Free Your Dream and Mine by Susan Kirby Page B

Emmaline answered her questioning. glance. She gestured toward the men and said behind her hand, “I’d send the whole lot of them packing, but their wives just send them back again. Go figure.”
    Thomasina smiled and thanked her and picked up her fork. “Mmm. This is delicious. Did you make it?”
    “Fresh this morning. More coffee?”
    “Why not?”
    Thomasina and Emmaline were chatting like old friends when the sheriff ambled in and announced the rescue callwas at Antoinette Penn’s house. Charlie looked up from the checkerboard.
    “Suppose one of them skintight dresses squeezed the air out of the merry widow?”
    “You volunteering for the resuscitating committee, Charlie?” asked Uncle Earl.
    “It’s her dad, the way I hear it,” said the sheriff. “He was there, watching the kids and got shooting pains in his chest. What’ve you got in the way of batteries, Emmaline? My watch has stopped.”
    As she left Newt’s Market and drove home, Thomasina whispered a prayer for Antoinette’s father. She was applying her second wind to unpacking, when a doll of a gal showed up at her door. Silver earrings big as bracelets dangled from her shell-like ears as her ruby-red lips flashed in a rush of distress.
    “You must be Thomasina. The kids told me about you. I’m Antoinette Penn. Do you know where Trace is?”
    “He’s out for the evening,” said Thomasina.
    “Oh, no!” The tension lining her young face deepened. “He was my last resort. Dad’s been taken to the hospital with chest pains. I was hoping Trace would keep the kids while I go to meet Dad at the hospital. Never mind, I’ll think of something else,” Antoinette replied over her shoulder as she hurried down the steps.
    “Wait, Antoinette!” Thomasina called after her. “I’d be happy to watch them for you.”
    Antoinette stopped midstride. Surprise, then gratitude flashed over her countenance in quick sequence. She motioned to Paul and Winny, waiting in the car, ushered them up the steps into Thomasina’s care and hurried away.
    “Is Grandpa going to die?” asked Winny, tipping her freckled face.
    “Die?” echoed Pauly. He lifted his face in silent entreaty to Thomasina.
    Tears gathered. Their little mouths puckered. Heart turning, Thomasina leaned down and gathered them close. “Your mama’s gone to help, and we can help, too. We can ask Jesus to watch over your grandpa.”
    “Who’s Jesus?” asked Pauly, lifting his face.
    “The doctor?” chimed Winny, clinging to Thomasina.
    “Yes,” said Thomasina, touching her cheek. “The best in the business.”
    Pauly squirmed free. He darted into Thomasina’s apartment, zigzagged between strewn boxes and back again. “Where’s the phone?”
    “You don’t need a phone to call Jesus. You ask and He hears.”
    Trace had chosen a popular downtown restaurant known for its good food, soft light and live music. He and Deidre had finished their meal. They lingered over dessert and coffee while the band played across the room. Deidre suggested they skip the movie and talk instead.
    Trace knew he should be over the moon. But his ticker was as steady as a clock. It hadn’t wobbled since that last glimpse of Thomasina in his rearview mirror, disheveled in her wrinkled shorts and her hair tumbling down around her shoulders as she waved to him and Ricky from the driveway.
    Deidre had always been a good conversationalist. Far better than he. Yet his thoughts kept drifting. Will’s news about Milt selling the farm had nearly blown him away. It was exactly the sort of the place he’d been wanting for years. He went over every inch of it in his mind. Laying out vacation cabins. Putting canoes on the creek for vacationers. Making a fishing pond and stocking it so youngsterswould get the thrill of hooking a fish without having to wait hours and hours.
    Deidre pulled him out of the wool of his thoughts, and gave a lively account of the mission school expanding to include a summer camp ministry for