Your Dream and Mine (12 page)

“You’d do that?”

“From what I’ve seen, he’s responsible,” said Trace. “Mind if I catch a ride home with you?”

“Does that make me an accomplice to your working on Sunday?”

“You won’t cut trees, you won’t cut church. What will you cut, Tommy Rose?”

“Ricky’s impressionable,” she reasoned, heat sweeping up her face. “You want to be a good role model, don’t you?”

“No,
you
want to be a good role,” he countered with a perverse grin. “
I
want to get a roof on the house.”

“Then we’ll leave my car for him instead.”

“I can’t let you do that,” said Trace, chagrined she would offer with the blush of his mockery still on her cheeks. “Forget I said anything. I’ll come pick him up in the morning.”

“That’s a lot of trouble when we could as easily leave my car for him,” said Thomasina. “He’s driven it before, and besides, my lease doesn’t run out until the end of the month. I’m entitled to a space in the back lot.”

Protesting when she looked so determined made Trace feel small. He gave it up, walked her to her car, then climbed into his truck and followed her across town.

Thomasina parked the car in her old space, ran the keys upstairs to Ricky and told him she’d need it in time to make it to her home church in the morning. The children who had attended Vacation Bible School the previous week were to sing for worship services in the morning. She had
promised to take Winny and Pauly, and Antoinette had said she would go, too. Though that was before their misunderstanding.

Anxious not to blot her evening with matters better left in God’s hands, Thomasina crowded out the thought, bid Ricky good-night and returned to find Trace waiting for her at the curb. His truck was a tricky climb in a straight skirt. Maneuvering it with grace, she spoiled the whole effect by sitting squarely on a paper bag in the seat.

“Oops. Nothing breakable, I hope.” Thomasina lifted one hip to retrieve the sack.

“Nothing important,” said Trace. He resisted the urge to wrench it out of her hand before she looked inside, and said with feigned nonchalance, “Poke it under the seat.” He let go a caught breath when she had done so. Inside the plain brown bag was a box of chocolates and a paperback novel. Chocolates, flowers and romance. His impulsive gesture of this afternoon was bittersweet now.

It grew quiet on the ride home. Thomasina told herself it was a companionable silence. But as it stretched, she knew it was not. Trace’s musky cologne tantalized, filling the air she breathed. Yet his withdrawal was unmistakable.
What had gone wrong?

Was it the farm? Was he having second thoughts about her admitted interest in it? He had seemed all right when she told him. Or was that just his public reaction? Thomasina stole a sidelong glance. Her gaze lingered on his hands, firmly gripping the steering wheel. Traveled to his long upper lip. Lifted to his eyes on the road. He met her silent study, his expression inscrutable. She tried small talk. His responses were polite but brief, discouraging idle chatter.

Thomasina gave up the attempt, and fixed her eye on the distant moon. As the silent miles passed, her hopes withered
like buds crowded into so small a container, there was no room to blossom. By the time Trace pulled into town, all Thomasina wanted was to have it over and done. The moment the truck rolled into the carriage house driveway, she released her seat belt and fumbled for the door handle.

“Wait a second while I get the door,” said Trace.

Thinking he meant her truck door, Thomasina waited. Instead, it was the carriage house door. A motion security light came on as he climbed out and slid it open. He returned to the truck, parked inside and killed the headlights.

Thomasina saw him turn in the seat and look her way as her shoulder touched the door. The paper sack she had tucked under the seat earlier slid forward. Her left heel caught in it before she could climb out. She leaned down to free it.

“I’ll get it.”

Trace reached for the sack with one hand, her shoe with the other. Thomasina tried to slip out of it, but his hand had closed around her ankle, too. His touch was brief, impersonal and still it burned. His whole focus was on the sack. What was inside? She whisked it out of his unsuspecting hand in retaliation for fifteen miles of silence.

“Hey!” Trace reacted in surprise as she sprang out of the truck. “Thomasina! Hold up a second.” He climbed out on his side and circled as if to meet her at the back of the truck.

Thomasina moved in the opposite direction, only to regret her impulse as he slid the carriage house door closed, cutting off an easy exit. That left the walk-through door. She lost no time heading that way. But he was fast on her heels, thwarting her effort to put enough distance between them for an unhindered look inside the sack. She reached the walk-through door with only a split-second lead and yanked it open.

Trace reached beyond her and shoved the door closed. “Come on, now,” he cajoled, a grin creeping into his voice. “Hand it over.”

“Why should I?” she said, more petulant than playful.

“Because you’re going to embarrass yourself if you don’t.”

“I don’t know why
I’d
be embarrassed. Whatever it is, it’s yours, not mine.”

“That’s right. So hand it over.” So saying, he reached to take the sack from her.

Thomasina poked it behind her back. “Back off, bub!”

“Bub?”

Stung by the mockery in his laugh, she thrust out her chin. “I mean it!”

“Or what?”

“Or I’ll look!”

He stretched his hands over her head, and leaned against the door with open palms. “Go ahead. If you’re quick enough.”

Thomasina tried to pivot in hopes of creating a niche between his body and the door in which to open the sack. But there wasn’t space.

“Give up?” His voice rumbled too close to her ear.

She slanted her head and lifted one shoulder, a guard against taunting whispers that made her skin tingle. His mouth tilted, but there was no laughter in his eyes. They shone, bold beams. Shone right through her, and sent back a reflection of her own red-faced hungry heart. His mouth lost its easy slant as she wetted her lips. One hand of its own volition moved from the door to her face.

Thomasina shifted, bringing the sack out of hiding. “Take it,” she said, but could not distract him from exploring the curve of her cheek with a caressing fingertip any more than she could muffle the hoof beats crumbling
the hard-packed barrier protecting her heart. “Don’t,” she whispered, hugging the sack, a barrier far too slim. “Please…”

“Shh,” he soothed, and stroked her bottom lip with his thumb.

She averted her face before he confirmed the truth she had hidden even from herself. Her life was crowded, but it was not full. There was a lonesome, empty space, so wide, so deep, she was drowning in it. Fifteen miles of angst-ridden silence left her aware of her weakness. “I’m going in. Move,” she said, just as the security light went out.

His chuckle stirred her hair in the blanket of darkness. “What do you know about that? God’s on my side for a change.”

“Your light burned out,” she said, breath catching.

On, no. His light was burning bright enough. She’d ignited it herself, sneaking glimpses of him all the way home, until he’d stopped caring that she wasn’t going to stick around for the long haul. “Aren’t you going to kiss me good-night, Tommy Rose?”

She shoved the sack at him. He dropped it, preferring the satin of her arms. Like trains running on parallel tracks, his hands glided up, past her elbows and followed a path of good intentions to knead the tension in her shoulders before moving on to the slim column of her neck. Her skin was dew to parched hands. He sampled between thumb and fingertip a silken curl, then laced his fingers at the base of her neck. Waiting, giving her options. She didn’t take them. He found the hollow of her throat, stroked it with his thumbs. Felt her pulse purring under sweet-scented skin, and reveled in being right. She was more than smitten. Weak with it. He didn’t know whether to kiss her or stir the ashes of his pride, and let her go while friendship was still an option.

What’s it going to be, Tommy Rose? The camp or me?
The thought caught him up short before he could put it into words. Did it have to be that way? God on one side, him on the other? What would it be like to have Him in
his
corner?

Thomasina stirred, short-circuiting the thought before he could follow it through. He breathed her name and drew her in. Her cheek was scorched velvet against his throat as she hid her face in the hollow beneath his chin. She kissed him there. A moist, breathless light-as-air kiss that sent shock waves through him.

It shocked Thomasina, too, that she could defy that shrinking shivering child within. The child who whined and warned that he had his own agenda. Hot with embarrassment, she would have quit his arms then and there, except they’d turned into staying bands. His mouth found hers in the darkness. Restrained kisses, seeking, tentative. She answered the wordless question, shyly at first, then with wildly sweet honesty. He explored her face with his kisses, and came back to her mouth, winner’s spoils. An answering strain ran through Thomasina, playing like silvery chimes as his mouth gentled again.

He pressed a kiss to her hair. Half fearful she’d change her mind about him once he let her go, he said, “You work tomorrow?”

“No.”

“You want to go to the air show?”

“What, about your rental house?”

“I’m giving myself the afternoon off.”

They made plans, trading a few more kisses in the dark, reluctant to call it an evening, yet wary of taking it inside. Trace kissed her one last time and let her go.

T
homasina curled beneath the sheets, going over the evening in her head. The thought of Trace’s blue eyes kept invading her mind, making it hard to sleep. Would she see him before church? Would he go if she asked?

Thomasina heard Trace moving around on the other side of the house. She almost picked up the phone, then thought better of it. The heart that hungered for the bread of life came to the table. She asked instead that God would whet his appetite.

As she coasted toward sleep, Winny and Pauly tiptoed to mind. Would they still be going with her in the morning to sing with the other children? Uncertain what to expect, Thomasina prayed for God’s guidance and awoke the next morning with bridge mending in mind. Knowing what time Antoinette arrived home from work, she phoned her house early in hopes of catching her before she went to bed. There was no answer.

Thomasina mixed up a breakfast casserole, dressed for church while it baked, then tried Antoinette’s number again. There was still no answer. The doorbell rang. Thomasina
dried her hands on a dish towel, hopes stirring. But it was Ricky, returning her car. She invited him in.

“Smells good, but I better not,” said Ricky. He scuffed his purple sneakers against the threshold plate. “Trace is waiting over at the house. He seems to think he can make a carpenter out of me.”

“That’s what I hear.”

Ricky grinned and turned away with his shoulders squared and an eagerness in his step that said just how much he liked the idea of working with Trace.

Thomasina closed the door and tried Antoinette’s number once more without success. Could she be at her father’s house with the children? She wrapped the sausage-egg casserole and drove past Antoinette’s house first. Her car wasn’t there. Following the paper boy’s directions, she found Antoinette’s father’s house. The widow’s car was parked in front of the modest white bungalow. But her hopes of Antoinette and the children attending church with her were dashed when Winny answered the door. She was still dressed in her pajamas.

“Thoma!” She stood on tiptoe, eye caught by the foilwrapped baking dish. “Whatcha got?”

“It’s a welcome-home-from-the-hospital breakfast for your grandpa to share with you,” said Thomasina. “Is your mom here?”

“Yeah, but she’s asleep,” said Winny. “Pauly, too.”

“Is your grandpa up?” asked Thomasina.

“Uh-huh. I’m helping him shave. See?” Winny giggled at the shaving cream on her chin. “You want me to get him?”

“Maybe I could just set this on the table. You can tell him I hope he’s feeling better.”

“Who is it, pet?” called a gravely voice.

“It’s Thomasina, Grandpa. She’s got food.”

Winny giggled and licked her lips as a thin middle-aged man with shaving cream on his face and a razor in hand came to the door. Thomasina introduced herself and explained she was a friend and neighbor of Antoinette’s.

“I was sorry to hear of your hospital stay. I didn’t know how else to help except to fix something to eat,” she said.

Registering surprise, he introduced himself as Dan Orbis. He thanked her for her thoughtfulness as he took the dish and repeated what Winny had said about Antoinette napping. “But I’ll tell her you were here.”

Thomasina hugged Winny goodbye, and left without mentioning the program. Already she was running late if she was to make it to services in Bloomington. Her enthusiasm for it had dwindled, now that Antoinette and the children weren’t going. Maybe she’d save herself the drive, and attend services here in town instead.

With the news of Milt’s farm coming up for auction, Trace had changed his mind about turning his latest acquisition into a two-story apartment dwelling. His intent now was to make it weathertight and ready for occupancy. He would have to sell his property in order to be prepared for the auction in November. If he won the bid on the farm, he’d move into Milt and Mary’s house. If he didn’t, he could move into this house until another piece of land came along.

He and Ricky were up on the roof, nailing on shingles when Thomasina parked in the drive below. He waved as she climbed out of the car. The summer breeze teased the gauzy fabric of her dress, blowing it about her legs.

“I thought you were going to church in Bloomington,” he called to her from the roof.

“I thought so, too,” she replied. “But Winny and Pauly weren’t ready, so I decided to come here instead.”

Trace slipped his hammer into his tool belt and tipped his cap back. “Antoinette still on her high horse, is she?”

“I didn’t see her,” she said. “She was asleep.”

“You did your best then, didn’t you?”

“I guess,” she said.

But her smile lacked its usual radiance. She took off her sunglasses and folded them into her pocketbook. Even the luster of her eyes seemed dimmed by disappointment.

“So how are you two coming along with your shingling?” she asked.

“We’re doing okay. Though we wouldn’t turn away good help, would we, Ricky?” said Trace, trying to chase away the shadows.

“She’s no help, she don’t like heights,” said Ricky, grinning.

“She’s ladder shy.” Trace walked to the edge of the roof. “She does just fine once she gets her feet off the ground. Don’t you, Tommy?” He made a U-turn in his banter, diverting her from kids to carriage house kisses with a wiggly eyebrow and a provocative grin.

A rosy glow swept over Thomasina’s face. She turned toward the sound of organ music floating through the open windows of the church half a block away. “There’s the prelude. I’ve got to go.”

“What? No doughnuts?” Trace called after her.

She pivoted and shaded her eyes. “It isn’t my turn.”

“Must be Ricky’s, then,” said Trace. “

“Me?” Ricky yelped, and thumped one big purple shoe on the roof. “Nobody said anything to me about doughnuts.”

“He’s got a lot to learn,” said Trace. He sighed and shook his head. “Pray for him, Tommy.”

“I always do.” Thomasina’s smile included both of
them. But her eyes met and held Trace’s alone before she turned away.

Trace heard the music change as she disappeared inside. “I come to the garden alone, while the dew is still on the roses.” The congregation fondled each word of the old familiar hymn. The words brought to Trace’s mind Mary’s garden, and the flowers in Thomasina’s arms as she went still in the glare of his truck lights a dozen days ago. “Oh the joy we share as we tarry there, none other has ever known.”

Some wordless notion stirred within, beguiling and fragrant like those dew-drenched flowers. Tangled up in it was a pang of sympathy over Thomasina’s disappointment in Antoinette, and her regret on behalf of the children. There was something else, too. He’d glimpsed it in her eyes as she turned away, a silent longing that struck flint and made fire. Passion? If so, it was of a nobler vein. Purified by the same force that sent her scurrying down the walk as if answering a dinner bell.

Trace unfastened his nail apron and dropped it to the roof. He took off his cap and combed his fingers through his hair.

Ricky swung around. “Where you going?”

“To church.”

“Dressed like that?” asked Ricky.

Trace looked down at his jeans and chambray shirt and almost changed his mind. But no. The tug was stronger than formalities. It was the lure of Thomasina, and something more. Something that whispered through the song like smoke through a screen. He moved toward the ladder, then turned and looked back at Ricky.

“She’s a stranger to most everyone in there,” he said as
if he needed to justify his actions. “You want to come with me?”

Ricky hesitated a moment, then shrugged. “I guess.”

In the hush of the opening prayer, Thomasina stirred to see who had joined her in the pew. Her glance began at the floor and traveled from scuffed boots up a stretch of denim to a pair of wide-open blue eyes. The vibrancy in them struck a responsive chord that kicked. She tucked her chin, closed her eyes and clasped her hands in her lap, only to get her elbow bumped.

“Scoot over,” whispered Trace.

Thomasina looked up and saw Ricky thumping his foot in the aisle. Before she could slide, he climbed over Trace’s feet, then hers, and sat down on her left.

“Hi, again,” she whispered.

“Shh,” said Ricky, and closed his eyes, so pious, she smiled.

Trace smiled, too, as if enjoying her reaction. Thomasina thanked God for them both, and tried not to let Trace’s denim-clad leg snug against hers distract her from worship. The hour flew by. With Ricky in tow, they stopped on their way out the door, and shook hands with Pastor O’Conley and his wife.

“Trace!” cried Deidre, hurrying to overtake them. “I didn’t see you come in.” She cocked her head like a little goldfinch, fanning them all with her smile. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

“Thanks, Dee. Nice to be here,” said Trace.

Reverend and Mrs. O’Conley’s words of greeting were eclipsed by a wave of angst as Thomasina looked from Deidre to Trace and back again while Trace made introductions. Deidre acknowledged her with a girlish grace.

“You were here last week, weren’t you?” Deidre asked. “And at the soup supper, too, if I’m not mistaken. I’m no good at names, but I remember your face.”

Deidre reached for Ricky’s hand next. “And you’re Ricky! It’s good to see you again. Bring your buddies with you next time.”

“She’s nice,” said Ricky a minute later as they ambled beneath a clouding sky toward Trace’s rental house.

“‘Nice’ has always been Deidre’s long suit,” said Trace.

Thomasina supposed he was right, and that she was without excuse for letting gossip linking Deidre to Trace influence her attitude. More than gossip, actually. She’d seen them embrace in broad daylight only yards from where they now strolled. Too clearly, she remembered Trace polished and shined to go out with Deidre. And recalled the scent of perfume when he returned that night. It was disquieting. Yet she crowded it out when he reached for her hand and made her heart tip with his smile.

Trace covered the unshingled portion of his roof before setting off for the air show. Thomasina took along her camera in hopes it wouldn’t rain and her umbrella in case it did. They dropped Ricky off at his home, then drove across town to the airport and wandered the grounds hand in hand, looking over the planes and getting stiff necks, watching the endless aerobatics overhead.

Trace laughed at Thomasina for covering her eyes when a jet dropped out of the sky like a swallow skimming supper over the meadow, barnstorming the airport’s back lot. She hid them again when a jet-fueled semitractor screamed down the runway, belching flames in a dead heat with a skyborne World War II fighter plane and yet again during a too-real-for-comfort reenactment of a World War I dogfight.

“You keep hiding your face, and no one’s going to be lieve you’ve been here,” Trace teased.

“That’s why I brought the camera.” Thomasina snapped
a shot of a fleet of jet fighters from a nearby air base going over in formation.

Later in the afternoon, the heavens provided an unrehearsed show. Thunder rumbled. Heavy clouds rolled in and the wind kicked up. The rains caught Thomasina and Trace on foot midway between the airport and the truck, a good distance away. It was a hard-driven rain. The freshmown field used for overflow parking couldn’t soak up the deluge fast enough. A gust of wind ripped Thomasina’s umbrella away. She stopped so abruptly, the man behind her stepped on the heel of her canvas shoe.

“Let it go!” cried Trace, grabbing her hand. He took the camera from her and shoved it under his shirt. They raced on to the truck and flung themselves in out of the rain, laughing and shaking the rain from their faces.

“Trace! Cut that out!” Thomasina squealed as Trace snapped her picture.

“Finally! Something she’s willing to cut.” Trace surrendered the camera to her outstretched hand, and prodded her muddy foot with the toe of his damp sneaker. “Where’s your shoe?”

“I tried to tell you!” Thomasina cried as she propped the camera on the dashboard. “I ran right out of it, and you wouldn’t let me go back.”

“Is that what you were after? I thought you were set on chasing down your inside-out umbrella.”

“My favorite one, too,” Thomasina lamented.

“I’ll buy you another one. Cotton or flannel?”

“Umbrella or shoe?” said Thomasina, confused.

“No. Shirt,” he said, and reached behind the seat.

“Oh! Flannel. I apologize for ever doubting you knew what you were doing, using your truck for a dirty clothes hamper.”

“That’s all right, I’ll get even.”

Thomasina laughed and leaned forward in the seat to wrap the flannel shirt around her dripping hair. Trace stripped out of his wet shirt and quickly donned a shortsleeved burgundy uniform shirt. He then handed her another one just like it. “I’ll turn my back if you want to change.”

Thomasina peeked at him from the corner of one eye as she rubbed her hair with the shirt. “You’re a real sport.”

“Just trying to please.”

“Yes, but who?”

Trace chuckled at having turned up the flame on her cheeks. “Do you want to go home? Or shall we wait around and see if they resume the show?”

“What’ll we miss if we go?”

“The stealth bomber fly-by.”

“I’d like to take a picture for Flo and Nathan. There’s a plaque marked Phantom Stealth at the air museum in the desert near their home. But there’s nothing there.”

“Desert humor.” Trace chuckled. “Are you hungry? We could get a bite to eat while we wait to see if the weather’s going to cooperate.”

“I could eat. But I don’t think we want to go into a restaurant, looking like this, do we?”

Trace couldn’t see a thing to complain about when it came to her looks. She looked like a million dollars to him, whether she was fluffed and dried or soaking wet. Keeping that thought to himself, he said, “We’ll get sandwiches to go, and eat in the truck while we wait.”

It was a short drive to a nearby fast-food restaurant. The rain had stopped by the time they arrived. Thomasina took a dry uniform shirt Trace had provided and ducked into the rest room, leaving him to order the sandwiches. She styled her hair in a single braid, tied it with a piece of twine from Trace’s glove box, and dried her polyester shorts beneath
the hot air hand dryer. Her T-shirt, a royal blue one, was made of a more absorbent knit and would take too long to dry. She slipped out of it and into Trace’s shirt.