Chapter 36
Evie
Christmas at the Montgomery household has never been the most .
. . festive of affairs. Even less so now that Grandma is in the hospital.
Dad’s house is silent, save for the sounds of Isabelle’s kids program coming from the TV in the living room and NSYNC’s Home for Christmas holiday album playing on an old boombox on the kitchen counter.
Francine sets a tea cup down in front of me at the kitchen table, followed by a silver tea set. “I can’t remember how you take your coffee,” she says, sitting down across from me. It’s just me and her in the kitchen. “But there’s milk and sugar if you want it.”
Delighted, I peruse the contents of the tea set. There’s a quaint teapot, milk jug, and small bowl stacked high with brown and white sugar cubes that look like they’re meant for miniature horses. I pick up two cubes with the miniature tongs and plop them into my tea cup. “Thank you.”
She grins. “You’re quite welcome.”
I shyly eye her as I stir the coffee. She’s sporting a blunt, straight bob these days, but her hair used to be as long as mine. Streaks of gray I’ve never seen before peek through the strands.
It occurs to me that I haven’t really looked at my stepmother in so long.
It makes me feel a little bad. Sure, I’d rather be anywhere but here right now, but it’s not because I dislike Francine.
We had our moments when I was a teenager, but there’s no real bad blood between us.
In fact, she often plays the role of the peacemaker when Dad and I bicker.
Gazing at me, she blows on her coffee. “So, what’s new?”
I’m silent for several moments, unsure how to answer.
But there’s a small voice inside of me, urging me to confide in her.
I don’t know why. I trust Francine, but we’re not close.
Still, she’s always made an effort to be a good stepmother to me.
But . . . in the back of my mind, I had always secretly hoped Mom would come home, and that she and Dad might get back together.
A silly fantasy in hindsight.
Even sillier? I didn’t want Mom to think I had replaced her, so I held Francine at arm’s length.
Brandon might have been onto something when he said I push people away to protect myself. To avoid confronting pain. And maybe, just maybe, that bad habit is keeping me from fostering a healthy relationship with Francine.
“Oh, you know. Not much . . .”
Francine gazes at me so intensely, her gray eyes full of hope and expectation. She wants to chat so badly.
I just don’t know if I have it in me to open up to her.
She cradles her coffee closer. “Evie, you know you can talk to me about anything, right? I know you don’t get along with your father, but that doesn’t mean we can’t be friends. I’m here if you want to talk. I can keep a secret. You know that.” She winks.
Her teasing breaks the tension, and I laugh. She never did tell my dad about how she found me reading those erotic romance books as a kid. She confiscated them and kept that information to herself, and for that, I’m glad.
“Your father might be a jerk sometimes, but he cares about you so much, Evie. We both do.”
Taken aback by her comment, I snort. Ugh. The least I could do is talk to her just this once. “There is one thing, actually . . .” I hesitate. “It’s complicated,” I say as a disclaimer. “But it would be nice to get an outside perspective.”
She sits tall. “Lay it on me.”
I laugh again. She’s so eager, like a dog bouncing on its hind legs, desperate for a treat. “It’s . . .” I look toward the living room. “It’s about Brandon.”
“Jamie’s friend?” I nod. “What about him?”
I turn my saucer around. “We have a little bit of . . . history. A couple of years ago, we—um, well . . .” My face heats. It’s safe to say I didn’t expect to start out the conversation with this information.
“You . . . ?”
“Well, we . . . you know . . .” I search her expression for a glimmer of understanding, but she continues to stare at me cluelessly. I sigh, exasperated but mostly embarrassed. She’s going to make me say it. “We hooked up, Francine. We banged.”
Her chin jerks back. “Oh. Oh my.”
I laugh at her weirdly innocent reaction. “Yeah. So. That happened. And then . . .”
She waits.
“Well, that was that. It was over. And now, he wants to rekindle that old flame.” He hasn’t said it in so many words, per se, but the way he was talking to me last night .
. . He left no room for interpretation about the fact that he plans on pursuing me until I’m ready to trust him again.
“And I want that, too. But I’m not sure that’s a good idea.
I know he regrets what happened, and he’s been on his best behavior lately.
” I roll my eyes fondly, recalling how we almost had sex last night—only for him to come in clutch with the whole abstinence before marriage thing.
“But . . . he really hurt me last time.”
I’m surprised by how easy it is to confide in Francine. She’s listening so intently, as if every word I’m saying is the most important thing she’s ever heard.
It’s . . . nice.
“He’s changed a lot in the last few years, hasn’t he?” she asks. “I know he’s been serving at the church, and he goes to Maggie’s Bible study every Wednesday. Did you know that?”
“I did, actually.”
“But you still don’t trust him?”
“It’s not that I don’t trust him,” I hedge. “I’m just nervous that he thinks I’m what he wants. But what if he changes his mind?” I trace the rim of my tea cup. “Do you think it would be stupid of me to give him another chance?”
She taps her ring finger against her saucer. “Taking a chance on love doesn’t make someone stupid. It makes them brave, if you ask me. Plus, Brandon is a man of God now. And usually, a godly man only pursues a woman if he intends on marrying her.”
My eyes widen. One mention of the word marriage four years ago, and Brandon was across the room and out the door before whoever was speaking could even finish their sentence. He could hardly stomach the idea of committing to one woman, let alone the concept of marriage.
Just ask Cora.
But he did say that if we ever did make love again, his ring would be on my finger . . .
Francine tilts her head. “Come to think of it, I haven’t seen Brandon with another woman in a very long time. An odd thing for him.”
I frown. I saw him with another woman at McDonald’s just last week.
“And it sounds like he’s made his intentions with you quite clear.” She grins triumphantly and squares her shoulders. “I think Brandon is courting you.”
My nose wrinkles. The word courting couldn’t sound more . . . archaic. It’s certainly not a term that would be in Brandon’s vocabulary, that’s for sure.
Yeah, talking to Francine was a bad idea.
“So, in conclusion, no. You wouldn’t be stupid to give Brandon a second chance. Not even close.”
I nod, but if anything, she’s convinced me of the opposite.
I startle when someone’s hands grab my shoulders. Glancing up, I find Jamie towering over me. “So, you and B-dawg, huh?”
“What?”
He grins, pulling the seat out next to me before dropping into it. “Don’t ‘what’ me, sis. I caught you guys snuggling on Grandma’s couch last night.”
My ears burn. “It doesn’t matter,” I say, rising from my seat. I go to the sink and turn the faucet on to wash my tea cup. “It’s not going to happen.”
“Good.”
My head whips in Jamie’s direction. “Good?”
“Well, no offense, sis, but Brandon, he’s . . .” He shrugs. “You know.”
“No. He’s what?”
He sighs. “I love him to pieces, but once a womanizer, always a womanizer.”
Francine grimaces. “That’s hardly fair. What about the redeeming work of Christ?”
Jamie shrugs, unrepentant. “You guys don’t know him like I do.”
My stomach twists. I trust Jamie’s judgment on this particular issue. Mostly because I’ve always been blind when it comes to the subject of Brandon.
“Besides,” he continues, spinning a salt shaker around on the table. “Look what happened to Cora. He had a ring and everything, but he backed out at the last second. He can’t be trusted—not when it comes to serious, committed relationships.”
My eyes water. He had a ring? He was going to propose to Cora?
He told me that he never loved her, that their relationship had always been casual.
He said that was why he couldn’t force himself to marry her like all of his friends and family members insisted he should. He got so much flack for that.
Rightly so.
But I was there for him through that, when he was at his lowest. When it seemed like the whole world was disappointed in him for his decision.
It turns out he was lying to me.
I don’t know why the realization steals my breath and makes the room tilt on its axis, as if I’ve never found out that he’s lied to me before. Still, I allowed myself to hope . . . to believe—
Rebecka waddles into the room, her pregnant stomach bulging beneath her red tunic.
She’s ready to burst any day now, and I hate the jealousy that eats at my heart, chipping away at it like a termite.
It’s wrong. I should be over the moon for her.
And I am. But there’s also a part of me that wonders why I never got to be that pregnant.
Why I never got to meet my baby face-to-face and rock him or her in my arms.
I was so ready to become the kind of mother I needed growing up.
Rebecka snakes her arms around Jamie’s shoulders and kisses his cheek, unaware of my grief.
No one but Jamie knows about my miscarriage.
Jamie reaches back to scratch her belly, smiling at her like she’s the only woman he’s ever loved.
I turn away from the wholesome image, swallowing hard against the tears. Why couldn’t I have fallen in love with a man as uncomplicated as Adam or my brother Jamie? A man who desires to be happily married to one woman and one woman only?
“Not only did Brandon break Cora’s heart,” Jamie rambles on, still stuck on this topic I’d rather drop.
“But Cora was a single mother for a long time because of him. And no offense, sis—I know you two have always been close, so you only see the best in him. But . . . that’s the last thing I want for you. ”
The air in my lungs becomes as thick as smoke, threatening to suffocate me from the inside out. I almost became a single mother because of Brandon once. I can’t relive that experience or anything like it. I wouldn’t recover.
I decide at once that I will never give Brandon the chance to hurt me ever again.