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“For Baby?”
He snorts. “She’s got a built-in wool scarf.”
“Could it be…me?”
He glances up for a moment, his lovely lips pursed in mock mysteriousness. I kiss his forehead and go wash my hands.
He’s quiet for the next few hours. Markedly so. I read a bit as he knits. The scarf is completed as I dress for Saturday sewing. He puts it on with gentle hands, running his fingers through my hair as he looks down at me.
“Does it suit me?” I murmur.
“I think it does.”
We share a simple kiss, and he helps me into my coat. I toss a spare pair of needles into my yarn-stuffed shoulder bag, and then I’m off, walking quickly to outpace the melancholy that’s begun to bear down on me at odd moments.
His ship departs in near two weeks…
I remember, as I take an odd, out-of-the-way trail into the village, that Saturday night means I can’t return to him. My chest aches at the prospect, but there’s nothing I can do. On Sunday mornings, everyone is going to and from church. Were I to walk down from Gammy’s, I’d be noticed in an instant.
My heart is heavy as I enter the post office through the unlocked front door. On Saturday evenings, the packaging room doubles as our sewing spot. I find Holly, Anna, Dot, Rachel, and Blair sitting in a row of rocking chairs that make us all feel geriatric.
“Fancy you should join us.” Holly looks up from her cross-stitch.
I glance at them, each one looking down at their hands. “Meaning?”
Dot sighs. “We all knocked all afternoon, trying to tell you we’d be starting early.”
My gut clenches.
“It’s Aunt Bea’s birthday,” Anna offers.
“So it is.” My words are soft and slow. My heart is pounding.
“Where were you?” Holly’s voice is snippy.
I take my seat in the smallest, creakiest rocker. I can scarcely breathe as I say, “On the slopes.”
“Did you have business with the sheep?” Blair asks as I bring my yarn out.
“Rain may be coming. Someone had to redirect a problematic gulch. Who better than me?” I roll my eyes as if it’s quite the headache.
“I hadn’t heard that,” Dot says.
“Checked the forecast.” I say a silent—automatic—prayer of thanksgiving when no one contradicts me.
Soon we’re comfortably lost in our gossip. Blair’s much younger brother, Randy, bit her calf when she stepped on his favorite Hotwheels car. She shows the bruise, and I fuss over it. Anna confides that Freddy’s mother Sheila encouraged her to poke a hole in Freddy’s condoms.
“It’s Lord God’s way,” Anna quotes. “Can you imagine? The Lord favors lying?”
We all shake our heads. Those liars, headed right to hell.
“Wee Kayti’s still so young, and…it’s a risk each time,” Blair says quietly.
Here on Tristan, pregnancy is never underrated for its risk.
Before too long, Holly starts fishing for Declan information. When no one offers any, she bemoans his disappearance from the bar. It’s a bit of work for me to keep from smirking like a twit.
Then Dot reveals she got a kiss from Rob Glass, and there’s the evening. Rob is nearly old enough to be her father.
