Endless Chain (24 page)

“Okay, Nando,” she said at last. “We’re all finished here. Let me dry it, then we’ll put some cream on it and you can have a Band-Aid.”

“You should have children,” Sam said.

She looked up at him. “So should you.”

“Why aren’t you married, Elisa?”

Her chest felt tight. They were only inches apart. It would have taken no effort at all to lean against him. “I was.” Her voice sounded like it was coming from far away. “My husband died.”

“I’m sorry.” He cocked his head. “There were no children?”

“My husband didn’t want them.” So much had happened, so many years had passed, and still the truth of that saddened her. “He did not want to bring children into this mess we have made of our world. But he helped me raise my brother.”

“
You
raised your brother?”

Again she knew she had said too much. “With my husband’s help.”

“Where were your parents?”

“Dead.”

He lowered his voice. “The day I hired you, you told me that you left home when you were young because your parents had too much to handle.”

There were so many lies, and it was so easy to be caught up in them. “They died after I left. I went back, took my brother, and married my husband.”

She glanced at him. He did not look convinced.

“You must be close to your brother if you raised him yourself. Will he come to visit?”

She hoped for nothing so much as that. “God willing.”

“You’ll introduce me?”

She took her time selecting a Band-Aid with Fernando’s help, taking the cap off the antibiotic ointment, drying Fernando’s leg. Then she looked up again.

“I don’t know what to say to you anymore, Sam. Do you want me to include you in my life? The rules have changed?”

His expression was unreadable. “I thought we were still friends.”

“I don’t think so.” She dabbed the ointment on Fernando’s leg, then covered the worst scrape with the favored Band-Aid.

“I didn’t ask you to shut me out entirely.”

She lifted Fernando off the counter and cuddled him against her. She was aware that the little boy was now a barrier between them, no longer a bridge. Only then did she meet Sam’s gaze. “It’s the only way.”

He didn’t deny it. When she opened the door, he let her go without another word.

E
lisa liked fall mornings in the countryside. She could lie in bed without opening her eyes and pretend she was in one of the mountain villages that she and Gabrio had visited. There, just as they did here, roosters announced the sunrise, and the dew-saturated air swept in through open windows and cracks in the walls.

If it was market day in the mountains, the family would be up before dawn readying produce or handicrafts for the journey. The air would be scented with coffee, smoke from the cooking fire and, too often, the acrid odor of inconsistent sanitation and poverty. But no matter how poor people were—and many of them had been all too desperate—they had shared what little they had, grateful for what she and Gabrio could offer in return, grateful that someone they could trust had come to listen.

Elisa knew at exactly what point in her reminiscences to force her eyelids open. As dawn slowly lit the room she would stare at the ceiling above her bed and resolutely follow the spiderweb crackling of the paint, compelling herself to seal her memories back in the box she envisioned deep inside her—a box far too close to her heart.

On November first she knew better than to allow herself even those few moments of remembrance. Some dates were so powerful that the memories became a plague, a feverish infestation of images she couldn’t bear. On this morning she slipped out from under the covers immediately upon waking and made the bed, folding and draping the extra quilts neatly across the footboard.

The sun was not yet up. Normally she would have been careful not to wake Helen, who wasn’t a sound sleeper, but Helen was in Richmond, spending the weekend with Nancy and Billy, and Elisa was alone in the house. This was not good for her state of mind. With people around her, she could exist in the present. Without them, it was too easy to let her mind drift. She scooped up clean clothes and took them to the bathroom, where she showered quickly, changed and left through the back door.

The sun was just lighting the horizon when she trooped out to the barn to feed the bevy of fat unnamed cats Helen swore she didn’t love. The morning was already warmer than she’d expected, promising a glorious Indian summer day. She removed the sweater she’d been sure she would need and flung it over her shoulders; then she continued on to the chicken yard to scatter feed and check for eggs. Finding none, she fastened the chicken wire fence, made sure the house was locked and left for church.

Nothing special was on the schedule today, and there were no unusual meetings to prepare for. A community group that normally rented the social hall on first Saturdays had postponed until December, since they had celebrated Halloween last night with a party at the American Legion Hall. Unless something unexpected had occurred, her work would be minimal. Then she would have the rest of a long day to get through alone. There were no children to tutor, and although she could spend the afternoon at the treadle or the quilt frame, neither held much appeal. It was too easy to think while she did both, too easy to relive her husband’s death. Too easy to wonder if she would ever see Ramon again.

As she’d expected, the lot was empty. She parked close to the entrance, then with a plastic garbage bag in hand, she made a sweep of the pavement, gathering candy wrappers that looked as if they had blown in from a ghost or goblin’s trick-or-treat bag. Behind the church, she walked through the tiny graveyard, then the rose garden, picking up gum wrappers, a paper cup and several straws, but clearly no one had set out to damage church property last night. Three boys who had vandalized
La Casa
had finally been arrested and charged. Sam was hoping they would be sentenced to make restitution and perform community service.

She bundled what little trash she’d recovered and tossed it in the bin at the back. She entered through the side of the church, flipping light switches until she gathered her things from the sexton’s closet in the upstairs hallway. She donned a canvas apron with wide pockets to keep her clothes clean, and trundled the mop and bucket into the social hall.

The wall clock reminded her it was not yet eight. She hadn’t eaten or made coffee at Helen’s, and by the time she’d mopped the floor and set up tables for tomorrow’s fellowship hours, she realized she’d made an error. In her hurry to exchange the empty house for an empty church, she had overestimated her own reserve of energy and, worse, her emotional resources.

She rested against a table and rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand; then she stared at the wall across the room, as she had stared at the ceiling that morning, and sought composure. She was still staring, trying to pull herself together, when she heard a noise in the hallway. She jerked her head up to see Sam in the doorway.

“You startled me!” Heart pounding, she straightened, pushing away from the table.

“What are you doing here so early?” he asked.

He was dressed in fleece sweatpants and a long-sleeved T-shirt with an American flag and words she couldn’t read from this distance. She thought he had shaved, but his hair was rumpled, and when Shadrach and Meshach wandered through the doorway, she realized he had probably jogged here.

“I could ask you the same thing,” she said.

“I couldn’t sleep.” He shrugged.

“Me either.”

“It makes for a long day. You look like you’ve had one already.”

She bent, extended a hand and clicked her tongue, and the dogs bounded over to greet her. She was glad to have two hands, one for each bobbing furry head. To their credit, neither of them jumped up on her, although she imagined that had more to do with exhaustion than good manners.

Sam followed the dogs. “I hear Helen’s out of town.”

“The house is too quiet and very empty.”

“You look tired.”

She looked up from the petting session and silently read his shirt.
Dissent is Patriotic.
“Another sermon?”

“There’s never enough time in the pulpit. And you’re trying to change the subject.”

She tried for a wry smile. “I was just thinking I should run out for some fast food. I didn’t eat before I left the house.”

“You should know better.”

“Did
you
eat?”

“I had a choice between saltines and canned beets. I passed.”

She knew he sometimes worked on his sermon on Saturday, but she had never expected to find him here so early. “Were you planning to stay? I could bring something back for you, if you like.”

“No, I was planning to finish my run.”

She looked down. Both Shad and Shack were panting. “The dogs look finished to me.”

“It’s early for them, too.”

She glanced up at the clock again to dismiss him. “Well, enjoy the rest of your day.”

“Fast food isn’t good for you.”

She thought she’d ended the conversation. “I’ll take that under advisement.”

“Fat. Salt. Sugar.” He frowned.

“Sam, since when has nutrition concerned you?”

“Let me take you to breakfast.”

For a moment she wasn’t certain she understood. “Breakfast?”

“You know, that meal most people eat first thing when they wake up? I guess we could wait for lunch, but I don’t think you’d make it that long.”

“Oh, no, I—”

He rested his fingertips on her forearm. “Yes, you could.”

She knew better than to go. Her feelings must have showed in her face. “It’s just breakfast,” he said. “We’ll go somewhere and sit across from each other at a table.” He hesitated, as if he was trying to figure out how to word the next part. “It’s not going to hurt anybody. You don’t look happy. Let me do something. At least let me feed you.”

“I couldn’t. You have the dogs. It will be so late by the time you run home—”

“We’ll drop them on the way, if you don’t mind them in your car.”

She didn’t bother to remind him it was his car. “You don’t think it might create problems? If we’re seen together that way?”

“There’s no reason for anyone to gossip.”

She didn’t want to bring up the wisdom of spending time in each other’s company. Calling attention to what had been merely wisps of conversation was a risk. She could make too much of this and by her very words create a situation where there was none. They had set no ground rules, made no declarations or refusals. He had implied he was attracted to her and that this was a problem for an engaged man. She had used even fewer words to tell him there was no hope of a relationship anyway. They had been careful, controlled, evasive. Anyone listening might have missed the inferences. But she had not.

And neither had he.

She had considered long enough and by doing so drawn too much attention to this. “All right. I have all day to finish my cleaning.”

“Correct me if I’m wrong, but it won’t take all day. Right this minute I’d be comfortable eating off any surface in the building.”

“Maybe an hour,” she admitted.

“Then you have plenty of time for coffee, bacon and eggs. And the place I’d like to take you has the best sweet rolls in Virginia.”

“Fat, salt and sugar, remember?”

“You’ve never had better.” He whistled for the dogs and disappeared back through the doorway in the direction of his study.

She squeezed the last drops of water from her mop, then wheeled the bucket back to the sexton’s closet, emptied the contents in the sink, cleaned it out, then went next door to the ladies’ room to wash up.

Sam was waiting by his office when she arrived. “I made a reservation.”

She was charmed but skeptical. The countryside had its pluses, but superior restaurants were not one of them. At the most she had expected a step up from the fast food she’d offered or one of the truck stops out on the interstate. Of the restaurants that were available, she imagined few served breakfast.

In the parking lot, she tried to hand him the car keys, embarrassed to be driving him in his own car. But he refused. “I’ll direct you from my house.”

Out on Old Miller Road, she glanced at him. “You’re being mysterious.”

“I’m basking in the glow of my creativity.”

She put her foot on the brake. “Tell me we’re not going to
your
house for breakfast and you’re not cooking.”

“You’re implying there’s something wrong with the way I eat.”

“You
are
going to cook.”

“No, remember? I need to go shopping. So, no. We’ll just drop off the dogs.”

Her foot moved back to the accelerator. They reached his house, and after the dogs were safely inside and he had changed into a sweatshirt that matched his pants, he returned to the car. “Just continue on Old Miller another mile.”

She was willing but skeptical. “Is this a back way somewhere?”

“Turn right at the next crossroads, then make your first right and your fifth left.”

“Heading toward the river?”

“You’re going to have a ringside seat.”

Despite herself, she was getting into the spirit. If she didn’t feel cheerful, at least she was no longer in danger of bursting into tears. She gave herself over to driving, following his instructions with a little prompting each time. Otherwise they didn’t speak.

At the fifth left she was forced to slow down when the paved road ended suddenly. “A picnic?”

“Do you see a basket?”

“What could possibly be out this far?”

“Slow down.”

“I’ll come to a dead halt.”

“We’re about to turn.”

She slowed to a crawl, and he pointed left. She stopped when she saw a sign that read: Daughter of the Stars, and beneath it, A Bed and Breakfast Inn.

“Gayle Fortman owns and runs it,” Sam said. “She’s the president of our board of deacons. The river’s just beyond.”

“Does she know we’re having breakfast with her guests?”

“Now that the leaves are almost gone, she says her guests have dwindled. When I called from my study, she said she’d be glad to have us this morning.” He touched her arm when he saw she was still hesitant. “I’ve been here before. She’s been asking me to come again. She wants to do this.”

Reluctantly, Elisa turned into the drive. The inn was old and rambling. The brick red paint, white trim and black shutters gave it a colonial feel. Porches jutted from every side. Gold chrysanthemums and purple pansies outlined flower beds and filled pots on the front porch. Wicker and wood furniture nestled under hanging ferns in comfortable groupings.

“The house has been here a long time,” Sam said. “Gayle and her husband found it when people could still afford property in the area. I gather the renovation took years. He left in the middle of it. She finished with loans and elbow grease.”

Elisa could imagine the work involved in running a place like this one and keeping it profitable. “She lives here alone now?”

“She has three teenaged boys. Good kids.”

“Friends of Leon’s?”

“I don’t know, but we ought to encourage that.”

Despite her best instincts, she was pleased at the “we” in that sentence.

She parked, and with typical good manners he got out and came around to open her door, but she was already out, too. “I still feel strange, Sam. Is this where Christine stays when she visits?”