17
Frances fumed internally as they sat in the streetcar heading to her old home. She had tried so hard to be normal and natural with Nick since his declaration that morning. For a while there, she’d thought they could just be friends again without all the stupid talk about love. And then he’d had to go and bring it up again. What was he thinking to keep pushing?
Still, her heart ached at the divide between them. They hadn’t been married quite two weeks. How could he have gone from being her best friend to this man professing his love for her in such a short time? If she hadn’t known him so well, she’d have thought he was teasing her. It was all Nick’s fault for ruining their friendship.
Frances refused to accept his hand when they left the streetcar but strode to the street where she’d grown up. He was silent and didn’t try to catch up to her but stayed a few paces behind.
As her surroundings finally broke into Frances’s irritation, an unexpected sense of nostalgia hit her, and she slowed her pace. The neighborhood hadn’t changed much in the last year. She imagined the children would be in school at this hour.
“Is it very hard?” Nick asked softly from beside her.
“More than I thought it would be.” She glanced at him for the first time since shutting him down on the streetcar.
“Is that you, Frances?” a familiar voice called from the large front porch of the house across the street from hers.
“Doc Turner.” Pleasure at seeing the old man washed away her irritation, and she hurried up the walk to give him a hug. “How are you?”
“Well, I’m a year older. And who’s this young man?”
“Oh, he’s… uh…”
“I’m her husband, Nick Reynolds.” He extended his hand. “Doc Turner is it?”
“Married too, are you? The wife saw notices in the paper for both Maude and Doris.” The old man glanced over his shoulder. “I’d invite you in for some cookies, but she’s resting.”
“Perhaps we can chat later,” Frances said, stepping off the porch. “We’re expecting my sisters later.”
“That would be wonderful.” Doc Turner glanced at her old home. “The neighborhood’s not been the same since your father died, and you all left. It was such a loss.” Shaking his head, he went back inside.
“That’s your house?” Nick asked, standing beside her again. When she nodded, he said, “It’s a beautiful place. Has it been in your family for long?”
“It’s a relatively new house. My father had it built for my mother. You can see her taste in everything because he gave her free rein with the decorating.” Sadness and the familiar sense of loss filled Frances. “That’s why everything is shabby.”
“Your father didn’t want to change anything your mother had chosen,” Nick said, his voice soft.
“No, he didn’t.” The words came out rough.
Frances was getting tired of feeling like she was on the verge of tears all the time. Sometimes full-out crying. If Luke’s cowhands had seen her crying like a baby as she had so often these last few weeks, she’d be in a world of trouble. Besides giving them ammunition to tease her, they’d look down at her as weak. Nick was the only one she’d ever felt safe to cry in front of.
Staring at her childhood home, emotion making her blink back tears, she’d expected him to offer comfort. He didn’t. Did that mean they weren’t even friends anymore? The melancholy she’d been struggling with lately intensified.
She’d never known anyone who saw inside her like Nick did. Last spring, after spending only a month in each other’s company, they’d started joking they shared a brain. One of the guys had overheard them joking about it and later must have thought to be clever by calling her a halfwit to the other men. The next day the cowhand had shown up with a shiner. Nick hadn’t denied hitting the man, but he wouldn’t admit to it either. The cowhand wouldn’t talk, though he’d never dared call her names again.
Why was it when Nick came to her defense it didn’t bother her? With any other man, she’d have thought he was implying she couldn’t handle things herself.
“Looks like someone’s been shoveling the walks,” he finally said. “Shall we go inside?”
“Yes. If we can find whatever it is my uncle wants, maybe he’ll finally leave us alone.”
“Do you have a key to the front door?” he asked.
“No. Let’s go around the back.” Frances tried to bite back a grin, thinking back on all the times she’d snuck out of the house. “I know how to jimmy one of the windows there.”
“Did your father ever catch you?” Nick asked with a chuckle.
With the simple question, her humor fled. How could her father have caught her when he refused to acknowledge her? They’d reached the front verandah, and stepped into the deep, crunchy snow and began trudging around the side of the house.
As she did, the locket’s chain tickled her neck, and she remembered the little scrap of paper. Maybe she hadn’t been as invisible to him as she’d thought. It took away the usual bitterness that accompanied thoughts of her father.
