The Barefoot Summer(73)

“For gravy or patties?” Amanda asked.

“Patties. We’re having pancakes, bacon, and sausage.”

“Sweet Lord!” Kate said from the doorway. “It’s going to take a year for me to lose the weight I’m gaining.”

“It beats the devil out of those green things you were drinking when you got here. Besides, with your height and build, I’d be willing to bet that you never gain a pound no matter what you eat.” Amanda poured a cup of coffee and handed it to Kate.

“Never have, but then I’ve never tested it like I’m doing now. What can I do?”

“Set the table,” Jamie said.

“We’re eating on the deck,” Gracie said.

“Since it’s outside, shall we use the good plates or the plastic ones?” Kate asked.

“The good ones,” Gracie said. “This is a special day and I’ll help you.”



Amanda carefully arranged eight sausage patties in the cast-iron skillet while Jamie did double duty frying bacon and flipping pancakes on the grill. Amanda’s thoughts went to the last time that she and Conrad made breakfast together in that same kitchen. That morning they’d had eggs Benedict, and afterward he’d taken her to the bedroom for one last bout of sex before they’d gone home from the honeymoon.

She’d thought that Conrad was the reward for turning her life around. She’d had a rebellious streak right out of high school. For a year she’d hung out with the wild crowd and frequented the bars around Wichita Falls, mostly country honky-tonks where she could always pick up a cowboy to take home for a one-night stand. Then one morning she awoke to find her cash and credit cards gone, right along with her laptop, her phone, and every piece of jewelry that she owned.

It took a lot of courage to go to Aunt Ellie and tell her what had happened, and it took hours of phone calls to get everything taken care of and reported. She’d lost what dignity she had left when she couldn’t identify the cowboy to the police—when she didn’t know if he was tall or short, had dark hair or light, or if he was young or old. Aunt Ellie put her back in church the following Sunday morning.

“Do you think that we get punished for our past sins?” Amanda whispered.

“Did you repent of them?” Jamie flipped two pancakes onto the platter and poured two more to cook.

“With many tears and lots of humiliation,” Amanda said.

“Then they are forgiven and forgotten,” Jamie answered.

Amanda frowned. “Why do they keep coming back to haunt me?”

“Who is haunting you?” Kate asked as she came back inside. “Gracie says she is going to watch the birds until we bring out breakfast.”

“We were talking about sins and whether we get punished for them,” Jamie said.

“According to the preacher at my church in Fort Worth, if we are truly repentant, then God forgives and forgets,” Kate said. “Why?”

Amanda drained the sausage patties on a paper napkin before shifting them over to the platter with the bacon. “I was wild. I partied too much, drank too much for sure, and had lots of one-night stands before I got myself straightened out. I thought God had forgiven me when I met Conrad. But now I wonder if he wasn’t punishing me with Conrad.”

Kate stole a strip of bacon and blew on it to cool it down before popping it into her mouth. “Then he was punishing all of us. What sin did you commit, Jamie?”

“You first?” Jamie grinned.

“Before or after Conrad?”

“Before,” Amanda said. “But I can’t see you committing a sin.”

Surely the great Kate didn’t ever do anything that resembled sin. Hell’s bells! She hadn’t even divorced Conrad when he told her that he was cheating with other women.

“I can’t see you taking home one-night stands, Amanda.” Jamie giggled.

“Well, I did, and the last one sure opened my eyes.” She told them about what had happened and how embarrassed she’d been. “Aunt Ellie made me start going to church with her again, and I finally figured out I was punishing my mother for abandoning me by acting out like that.”

“You have to show ID to buy a beer now. I can’t imagine how young you must have looked then,” Kate said.

“I had a fake one from the time I was sixteen, like every other kid in school.” Amanda flipped the sausage over. “But you were about to tell us what you did that you’d feel like Conrad was punishment.”

“I was too busy for one-night stands, but I did have a couple of relationships in college. One with a married professor,” Kate said.

“No!” Jamie almost dropped the pancakes she was moving from griddle to platter. “I can’t even imagine it. Was he old and bald headed?”

“You are joking, right?” Amanda whispered.

Kate held up two fingers and then crossed her heart. “It’s the truth. He was about thirty. It was his first year as a professor, and I was twenty-one. When I found out that Conrad had two more wives, I figured it was my comeuppance.”

“But then what?” Amanda asked.

“I truly repented and said I’d never do that again. Still, I wonder about it.” Kate picked up a plate and headed toward the deck with it. “And you, Jamie?”