On Her Way Home (10 page)

When Travis brought Will Morgan home from college on winter break, Jo and Krissy’s fractured relationship only split further. Will was a smooth college man with wild eyes to match his temperament, and he glided in at a time when Jo was still reeling from her discovery that her life was completely predictable. All of the sudden, everything she did was exciting and fun; she was swept along to movies, dances, and loud riotous parties with Travis and Will. Will teased and flirted with Jo, showing her attention she’d never had and planting the idea in her mind that she was special to him. Travis tried to warn Jo one night that Will’s intentions weren’t on the up and up, but she had dismissed him as the older protective brother.

The day before Travis and Will went back to college, they took Jo and went tobogganing with a group of friends. Will took Jo’s hand in front of the others and pulled her along to the top of the hill. Red-cheeked and thrilled to have his attention, she sat on the sled, and Will climbed on behind her. Wrapping his arms and legs around her, he pushed off sending them flying down the white slope. Hitting a bump at the bottom, Jo and Will toppled off the sled, landing in a tangled ball of arms and legs in the white snow. Laughing, Jo tried to unravel herself from Will, but he wouldn’t budge, pinning her beneath him with his eyes smoldering into hers. The crisp winter air felt warm to Jo as Will stroked her flushed cheek and asked her, “If you could have anything in the world right now, what would you want?” The only thing Jo had wanted right then was for him to kiss her, but she felt foolish saying so. He prodded her some more. “Tell me. What is it?”

Trusting him, she sheepishly answered, “I want you to kiss me.” He had grinned wickedly and done so.

Jo was heartbroken when he left. He told her he would be back in the summer and asked her to wait for him. She was more than happy to.

Unlike Jo, Krissy’s winter had been unpleasant. Mother hadn’t felt comfortable letting Krissy tag along to dances, parties, and anywhere else her older siblings went. For the first time in her life, she was jealous of Jo.

Jo wrote to Will during the long months he was away at school, and he wrote back, though not as often. Finally, green leaves filled the branches, and summer came drifting in, and just as he had promised, Will returned with Travis. Once again, Jo’s monotonous life was swept away with Will’s wild fun and smoldering looks. One night, setting aside Travis’s warning, Jo decided to go driving with Will. As she climbed in the car, he wrapped his arm around her shoulders and dragged her across the seat to sit next to him. She loved how he made her feel so wanted, so feminine. They drove down to the lake, and Will pulled the car to a stop, turning off the engine. He and Jo kissed a little until she pulled away, afraid things were going too far.

He whispered in her ear and teased her, “She doesn’t drink, she doesn’t pet, she hasn’t been to college yet.”

The joke offended Jo, but she didn’t want to make a big fuss over it, so she teased back, “Oh, is that what you’ve been studying at college?” He didn’t answer her, but just leaned forward and nuzzled her neck. She pushed him away again, looking at him seriously. “Did you kiss other girls at school?”

Frustrated, he flopped back in his seat, running his hand through his hair. “You love me, don’t you, Jo?” Jo did love him but wasn’t ready to say so until he did. He looked at her in earnest. “I want to be with you. Don’t you want to be with me?” He sounded hurt. Jo responded to the pain in his voice, pressing into him and kissing him with passion, trying to reassure him that she did love him. He wrapped his arms tightly around Jo, whispering in her ear that he wanted to marry her, that he couldn’t wait to be with her. Once again, Jo had to forcefully push him away as he deepened his kisses and his hands moved toward dangerous places.

He became angry. “Damn it, Jo, we are practically engaged. You are such a prune pit,” he snapped at her. Hurt by his anger, Jo slid to her side of the seat as he started the car. He didn’t speak to her as they drove back to the farmhouse, and Jo, in uncomfortable silence, had wondered what he was thinking. When they reached the house, he turned the car off. Hoping to make peace, she placed her hand on his arm, but he shrugged it off and climbed out of the car. Once she was in the house and snuggled in her bed, she cried and cried, hoping he would forgive her. In the morning, Jo arose early, anxious to see if the long night had repaired the argument between them. She went downstairs, but Will wasn’t awake yet.

For the next two days, he was distant and cold toward Jo, showing extra attention to Krissy who was happy to lap it up. Jo felt punished by him and didn’t like it. She wondered if he would treat her this way once they were married. Soon he softened and returned to his charming self, but Jo couldn’t un-see the flaws he had set before her eyes.

The next Saturday Travis and Will dragged Jo to a dance at the grange. After a few dances together, Jo and Will lost each other in the shuffle of bodies. Not wanting to dance with anyone else, she stepped outside to rest on the benches in the park next to the building. The music from the dance hummed from the walls of the building. As Jo cooled off, she heard voices near her in the dark. She recognized Will’s voice and almost called out to him when she heard a feminine giggle.

“If you could have anything you want in the world right now, what would it be?” she heard Will’s husky voice ask.

The female voice responded, “I want you to kiss me.”

Jo felt like she had been socked in the stomach; the air left her body. She was frozen on the bench while Will kissed and coerced the girl with him. She felt disgusted, humiliated. She wasn’t special to Will. She had fallen easily into his trap. How many women had he used that same line on? She shamed at the thought of what he had wanted her to do in the car. What if she hadn’t refused? Oh, she was sick.
Sickened
. She left the bench and sat mutely in the car. When Travis and Will finally came to the car, Will proclaimed to have looked all over for her. He wrapped his arm around her and tickled her cheek with his nose. She said nothing to him, nothing that night, nothing the next day, nothing again. Ever. He tried for days to charm, flatter, and manipulate her into speaking to him. He begged her to tell him what was wrong, why she had changed, but Jo said nothing. She was a fool. She knew it and had to live with her shame, but she would never admit to another soul that she had been so easily duped. She would die before she would let Will see how badly he had hurt her. Thankfully, she didn’t have to. Only a week later, he began focusing his attention on Krissy, petting and fawning over her like she’d always wanted.

Jo gave no indication that his shift from her to Krissy concerned her until one night Krissy and Will made plans to go to the show. Feeling protective of Krissy, despite her recent snobbishness toward Jo, she pulled her aside, attempting to warn her about Will. Krissy had laughed in Jo’s face saying, “I knew you were jealous. It bothers you that he prefers me.”

That was the last time Jo said his name to anyone. If the rest of the family noticed Jo’s sudden dislike of Will, they said nothing. The only person who spoke up was Pa. He knew she was hurt, and once he had tried to ask her about it, but she’d shut him down. After a while everyone just moved on. Krissy was with Will having the time of her life, and Jo went back to her boring life, as if she’d never loved him.

Jo suspected that Krissy’s desperation to have her at the wedding wasn’t out of sisterly love; it was to gloat over her win. The problem was that Krissy didn’t know she had actually lost, and part of Jo felt responsible. She should have tried harder to warn her away from Will.

Jo read over the last few sentences of her letter. There was no trace of the feelings she had harbored for Will, no sentiment that could be detected but happiness for Krissy. She could write the part of the delighted sister as well as she could play it.

Sealing her letter and setting it on the bureau, Jo then knelt beside her bed to say her evening prayers. “Heavenly Father, I thank Thee for the day and for Thy help and strength. Thank thee for bringing me to this home and surrounding me with new friends. Help me, Father, to do Thy will and follow Thy plan. Please bless me with strength to forgive others and bring happiness to those around me. I ask for Thy care to watch over my family and protect them. Help them to heal, and bless mother with courage to face her new life without Pa. I love thee, Father. Amen.”

Chapter Thirteen

Bright and beautiful glowed the morning. Once Jo’s head hit the pillow, she had slept soundly through the night and woken up refreshed and anxious to tackle whatever Mac put in front of her today. Her reflections last night had helped her to sort through painful feelings, and today she felt revived and whole again. Beaming with positivity, she sang into the kitchen wishing everyone a good morning. Only Kirby and Mattie occupied the room.

Kirby looked up from his morning coffee at Jo’s greeting. She was dressed in her oversized men’s dungarees with a long-sleeved white shirt tucked in at the front but trailing out the back. Her blue eyes popped out of her fresh face. “You must have slept well. You’re as chipper as that noisy magpie making a nest in the haymow,” he grumbled.

Jo walked around the table behind him and put her hands on his shoulders. She bent near his ear to pester him, singing, “Chirp, chirp.” He waved her back with his hand, feigning annoyance, but Jo saw the half smile he tried to hide as he put his coffee mug to his lips. Mattie had been right about Kirby; his surliness was a sham.

Jo helped Mattie put the basket of biscuits on the table and sunk into her seat asking where everyone was at this morning. “After I got Shirley milked and brought the eggs in, I thought everyone would beat me to the table. I was worried Charlie would have all the gravy ate up by now,” she joked.

Scooping a ladle of sausage gravy over his biscuits, Kirby replied, “Nope, we won’t have to fight Charlie for our fair share this morning. I swear that boy has grown two inches since we brought him home.”

Mattie smiled. “It’s good cooking and ranch work. Nothing builds muscle on a boy quicker than farm work.”

Or a girl
, Jo thought to herself. She’d noticed just this morning that the muscles in her arms felt tighter.

Clearing his throat after a big bite of dripping biscuit, Kirby said, “The men should be along after lunch sometime. The three of them rode over to the neighbor’s this morning. Mac is borrowing Ray Wagner’s machinery to cut the alfalfa. He worked out a deal with him to use his swather in exchange for some extra help branding today. It’s a bit early to cut the hay, but we will be too busy next week, bringing in the cows, to do it.”

“Do you know what I’ll be doing today?” Jo asked Kirby.

Sighing heavily with an unhappy glance to Mattie, Kirby answered, “Yep, Mac said he wants you pitching the hay from last year’s harvest up into the barn.” Vexed, Kirby pushed his plate away from him. “It’s not going to be an easy task, especially since you’ll be on your own. After breakfast I’ll take you out there and show you how to use the hay lift and hook up the wagon for you.”

Mattie clucked her tongue and tramped to the kitchen, muttering under her breath, “That man. He won’t stop until he’s run her off.”

Trying to remain cheerful, Jo said brightly, “Oh, I don’t mind the work, Mattie. It’s good for my soul. Plus, if I’m working by myself, I won’t feel rushed to keep up with Leif and Charlie.”

Mattie sat down next to Jo, straightening the tablecloth. “Mac wasn’t always so,”—Mattie paused, searching for the right word—“so indifferent.”

Kirby slapped his palm on the table. “Indifferent. Hah, that’s putting it nicely. What Mattie is trying to say is Mac wasn’t always such a jackass.”

“Kirby!” Mattie cried in shock, placing her hand on his arm to silence him. She turned to Jo. Her eyes were full of tenderness. “Mac wasn’t always so hard. You won’t believe this, but when the boys were younger, Leif was the quiet one, and Mac was the tease.” Mattie’s eyes filled with sadness. “Mac hasn’t been the same since the war.” She shook her head and looked down at the tablecloth.

Not enjoying the uncomfortable turn of conversation, Kirby scooted his chair back and said, “Jo, we better get a move on. I’m afraid it’s going to be a long day for you.”

Jo was curious to hear more about Mac, but reluctantly turned her attention to her breakfast so she could hurry out to the barn with Kirby. After she drank the last of her milk, she rushed upstairs to retrieve her hat and gloves. Rolling her long sleeves up, she hurriedly wound a strip of cotton around each palm and along her thumb then tenderly pulled her gloves on. The gloves were tight and uncomfortable with the extra bandages, but she hoped they would help to keep the blisters clean. Jo unrolled her sleeves and jogged out to the barn.

Private and Sergeant stood hitched to the wagon, waiting for her in front of the barn. Kirby took his time explaining the hay lift to Jo and how she was to use it. The hay from last year had been baled with the stationary baler and stacked in a pile under the shed. Jo needed to move the bales onto the wagon then drive it to the barn and park it underneath the peak. At the top of the barn, hung a hayfork attached to a pulley. Pulling the trip line, Jo would release the hayfork, sending it slowly down, where she would stick it into the hay bales. Another horse, Captain, would be harnessed to the pulley, and Jo would need to lead him forward to raise the hay into the mow and pull it along the hay carrier. Once the hay was in the barn, Jo would climb up the ladder into the loft, trip the line to release the bales of hay, and stack them.

Jo had seen this done many times at home, but it was always a family chore, split between the boys. Travis and Caleb would load the hay and stick the bales, while Johnny unloaded and stacked them in the top. Jo’s eyes scanned the ladder she would have to climb repeatedly to reach the top floor of the barn.

Kirby watched Jo’s reaction as he mentioned each phase of the chore Mac had planned for her. Her chipper smile vanished as the full understanding of the work load she was about to tackle fell on her. Kirby could throttle Mac. He’d argued with him this morning telling him how unfair it was to ask this much of Jo. “We’ve never loaded hay into the loft by ourselves. It’s unreasonable asking
her to do this by herself,” He ranted at him, but Mac was ambivalent to his pleas.

Angrily cutting Kirby off, he
shouted, “She wanted the job, and the hay needs moved. If Leif had hired a man, you wouldn’t be out here mollycoddling him. She will either do it or she won’t.”

Kirby
glared at him, threatening, “If you weren’t twenty-eight, I’d take my belt to you.” Ignoring Kirby, Mac had swung onto General and galloped down the road to the neighbor’s. Kirby was still seething over the exchange.

Putting her hands in her back pockets and shrugging her shoulders, Jo released a loud breath, “Well, I guess there’s nothing to do but get to it.”

Kirby kicked the dirt and shook his head, still inwardly cussing Mac. “I have to track down a couple of the pregnant cows today, but I have time to do the first load with you. Come on.” Kirby handed her a pitchfork as they walked out of the barn.

Grimly, Jo took it from his hands thinking,
Well, it’s not a rake
. Steeling herself for the back-breaking day, she sincerely hoped her hands would survive the battle.

They drove the wagon to the field shed where tall stacks of baled hay waited for Jo. Kirby showed her how to create stairs to reach the highest bales first and toss them down the pile. Then she climbed down, wrapped her hands around the twine, and hefted with all her might, walking rigidly to the wagon and tossing it up. Thirty minutes later, the first load was ready to be driven in from the field, and Jo was sweating profusely. She was so grateful that Mac hadn’t been there to observe her struggle with the hay, pushing, pulling and finally shoving it three high onto the wagon.

Kirby parked the load underneath the barn and gave Jo her first lesson in sticking the hay, warning her to never take her eyes off the hayfork. “Sometimes when the fork hits the hay carrier, it jerks and dislodges the bales of hay at the center, causing them to drop from the full height of the barn,” he warned her. “If it hits you…you’re a goner.”

Jo followed Kirby’s instructions carefully, and in another thirty minutes the load was stacked neatly in the hay mow. Kirby cautioned Jo again to be careful then regretfully saddled his horse, Big Dan, and went to check on the cows, leaving Jo to work.

Hours of harsh physical labor passed as Jo loaded and unloaded hay, pushed the heavy metal fork into the bales, and climbed up and down the ladder. Her hands were sticky inside her gloves. She hoped the sticky wetness was only sweat but was pretty sure it was blood. The twine on the bales of hay slashed directly across her blistered palms, and every heave of the bale stung the tender skin. Mattie rang the lunch bell thirty minutes before, but Jo was too hot and too tired to eat. She slumped against the cold barn wall to rest before driving to the field for another load. She could quit. If today proved anything, it was that Mac would go to any lengths to see her gone.

Jo said a prayer in her heart.
Heavenly Father, please help me. I can’t go on.
She rested her head back on the barn, closing her eyes and taking calming breaths. An answer came to her in the stillness of the barn, and resigned, she rose to her feet and walked to the wagon.

***

The sun had just started its descent in the sky when Jo unsteadily climbed up the ladder for the last time. Her legs were shaking from exhaustion. She wrapped her arms around the ladder and rested her forehead on the rung above her, trying to catch her breath. She was in pain.
It’s stupid trying to do this alone!
she yelled at herself.
And for what?
She owed nothing to these people.
This was just a summer stop. I can go anywhere in the country.
Why am I doing this?

Jo hung on the ladder for another minute, squeezing her eyes shut. One hot tear escaped and ran down her face, scalding her cheek. She remembered the advertisement pinned to the depot wall by the attendant. If she’d left one minute earlier, she would have never seen it, never traveled here, never met Leif, Kirby, Mattie, Charlie, or Mac. She’d honestly taken the advertisement as a sign that she was meant to come here. Jo remembered sitting in the café behind Leif and Kirby and thinking,
how serendipitous
. Beginning to doubt her own instincts, she questioned
, I thought this was the new path for me. How can I trust what I feel anymore?
Jo was breaking. The fatigue, her hands hurting so badly—this was all pointless. Slowly, she picked up her foot, making herself drop it down to the next rung. She was beaten. She would leave in the morning.

As Jo reached the bottom of the ladder, Charlie came bounding into the barn with Leif behind him. “Hey Jo,” he called, skidding to a halt near her, with Leif bringing up the rear. Charlie was too excited after his day of rounding up cows to notice Jo’s distress, but Leif saw it. Jo tried desperately to appear fine, saying a quick hello, without making eye contact, and looking toward the barn stalls.

Leif sensing her fatigue, quickly slapped Charlie on the back. “Scamper on up the ladder and unhook that hay, would you Charlie? We are going to help Jo put this last bit of hay up into the barn.”

Charlie, with a foot already on the ladder, shouted, “You bet,” as he swiftly scaled the rest of the rungs.

Leif took a step toward Jo. He was smelly and dirty from the day of branding cows, but he pulled her in anyway, wrapping an arm around her shoulder and leading her out of the barn. Leif sent Jo to lead the horses while he stuck the hay, and with the three of them working together, the last of the hay sat snugly in the loft in no time at all.

***

Mac rode into the yard just as Jo finished putting the horses away. He gave her a slight nod as she trudged passed him across the yard. Her gait was slow and weary, but as she passed him, she jutted out her chin.
She has grit
, he admitted to himself begrudgingly. From the looks of it, she had somehow managed to move all the hay into the mow. Completely shocked that she had accomplished the impossible task, he couldn’t help but be impressed. Kirby was right this morning. Asking her to do the chore by herself was villainous. That’s precisely why he’d done it. He’d figured if there was a task that would beat Jo, moving the hay into the mow was it. Once again, his plan to run her off had failed. Women never surprised him, but Jo was making a habit of it.

As Jo reached the porch steps, he saw a glove from her back pocket fall to the ground. “Jo,” he called, jumping down to retrieve her glove.

Jo stopped before the steps but refused to turn around, deplete of energy. The sun was dropping from the sky, outlining her figure in the pale dusk.

Mac jogged up to her, scooping down to pick up the glove as he passed it. Chewing on the inside of his cheek, he said uncomfortably, “I see you got the hay moved.” She didn’t turn to face him. He figured she was angry, and truth be told, he supposed she had a right to be. Clearing his throat, he held her glove out, “Here. You dropped this.”

Jo turned slightly to see her glove suspended in his hand. Still not meeting his eyes, she carefully reached to take it, trying to hide her palms. As she did so, Mac glanced at the glove. The leather was hard and crusty on the palm. He turned the glove over in his hand, swiping it away from Jo as she reached for it and bringing it closer to his face to examine it.
It’s blood
.
There is blood crusted on her glove.

His eyes narrowed as she shoved her hands into her back pockets and spun toward the house. Quickly grabbing her by the elbow, he halted her escape. She jerked her arm violently away from him.