скачать книгу бесплатно
Jenna tried to focus on the abstract watercolor in the doctor’s office at her father’s follow-up appointment the next day. Staring at the strange shapes was easier than looking at her dad or the doctor. Thankfully, Toby had stayed back at the orchard to tend to the work they’d missed yesterday and wouldn’t have accomplished today if he hadn’t been around. Busy fussing over her father the rest of yesterday, Jenna had missed her opportunity to meet Kasey but hoped to rectify that once she was home from school today.
But after this blow, who knew? A motorized wheelchair. Her father, who used to think nothing of working ten hours a day in the busy season—the man who had taught her to ride horseback, to swim and to race on her bike—was being told it was best for him not to walk on his own going forward.
“You’re telling me my father can’t walk anymore?” Jenna tried to modulate her voice. It wasn’t Dr. Karol’s fault—he was a messenger, tasked with delivering bad information. Still, worry simmered through her veins.
“Jenna.” Her father’s voice held a warning.
But she pressed on. “He fell. Doesn’t everyone fall sometimes?” She heard the desperation in her own voice. Tell me it’s all a cruel joke. Tell me Dad will just get better on his own.
“The type of MS your father has—”
“It’s PPMS, I know. I know it’s different from normal multiple sclerosis.” She didn’t mean to be rude, but she’d attended every one of Dad’s appointments for the past six months. She had already listened to Dr. Karol talk about Primary Progressive Multiple Sclerosis—PPMS—in detail on many occasions.
Dr. Karol nodded and leaned against the counter. “With primary progressive the legs lose power, and simple tasks, like going out to check the mail, can deplete all of a person’s energy.”
“And some days it sure does,” Dad agreed.
How could he be taking the news so easily?
Jenna clutched the brochure that broke down how much their insurance would cover toward each of their chair options. “But saying he’s not allowed to walk...that...that takes away his ability to live.” Once people weren’t mobile, didn’t they get pneumonia? And people could die of pneumonia. That’s what had happened to Mom.
The doctor set down his clipboard and opened the small laptop on the counter. “On the contrary. Using a motorized chair, especially with the technology that exists these days, gives back movement and strength. Right now, Richard expends all his energy by noon, just from being mobile in your house. But a chair allows you to store that energy—it gives back his life because there are reserves left to spend time with family or go outside. Think, during harvest your father can come out to the orchard and oversee your work.”
Jenna still wasn’t convinced as she helped her father into the car and started driving home. Not walking meant accepting defeat. It meant accepting that her father was ill. She wasn’t ready for that. Might never be. She tried to repeat what Toby had told her yesterday at the ER. That every situation was a chance to show love—to show God. But her heart had a hard time digesting that. Mom had died so quickly after becoming bedridden. While a motorized chair wasn’t the same thing, wasn’t it a step in that direction? Not my dad. I won’t let that happen to him, too.
Her knuckles were turning white on the steering wheel. She eased her grip.
Dad rolled down the window and braced his arm along the frame. Warm September air laced with dampness from Lake Michigan tumbled into the car. “I don’t like admitting I need a chair any more than you do, but it seems like the right choice.”
Jenna blinked, trying to get a clear view of the road. She needed to be strong for her father. No crying. No falling apart. “We can safety-proof the house. Take away all the rugs and anything that could cause you to trip.”
“Jenna.”
“And if you want to be part of the harvest, you can ride shotgun in the truck. We take the pickup down the rows anyway. Toby won’t mind.”
“Jenna.”
“And we could—”
“Honeybee, stop. I’m sick.” He fisted his hands, but not quickly enough to hide the shaking. From stress. She was causing that. Guilt punched at her heart.
He rested his head against the back of the seat. “My body’s failing me. Admitting that is part of being able to move forward and live with my disease.”
“Why?” Jenna whispered, so quietly she wasn’t sure if her father heard her. A part of her didn’t want him to. “Why is God doing this?”
He scrubbed his hand down his face. “He’s not doing this to me. It’s not a punishment. Our bodies fail us because we’re mortal. That’s all there is to it.”
God was perfectly fine with letting people who loved Him suffer? Was it like watching ants on a small anthill? Easy to feel no attachment?
The muscles in her shoulders bunched. She couldn’t deal with Dad’s train of logic right now. “But they’re not letting you walk. Your hands shake all the time. You—”
“It’s not a big deal, Jenna.”
“Not a big deal? How can you say that? I can’t believe—”
“Stop.” He drew his hands so they were in his lap, and his gentle blue eyes met hers when she braked at the intersection. “Jenna, sweetheart, the Lord gives and the Lord takes. In all of it let the name of the Lord be praised.” He referenced a verse that was written on a plaque that used to hang near the front entrance of their home. Years ago, after Mom’s death, Jenna had ripped the plaque down and stuffed it between books on her old childhood bookshelf.
Her father continued. “My hope will remain with my faith, no matter what happens to my body.”
No matter what happens to my body. Her throat tightened as if someone had shoved a bundle of itchy wool into her mouth and forced her to swallow. Dad didn’t know what those words meant to her, but they still felt like a slap.
“I don’t like it. I don’t like admitting that you’re not a superhero.” Her voice shook.
“Every superhero has their foil. I guess PPMS is mine.”
“I love you, Dad. You know that, right?”
“I love you, too, sweetheart. I love you very much.”
She had to lighten the mood, or else she’d dwell on her thoughts too much and start crying. Besides, she was stressing him out and she didn’t want to be the cause of any more issues for him. “So...what you’re saying is we should paint the Batman symbol on your motorized chair when they deliver it?”
“Ha! I don’t know if I’d go that far. Besides, we heroes like to be more covert.” He winked. “If you don’t mind.”
Her Camry kicked up a cloud of dust as they drove down the driveway. For her father’s sake, she parked as close to the house as she could. Just like yesterday, her eyes were drawn to the sagging and worn-down parts of their home. It had once been a beautiful place. Dad used to paint it a brilliant white every summer, even though the orchard demanded so much of his time during that season.
Now the house matched its owner.
“He’s changed.” Dad’s voice dragged her attention away from assessing the house.
Jenna followed the path of his vision to where Toby carried a basket of apples into their barn. He’d been out mending the fence when Jenna conducted her morning perimeter walk. Actually, after they’d arrived home from the ER yesterday afternoon, he must have headed back to her ruined Braeburns, because this morning the baby trees were encircled by plastic orange construction fencing. And two of the ones she’d thought were dead, he’d pruned and retied and was trying to save.
Dad kept talking. “Don’t get me wrong. I always liked him. But he’s different. I mean that in a good way.”
Jenna yanked the keys from the ignition. “I guess.”
She didn’t want to think of Toby in a good light. That was dangerous. Feeling anything about her old friend would only lead to hurt. They would never be buddies again. The carefree days of lying in the orchard counting stars were gone forever. He wouldn’t stay here, not indefinitely. Toby’s dreams were bigger than hers. So there was no reason to appreciate him or get attached. Not that she wanted to. Toby was a pest at best and a traitor at worst. She still leaned toward considering him the latter for now.
She rounded the car and helped her father out.
He squeezed her arm. “Whatever happened between the two of you? You used to be inseparable. I figured you’d be over the moon about him coming home, but perhaps I was wrong.”
He pretended not to know me. He made fun of your livelihood. Embarrassed me in front of the whole school. And broke my heart in the process. That didn’t feel like an appropriate answer, so instead she said, “We both grew up.”
“Now, I’m showing my age here, but bear with your old man. Was there ever anything romantic between the two of you?”
Not on Toby’s side. Nor would there ever be.
“We’re two kids who used to play together. That’s all. Nothing more.”
“Well, the fact that you’re taking a breath belies that. If you’re living, there’s always more. More to experience. More to know. More to laugh about. More is a gift that should be celebrated every day, honeybee. Toby’s back in our lives for a reason. That means he’s part of the more for both of us.”
Yeah, probably more pain.
Which was exactly what she was so worried about.
* * *
Toby set the crate full of apples on top of the old, rough table that ran the length of one side of the Crests’ barn. He scooped an armful of fruit, placed them in the large washbasin sink and started to scrub them.
The Crests weren’t farmers, at least not in the normal sense. There were no cows or chickens poking around their ten acres, just apple trees. The barn was separated into three sections—a storage area for equipment, an industrial kitchen area that was set to meet health codes so they could make items to sell and the little storefront in the front of the barn where they sold their goods from the end of September through November, though October was always the busiest time of year.
Perspiration dotted the space between his shoulder blades. He’d forgotten how much manual labor running the orchard could be. How had Mr. Crest managed the past few years? Toby leaned over the sink and cracked the window, letting in a stream of wind. He dragged in a deep breath of air through his nostrils. Sweet notes from the nearby Fuji, Red Delicious and Gravenstein trees flooded his senses. Those smells were home and happiness. Everything he longed for but could never have—not someone like him, not permanently.
Jenna and her mom, along with a team of hired seasonal workers, used to spend all of fall in the kitchen area baking pies, making apple-cider donuts and apple dumplings, loaves and muffins, canning applesauce, and cooking apple butter and jelly. Did Jenna do that all alone now? Did the Crests still run the store at all?
He should have been here. Should have helped them.
A heavy weight settled in his gut.
The Crests weren’t his family, not by blood. Even still, he’d spent so many years moping over dreams lost when he could have been of use here. But he could change that now. Toby would be here for them, and he would work hard.
Maybe his life would actually matter. He could finally prove he wasn’t a failure.
Okay, that might be asking too much.
Toby dropped more apples into the sink before turning on the faucet. They needed to be scrubbed and chopped; then he could put them in the apple press. Nothing went to waste at the orchard. They always used all the fallen apples to make cider. This would become a daily process once they opened for the season.
The side door creaked, drawing his gaze.
Jenna entered and glanced around. “My dad sent me in here to check on you.” She closed the door and moved a few feet closer. “Making cider?”
“I figured it was time for the first batch of the season.” He turned off the faucet and pulled the scrub brush off the counter. “You guys still run the store out of the front?”
“We’ll open next weekend. The pumpkins should be delivered on Wednesday.” She placed a dishtowel over her shoulder, selected a knife from the drawer, gathered a cutting board and joined him by the sink. “You wash, I’ll cut.”
For a few minutes the only sounds were water sloshing, the rhythmic chops of the knife going through the fleshy apples and a nest of birds outside. When he moved to refill the sink with more apples, Toby snuck another glance at Jenna. Even with her hair tucked back in a ponytail, golden waves framed her face. His eyes ran over her gentle curves. Jenna was beautiful. How had he missed that when he was young?
Even if he had noticed, he’d never have been worthy of her. She was innocent. Pure. He was...he was every mistake in the book, and then some. Someone like him could never deserve someone like Jenna Crest. Not in a million years. Not when he was in high school, and certainly not now.
She stopped cutting and looked over at him. “Need something?” She ran the back of her wrist over her forehead.
He’d been caught staring. Great. Toby cleared his throat as he picked up a few more apples. “How’d your dad’s appointment go?”
Her knife stilled over the board. “They said...” She took a breath and started again. “They said he should stop walking.” She cut into the apple but then straightened up and rolled her shoulders. “They’re making him get a motorized wheelchair.”
When Jenna’s mom had been unable to walk was when her health had really started to go downhill. Hearing the same news about her father had to have hit Jenna hard. “How bad is he?”
Her forehead wrinkled. She smoothed her fingers over it. “I might as well tell you. I don’t really tell anyone this stuff, or what I told you yesterday about my panic attacks, but I guess I will. It’s not like you wouldn’t figure stuff out, living on our property. Do you know what he has?”
He knew that look. The one that said “Please don’t make me explain something I don’t want to acknowledge exists.” He knew because he’d worn that expression many times himself. He’d spent his childhood pretending to be okay. Pretending his brother’s illness and death didn’t affect him. Pretending he was the perfect son, athlete, student—anything people wanted him to be—so that he didn’t have to answer questions or be honest about what he really felt. Didn’t have to tell them he hated it all, the death and the questions and trying to be the son who “deserved” to live. It was all an act. Ben had been a better person than him. Would have been a better man. He would have made his life matter. Toby was sure of that.
Toby knew that in the same way he knew that his own life was a waste.
But thoughts like that wouldn’t help Jenna. He needed to find a way to get her to talk more. Engage with him. Stop disliking him.
Toby ran his finger over a splintering crack in the counter. “Primary progressive MS. My mom told me.”
“Your mom. Of course.” She turned toward him, pressing her hip into the counter. “So how much do you know about us?”
He shrugged. His mom was a bit of a talker. Some would call her a gossip.
He wasn’t about to admit that he knew it’d taken her six years through correspondence courses to finally achieve her college degree. “You went to college for journalism. Did some freelance writing for a magazine and newspaper out of—” he held up a finger, thinking back over his conversations with his parents “—Grand Rapids. You lived there for a little bit, right?”
Her face clouded and she looked away. “Up until six months ago.”
Toby’s gut kicked a little. Had she left behind a life she loved back in Grand Rapids? A boyfriend? His chest felt tight. Why did that thought bother him so much?
“Do you miss it?”
She laughed softly. “I was writing a little, but mostly working at the coffee shop below my apartment. Not exactly earthshaking stuff. I was glad to come back. Relieved, actually. Does that make me a bad person?”
He was in a similar place—here because his cousin had passed. Something bad had brought him back, but he’d welcomed any sort of direction in his life. “I hope not, because I was happy to come back here, too.”
“I mean, I had to come back because my father was sick. And I was happy to have a reason to come back—not happy he’s sick, but...does that make sense?” Guilt made her face tense.
A part of him really wanted to open up his arms and offer her a hug, but she wouldn’t accept that. At least, he was pretty sure she wouldn’t and wasn’t brave enough to try without knowing he wouldn’t get shot down.
“Completely. You can say anything around me—you know that. We always functioned with the umbrella. What’d we call it?” He squinted, looking at her for the answer.
She sighed, and the tiniest trace of a smile pulled at her lips. “The Umbrella of Grace. Whenever we wanted to say something blunt or hard, we’d pretend to open an umbrella and both stand under it and call it the Umbrella of Grace. We could say whatever we wanted without judgment.”
“As long as the umbrella was up.” Warmth spread across his chest. How had he forgotten about that? More important, what else had he forgotten when it came to their friendship? He’d blocked most of it out when he left for college, too aware that if he held on to those memories, relived them, it would make him miss things he couldn’t have.
But was it possible for him and Jenna to pretend? To act like they did in the old days? As if life could exist simply on the orchard, and they could forget failures and pressure from the outside world? If Toby was excellent at anything, it was pretending.
Toby wiped his hands off on his shirt, then pretended to click an umbrella open and duck under it. “Want to come under here with me?”
She braced her free hand on the counter. “Those days are over. You and I both know that.” Her voice shook.
He dropped his hands from his imaginary umbrella. Why didn’t she trust him? “Jenna? What happened? What—?”
“I should go check on my dad.” She set down her knife and made to leave.
“Hey, stay.” Toby caught her arm and gently let his hand slide down to encircle her wrist. “Stay with me.”
She focused on where his fingers wrapped around her. For a moment, he thought she was going to shove away from him. Instead she studied his hand as if she were a scientist looking through a microscope at a new life-form.
Toby playfully swung her arm between them. “You okay?”
