“I know that.” Joey sighed again. “I just…I can’t.” The differences between her and Adam felt so stark in that moment. She didn’t want them to be so apparent, but she worked two jobs according to someone else’s schedule, and he worked from home according to his own.
“I’m going to think about it,” she said. “I’ll look at my finances again when I get home tonight.”
The twin bed she slept in now was from her childhood, and she could take it with her. Joey felt selfish and greedy as she thought, but she didn’t want a twin bed in her new apartment. She wanted to feel like an adult, and adults had big beds.
“Okay,” Adam said. “I’ll call you later tonight, and we can talk some more about it.”
Joey wasn’t sure she wanted that, either, but she didn’t argue.
“I just want you to be happy,” he said.
“I know,” she said. “It’s not that I’munhappy with Grams and Gramps. I’ve always loved them, and they’ve been so good to me.”
“That’s not really what this is about,” Adam said quietly, and Joey hated that he understood her so completely. She should be happy about that, and in most cases, she was. Right now, she told herself that he simply didn’t get it.
Adam had had money in his life for a long time now, and he’d merely forgotten what it was like not to be able to buy anything he wanted.
Joey wanted to make her own way in the world. She didn’t want to have to go to her parents or grandparents or anyone else to get help, even as unfeasible as that was at this stage in her life.
“I’m baking tomorrow,” she said. “Are you still planning to come?”
“Yes,” Adam said. “If that’s okay.”
He’d been making the drive to Coral Canyon every day for lunch, as Joey got off from Cake Bites by eleven and didn’t have to be at Pork and Beans until four.
“Yeah, of course it’s okay,” she said. “I can’t wait to see you.”
“I could have come apartment hunting with you today.”He made his voice light, but Joey still heard the hurt inside it.
“I know,” she said. “But you had all those phone calls to make. Did you get everything sorted with the sound and light company?”
“Yes, finally,” he said, his tone turning a bit darker, because it had taken him a long time to find the proper equipment he needed for the concert series. “We’ll have everything we need for the concerts.”
“Oh, that’s great,” Joey said. “They’re coming up fast.”
“Yeah, just a few more weeks,” Adam said.
Joey made the last turn to the big historic church where Pork and Beans had their catering office in the back. “All right,” she said. “I’m at work. I have to go.”
“All right, Roo,” Adam said. “Seriously, call me tonight.”
“Okay,” she said, though she wasn’t sure she’d call him. Knowing Adam, even though they’d only been dating for a couple of months, she knew he’d call her if she didn’t. “Talk to you later.”
“Bye, baby,” he said. He ended the call, and Joey sat in her car, still a few minutes early for her shift. She stared out the windshield, a single question running through her mind:What is he doing with me?
Everyone, from her Uncle Tex to her daddy to Adam himself, had been trying to get Joey to see how awesome she was, but as she sat in the driver’s seat, alone, thinking of how much it would cost her to furnish an apartment and move into it, Joey had never felt so low.
She closed her eyes against the burning tears,determined not to let them fall. “Dear God,” she prayed. “I am trying to see myself as Thy daughter, worthy of good things in my life, like a nice apartment and my sweet boyfriend, Adam. Will You please help me see it? Help me see in myself what he sees. Help me see and understand what my daddy sees and what Georgia sees and what Grams sees, because right now, I just feel like a problem.”
And to Joey, there was no worse feeling.
She waited, the gentle air of the heater blowing through the car, and her own mind blissfully quiet. She opened her eyes and found the snow had finally arrived, big, fat flakes drifting down and melting when they touched her windshield.
She smiled, because Joey had always liked living in Wyoming. She didn’t mind the winter or the snow, because it meant she could plug in her blanket, make a cup of hot chocolate, and collapse into her bean bag and read for the day.
Not that her life allowed her to do that very often anymore, but the thought that shecouldbrought her comfort.
You are precious to me, the words entered her mind in the same near-silent way that the snow fell, and Joey let the tears burning in her eyes streak down her face, for she knew God had just spoken to her and confirmed to her that she was His daughter and she did have worth.
