them,” he said.

“It isn’t that interesting.”

“It is to me,” he said.

Thomasina told him. Going over it was what she imagined amputation might be like. A finger here, an elbow there, half a dozen toes. Amazing she was still on her feet with all those subtracted parts. And still he lingered, watching her with the strangest light in his eye.

“Bored yet?” she asked with a brave little smile.

“How could someone who eats her icing for an appetizer ever be boring?” Trace motioned her toward the stairs, knowing he couldn’t leave her now. “Run up and put on something green. You’re coming with me.”

“Green?” echoed Thomasina, alarmed at her willingness to do as he said. “What for?”

“Tootsie’s idea. It’s easier just to go along.”

“I don’t want to intrude.”

“You aren’t I’ll put the shamrock in the truck while you change.”

She didn’t ask, “What shamrock?” Instead, it was Deidre on her mind. She started away, then turned back, struggling with herself. “What about Deidre?”

“What about her?” he asked.

“She was with you this morning,” she said, voice dropping. “I thought maybe…”

It caught him off guard, the realization she’d seen him and he hadn’t seen her.

Color rising to her cheeks, she asked, “You’re not meeting her there or anything?”

He smiled then, realizing what it was worrying her. “I’ve got a one-date limit. You’re it.”

“Trace?”

He turned back again, and watched her flush deepen. It
made him think of sunshine lighting a field of red clover. “Never mind,” she said finally.

That she wanted to know about Deidre was a good sign, Trace decided. He could have told her that Deidre and Tootsie were cutting out shamrocks at his mom’s kitchen table when he stopped by on his way to visit Milt and Mary, and that Deidre, still on crutches, had asked if she might ride along. He
could
have. But she’d given his ego such a winnowing the past few months, he didn’t suppose it would hurt her to wonder a little.

A
ssured by Trace that the party was a casual affair, Thomasina donned slim-fitting jeans, a navy turtleneck and an emerald oversize sweater. She wore her hair loose, swept the sides up with a green scarf and accessorized with gold loop earrings and a gold chain. It was after nine o’clock when they arrived at the lakeside lodge.

Deidre and Will were the only familiar faces amidst a group of fifty or so assorted friends and family. Voices young and old rang through the rustic post-and-beam lodge. A dining hall dominated the right wing of the structure. It was decorated in green bunting, crepe paper streamers and shamrocks for the dinner which was to be the last event of the evening.

Trace’s sister, Tootsie, relieved Trace of his painted sign and propped it in front of the dining hall door while Trace introduced Thomasina to his parents. Trace, she saw, got his handsome eyes from his father, and his dimples and height and wavy hair from his mother. His parents were warm and welcoming, as was Tootsie. Her gold shirt and green bib overalls bore designer labels, the derby perched
atop her dark hair, a dime-store tag. Her nails were a glossy green, her gold-dust freckles a fitting canvas for the shamrock and pot of gold painted on her cheek.

“Where’s your green?” she asked Trace.

“Thomasina’s wearing enough for both of us,” Trace replied with a straight face as he helped Thomasina out of her coat.

“At least someone is cooperating!” Tootsie’s sparkling gaze flickered over Thomasina’s green sweater and ribbon. Her smile broadened as Trace unzipped his own coat and smoothed his kelly tie.

“Spoofing me, weren’t you!” She laughed and patted his cheek and took the coats. “Help yourself to soda and popcorn while I hang these up. Then grab a seat and I’ll start the tape.”

“What tape?” asked Trace guardedly.

“This is your life,” said Tootsie.

Trace groaned.

“Not
your
life, you goof. Mom and Dad’s.” Tootsie rolled her eyes and whispered loudly behind her hand, “He’s such an egotist! How do you put up with him?”

“She doesn’t. And you’re not helping matters. So go away,” said Trace. He laughed at Tootsie’s impudent face, took Thomasina’s arm and coaxed a couple of young cousins into making room for them on the sofa.

The video Tootsie had had produced was a composition of slides, photos and home movies on film choreographed to tunes from the past. It spanned Mr. and Mrs. Austin’s courtship, wedding and the years that followed, and sparked memories in the older generation and tickled the funny bones of the fashion-conscious younger set.

“Isn’t this fun, strolling down memory lane with strangers?” quipped Trace as the pink-cheeked toddler on the
video climbed a half a dozen steps to a slide poised over a plastic wading pool.

The boy had changed—all but his eyes. Thomasina smiled into his forget-me-not blues. “That’s no stranger, that’s you in a diaper!”

“X-rated,” he said, and covered her eyes.

Thomasina wasn’t sure what she missed, but by the time she’d pried Trace’s hands off her eyes, there was a diaper floating in the pool and a toddler circling to the ladder again, his chubby backside dimpled and bare.

“Honey buns, would you like another soda?” asked Tootsie, elbowing Trace.

Everyone broke out in stitches. A kaleidoscope of camping pictures, birthday parties and “grow-mark” events followed, among them a car wash where Trace, as a rail-thin teen, had his arms around Deidre, trying to get the garden hose away from her.

Deidre leaned forward in her Adirondack chair, peered at the TV screen and crowed, “You’re all wet, Trace. How’d that happen?”

Thomasina pinched out a quicksilver twinge, and joined in the laughter. The video ended with a photo of Trace’s parents climbing into a motor home emblazoned with the words Happy Trails!

“That was lovely, Tootsie,” said Trace’s mother. She blinked glistening eyes, and tilted her face to her husband’s as the accompanying melody faded away.

“To thunderous applause.” Tootsie milked a spatter of hand clapping from the guests. “Thank you, thank you. House lights! Now grab your coats. The horses are harnessed, we’re going on a hay ride!”

It took two hay wagons to transport them all, and even then, they were crowded. The night was crisp and pungent with mingled pine and autumn fragrance, the starry sky
bright with a harvest moon. Thomasina and Trace sat in loose straw with their backs propped against hay bales. Enticed by the virile soap and lotion scent of him, Thomasina leaned into the arm he flung over her shoulder. He smiled and playfully rubbed noses with her. Her pulse quickened. But his lashes came down and lips that had hovered close delivered banter instead of a kiss as a young child fell off a bale and tumbled into his lap.

“You lost, Mack?” Trace tugged the little boy’s stocking cap down over his ears before passing him back to his mother’s arms.

The tangerine moon bathed the lake in muted light as the horses plodded along. Water lapped at the shore. Leather harnessing creaked. Crickets hummed a melancholy dirge as the breeze whispered back a response. One voice joined another in a rendition of “Moonlight Bay.” It grew into a medley of show tunes and church hymns and campfire songs. What they lacked in harmony, they made up for in enthusiasm.

The child Thomasina had been put her round-eyed face to the glass, marveling at this paradigm of family. Larger than life, noisy, joyful, the pot at rainbow’s end, and a stark contrast to her impoverished early days. It was, much as Flo and Nathan had been, a knock at the door of a need hereto unmet.
I would adore a guy who’d adore me.
Her flippant words of months ago rang hauntingly true. She wanted to tip her face and take the kisses hovering on Trace’s lips. But knowing now just how badly you could get hurt giving your heart away, she resisted his canted head and sang instead.

The ride was long and glorious despite Thomasina’s tugof-war between her hungry heart and the angst-ridden child of her past. The dinner that followed was superb. The table groaned with delicious country fare including savory ham,
mounds of potatoes, sawmill gravy and biscuits, fried okra, corn on the cob, apple salad and homemade pies.

Will and Deidre sat on the other side of the table from Thomasina and Trace. They talked and laughed over school days and county fairs and a heartbreaking state basketball tournament lost at the buzzer. There was no reference to first loves, and no need, with the car wash shot so firmly imprinted upon Thomasina’s mind.

She couldn’t help begrudging the heart prints on Trace’s past, or oust the concern that they menaced her present, despite Deidre’s friendliness toward her. It was confusing, that friendliness. Genuine or contrived? Knowing she couldn’t be objective about it, Thomasina gave Deidre the benefit of the doubt, and refused to coddle her own jealous twinges. With studied deliberation, she inserted an occasional comment, a question, a smile until all surface awkwardness between herself and Deidre disappeared.

Later, on the ride home, Trace commented, “You and Deidre seemed to hit it off. What were you talking about over dessert?”

“The young people at church mostly.”

“I should have guessed. Did she mention the shortage of help with youth group?” asked Trace.

“Only that you’d been helping her with it,” said Thomasina.

Trace slanted her a smile. “Better watch yourself. She’s pretty good at arm twisting.”

“Is that how she got you involved?”

“Partly. Partly it was Ricky. He was holding back getting involved, saying he didn’t know anyone.” Trace hit the dimmer switch with his foot as a car approached from the other direction. “I figured if I helped, he’d know at least one person.”

“You’ve got a nice way with him.” Thomasina crowded
out the thought of the time he spent with Deidre each week, sharing the youth group sponsorship. “Before he started working for you, Ricky’s mom was worried about the street sucking him in.”

He smiled. “When I can get him away from you and the vacuum cleaner, don’t you mean?”

“Shhh!” Thomasina pressed a finger to her lips in mock horror. “You’re not supposed to know about that. If Ricky thinks I told, I’ll lose the best housekeeper I ever had. The
only
housekeeper,” she amended.

Trace chuckled. “Relax. He told me himself. He said you didn’t have time for housework, that you’d gone back to school. Bible college, is that right?”

Thomasina nodded.

“Mind if I ask what for?”

“Are you sure you want to know?” she countered.

“The camp?” He made a likely guess, and knew by her quickly averted gaze that he was right. “What made you decide to do that?”

“My lack of experience,” said Thomasina.

“Not with kids surely. You’re a natural.”

“There’s a lot more to it than that,” she said. “Things I’m only now beginning to realize.”

“Like what?”

“How to set up a nonprofit organization. How to find the right personnel. How to line up supporting churches. How to seek out the children the camp is intended to serve,” said Thomasina. “And on it goes.”

“How much schooling have you had?” he asked.

“Not counting nurses’ training? Two months.”

“Two months! Do you mean to say…?” Seeing her chin come up, Trace swallowed his shock at her lack of preparedness. “You’re good with children, though,” he amended. “That’s what counts.”

Was it? Thomasina was no longer so sure. She didn’t want to talk about this, especially not with him. It was never far from her mind that her dream, if realized, would come at the expense of his.

“Are you enjoying school?” he asked.

She wasn’t. It kept her from things she’d rather be doing. But he didn’t need to know that. “It’s interesting,” she said, and smiled. “Sometimes Ricky and I help each other with homework. He proofreads my papers.”

“He’s a good kid,” said Trace.

“Yes he is,” agreed Thomasina. “There are a lot of kids like him. A little encouragement and direction can make a difference.”

“Camp-Help-A-Kid.”

There was no cold mockery in his eyes. Just warmth and shared interest and something more, something that made her tummy tip. “You’ve changed,” she said, voice dropping.

“Must be the haircut.”

“No.” Thomasina played along. “It’s your green socks.”

Trace laughed with her, and slid his arm along the back of the seat as he slowed for Liberty Flats. The gesture accentuated the amount of truck seat between them. Thomasina dared herself to slide over. But courage failed her. The moment was lost to the crunch of gravel beneath tires as they turned up the carriage house drive.

“Thanks for inviting me, Trace,” she said as she prepared to climb out. “I had a lovely time.”

“Did you? Me, too,” he said. “Do you want to do it again in forty years?”

“It’s a date!”

“Mark it on your calendar.” Trace grinned and got out to slide the door open.

They parked inside. Trace locked up, and took her hand as they struck across the frost-glazed grass toward the sheltered back porch. The moon had climbed to the top of the star-dimpled sky. It shone through windows and lattice, illuminating the white wicker love seat on the darkened back porch. The floral cushion beckoned cheerily as they climbed the steps together.

Though it was late, Thomasina followed Trace’s lead and sat down. Trace spread his feet, his thigh warm against hers as the wicker creaked beneath them. His arm settled around her. She curved toward him and found a nook between his chin and leather-draped chest fitted just for her.

“This is nice,” he said into the soft cloud of her hair. “I’ve missed you, Tommy.”

“Me, too,” she whispered into that musk-scented nook. Her senses soared to the corn-husk brush of his voice so near her ear, the sinewy strength of his cradling arm and his finger tracing the outline of her ear. She had only to tip her face in invitation and his other arms would close around her. Like a wheel that had hit an obstruction and strayed off course, they would find their way again. But the wounds incurred by that kiss-tag bump and a bread-crumb trail of similar rejections leading back to her earliest years made it difficult to fling caution to the wind and expose her heart again. Thomasina kept her chin tucked, her face firmly to his chest. Leather, lining and shirt couldn’t muffle the sweet swift life-beat beneath. Her own heart was a wild tempestuous traitor to her shrinking inner child. The circling pattern of his finger tracing her ears sent delicious sensations along her nerve endings.

“You want to meet me for breakfast in the morning?” he asked.

“I’ll cook,” she said.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

Thomasina smiled and angled her face to see his better and said, “You survived my spaghetti, didn’t you?”

He chuckled on his way to his feet, and pulled her up with him. “It’s the cook, not her cooking I’m thinking about.”

Thomasina flushed and pulled her hand free, realizing he was once again trying to protect her from becoming part of the round-table discussion down at Newt’s Market. Had they made that shift, found that groove? Were they on course again?

“What time’s church start?” Trace asked, as if in answer to the unspoken question. “We’ll go early and eat somewhere in town. You can pick the place.”

“You’re going to church in town with me?” said Thomasina. “What about Liberty Flats?”

“We’ll take turns,” he said. “I’ll go with you in Bloomington tomorrow. Then next week, we can catch morning worship in Liberty Flats. How’s that sound?”

Rare was the weekend when Thomasina didn’t work one or both days. But she smiled and accepted his offer to go with her in the morning and told him what time she’d be ready.

Trace reached the door leading into the laundry room ahead of her. She stopped and lifted her face, fawnlike in the spotted moonlight coming through the porch lattice. Fawn-eyed, fawn soft, with dew on her lips, and a quivering pulse in her throat, poised and alert.

Aren’t you going to kiss me good-night?
He’d said it before, so easily. But he couldn’t say it tonight, and he knew at a glance that he could stand here forever blocking the door, and she would not come to him or even meet him halfway. Would she retreat if he spanned that one board?