30
Kristin
Rain continued to fall as got into my car and then made my way down Main Street. People were scattering into the storefronts or hiding out under canopies as they waited for the spring storm to pass, but it didn’t seem like this was going to be rain that went away easily. I eased my way onto Route 5 and then made the quick turn onto Martin Way and up to Wes’ parent's house. I could see Wes’ home looming up on top of the hill, all dark with no one there, and I tried not to think about the last time I was up this way. Instead, I pulled into his parents’ driveway and parked next to Wyatt’s familiar pickup truck.
I tucked the book into my purse so it wouldn’t get wet from the rain, tugged my hood over my head, and made my way to the porch. I knocked on the door and glanced up at the camera that I now knew was there, pulling my hood back off so that I could be recognized. The front door quickly opened, and there was Wyatt inside, greeting me with a smile.
“Wow, I didn’t expect you to come by so quickly,” Wyatt said to me with surprise.
“It was my lunchtime anyway, so I figured I would just bring it over,” I said to Wyatt, putting the book out in front of me for him to take.
“Why don’t you take it in to Jenny?” Wyatt said to me. “I’m sure she would like to meet you after hearing about you.”
I was a little nervous about meeting Jenny, particularly because the circumstances lately may not have been ideal. I nodded to Wyatt and took my wet windbreaker off. Wyatt took my coat and hung it on one of the hooks by the door, and then took the lead as he walked through the living room and down the hall. I followed a few paces behind, trying to keep my composure.
Wyatt knocked on the bedroom door, and I heard a voice say, “Come in.” He swung the door open and went in, and then waved me over to follow him. I walked into the room and saw Jenny Martin for the first time. She sat there on the bed, blanket pulled up to her over her lap. I could see the oxygen machine she was using sitting on the nightstand next to her and hear it as it was working. Jenny looked over at me and smiled and then looked at Wyatt.
“Wyatt, why didn’t you tell me we had a guest over? I would have gotten more presentable. I look a mess,” she said, trying to straighten her hair.
“Don’t be ridiculous Jenny,” Wyatt said, moving to the foot of the bed. “You look fine. This is Kristin Arthur, the librarian.”
Jenny looked up at me and smiled. “It’s nice to meet you, Kristin,” she said to me with a smile. “I’ve heard a lot about you around here,” she said as she looked at Wyatt.
“It’s nice to meet you as well, Mrs. Martin,” I said to her, giving a nervous smile.
“Please, call me Jenny,” she said to me. “What brings you out in this horrible weather today?”
“Oh, well Wyatt had sent me a message about a book he thought you might be interested in,” I said as I held out the book to her. Jenny reached over, her thin hand taking hold of the book and bringing to her lap.
“Wyatt, you made this poor girl come all the way out here in the rain for this?” she said to him, scolding him.
“I just sent her a message,” Wyatt said in his defense.
“I came out on my own, really,” I said to her.
“That was very sweet of you,” Jenny said. “It is one of my favorite books. I’ve probably read it a dozen times, but it has been a while since I read it. And I don’t think Izzy has read this one yet either so it will be good for both of us. Thank you, Kristin.”
“You’re very welcome, Mrs. Martin,” I said as she glanced at me, reminding me not to call her that. “I mean, Jenny,” I said with a smile.
I stood nervously for a minute as Jenny leafed through the book and Wyatt smiled at her. Jenny then looked up at me and then at Wyatt.
“Wyatt, why don’t you get some tea for Kristin and me?” Jenny said to him. Wyatt arose from the bed.
“Sure thing; I’ll be back in a few minutes,” Wyatt said as he went to go to the kitchen.
“Oh, no, you don’t have to do that,” I replied. “I should probably get back to the library and leave you to rest.”
“Nonsense,” she said to me. She reached over and patted the chair positioned next to her side of the bed. “Come and have a seat.”
I walked over to the chair and sat closet to her. I could see close up that she looked a bit weary and a little thinner than I had expected, but she had the same fire and spirit in her eyes that I saw in Wes. I sat and put my hands in my lap, nervously fiddling with my skirt as I sat there.
“I’m sorry if Wyatt pushed you into coming out here,” Jenny said to me quietly. “I know it probably wasn’t easy for you to come out here with all the turmoil that went on.”
“He didn’t push me, honestly,” I said to her. “I was happy to do it. Actually, I was glad for the opportunity to meet you after all I had heard about you from Wyatt and… and Wes.”
“I’m surprised they had nice things to say about me,” she said with a laugh. “I run a pretty tight ship out here. All three of them can tell you that.”
We sat silently for a moment as Jenny adjusted the oxygen cannula in her nose to make it sit more comfortably. “This thing is a royal pain,” she said to me.
Wyatt appeared with two cups of tea, passing one to me and then one to his wife.
“Thank you,” I said softly, placing the cup and saucer in my lap while Wyatt placed a bed tray on the bed for Jenny to use.
“If you ladies don’t mind,” Wyatt started, “I need to run down to the stables for a minute. George was having an issue with a delivery. I won’t be gone too long.”
I felt nervous about staying with Jenny, but she chimed right in. “Go ahead Wyatt,” Jenny told him. “But you better not be running down to the diner to tell Clyde Stuart that you got this pretty girl to come to your house.”
I blushed when she said this, and Wyatt cracked a smile.
“Well, I was going to tell him I had two pretty girls here, but now you’ve gone and spoiled it,” he said as he leaned over the bed and gave Jenny a kiss.
“Be back in a bit,” Wyatt said as he waved.
Jenny turned and looked at me. “So, what shall we talk about?” she said as she smiled at me.
I felt like a schoolgirl before the principal. “Um, I’m not really sure,” I answered. “What would you like to talk about?”
“How do you like being the librarian here in Chandler?” Jenny asked me.
“I love it,” I told her. “Being a librarian is something I always wanted to do, and to get the chance to share my love of books with everyone else is a real treat for me. I think we can do some great things with the library if we get the chance.”
“Well if you can pry some money out of Marion Harris and the rest of the board, I’m sure you will,” Jenny said to me. “I used to be on the board before I got sick,” she said to me. “But, I was missing too much of the going ons and thought it would be better to leave it to someone that could devote more time to it, but I do miss it. And I know how tough it can be to deal with them. But from what I have heard about you, it seems like you can handle yourself well. They’re the ones that should be worried,” Jenny said with a laugh.
I laughed along with her. “Thank you for the vote of confidence,” I told her. “I try to stand up for myself as best I can.”
“That brings me to another topic,” Jenny said. “My granddaughter, Isabelle.” I was little worried this was going to come up and could feel myself feeling uncomfortable.
“I am sorry for all that unpleasantness,” Jenny said to me, stretching her hand out to put it on top of mine. “I’m afraid Wes, Wyatt and I didn’t do such a great job preparing her for something like that. We never talked much about Wes dating and seeing people because it was never around us. I think she was taken by surprise by it and by how she reacted to the situation.”
“You don’t have to apologize to me, Jenny,” I told her quietly. “I understand that there were special circumstances. If I were in her shoes, I might have reacted the same way.”
“Don’t defend the way she spoke to you,” Jenny said strongly. “She had no right to speak to you that way. I gave her a good lecture about all that. She let her emotions get the better of her and acted badly, and rudely, and she knows it.”
“It may have been for the best anyway,” I told Jenny. “If Wes was going to be leaving, I’m sure he didn’t want to get tied down into a long-distance relationship. It would just be a difficult distraction for him.”
“I think you underestimate him a bit, Kristin,” Jenny said. “I know my son pretty well, even if he doesn’t want to admit it. I could see it in his face when he talks about you. You may not have known each other very long, but you mean a great deal to him. It hurt him deeply the way things played out, and I think he would do whatever he could to try to make it work for you.”
“He is special to me too,” I told her softly. “I just don’t want to be a complication in his life, and that’s what it seemed like to me. It was very hard for me to just give up that easily.”
“Then don’t give up,” Jenny said to me. “You don’t have to give up your life and your dreams to accommodate Wes’ lifestyle. What you do, and think, and believe is just as important as him swinging that baseball bat. Will it take compromise? Absolutely. But if you both really want it, then there’s no reason why you can’t have a relationship.”
“But what about Isabelle?” I said to her. “I don’t want her to think that I am trying to take her place or push her out. I don’t want her to hate me or seem like some kind of threat to her relationship with her father.”
“There’s only one way that is going to resolve itself, Kristin,” Jenny sat up against the pillows on her bed. “You and Izzy are going to have to talk about it so you can let her know how you feel.”
I sat back in the chair. Jenny was right of course but having that conversation didn’t seem like it would be an easy thing for either of us.
I heard the front door open and close and footsteps coming down the hallway. I figured it was Wyatt coming back from the stables, but then I heard “Grandma, I’m home. Track practice got canceled because of the rain, so I thought…”
Isabelle walked into the bedroom and saw me sitting there next to Jenny. We were both taken a bit by surprise, and I could see that she was as unsure as I was about what to do.
“I should go,” I said to Jenny, putting my teacup down on the nightstand and going to stand up.
“Kristin, you sit,” Jenny said to me. Isabelle went to back out of the bedroom. “Isabelle, come over, please.” It was not as much a request as a command. Isabelle walked gingerly into the room and sat on the bed near to Jenny’s waist.
“Now I know this may not be exactly as the two of you wanted your day to go, but this is as good a time as any to hash things out. Isabelle,” Jenny said, looking at her, “I know you have something to say to Kristin to start with, for sure.”
Isabelle blushed and looked down at first. She looked over at her grandmother, who gave her a bit of a glare.
“I’m sorry, Ms. Arthur,” Isabelle said to me. “I should not have spoken disrespectfully to you.”
I could tell it was very tough for her to have to say that to me, but I was glad to hear it.
“Thank you, Isabelle,” I said to her. She looked up at me, and I could see that she was turning red and feeling choked up.
“Izzy, I know this has been difficult for you to deal with,” Jenny said to her, turning her attention to her and taking her hand with her left while still holding mine with her right. “It was far from the ideal circumstances for your first exposure to your father having a relationship with someone. I know your Dad and Kristin both feel that way. You need to take a step back from the emotion you felt right away and look at it from the other side. It has been a long time since your father has felt close to someone and let them into his life like this. It hasn’t happened since your mother; he wouldn’t let it happen because he was trying to do what was best for you. You’re a young woman now Izzy, not a little girl anymore. In time, when you start to have romantic interests and boyfriends, you may understand the whole thing a little better.”
I saw Isabelle look over at me when Jenny mentioned boyfriends. I am sure she was worried about what I had seen down at the diner.
The three of us sat there silently for a moment. Jenny slid herself over to the side of the bed where my chair was and put her feet on the floor. She grabbed her oxygen concentrator and slung the bag over her shoulder and stood up from the bed, shakily at first. I grabbed her hand so she could brace herself and she looked at me and smiled.
Jenny leaned down and whispered into my ear. “Talk to her,” she said to me as she shuffled around the bed, gave Isabelle a kiss on the forehead, and walked out of the room, closing the door.
I wasn’t sure what I should do. I had a wave of nerves run through my body as I tried to figure out what to say. I looked over at Isabelle and saw she was looking down at the bed, tracing the outline of the quilting with her index finger. She probably wasn’t any surer about what to say than I was.
“Did you,” Isabelle said nervously, “Did you say anything about what you saw?” she asked.
“No,” I told her. “That’s your business. It’s not my place to say anything.”
“Thank you,” she said quietly. “I know Dad would freak out about it. He’s already all tense about me going to the dance on Friday; this would just make it worse.”
“There’s a dance this week?” I said to her.
“Yes, it’s the big spring dance, and the first one I got asked to go to. I’m pretty excited,” Isabelle told me, relaxing a little bit.
“I remember my first dance,” I said to her, leaning forward in my chair.
“Did you go with a boy?” she said, scooting closer to me as she stayed on the bed.
“I did,” I said with a smile. “Charlie Everson. He was captain of the basketball team. I was so excited to get asked, and he was very sweet.”
“How was it? Were you nervous?” Isabelle was showing greater interest in the conversation now.
“I was very nervous,” I told her honestly. “It was my first date. Thankfully my older sister was there to help me out and get ready. She drove me to the dance since I couldn’t drive yet, and neither could Charlie. Once we met there, we had a good time. We danced, we laughed and had a good time with our friends. It was fun.”
“Did he… did he kiss you goodnight?”
I smiled at her. “He did. It was… it was special.”
Isabelle looked at me and smiled. “Bradley hasn’t kissed me yet,” she said sounding disappointed. “I think he’s nervous about it.”
“Boys usually are,” I told her. “When the time is right, he will, I’m sure, and you’ll remember it forever.”
“I wish I had a sister to help me like you did,” Isabelle told me. “Grandma means well, and she tries, but it’s not quite the same thing.”
“If… if you want to, I’d be happy to help you get ready Friday night,” I told her. I didn’t want her to feel like I was imposing myself on her or anything. I could see her eyes light up a bit after I told her.
“That would be nice,” Isabelle said to me. “I would like that a lot.”
I looked down at my watch and saw it was almost two-thirty. I jumped up out of my chair.
“Oh geez, I need to get back to the library,” I said to her in a panic. I walked around the bed, and Isabelle got up and opened the door for me. I smiled at her as we walked out of the bedroom.
Jenny was sitting in the living room, and Wyatt was there with her. They both looked over at the two of us as we entered the room and saw we were both smiling.
“I need to get back to work,” I said to Jenny and Wyatt.
“Thank you so much for bringing the book out,” Jenny said to me. I came over and stood in front of her, and she smiled and took my hand again.
“It was wonderful to get to meet you,” Jenny said to me.
“Same here,” I said to her softly. “Thank you.”
I turned and looked at Isabelle and smiled at her and she gave me a little wave.
“Say, Kristin,” Wyatt said to me as he handed me my windbreaker. “The three of us will be watching the ball game tonight. We’d love for you to join us if you want.”
I put my jacket on and looked at Isabelle, who was looking hopeful like she wanted me to say yes.
“That would be nice,” I said to Wyatt. “I would be happy to join you.”
“Well then come over after work,” Jenny said to me. “We can have some dinner and then watch the game together.”
“Great,” I said. “I will see you then.”
Wyatt held the front door open for me and then followed me out to the porch. The rain had let up quite a bit, but it was still drizzling slightly.
I smiled and looked at Wyatt as I zipped my jacket.
“Did you know this would happen when you invited me out?” I said to him.
“Did I know?” Wyatt said with a laugh. “Heck, when it comes to women I learned a long time ago that I don’t really know much of anything. I sure hoped everything would work out though, and I know Jenny well enough to know she could steer things the right way. She has that effect on people.”
I leaned over and gave Wyatt a peck on the cheek. I could see he turned red from it.
“Thank you, Wyatt,” I said to him. I turned and walked out to my car, not caring if the raindrops got me a little wet, or if I got rain on the seat of my car. For the first time in days, I felt like life in Chandler was going pretty good for me.