Reconciled for Easter Read online

  Bethany smiled as they shook hands. “It’s nice to meet you.”

  “I’d forgotten you live here,” Thomas said casually, stepping over so he was just at Abigail’s side. He put a discreet hand on the small of her back as he continued, “It’s a charming town.”

  “Thanks. We’ve worked hard to make it so.”

  Abigail was still wondering about the change in Thomas’s expression. He was studying her face out of the corner of his eyes, like he was looking for signs of something.

  She had no idea what had distracted him, but she could feel in the vibes from his body that he’d tensed up a little.

  There didn’t seem to be any reason why. Bethany seemed like a perfectly agreeable woman—friendly and natural.

  Since Thomas wasn’t putting much effort into the conversation, Abigail picked up the slack. “What happened to your wrist?” she asked, gesturing toward the cast.

  Bethany made a face. “Fell down some stairs. Very stupid. Now I’m paying for it. I can’t believe how many things are nearly impossible with only one hand.”

  “Don’t I know it,” Abigail replied sympathetically. “I was in a car accident a couple of months ago, and I had a cast on my arm for eight weeks. How much longer do you have?”

  “The doctor said maybe another month. I guess I’ll live.” Bethany glanced over to Thomas, who still looked rather odd. “Anyway, I just stopped by to say hi. I hope you enjoy the rest of the evening.”

  “Thanks,” Abigail said, as Thomas managed a farewell as well.

  As they sat down at their table again, Abigail frowned and studied Thomas’s face. What on earth could have caused him to get so uptight? He was still searching her face almost urgently.

  “I’d forgotten she lived here,” he said, as if in response to a piece of conversation Abigail had missed.

  Abigail blinked. “That’s what you said before. No reason for you to remember. There must be millions of nurses at the hospital.”

  Thomas’s eyes narrowed, and something changed on his face. But he said lightly, “That might be a slight exaggeration.”

  She chuckled. “Maybe. But what got into you? Do you not like her? She seemed really nice.”

  “She’s fine,” Thomas said, still focused as if he were trying to peer into Abigail's soul. “She’s good at her job. I don’t know her very well.”

  Abigail shrugged. “Anyway, you were telling me about that crazy man on the elevator.”

  Thomas leaned back in his chair and stared at her for a moment, as if he were silently astounded.

  Growing self-conscious and absolutely bewildered, Abigail demanded, “What the heck is the matter with you, Thomas?”

  “Nothing,” Thomas assured her, his face clearing of its inexplicable distraction. “Sorry. I was just thinking about something else.”

  Abigail watched him thoughtfully as he finished his story. But she concluded that—whatever the thing had been—it was temporary and not very important. It hadn’t really altered the mood between them.

  If anything, Thomas’s expression now was warmer and fonder than before.

  ***

  It was late when they got back, and Thomas walked with her to the front door of her house.

  She felt warm and fluttery, the way she had after their very first date, when he’d brought her flowers, taken her out to dinner back in Durham, and asked very earnestly if he could see her again.

  “Did you want to come in?” she asked, glancing over her shoulder to the front window. The lights were flickering, so the babysitter obviously had the television on.

  Thomas shook his head, his eyes deep and soft. “If I come in, I’ll want to stay.”

  She felt her heart speed up, realizing that she wanted him to stay too. She would love to take him to bed right now. But they’d agreed to take it slow, and she didn’t want to get caught up in the enjoyment of sex and fail to ensure the rest of their relationship was on track. So she said, “Okay. I guess it’s pretty late.”

  “I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  “Thank you for tonight. I really enjoyed it.”

  She saw his expression shift as he leaned toward her, and she stretched up to meet him halfway as his lips pressed very gently against hers. “I did too,” he murmured against her mouth.

  She reached her arms up to wrap around his neck, and he pulled her into a tight hug. It felt like his strength and affection was surrounding her, embracing her.

  When she pulled away, she couldn’t help but say, “Can I ask you something?”

  “Of course. Anything.”

  “Why were you acting so weird this evening, when we ran into Bethany?” The weirdness had totally dissipated, but the question still lingered in her mind.

  He cleared his throat and glanced down at the front step before he lifted his eyes to admit, “I was afraid you might get jealous.”

  She blinked a couple of times. “Jealous? Of Bethany? Wh—” She broke off her question as she realized the answer. She let her breath out in a rush. “Oh. Of course. I would have gotten all jealous and insecure before.”

  “Maybe I was wrong to worry, but I didn’t want anything to get in the way of how things are going between us right now. So I…” Thomas gave a sheepish shrug.

  “Yeah. It’s funny, but it never even occurred to me to be jealous tonight.” She felt a deep swell of hope at the realization of how different things felt now.

  Maybe she’d really changed. Maybe she’d actually won a victory over the spiritual battle she’d been fighting for so many years about never feeling good enough. Maybe she could finally stop working, trying, making sure all the baggage from her past didn’t make her into someone she wasn’t. Maybe this meant their marriage wouldn’t have to be a constant, uphill battle.

  She felt so much hope and joy that all she could say was, “I think that’s a good sign.”

  “Of course, it’s a good sign. It means so much that you trust me.”

  She could tell that he meant it, and it sent a ripple of concern through her heart. “It’s not that I ever really thought you would cheat on me, Thomas. I hope you know that. It was just part of how I always felt not-good-enough, and the idea of other women who seemed to have more to offer than me just confirmed the feeling.”

  “I understand that now.”

  “Back then you didn’t?”

  He shook his head with an expression that was almost tired. “Back then I assumed it was another sign that I wasn’t any good at relationships and you were slowly pulling away from me. I hope you understand that I felt just as not-good-enough as you did. It just took a different form.”

  “I didn’t know that before,” she admitted. “It never even occurred to me. But I’m starting to realize it now.”

  He reached out to pull her into another hug, and they stood together in the embrace for a long time, on the front step of her little house.

  When they finally pulled apart, Abigail had to force herself to go inside before she grabbed hold of Thomas and dragged him inside with her for the night.

  Ten

  On Friday, Abigail was cleaning up after a quick dinner—fit in between Thomas arriving after work and their all leaving for the Good Friday service at church. She’d wanted it to be a family occasion, so they were all going to Willow Park church.

  She was seriously thinking about starting to go there all the time, since it was a better fit for her as a church, and Thomas’s attendance was no longer an obstacle.

  At the moment, she was listening to the conversation in the dining room, where Thomas and Mia were playing Thomas’s old board game of Operation, which he’d dug out of his attic earlier that week.

  They were both utterly serious about each move they made, and Abigail had a few private giggles as she listened.

  “Oh, no,” Mia said, after several seconds of silence and then a familiar buzzing sound. “I messed up.”

  “That’s okay. It takes a lot of practice to keep your hand really still.”

>   “Did you practice a lot when you were a kid? Did you and Aunt Lydia play?”

  “I played a lot, but Aunt Lydia didn’t really like it. She always said it was mostly boring with just a few seconds of excitement. She liked to play sports and more active games.”

  “Oh.” Mia clearly thought about this for a while before she continued, “Did you like to play sports and more active games too?”

  “Not really. I swam on a swim team, but I didn’t really like it. I mostly liked school and books.”

  “Me too. That’s what I like too.”

  “Well, we’re alike in that then. I was on the chess team, though. I liked that.”

  “Do you think I would like chess, Daddy?”

  “You might. I can teach you sometimes, if you want.”

  Abigail shook her head, already imagining the intense chess tournaments between the two of them in the future.

  “One of the girls in my class said that girls who like to read all the time are boring and not popular. Do you think that’s true, Daddy?”

  Abigail stiffened in instinctive resentment at the girl who had made Mia feel bad about herself. Mia hadn’t told her about it, and she wished she’d known it earlier.

  “No. I don’t think that’s true. But I don’t think being popular is really that important anyway.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it doesn’t mean you’re happy or not. It doesn’t mean people really love you. Your Aunt Lydia was always really popular in school, and I was never popular at all. But we’re both happy now, and we have people who love us. And God loves us both just as much. I think that’s what matters more than being popular.”

  “Oh.” Mia was obviously mulling over this bit of wisdom, the way she always did before she spoke. “I think so too.”

  Abigail felt her chest relax at the peace in her daughter’s voice, and she felt a tug of affection for Thomas with his matter-of-fact sincerity in handling the issue.

  It was funny. She always thought about Thomas as he was now—handsome, successfully, brilliant, composed, and seemingly confident. She’d never thought about him as a boy. But he would have been super-smart, reserved, academic, and focused, none of them traits that led to popularity in school. He’d called himself a nerd, and that was how other kids had probably seen him.

  She’d never even considered until recently. When they’d talked about their childhoods, he’d told her about his family and about the ways he’d excelled in academics. He’d never told her about not being popular. She’d never imagined he would have any reason to be insecure. About anything.

  The game-playing continued from the dining room, and she was finishing loading the dishwasher when she heard Mia say, “You’re really good at this, Daddy.”

  “I do my best.”

  “If I ever have to have an operation, will you do surgery on me?”

  “No, sweetheart. I couldn’t ever do surgery on you.”

  “Why not? I would want you to, because you’re the best.”

  “Surgeons can’t do operations on their own family.”

  “Why not?”

  Thomas’s voice was as calm and gentle as it had been the whole time as he answered. “Because to do a good job as a surgeon, you have to think only about the job, the surgery—not about the person you’re working on. And you can’t look at your family as a job. You can only look at them as people you love.”

  “Oh.” Mia paused to think some more.

  Abigail, deeply touched, moved to the doorway of the kitchen so she could look at them—Thomas with his high forehead and slightly wrinkled dress shirt and Mia with her braids and glasses.

  “What if I really need surgery?”

  “Then I’ll find the best surgeon I can to do it. But I could never look at you as a job.”

  “So you only look at me as someone you love?” Mia asked.

  “That’s right. Because you’re my daughter, and that’s never going to change. No matter what happens to you or to me, no matter what either of us does, I can only look at you as my family, my daughter, as someone I love. I can only look at you as mine.”

  Abigail’s eyes burned with emotion at hearing the words, at seeing how much he meant them—even though his matter-of-fact manner had never altered.

  Mia nodded, as if she understood and accepted his words. “Then I guess you’ll have to find another surgeon as good as you, in case me or Mommy has to have an operation.”

  Thomas was smiling as Abigail came out, feeling strangely overwhelmed with emotion and responding to it by trying to return to normal life. “Okay. I think the game has to be paused for now, or we’ll be late for church.”

  “But I was just getting good at it,” Mia complained. “Can we finish after church?”

  “It will be bedtime after church, so you’ll have to finish it tomorrow. Now run put on your socks and shoes.”

  Mia didn’t look excited, but she wasn’t whining as she went to do what she was told.

  Thomas had stood up, and Abigail looked up at him for a minute, feeling like he was real to her in a way he hadn’t been earlier in their marriage.

  “What is it?” he asked, his forehead wrinkling.

  She shook her head. “Nothing. Just you were really good with her just now.”

  “Thank you. Is that all you were thinking?” His eyes were searching her face, and his hand rose to cup her cheek.

  It felt like he could read her mind, see how she was feeling, and the idea caused flutters of fear and excitement to rush through her.

  If he could see how she was feeling, then he would think they were better, that they were on the cusp of starting again.

  Maybe they were.

  Maybe after all their work they could finally be rewarded.

  Maybe all the work they’d poured into this marriage could finally—finally—be over.

  He leaned to kiss her gently, and she clung to him, overwhelmed and bewildered by what seemed to be happening.

  “You said we were going to be late for church,” Mia said, tying her shoes in the living room.

  “We will, if we don’t leave soon.” Abigail said, pulling away from Thomas and flushing from being caught by their daughter.

  Thomas chuckled, and Abigail couldn’t fail to see that his expression—even beneath his characteristic reserve—was warm, pleased, hopeful.

  That made her feel all fluttery too.

  ***

  The Good Friday service at Willow Park church was quiet and solemn. There wasn’t much chatting before the service began, as the organist played a number of traditional hymns about the crucifixion.

  Mia was always good in church because she loved to read, so she sat between her parents with her children’s story Bible—with the stories nicely rewritten for children—and read happily. Thomas’s arm was across the back of the pew, stretching over Mia’s head so his hand was resting on Abigail’s shoulders.

  She liked it there. She liked how it felt to sit together in the pew. Like a family. Like they’d never been broken.

  The service passed with hymns, prayers, readings, a short sermon from Daniel, and then communion. Abigail tried to focus, but she had trouble not thinking about Thomas, about what was happening now between them, about whether she could now let herself hope for the future.

  Afterwards, after the benediction, groups of the church members had gathered to talk, and Abigail slipped away to go to the bathroom.

  She was washing her hands when Lydia came in.

  After greeting her sister-in-law, Abigail asked, “When do you all leave for India?”

  “Two more months. I’m so excited. You have no idea.”

  “I think it’s amazing the work that you and Gabe are going to do there. Are you nervous?”

  Lydia had gone into one of the bathroom stalls, but it didn’t stop her from talking. “Occasionally, but not much. I’m just so sure of it, you know.”

  Abigail sighed. That was the thing. That was why she was still hesitating,
no matter how good things were getting between them. She just wasn’t sure about her marriage the way Lydia was about India. She stared at her face in the mirror, praying that she would get some sort of sign one way or the other.

  She was still standing in front of the sink when Lydia came out to wash her hands.

  Giving her a curious look, Lydia asked, “So how are things with you and Thomas?”

  “Okay, I guess.” Abigail didn’t resent the question—since it was characteristic of Lydia’s blunt manner—but she wished she had a good answer for her.

  “It looks like things are going pretty good.” Lydia was obviously trying not to smile too wide. “I mean, I haven’t seen Thomas so happy in a really long time. Maybe ever.”

  Abigail swallowed and stared down at the floor, suddenly feeling guilty for questioning, when it was obvious that Thomas wanted this so much. So did she. “It’s complicated,” she managed to say.

  “I know. I know it takes time and it’s really hard. I’m just really glad…” Lydia cleared her throat. “I’m sorry. Maybe I shouldn’t have asked. Thomas is always telling me to back off about it, but I just want you both to be happy.”

  “I know you do.” Abigail smiled, appreciating Lydia’s heart, despite the uncomfortable feelings the conversation had evoked. “Thank you.”

  When she left the bathroom, she looked around until she saw Thomas and Mia talking to his parents.

  She walked to them automatically, sidestepping to avoid two little boys who were playing in the hall, and she had a strange, sudden recognition.

  She’d moved toward Thomas and Mia without even thinking. Because they were her family. Because they were where she belonged.

  So she was even more rattled and emotional when she reached them, suddenly wishing she were alone so she could sort through everything she was feeling. Make a wise, conscious decision.

  But she wasn’t alone. Mia grabbed at her hand, and Thomas wrapped an arm around her, pulling her against his side.

  He didn’t even seem conscious of doing so. He was focused on talking to his mother about plans for Easter dinner on Sunday. He’d just reached for her. Automatically.