An Honest Life. Dana Corbit
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people could be disastrous for a loner like him. It would only make him vulnerable—something he couldn’t allow. He could never again let himself be that lost child of his memories. The only way to avoid that was to rely only on the person beneath his own skin. He’d never needed anyone, and he wasn’t about to start now.
Early Tuesday afternoon Rick perched two extra two-by-fours on his shoulder and headed back to the framed building. A noise to his right caught his attention, and he turned to see a familiar car coming up the drive. He didn’t have to look twice to recognize the driver, and he smiled against his will.
“Here we go again,” he said, unloading his cargo onto the stack before glancing back at the parking lot.
If the idea of another verbal sparring round with Charity bothered him so much, then he shouldn’t have been sauntering right to her, his heart tapping out Morse code in his chest. He reminded himself of a clown punching bag, the kind with sand in the bottom to keep it popping back up for more punishment.
But his comparison didn’t stop him from stepping next to her car when she parked it and bending to speak into her open window. “We’ve got to stop meeting like this. People will talk.”
Her hair wasn’t tied back this time but flowed to her shoulder blades in a wavy mass. A crazy temptation to see if her tresses felt like silk had him tucking his thumbs safely through his tool belt.
Instead of saying something clever, she blushed. “I came to pick up some materials for my Sunday school class.”
“Did you forget them when you were here yesterday?” He extinguished the thought that she’d made an excuse to see him, but not before feeling the tiniest bit pleased.
“Yeah, I forgot.” But the way she chewed her lip and refused to meet his gaze as she got out of the car decreased her credibility. She fussed with her hair, shoving it over her shoulders as if it was a bother.
She seemed so uncomfortable, the woman of far too many words suddenly struck silent, and he scrambled for a way to relieve her discomfiture. “Did you come to monitor our progress? I can show you the roof trusses we’ve set. We’ve worked really hard. I promise.”
“No, that isn’t necessary.” She shook her head emphatically. “I just need to get my things from the church so I can get over to Andrew and Serena’s house.”
“The Westins?”
Nodding, Charity took a few steps toward the door. “I talked to them this morning and promised to come over and play with Tessa for a while before I go to work. It’s a big transition for her, suddenly having a brother.”
So she hadn’t come by to see him after all. He hated the disappointment that reared inside him, but that didn’t stop him from wanting to delay her departure a few minutes longer. “It’s nice of you to think of that little girl.” Her blush deepened at the compliment.
“Tessa’s really special. I teach her in Sunday school. Although she lives with a painful illness, juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, she’s always smiling.”
Charity gazed at the parsonage, her eyes shining a bit too much, but she rolled her lips inward and looked away a few seconds. When she faced him again, the shimmer of threatened tears was gone. Rick wondered if it had been there at all. It was the most honest expression she’d displayed since they’d met.
“Yeah, I’ve seen her playing on her swing set. She’s always laughing,” he said when she didn’t speak.
He glimpsed the shine again before she turned to pull open one of the glass double doors. “You’re sure you don’t want a tour?” he said, relieved when she stopped again and turned back to him. “Or better yet, you could come back tomorrow, and I could put you to work on the crew. How are you with a pneumatic nailer?”
She laughed at that, the sound sweetly feminine. Melodic even. “I don’t think you want to let me loose on society with one of those.”
“That’s too bad. I sure could have used a bigger crew, especially for framing. I only have eight, and a dozen would have been better. Faster.”
Something akin to relief filled him when she allowed the glass door to fall shut and turned back to him. “Adding me to the crew would be like subtracting one of your regular guys. Maybe even two. They would have to work full-time to fix my mistakes.”
“You’d be fine as long as you remember one rule. Measure twice, cut once.” He demonstrated the concept with his hands.
“I’ll try to remember that.”
Levity glimmered in her eyes, tempting him to tell his best knock-knock joke just to see her laugh again. But he waited too long, and she reopened the door. “Sorry, I’ve really got to go.” She waved and disappeared inside.
A few minutes later, after Rick had returned to the power saw, Charity crossed the parking lot and hurried to the parsonage. She emerged again with the petite curly-haired brunette, who danced rings around Charity as they approached the wooden play structure behind the house.
As much as Rick tried to focus on his own directions about measuring and cutting, he found himself watching them. First, Tessa slid down the yellow slide into Charity’s open arms. Then, Charity stood and twirled around and around with the child’s legs tucked around her waist. When both appeared sufficiently dizzy, Charity carefully lowered to the ground, and both rested on their backs kicking their feet up in the air.
The scene was so sweet and private that Rick felt it was an invasion to watch, but he couldn’t make himself look away. Charity’s laughter drifted across the lot on the few occasions when he turned off the saw and his crew took a break with the nailer. His chest tightened, the sound of their laughter threatening to wrap itself around his heart, but still he observed them.
Though she wrestled and laughed with Tessa, Charity moved cautiously, as if to protect the child. A nurse’s instinct. Hospitals—Charity, working there, and Tessa, a frequent guest—probably were the common denominator connecting the two.
Before Charity had mentioned anything about Tessa, Rick had already known about the Westins’ fragile child, the information courtesy of Rusty. If only his friend would stop telling him stories about the people at Hickory Ridge. It felt too personal.
He especially wished Rusty would stop talking about Charity. Without that information, Rick could have been just a casual observer now, one who might have guessed he was witnessing a tender moment between mother and child. But Rick knew better. And the knowing ruffled his thoughts even more. This was not her child but Serena’s daughter. Serena, the woman who had taken what Charity had believed to be her place in Andrew’s heart and by his side in church hierarchy. The youth minister’s wife.
But the loving picture the woman and young girl painted together, still giggling as Tessa straddled Charity’s belly and tickled her under the chin, revealed none of that uncomfortable history. The sides of Rick’s mouth turned up in a smile he couldn’t restrain.
For once, Charity was being benevolent and living up to her name. She was such a paradox. Just when he thought he had her figured out and could justify his resentment toward her, she allowed him to glimpse this other, endearing side. He wasn’t sure how to process this observation, fearing he liked this side a little too much.
In what felt like a short time later, Charity and Tessa walked hand in hand through the back door into the house. Rick surprised himself by wishing she wouldn’t leave so soon. The way she blurred the clear lines around his personal boundaries, he should have been wishing she would disappear until the building dedication instead of hanging around and distracting him.
From his perch on the ladder, Rick glanced at Charity as she climbed in the car. She looked over and waved shyly before closing the door. Despite his embarrassment over getting caught watching, Rick couldn’t help wondering when he’d see her next. Or hoping it wasn’t too long.
At work a few hours later, Charity tried to contain the smile that pulled at her lips as