Jillian hurried out to meet them.
“Hi there,” Maggie said, noticing her first. “Did you want to see the calves?”
“Thank you,” Jillian said. “But no, I actually wanted to just grab the girls. Unfortunately, I’m not feeling well all of a sudden.”
“Oh dear,” Maggie said. “Do you need an aspirin? Do you want to lie down for a bit?”
“No, no,” Jillian said. “I just need to get on home.”
“No,”Posey whined. But her big sister grabbed her hand and whispered in her ear, and she settled.
“I’m so sorry, dear,” Maggie said.
“Please tell everyone I’m sorry,” Jillian said. “Hopefully, we can get together another time.”
Maggie nodded, concern still clear in her eyes.
Jillian took the girls by the hand and hurried off to the car before the other woman’s sympathy unlocked the tears that were gathering.
“I’m so sorry, girls,” she told them. “I know you were having fun. Maybe we can put on a movie when we get home.”
“I wanted to eat dinner,” Posey said sadly.
“I wanted to play hide and seek,” Mari added,breaking Jillian’s heart. She was proud of her daughter for getting more comfortable with the other kids.
She only wished she were strong enough to stay. But she knew she couldn’t simply pretend that everything was fine for the rest of the evening.
Everyone was quiet on the quick car ride home. As Jillian drove onto the nice gravel surface by the back door, she thought of Tripp again and her heart ached.
People are who they are,she reminded herself.It’s not his fault. And it doesn’t help to wish for him to be someone he’s not.
But she couldn’t help the pain that weighed on her chest at abandoning the feeling she’d had all night, like she could just see her own girls’ futures playing out surrounded by family gathered at the big table of the Lawrence farmhouse.
She told herself that their future would still be great. It just wouldn’t be there, with those people. And she knew they would all be just fine.
But it still hurt.
19
TRIPP
Tripp stood on the front porch of his parents’ farmhouse, looking out over the fields he had cared for since he was old enough to walk.
The cold wind slid icy fingers under his flannel and the distant sound of the cows lowing in the barn seemed lonelier than usual.
Plenty of things had happened in his life, good and bad. There were the hockey wins, the lost calves, the arrival of nieces and nephews, and the years when the farm barely broke even and everyone scrimped and prayed.
He’d stood here to absorb every one of them, and let the land, and the wind, and the mountains steady his heart, for better or for worse.
But tonight, even the peace of the snow covering the meadows in a fresh white blanket did nothing to ease his heart.
I thought this was meant to be…
It had filled something deep in his chest to seeJillian at the family table and the girls fitting right in with the other kids, almost like they had always been there.
Like they belong here with me.
But Jillian was nothing if not a steady person. Unlike Tripp, she wasn’t impulsive, and she didn’t do things without thinking first.
