Josh looks both surprised and a little annoyed. “I didn’t expect you to take his side.”
“There don’t need to be sides,” I reply as I start loading the dishwasher. Even if Mike criticized my chicken pie, or at least the chicken in it, which was bad enough. “And the truth is…” I pause, letting my thoughts coalesce into something approaching certainty. “I think he’s lonely.”
Josh gapes me for a second. “Lonely…”
“Yes, lonely.” I warm to my theme. “He moved around as a kid with his dad in the army, he’s not married, no children as far as I know, and then he comes here all by himself?” My voice rises in a squeak of indignation. “Of course, he’s lonely.”
Josh nods slowly, seeming both chastened and impressed by my unexpected outburst. “Okay,” he says. “I see it. I get it.”
“So, we can be friendly,” I tell Josh severely. “We can befriends.” Then I can’t help but crack a grin. “Besides, he’s got all those guns.”
Josh lets out a shout of laughter, then gathers me in my arms.
“I love you, Abby,” he says, which seems like a complete non sequitur, but I’m glad he said it all the same.
CHAPTER SIX
When I see Emmy at Bible study the next week, she’s back to her brisk self, cheerful and dismissive of her outburst the other morning, which she tells me was a combination of PMS, lack of sleep, and being hangry.
I’m not sure I believe her.
Emmy is always so cheerfully capable that it never really occurred to me that keeping her mood up might sometimes be exhausting. That someone as seemingly confident and faith-filled as Emmy might have moments of doubt or fear or just weariness, the same way I do. Looking back, it seems obvious, but Emmy puts up a very good front, and really, I think she is that way most of the time.
Just notallthe time. And because Emmy has helped me in so many ways, I want to help her, too. The trouble is, people like Emmy don’t always like accepting help, so I know I’ll need to be sneaky about it.
Fortunately, I’ve got a plan. I just need to talk to Josh about it.
Life is getting busy on our homestead, now that it’s spring, and although he’s still hobbling around and wearing a boot, Josh is determined to get outside and startdoingthings. With William working full time for the forestry, he doesn’t have his usual partner for projects, and I worry he’s going to overdo it. Plus, it’s hard to find a time to talk about my plan for Emmy.
One morning in early April, I stare out of the kitchen as Josh limps to the barn, a now familiar ball of worry knotting in my stomach. Yesterday, he insisted he didn’t need to go to Buckholt anymore for PT. It’s only been a month, and his surgeon said he needed three to six months of physical therapy. He also said if Josh didn’t do it, he could suffer some kind of permanent damage to his knee. Meanwhile, my husband seems to secretly believe that PT is for sissies, which feels like a very outdated, not to mention stupid, notion.
I glance back at Jack, who is slurping Cheerios and reading a graphic novel, which at least has some words in it. He’s meant to be doing his math right after breakfast, but now that the weather has started getting warm, both of our wills to keep homeschooling are petering out. I’ve come to realize that the homeschooling cycle is a burst of purposeful education followed by myriad distractions and enticements—first it was Christmas, then snow, now spring. There is, I reflect on a sigh, always something, so really, it’s kind of amazing that my kids even know how to read. Of course, they all learned that before I started homeschooling them. Thankfully.
Rose comes into the kitchen with a basket of eggs from the coop, practically an ad for the bucolic benefits of the homeschooling—or maybe just homesteading—life. She finished her reading and writing for the year by the end of February, but she could do some math, too. The trouble is, she only likes the fun word problems Josh makes for her, and he hasn’t done those lately. I tried, writing a convoluted problem about cupcakes and sprinkles, but she said it wasn’t the same.
Josh, meanwhile, is struggling just to open the barn door.
“Jack,” I say abruptly, “go outside and help Dad. I think he wants to get the tractor out.” After Mike the Prepper reprimanded us for not plowing yet, I think Josh has been feeling behind. Last night I saw him googling cold frames, even though we hadn’t considered them before Mike came along, and it’s probably too late in the season, anyway. Maybe next year.
I did venture into our semi-dilapidated greenhouse that Bethany and William reassembled from an old one Ed Wilson had brought over. It lists to one side, and there are some serious drafts blowing in through the cracks, but it mostly works.
It felt strange to be starting over for a second time. Last year, everything felt brand new, scary, and exciting, our plans barely nascent. This year, I have more confidence in what I am doing—mostly—but I am also wondering why I didn’t rinse out the plant pots, which are now full of dried, ashy compost, or tidy up the sacks of potting soil, or consider labeling the plastic baggies of various seeds I cannot possibly identify now. I guess I could just plant them and see what happens. Or we could just throw them out and start over, which feels easier.
I continue to watch Josh struggle while Jack stands nearby, looking torn. I’m guessing he wants to help, but he’s afraid Josh is going to yell at him, which is likely because Josh doesn’t like being offered help, especially by his children. Since getting his cast off, it’s as if he’s been auditioning for Superman. Admittedly, a lame Superman. Literally.
I watch apprehensively as they exchange words, both Josh and Jack standing with their hands on their hips, facing each other. A jolt of surprise goes through me at the sight; until now, when I can see them standing there together, I didn’t realize how tall Jack is now, well past Josh’s shoulder. He looksgrown-up… and he also looks a lot like Josh. The same wide-legged stance, the same stubborn look on his face.
“Don’t you have some homeschooling to do?” I hear through the open window.
“Isn’t this why we moved here?” Jack replies. “So I could do this stuff?”
Josh sighs and rakes a hand through his hair. “Yeah, okay. Sorry.” He gives our son a sheepish smile. “I guess I just wish I could do it myself.”
As Jack goes to open the barn door, I feel a little pulse of relief. Crisis averted. I turn back to the kitchen table, where Rose is meant to be starting her math, only to discover she has disappeared. What a surprise.
“Rose,” I call. “It’s math time, and you still need to put your eggs away.” I rest one hand on my bump, feeling tired eventhough it’s only eight o’clock in the morning, when a sudden twitch inside has me stilling, and then gasping out loud.
I think the baby just kicked me. My little girl.
