Free Tomorrow's Dream by Janette Oke, Davis Bunn Page B

are you?”
    â€œWe’re all very worried about you.” Martha’s hand reached up to stroke Kyle’s hair. There was a flinching move away. Martha’s hand fell back to her lap. “Is there anything I can do?”
    â€œNobody can do anything anymore. It’s too late.”
    Kenneth sighed and shook his head. “Can I get anybody anything?”
    Ruthie’s stricken look and tear-filled eyes gave Joel the fleeting impression that she was feeling everything Kyle was not permitting herself to feel. Ruthie silently gazed at Kyle, then her eyes dropped to her folded hands, and Joel knew she was praying.
    Harry looked at Kenneth and said, “I’ll have a soda if you’ve got one.”
    â€œSure.”
    Joel followed Kenneth into the kitchen. “What’s happening?”
    â€œYou can see for yourself,” Kenneth replied wearily. “She’s been like this since the funeral. Nothing reaches her. Nothing gets through.”
    â€œShe must not isolate herself from us,” Joel said. “She has to allow herself to grieve.”
    â€œThat’s exactly what the doctor says.” Kenneth pried off the bottle top and started back to the living room. “Until she opens up and lets it out, she can’t begin to find peace. It wrenches my insides to see her isolating herself even from God.”
    Joel followed him back down the hall and entered the parlor in time to hear Kyle tell Martha, “I’m coping, Martha. Isn’t that what everybody wants me to do? Cope.”
    â€œI want you to get better,” Martha said, her voice wobbly. Harry accepted the glass from Kenneth, his eyes reflecting his wife’s pain. Martha went on, “I want you to recover.”
    Kyle did not respond for a long moment. When she did speak, it was in a voice that sounded as though it had traveled a thousand miles. “I’m not the one who needed to recover. The battle is over now. It doesn’t matter anymore. Nothing does.”
    Ruthie looked up, the tears filling her eyes and spilling over. She gave Joel a pleading look. He stepped over to where he could look into Kyle’s face. “We miss you down at the mission, sister.”
    She raised her head, and for an instant something flickered deep within her gaze. It came and went so swiftly that Joel could not be certain what it was he had seen. A cold rage? Perhaps. Whatever it was, it left his heart thumping painfully.
    Kyle dropped her gaze to the floor at her feet. Her voice remained flat, empty. “What good would I do there? I’d just be in the way.”
    â€œThat’s not true,” Ruthie pleaded softly. “Please, Kyle, come down and keep me company. I miss you so.”
    To this Kyle did not reply at all. The silence continued until Harry drained his glass, set it down, and rose to his feet, a single motion that was enough to lift the others. He bent down and gave Kyle a one-armed hug, so unexpected that she did not have time to flinch away. “We’ll see you soon, honey.”
    Martha followed his lead, her embrace as fierce as it was fleeting. “Let us know if there’s anything at all we can do for you.”
    Ruthie bent over and hugged her then. Kyle closed her eyes as the embrace continued, but at least she did not pull away. Ruthie rose up, leaving a wet spot on Kyle’s cheek where their faces had touched. “You stay in my prayers, Kyle, daily.”
    Harry patted Kenneth’s shoulder as he passed, then left his hand in place, turning Kenneth around and pulling him down the hall and through the door. Joel followed them out into the open air and heard Harry ask, “How are you holding up, Kenneth?”
    Kenneth seemed about to fall, held aloft only by Harry’s hand and his own grim resolve. “Oh, Harry, I don’t know how much more of this I can stand. I’ve lost both of them.”
    â€œWhy don’t you and I get together and do