Free Marriage Seasons 01 - It Happens Every Spring by Gary Chapman, Catherine Palmer Page B

always one step ahead of me."
    Brenda laughed. She liked the way Nick called her "girl," as
though she were just a kid. They had discovered they were only a
year apart in age, but that was about the only similarity between
them. Brenda had grown up in the same house and neighborhood
with the same set of parents and siblings all her life. Nick seemed to
have been riveted together from various bits and pieces, like one of
those whirligigs Missouri gardeners built to the keep the crows
away.
    He had been raised with parents, stepparents, brothers, sisters,
half brothers, half sisters, stepbrothers, stepsisters, cousins, family
friends, and the occasional stranger all living under one roof. But
that roof had altered through the years as changes in the family
structure moved him from rental houses to trailer parks to apartments. Once he had even lived in his car for nearly a year.
    Along the way, Nick seemed to have lost parts of his tackedtogether self. While splitting kindling, he had cut off half of an
index finger. A little sister had drowned, and then his parents got
divorced. During Nick's rodeoing days, his first wife had left him. "My heart wasn't the only thing that got broke," he had told
Brenda, his blue eyes misting with tears as he spoke. During that
brief period, he had snapped his leg three times and shattered an
elbow. Later, his second wife had miscarried his first son. And part
of his left ear was gone, lasered off during a brush with skin cancer.

    Still in his second marriage, Nick LeClair now lived in a mobile
home near Camdenton, had grown children, and loved his two
grandbabies. Though he didn't go to church, he said he believed in
God. Family and faith weren't the only things that enriched his life.
Though he had barely graduated from high school, Nick informed
Brenda proudly that he never once considered going to college.
    "Didn't need it," he assured her, "because I have the gift of
vision."
    Nick insisted he could look at a bare slab foundation and see an
entire house right down to the plumbing and wiring. He could
remodel a room in his mind without even needing a blueprint.
And, he told Brenda, he could see right through people.
    "You're a bona fide artist," he drawled as he carried cans of
paint through the basement door and set them on the concrete
floor. "I'm not kidding. When the paint guy at the hardware store
saw the colors you had picked out for the basement, he liked to
have had a cow. He told me every one of those greens was used on a
video the paint company sends out to help train the salespeople.
Neither of us could tell the difference between one shade and
another when we looked at the samples, but once we had them all
mixed up and we opened the lids, we could see it was a perfect
range. I told him, I said, `That lady I'm working for is an artist, pure
and simple.' And he said, `Let me tell you what, Nick; I do believe
you're right.' Not only did you get the colors right, Miz Brenda, but
you're a whole step ahead of me with the taping."
    He straightened and grinned at her, his cloudless blue eyes
shining in the sunlight that streamed through the basement windows. Nick might have broken a few bones and plastered his arms
with tattoos, but there wasn't a thing to mar the man's perfect white teeth. Unlike most of the construction workers Brenda had
met through the years, he didn't smoke. His mother had died of
emphysema, Nick explained, and that made up his mind for him
at an early age. Still smiling, he stripped off his jacket and hooked
his hands in the pockets of his jeans.

    "Well, I'm ready to change your life, girl." He reached down and
picked up a paint roller. "You ready?"
    Swallowing, Brenda stepped toward him and took the handle.
"Let's do it."

    Steve flipped shut the door to his gas tank and hurried into Rodsn-Ends. There was serious business afoot, and he wanted to discuss
the situation in the privacy of the tackle shop. For days now,