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Later, while I was hunting with Elijah, he noticed my good mood. “You haven’t stopped smiling since you came back to get me. “Something tells me things are going well with you and Amelia. I half expect you to break out into a song and dance soon.”
I nodded in agreement at my friend’s words. “They are. She was nervous at first, but she’s fully on board now and I can’t wait to live the rest of my life with her.”
This next week was going to be the longest week of my life.
9
AMELIA
Iwatched William leave on his four wheeler. I didn’t stop until he was totally out of sight.
I couldn’t believe how different things had become in a week. When I got here, I almost asked to get sent back. The nerves about marrying a man I’d just met were real.
The more I got to know William, the more I realized I could fall in love with him, if I wasn’t already. I didn’t know anything about love other than what I’d read in books or seen in movies.
I thought love at first sight was a myth, but I was becoming a believer after spending so much time with William.
I know my father’s heart was shattered when my mother died, but I never understood. As my feelings grew for William, that changed a little. I’d probably always be hurt that he chose to escape reality with drugs and alcohol instead of taking care of me, but it allowed me to give him a little more grace, and not be so angry with him.
I continued to look at some colleges online out on the gorgeous screened in porch. I was so excited to attend college, even virtually. A college degree was something I never thought I’d have. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do, so William told me to get a degree in liberal arts and I could figure it out from there.
When I first found the website for this mail order bride thing, I figured the men just wanted someone to cook and clean for them or someone to have their babies. That couldn’t be further from the truth, at least for William. Well, after talking with him this week, I do think he wants me to have his babies, but I’m okay with that too.
William was so sweet, wanting to wait until we were married to sleep with me. When I told him I was a virgin, I thought that would turn him off. Instead, that seemed to only turn him on more.
Too bad we had to wait another week to get married.
We’d been making out a lot on the couch like a couple of teenagers. He would slide his hands down my jeans or leggings and finger me until I came undone around him, but that was it. He wouldn’t let me touch him at all. At first I was hurt, but he assured me it had nothing to do with me and everything to do with his self control. William was afraid he’d lose it if I touched him.
I went inside and made myself a sandwich, coming back to sit on the porch. The sky was starting to darken up and began to worry about William. He was an experienced outdoorsman and would surely come back if it started storming badly.
I sat and watched the cloud roll in, hugging my knees to my chest. He didn’t have a phone with him, so I had no way to contact him.
The wind started to pick up and I watched the branches of the trees move. Some looked like they were almost being bent in half. I hurried and went inside, checking the radar on my phone. My heart dropped when I saw the big red blotch coming right for us.
A pinging sound started and I glanced out of the window. It looked like there were golf balls falling from the sky, the hail was so big.
I racked my brain, trying to remember what we were always told to do in school in a bad storm - something about a bathroom if you couldn’t go downstairs. William’s cabin didn’t have a basement, so that was my only option.
I didn’t want to hide though. I wanted to watch for William. Then a loud crash of thunder filled the air, causing me to jump and scream. The wind seemed to be blowing even harder now, so I grabbed my phone and a blanket and headed for the bathroom.
I shut the door and jumped into the bathtub. Maybe I was overreacting, but William had emphasized to me that as beautiful as Alaska was, it could also be very unforgiving when it came to the weather.
I huddled in the tub, hugging my knees to my chest, and prayed for the storm to pass quickly. I prayed for William and his friend to be safe, and that maybe it wasn’t even storming wherever they decided to hunt.
The wind howled and the rain pelted the cabin for what seemed like forever. After one clash of thunder that sounded like it right on the other side of the wall, the cabin lost power.
I watched my radar but it seemed like that red dot was never going to pass over us. There were now tornado alerts on the weather app and I guessed there weren’t tornado sirens out here in the middle of the mountains.
I heard what sounded like a train in the distance, but I was pretty sure there were no trains nearby. That’s when I remembered learning about weather way back in the second grade - a tornado often sounded like a train.
The sound got louder and my heart was pounding in my chest. My instincts were telling me to run, but you can’t outrun a tornado. Tears streamed down my cheeks and I covered myself with the blanket.
Eventually, it sounded like the tornado passed and got quieter. Within minutes, the wind died down. It was still raining, but it didn’t sound like it was coming down in sheets like before.
Still no word from William although I wasn’t sure what I expected when he didn’t have his phone. I made a mental note to make sure we had some way to communicate when he went hunting.
If he made it bad. I was so scared I wanted to throw up. Life hadn’t been very kind to me so far and it would certainly be ironic if my chance at happiness was taken away from me once again.
