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“What?”
“I get to have free rein to meddle in your relationship with Caleb.”
Amanda gave her a horrified look. “I don’t have a relationship with Caleb.”
“You will when I’m through,” Maggie said cheerfully. “Enjoy your evening.”
She was gone before Amanda could formulate a reply. This wasn’t good. Not good at all. Maggie meddling all on her own would be bad enough, but if she brought the romantically irrepressible Nadine into it—and she very well might—who knew what mischief they could stir up for Amanda and Caleb?
Caleb took in Amanda’s flushed cheeks and too-bright eyes and tried to figure out what had brought on this sudden attack of nerves. It couldn’t be because he and Mary Louise were the first official guests at her new home. Amanda had grown up entertaining for Big Max. She’d been hosting dinner parties for Charleston’s power brokers by the time she was thirteen. So why was she fluttering around the living room, fussing over a plate of cheese and crackers and a couple of soft drinks?
He captured her hand as she was about to take off for the kitchen once again. “You okay?” he asked.
“Fine, just fine,” she said too cheerfully. She turned to beam at Mary Louise. “Just let me get some napkins and we can talk.”
“There are napkins on the table,” Caleb pointed out.
Her good cheer evaporated. “Oh, of course there are. What was I thinking?” She sat down on the edge of a chair. “Mary Louise, why don’t you tell me a little bit about you and Danny?”
Mary Louise, who’d been tense ever since Caleb had picked her up and hadn’t said a word on the ride over, launched into a dreamy description of their relationship. If it had been written down, it would have been punctuated by hearts and flowers.
Amanda grinned at the romantic picture the girl was painting. “Then you’ve been in love with him practically forever?” she summarized.
Mary Louise nodded. “That’s why I don’t understand what all the fuss is about us getting married a little sooner than we planned.”
Caleb was about to explain when Amanda asked, “What’s Danny studying at Clemson?”
“Architecture,” Mary Louise said.
“Is he excited about it?” Amanda asked.
“He loves it. Who could live around here and not care about all these historic old buildings? He really wants to find ways to preserve them.”
“I have a couple of friends who do historic preservation work,” Amanda told her. “It requires a real passion and understanding to do it right. How are you going to feel if Danny has to give that up?”
Mary Louise looked startled. “Why would he have to give it up?”
“Supporting a family means bringing in a paycheck and putting food on the table,” Amanda explained. “It means doctors for you and the baby. It means paying rent for someplace to live.”
“I can work,” Mary Louise said staunchly.
“For a while,” Amanda agreed. “What about once the baby comes?”
“We can manage,” Mary Louise insisted.
Just then Larry, Jimmy and Susie raced in from the backyard demanding Amanda’s immediate attention. In Caleb’s opinion, their timing couldn’t have been better.
“Mommy, they wouldn’t let me swing on the swing,” Susie said, tears rolling down her cheeks. She cast an accusing look at her big brothers. “They’re mean and I hate them!”
“Susie!” Amanda said. “You do not hate your brothers.”
“Do, too,” she said with a sniff.
“She’s just a big ole baby,” Jimmy countered.
“Am not,” Susie retorted.
Before the battle could escalate, Amanda scooped up Susie, then directed a forbidding look at the boys. “Come with me,” she said.
“I can take them,” Caleb offered.
“Not this time,” Amanda said tersely, heading to the back of the house.
“But it’s not fair,” Jimmy wailed just before one bedroom door slammed shut.
“They were being mean,” Susie repeated, her voice thick with tears. “How come I have to go to my room?”
Caleb couldn’t hear Amanda’s murmured reply, but then a second door closed. She came back, looking faintly harried.
“Sorry. Where were we?” she asked Mary Louise.
“I was telling you that Danny and I can figure all that out,” Mary Louise said, though her gaze seemed to be drawn in the direction of the unmistakable sobs coming from down the hall. She looked shaken.
“You’ll need to get used to that,” Amanda told her mildly. “Kids cry, especially babies. It’ll make it tough for Danny to study, at least at home. Next thing you know he’ll either have to drop out of school or spend all his free time in the library so he can keep up with his classes.”
Mary Louise reacted with dismay. “It’s one little baby,” she protested.
Amanda smiled. “You have no idea what a ruckus one little baby can create, especially if he or she happens to be colicky. Jimmy didn’t let me get a decent night’s sleep for months.”
“Didn’t your husband help?”
“Some, but he was working. He needed his sleep, just the way Danny will need his if he’s going to keep up with his studies.” Amanda’s expression turned sad. “Bobby and I fought all the time during those months.”
“How come?” Mary Louise asked.
“He thought I ought to be able to do something to stop the crying. It was like he was accusing me of being a bad mother. It tapped into every one of my insecurities, so I lashed back.”
The memory still seemed to touch a raw nerve and Mary Louise seemed to get that. “How old were you when you got married?” she asked.
“I was nineteen, just a year older than you,” Amanda told her.
“But your husband wasn’t in college, right?” Mary Louise said, seizing on some slim difference between him and Danny. “He was working.”
“Right. He was getting his business off the ground. He was gone all the time, so everything at home was up to me.”
“If you were in love, though, I’ll bet it was worth it,” Mary Louise said, her expression hopeful.
“In many ways, yes,” Amanda agreed. She exchanged a look with Caleb. “But I won’t lie to you, Mary Louise, the exhaustion and stress pretty much sucked the romance right out of it. Bobby and I were lucky, though. No matter how tough things got, no matter how many fights we had, we stuck together. We both knew we didn’t have anybody else to fall back on. We had to make it work. It might have been easier, though, if we’d waited.”
“But Reverend Webb told me your husband died,” Mary Louise said. “What if you hadn’t had that time together? Aren’t you glad you had that?”
Caleb saw the unmistakable sadness in Amanda’s eyes. It was always there when Bobby’s death was mentioned. It was always there, as well, when anyone mentioned her father. That loss ran just as deep.
“Yes,” Amanda whispered. “I’m glad for every minute we had. No one can live their life, though, based on what-ifs. You have to be smart and base your decisions on what is.”
“Danny and I are having a baby,” Mary Louise said. “That’s what is.” She aimed a fiercely determined look at Caleb. “And I’m not giving the baby away. It might be hard and scary, but this is what I’m doing and nothing you say will talk me out of it.”
Caleb recognized that level of determination and knew that Amanda had hit the nail on the head. He, too, had to deal with things the way they were.
“Okay, then,” he said. “I’m going to see you and Danny again on Sunday and then afterward I’m going to ask your folks to join us. Let’s see where we stand and what we can do to make sure this baby has not just two parents who will love it, but a whole support system.”
“Really?” Mary Louise said, her eyes wide. “You’re going to marry us?”
“One step at a time,” Caleb warned. “Let’s get Danny and your folks on board first. You don’t want Danny to feel like he’s been backed into a corner, do you?”
“No, of course not. He wants this as much as I do. You’ll see,” she insisted.
Caleb had his doubts about that, but maybe there was a way to bring him around, especially if he could come up with some way to ensure Danny didn’t lose his career dream in the process.
Once Amanda had gotten over her case of the jitters, thanks to that untimely and provocative conversation with Maggie, she’d been able to focus on the young woman Caleb had brought over. She’d totally empathized with Mary Louise’s unshakable optimism in the face of an unexpected pregnancy that threatened to change her life forever. She’d done what she could to explain the harsh realities of marrying and having a family too young, but a part of her had been rooting for Mary Louise to stick to her guns and fight for what she wanted. It was that sort of spunk that would be needed if she and Danny were to have even half a chance of making it.
As soon as Mary Louise and Caleb had left, she’d wilted as she considered the confrontation that awaited with her own squabbling children. With no siblings of her own, she was always taken aback by the battles among her three children. She’d always had this rosy picture of them loving one another through thick and thin. The reality was that there were plenty of times when they barely tolerated one another.
Before she gave them permission to leave their rooms, she fixed a quick dinner of spaghetti and meat-balls, one of the few meals they all loved. Maybe that would facilitate peace.
When the food was on the table, she went to the boys’ room first. “Okay, you two, dinner’s ready, but I want you at the table only if you can promise me that there will be no fighting with your sister. You know how I hate it when you gang up on her.”
Larry and Jimmy regarded her with tear-reddened eyes.
“I’m sorry, Mom,” Jimmy said first.
“Me, too,” Larry added. “We really weren’t being mean. We were scared she’d fall out of the swing like she did yesterday.”
Amanda’s mouth gaped. “Susie fell out of the swing yesterday?”
Jimmy nodded. “Twice. She made us promise not to tell, ’cause she was afraid you wouldn’t let her get on the swing anymore.”
Amanda sighed. “Then you were trying to protect her?”
Both boys nodded solemnly.
“Then I’m the one who’s sorry,” she told them. “I should have given you a chance to explain.”
They wrapped their arms around her waist and leaned into her.
“It’s okay, Mom. You were kinda busy with Caleb and that lady,” Larry said.
She looked down into their upturned faces. “How about I make it up to you with ice cream after dinner?”
“We have ice cream?”
“No, but we’ll take a walk and get cones,” she said.
“Susie, too?” Larry asked indignantly.
“Something tells me she’s learned her lesson,” Amanda said. “She was sent to her room, too.”
Both boys seemed to consider that for a moment.
“Okay,” Larry said eventually. “But we get double dips and she only gets one, ’cause we’re bigger.”
Amanda laughed at the twisted logic that gave them a triumph over their little sister. “That sounds fair.”
Caleb returned to Amanda’s just in time to meet her and the kids on the sidewalk.
“We’re going for ice-cream cones, Mr. Caleb,” Susie announced, holding out her arms to be picked up. The red band holding her hair in a ponytail had slipped and curls were poking out in every direction. There was a streak of spaghetti sauce on her cheek and another on her purple T-shirt.
He scooped her up just as Larry tugged on his shirtsleeve.
“We get two scoops, but she only gets one,” he told Caleb.
“Because you’re older,” Caleb guessed.
“And because Mom’s’ pologizing to us,” Jimmy added.
Caleb glanced at Amanda. “Oh?”
“Long story,” she said. “What brings you back?”
“I was hoping we could talk some more about the Mary Louise and Danny situation.”
Amanda looked vaguely uneasy. “Sorry I wasn’t more help.”
“Actually you were a huge help.”
She seemed startled by that. “Really?”
“Seems I’m the one who came away from the talk with a whole new perspective,” he admitted. “Have you ever considered going back to school and getting a degree in psychology, so you could counsel young people?”
She stared at him as if he’d grown two heads. “Me? No way. I barely have my own life together. I certainly don’t want to tell anyone else what they ought to be doing.”
“That’s just it, you weren’t telling Mary Louise what to do at all. You were showing her what lies ahead and letting her draw her own conclusions.”
“She came to the wrong one, according to you,” Amanda reminded him.
“No, I suspect she came to the right one for her. Or, if she didn’t, at least she’s moving ahead with her eyes wide open. That’s the best we can hope for.” He met her gaze. “I’m serious, Amanda. I think you could do this. I could certainly use someone like you to work with the kids at church. Maybe you could do that on an informal basis.”
“How?”
