A Rose So Fair by Myra Johnson

Author:Myra Johnson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Myra Johnson

Sunday morning and no rose on the stoop.

“Well. Serves me right, I s’pose.” On her way to the barn for chores, Rose took a giant stride past the step where Caleb usually laid his floral offering and stomped across the yard. Not one more tear would she shed over Caleb’s leaving. She’d used them all up a week ago, shaming herself unmercifully with a crying tantrum to rival any she’d ever witnessed from baby Missy or even little George Vargas.

The crying had continued long after she’d thrown Caleb out that afternoon. Too upset to sleep, she’d curled up on the parlor settee most of the night, Delano dozing at her side and Grandpa’s Bible open on her lap but offering no comfort. Eyes nearly swollen shut, she couldn’t have made out the words anyway.

There’d been a rose last Sunday morning, though, and in a fit of blinding, self-pitying rage she’d carried it straight to the manure bin and stuffed it deep into the muck.

Now, halting in the barn door, she doubled over and gulped for a breath that wouldn’t come. Oh, Lord, Caleb’s last rose—what had she done? Still sucking air, she raced behind the barn to the manure bin and thrust her hands into the stinking ooze of excrement and urine-soaked straw. She had to find it, had to rescue this one little piece of Caleb’s heart, the only thing she had left of him.

But after a week’s worth of mucking stalls, the rose was buried too deep. Even if she found it, there’d be nothing left worth saving. Heart thudding, arms coated with putrid black slime, she stumbled to the backyard pump and knelt in the mud to rinse herself clean before she threw up from the stench. Even Delano kept his distance, plopping on the grass several feet away and watching her with a bewildered twist to his brows.

The tears she’d sworn not to shed now came again in bucketfuls. She’d been so cruel to Caleb, first with her vitriol when he told her he was leaving, then with her unremitting pleas for him to stay. He’d explained over and over, with more patience than she deserved, that signing up with the CCC was the only route left open to him.

“You’ll always have my heart.”

If she wasn’t the stupidest, most selfish woman who ever drew breath! She’d go to him now. She’d apologize, beg his forgiveness, tell him she understood. The boy—the man—dearer to her than life itself would not go away for six months believing their friendship lay in ruins.

Scrambling to her feet, water dripping from her arms, she ran to the house. It wouldn’t do for Caleb to see her looking such a fright. She’d wash up properly, even put on a dress and pin her hair into a ladylike coil. It was Sunday, after all. Maybe once he’d forgiven her, they could go to church together one last time.

Half an hour later, wearing the pretty flowered dress from Lark’s wedding—the dress she’d worn to

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