Free Betting on Love by Jennifer Johnson

the sun shone high and the breeze blew perfectly, she’d say praises about how good God was to them. To be honest, Melody was just plain sick of it. The whole wide world didn’t revolve around God.
    “It doesn’t?”
    She wanted to growl at the still, small voice that seemed to creep up within her at the weirdest moments. Every time it did, she was forced to think about if she had a few things wrong.
    Over the last few weeks, she decided she did believe there was a God—or at least some kind of higher being. The sermons and the comments from her family and friends had made enough sense, and it was true that creation was entirely too intricate and too perfectly put together not to have been formed by something.
    So if something did form all of creation—the oceans and mountains, the rivers and valleys, the animals and plants, and the intricate weavings of all those things—would it make sense that the world revolved around it?
    Holding the baby with one hand, she rubbed her temple with the other. She’d had more headaches in the last few months than she’d had in her life, and she was still having nightmares. Only now they were about her dad leaving when she was five.
    She barely remembered the man, and she definitely had no recollection of him leaving them. He’d gone in the middle of the night, when she was asleep. And yet, for several nights in a row, she’d envisioned him walking out the door and not looking behind him in her dreams.
    She’d begun to dread nighttime. She’d grown weary of asking herself why God allowed so many bad things to happen. Now she’d have new questions to invade her thoughts:
Does the world revolve around God? And if the world does revolve around Him, then is Gracie’s approach of talking to Him and about Him every day the right way to have a relationship with Him? But again, if the world revolves around God, why does He allow bad things to happen?
    Melody scrunched her nose. It was like a constant circle of unanswered questions. Her brain had never worked this hard before moving to River Run, even when she was learning all she needed to know about mechanics. The pulsing in her temple deepened. “Gracie, do you have any ibuprofen?”
    “Sure.” Gracie got up and walked to the cabinet. “You have another headache?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Maybe you should see a doctor.” Gracie grabbed a water bottle from the refrigerator and handed it to Melody. “You’ve been looking tired a lot lately.”
    “I haven’t been sleeping well.”
    Melody placed both pills in her mouth and with one swig of water swallowed them down. Hopefully, they would kick in soon after she got back to AJ’s garage. She still had a long day ahead of her with a transmission to fix, and she wanted to look over Uncle Roy’s tractor engine one more time. In only a few days, she’d be whipping up on Drew at the fairgrounds.
    “I know you may not…”
    Melody looked up at her friend when she started to talk and then stopped. Gracie bit her bottom lip as if unsure if she should continue. Melody furrowed her eyebrows. “We’re friends. You can tell me anything. What’s wrong?”
    “I was just wondering if you’d let me pray for you.”
    Melody shrugged. “I don’t care. Pray all you want. I’m getting ready to go.”
    Gracie shook her head. “No. I mean right now. Before you leave. Out loud.”
    Melody’s body stiffened, and she let out a long breath. It was one thing to sit through a church service and bow her head when the pastor told her to or to sit at the dinner table while someone prayed over the food, but to actually have Gracie pray for her—Melody wasn’t sure how she felt about that. She gazed over at Gracie, whose expression seemed to plead for Melody to allow her to do it. With a long sigh, Melody nodded. “Okay.”
    A smile brightened Gracie’s face, and before Melody could protest, she grabbed her hand and squeezed. “Oh dear Jesus, I praise You for my wonderful friend, Melody. I love her