Sweet Caroline(86)

And what I feel terrifies me.

“Caroline?” Elle nudges me. “Did you hear me?”

Forcing a smile, I answer, “No, what?”

“I asked if you wanted Mom to come with us to shop for wedding dresses. She’d love to help. Besides, the woman has five daughters, three married. She’s a pro.”

“Yeah, that’d be great.”

“So, any word from Hazel? How’d she take the engagement news?” Elle straightens one of her wall portraits.

“She said, well—”

“Excuse me, Miss Garvey,” A slender brunette with sun-lined cheeks steps into our conversation. “I’d like to talk about this piece over here.”

Elle excuses herself and walks off to make a sale.

I haven’t told Hazel, yet.

Mitch joins me after a moment, slipping his hand along my shoulders. “Want to grab some dinner?”

I peer into his boundless blue eyes. “Sounds lovely.”

“We can talk about setting a date. My schedule is booking up and I want to save plenty of time for wedding and honeymoon”—he gives me an intimate grin—“stuff.”

Taking his hand, I follow him out the door, with a backward wave at Elle, who is taking the large painting down from the wall.

Mitch is so the opposite of J. D. Although I sense his passion as strong as J. D.’s.—maybe more—never once has he pushed the boundaries.

So why, oh, why, does my heart race every time I think of marriage? Why does my belly flip-flop every time I think of Barcelona?

Climbing a tree is not as easy as it used to be. When did my legs become cranky old ladies? Wasn’t I just in this tree a few months ago?

“Omph.” I hike my foot up to the first branch, stretching my arms toward a branch so I can pull myself up. The heel of my work clogs catches in the crook of the limb as I clasp my fingers around a thin limb and heave myself up. My skin crawls as I feel the platinum shank of my engagement ring scrape against the rough live oak bark.

“Come on, Caroline, sissy girl, get in the tree,” I urge myself. But my hands slip. I tumble backwards, arms winging in the wind. My foot is stuck. “Ack!” My ankle twists one way while my body goes the other. There’s nothing to catch me but the ground.

Face-first, I fall, leaving my shoe wedged in the tree and my skirt hiked up to my skivvies.

A few minutes later, sitting on the dock, I stare up at the twilight sky, wondering why the dream of a lifetime coming true doesn’t feel as swell as I thought.

“What’s going on?” I ask, not the stars this time, but the One who holds them in His hand. “This is Mitch. And me. Finally. The life I wanted.”

I wanted . . .

The words slice gently through my soul, cutting away the cruddy feel-ing I’ve had since Mitch—oh, my man Mitch—asked me to marry him.

Since I said yes. When he asked me to pick a date the other night at dinner, I froze. Then, later, while cuddling on the couch, I fell asleep against his chest. He was so gracious and loving. But I feel guilty and need to give him an answer.

For the first time since I handed God the reins of my life and said, “Here, take all of me,” I realize I just said giddy-up to three things I never really asked Him about.

Selling the Café. The job in Barcelona. And marrying Mitch.

“Okay.” I cup my hands together and raise them toward heaven. “You can have it all. The Café, Mitch, Barcelona. And me.”

I squint and turn my chin over my shoulder, bracing for the pain of having God rip out my heart. My arms shake as I stretch my hands higher.

And yet, as I take a deep breath, I feel relieved. Sincerely, profoundly, deeply relieved. While I sit in the chilly night, thinking and praying, clarity comes.





DAILY SPECIAL


Wednesday, October 17

Fried Oysters

Corn on the Cob

BBQ Baked Beans

Side Salad

Bubba’s Buttery Biscuits

Apple Fritters

Tea, Soda, Coffee

$8.99


35

The sun sets in a gold-red-orange-blue fall sky as Mitch and I stroll arm in arm along the beach by his house. The crisp air has me thinking of a warm fire and mugs of hot chocolate.

I burrow my face into Mitch’s arm. “My nose is freezing.”

“Let’s go inside and build a fire.” In one deft movement, he scoops me up in his arms and carries me up the beach toward his home. The stinging wind slips up the hem of my skirt and I kick and squirm to be let down. He refuses, huffing and puffing up the deck steps to the back French doors.

When he sets me down, his warm lips touch mine. “I can’t wait until we’re married and I carry you across the threshold as my wife.”

It’s then that I know for sure.

“By the way,” Mitch opens the left-side French door and starts gathering wood from the deck pile, “Mom wants to host an engagement tea for you. Invite the ladies of the church. She knows you’re working like crazy, but when would be a good time for you?”

“A tea party? For me?”

Mama wanted to give me a tea party for my twelfth birthday. She hand-painted fifteen invitations to girls in my class and called all their mothers. She painted the sunroom to look like a wild prairie meadow. We strung multicolored summer lights, shopped for a special tea set, and hired Mrs. Hogan to sew Mother-Daughter dresses. We ordered a cake from Mrs. Parker.