Free Believing the Dream by Lauraine Snelling

his head at his fancy. Of course the tree was already decorated and waiting in the parlor to light the candles on Christmas Eve.
    I missed all of the preparations this year . The thought tugged his spirits downward. In spite of the concert at school with both the choir and the orchestra, he still didn’t feel like this Christmas was real.
    Even printing out the booklet with his Christmas story for those at home hadn’t made him feel in the Christmas spirit. So why not? He asked himself the question for the whatever number of times.
    Anji. Her name echoed in his heart. The closer he got to home, the stronger her name rang. At school he’d been able to keep so busy he could ignore his heart, at least part of the time, but not here with the clackety-clack of the train.
    “Blessing. Next stop, Blessing, North Dakota.” Sig smiled as he swayed by.
    Out across the white-drifted prairie Thorliff could see the Baard farm and on beyond that, the Bjorklund barns. The train slowed. The silver blue of twilight shadowed the drifts. If he craned his neck, he could see the grain elevator up ahead. Steam billowed past his window as the engineer applied the brakes, the screech a more sure announcement than the conductor’s call. The snow-shrouded elevator, Onkel Olaf’s furniture shop, and out the window across the aisle, Bestemor’s boardinghouse. The station. Thorliff reached for his satchel and stood. Strange, but he felt in another world or at least another time period than Northfield, as if he’d traveled through a telescope back in time. In spite of his knowing better, the feeling persisted that nothing had happened in Blessing while he was gone. It had remained frozen in time like children playing statues.
    He swung down, using the bar by the door with his free hand.
    “Thorliff!”
    He turned at the calling of his name to see a horse and sleigh waiting at the far end of the platform.
    “Astrid?” What was she doing driving the sleigh like that, a little girl like her?
    She whipped the reins around the whip stock and leaped from the sleigh, her braids bouncing from under her red knit cap as she ran toward him. He dropped his valise in time to catch her when she threw herself into his arms.
    He fought the burning behind his eyes and sniffed. Surely the cold, that was all. “Astrid, how did you know to meet me?”
    “I’ve been coming every day since school was out. You almost missed Christmas.” She released her stranglehold on his neck to lean back and see his face.
    At her accusation, he could do nothing but nod. “I know, but I’m here now, and I think you’ve grown a foot since I left.”
    “No, already had two, didn’t need another.” Her saucy grin said she knew just what he meant, but just because he was a big college man, he wasn’t above being teased.
    He grabbed her again and this time swung her around in a circle like he used to do when she was little. Only now he held her by the waist and the spinning almost sat him down in the snowbank.
    They ignored the train leaving and arm in arm headed for the sleigh.
    “Do you want to stop and see Bestemor first? Or . . .” Her eyes grew round. “You haven’t seen Gus.”
    “Gus?”
    “Penny and Hjelmer’s baby boy.” Patience colored her tone.
    “Sorry.”
    “He’s the sweetest baby in the whole world.”
    Thorliff shook his head. “No, I think I’d rather just go home.”
    “You want to drive?”
    “Ja.” He glanced toward the church and school. “Pastor Solberg isn’t in town, is he?”
    She shook her head and climbed up into the passenger side of the sleigh. “No, he’s at home, but said to come on out any time you wanted. We’ll see him at service on Christmas Eve.”
    Thorliff tried to focus on her words, but all he could think about was Anji. Should he stop now or come back later?
    “Mor will have supper ready when we get there. She’s made rommegrot just for you.”
    Sitting himself on the sleigh’s seat, he grasped the buffalo robe