She put her hand on my shoulder and smiled. “He has already. But peace and comfort don’t always take away the pain. They just dull it a little.”
I hugged her tight, and she hugged me back.
“Now,” she said as she pulled away, forcing a smile, “let’s make the best wedding feast we can manage. Today is a day to celebrate, and the day after tomorrow is our birthday. We have much to be thankful for.”
I helped her make a chicken pie with carrots and beans on the side. She patiently taught me how to make the puffed pastry and how to clean the chicken and season the meat just right.Then she helped me make a pound cake for dessert. By the time Isaac returned, we had a delicious feast prepared, and I knew a few more recipes. In the past, I had not enjoyed cooking and baking, but I had never had a husband to feed. I wanted to please him more than I wanted anything else, and it made me proud to serve him good food. The work didn’t feel like a chore when I had his pleasure to anticipate.
After the meal was finished, we sat at the hearth with apple cider. I nestled close to Isaac, wanting to be as near him as possible. Every chance I could get.
Grace sat opposite us, looking into the flames. I had worried that it would be difficult for her to see Isaac and I together because of her old feelings for him, but she seemed hardly to notice us. She was so caught up in her own grief and memories.
“Tell me about flying,” Isaac said yet again. He never seemed to tire of hearing about 1912, and I never tired of telling him.
“’Tis unlike anything you can imagine,” Grace said before I could answer him. “’Tis a sort of weightless freedom. Thrilling yet dangerous. Effortless yet extremely difficult. A miracle, really.”
Isaac and I both looked at her, though she still stared into the fire.
“You flew, as well?” he asked.
She turned to him and nodded. “After Hope died, I learned to fly and made a trip across America, from New York to California.”
“California?” he repeated.
“There’s so much to tell you,” I said to him, leaning closer. “So very much.”
“Luc taught me to fly,” Grace continued, as if she hadn’t heard us. “He taught me many things.”
“Who is Luc?” Isaac asked.
“The man I love,” she said with a simple shrug and tears in her eyes.
Isaac looked at me, questions in his gaze, and I nodded. He had to see that Grace’s grief went deeper than losing our parents and her life in 1912. She was grieving the loss of a lifetime.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I wish I had known him.”
Grace turned her gaze back to the flames and nodded. “I wish you had, too.”
Isaac asked other questions about automobiles, telephones, and things we would not live long enough to see. We talked for over an hour as the sun disappeared and the stars filled the vast sky.
Finally, it was time for bed.
Isaac went up the ladder first and smiled at me before he disappeared into our room. My heart raced with anticipation, and my nerves hummed with energy.
Grace blew out all but one candle, which she left on the table for me.
“Good night,” I said as I gave her another hug. My joy was dimmed by her melancholy, and I wanted to ease her pain. But the only thing that could heal her broken heart was time. “Thank you for helping me with supper.”
She nodded and then turned, almost blindly, to her cot, where she began to undress for bed.
With a trembling hand, I took the candle and made my way up the ladder. Grace and I had slept in the loft the past two nights before the wedding, but it would now be just mine and Isaac’s until we returned to his farm in Salem Village.
He stood near the lone window, his back to the ladder. When he heard the boards creak beneath my feet, he turned and extended his hand to me.
I set the candle on a small table near the bed and joined him at the window. He put his arm around me, drawing me into his warmth. I looked up at him, my nerves settling. This was Isaac, the gentle, kind man who had loved me so well for so long.
“Is there anything we can do for Grace?” he whispered. “Anything at all?”
“We can pray.”
