Holden: Hollow Duet: Part 2 (The Hollow Duet) Page 3

  “Holden…”

  “Isabella, I’ve already bought it. I’ve met with the lawyer today while you were at the school. I---” He looked distraught as he raked his hand through his hair.

  Silence stretched between us.

  As his hand dropped, I grabbed it and squeezed. I looked directly into his eyes. “I love you.”

  His eyes went warm and he pulled me close.

  “And I love you, Isabella.” He breathed me in, and I felt his body relax with relief.

  Yep. I’d said it first. I said it to take the pain away and I said it because I did; I loved him. We had a rough start, the roughest --- beyond imagining --- but I was going to try my best to just look forward. And the past few weeks with him had been the happiest times in my life. I knew, deep inside, that we were meant to be. However we got here, it was where we were supposed to be.

  “I trust you,” I told him.

  He stared at me with so much love, so much.

  He took a step toward the door.

  “No. Please.” I snatched my hand away. “Don’t make me go inside.”

  He froze. “I won’t.”

  I blew out a breath of relief.

  He backed up and grabbed my hand, then steered me toward the little ramshackle woodshed.

  “A home should be built by the man of that home. That’s how I was raised. I want us here as quickly as possible so I’ll accept some help, but my hand will be in all of it, every room. Is that silly and old-fashioned to you?”

  “Not at all,” I answered, leaning into him. I was always magnetized when we were in the same space. I was drawn to be as close as possible to him. He loved it; I could tell. He took every opportunity to have me in his arms. He was so strong. So capable. I felt unbelievably lucky, standing there with him.

  “It’s how you were raised?” I asked, looking up into his eyes.

  His eyes were always warm. They went warmer as he stroked my cheekbone with his knuckles.

  “My father built my mother a house. It was where we all grew up.”

  I waited, hoping he’d tell me about his family since he already knew mine.

  Mom loved how old-fashioned and gentlemanly he was. Holding the door. Holding out my chair for me. He immediately apologized to my father for eloping with me and not first asking for my hand, claiming I’d mesmerized him so much that he knew he had to tie me to him immediately. Dad was a college professor and didn’t seem overly thrilled with the idea of me marrying a farmer without his own farm initially, but once we moved in and showed them the property, Holden giving the whole family the grand tour, Dad seemed to change his tune.

  “Nine of us. Girls in one room, boys in another. I’d love to build you a house with a room for all our girls and for all our boys.”

  I melted even further into him and managed to hide the sharp pang of pain that sliced through me, the loss that would always be with me because of my pregnancy.

  A blighted ovum? I doubted it very much. I just felt like there was a real baby in me. I also felt like it was very much my fault that the baby disappeared. My fear, my utter terror, it made me wish it away. The abortion clinic went up in flames, and then I lost it anyway, and regretted it.

  I’d wanted to go back to before Halloween night. But I didn’t get to go backwards. I wound up somewhere else. And if I had been able to go back, I wouldn’t have the most amazing husband I could ask for.

  “You’re right. It’ll be perfect.” I looked at the cabin and felt a hope in me that was similar to the hope I’d felt when I’d first seen the cabin that night, looking like a beacon of possibility, the possibility of being saved.

  “I was thinking this would be a good place for my coach house,” he mused, then squatted and picked up an old rusted horseshoe and examined it.

  My heart twisted at the sight of it. I decided to steer the conversation to something light.

  “Oh, a garage? and how big will this coach house be? Big enough to hold six cars, a boat, a motorcycle, and what other toys that go vroom vroom do you want?”

  His face transformed to something so joyful, it made my heart squeeze.

  “I like the way your mind works, little wife.”

  I looked at the back of the little cabin, knowing we’d build something new. We’d make good memories to cover the old ones. Though, I was sure we’d never fully forget.

  “Good. But, can we get out of here before dark?” I asked.

  His smile vanished and his eyes went haunted. “Of course.”

  ***

  The property now had a house, a garage almost the size of that house, a barn, cattle, farm machinery, and he’d begun all sorts of prep on fields that would eventually grow things.

  I loved our home, the land, all of it. The memories we’d been building there, too. Instead of living in a house in the middle of a big, open field like most farms I’d seen, we had our own private little valley with that stream and the farm fields surrounded most of the valley. Our property also included the land the tulip tree had been on.

  I decorated the house he built us with love and care. And it did mean so much to me that he had a hand in building every room in that house on the very spot that we’d first spent the night together. That night that was the most terrifying of my life but that was the beginning of us, it was the night that brought him back to finish the life he’d had cut short. And somehow, some magical way, I’d been chosen to be the one for him to continue his life with.

  The weekend after the visit to the valley, he began to tear that little cabin down himself as I watched from a chair, a blanket around me, a book in my lap. I was going to skip it, but he promised he wouldn’t make me go in there.

  “You’ll never have to step foot inside of it. Promise. Just keep me company?”

  “Pinky swear?” I requested and held out my pinky finger.

  He gave me that perplexed look of his.

  I hooked his pinky with mine.

  “Pinky swear,” he vowed.

  As I watched him dismantle the cabin, it felt pivotal. And I think I was meant to see it come apart, see that there was a new page turning for us despite where we began. Though he tore it all down, he saved some of the materials and we used them. That felt pivotal, too, like Holden was showing me that despite the start, we were moving forward without forgetting.

  We used the metal bucket that previously sat beside the fireplace to hold firewood beside our new fireplace. Only, it was now painted with white enamel paint and black script I’d put on myself that read, Home is Where the Hearth Is.

  The cabinet and counter he’d stood at that night to mix the herbs he’d put on my leg wound was now used as a workbench in the garage that sat beside the house. He’d sanded and refinished it. The rusty horseshoe hung on the wall over the bench. The ladder that led to the original loft was painted black and hung on the wall in our foyer, rungs extended into shelves that Holden had made, which held knickknacks, including the antique glass decanter that held the brandy he gave me that night.

  While we couldn’t talk about it, it surrounded us… the roots of our relationship. They were planted here and it was always a presence, in our home with us, making us both mindful of what we had, how we got it, and the fact that we wouldn’t risk it.

  Come spring thaw, he’d worked with help from a local contractor but participating in just about every bit of the process (even the more modern stuff, like the electrical and plumbing) and in the middle of the summer, we moved out of our apartment above the drycleaners and into our very own pretty-as-a-picture house.

  It was two stories, had three bedrooms, and we had a big and beautiful porch that ended just a few dozen paces before a big oak tree and the creek. Holden built the massive garage set back, where that woodshed and horse paddock used to be.

  My sister Cheyenne was right: he was not much of a talker, but he demonstrated how he felt about me through affection, through lovemaking, and with soulful eyes and a hungry touch that said more than words could ever say.
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  I did my best to be a nurturing wife and he took great care of me, too. I got a cold, just a few days after he dismantled that cabin and he nursed me to health with as much care and concern as if I’d had a dangerous illness. He was nurturing every single day. There almost never was a cross word between us.

  He insisted on picking me up from work each day, no matter how busy he was, although our home was only a half hour or so walk away. Sometimes he would wait against the lamp pole in the parking lot and we would walk home down that path I’d taken back to town after that first night.

  Other times, he’d be on a tractor or his ATV at the edge of the property and I’d climb on with him. Sometimes, he’d wait for me in his car and we’d take a nice drive through the country to his favorite restaurant, a quaint little steakhouse for supper.

  Though he was old-fashioned, he was also helpful around the house, which surprised me. He seemed to just love being with me and if I was doing something domestic, he lent a hand. He helped by drying the dishes while I washed them, asking me about my day. He brewed me a cup of tea every morning and left it for me in a pumpkin covered coffee mug before he headed out to do his morning chores. He helped me with the flowerbeds, constantly complimenting me on my green thumb. We grocery shopped together, though he typically wandered to the hardware or electronics sections to look at things. He was an observer of everything and everyone, taking in life in the 21st century.

  Holden lifted me over puddles walking through town, which had garnered attention from other females more than once. He held the door for me. When we were at home, it was a companionable silence much of the time, though he encouraged my chatter when I talked about my students.

  He’d listen to me on the landline phone sometimes, nattering with my mom, my former roommate Katie, or my sister Cheyenne and I’d catch him staring at me with amusement instead of reading the book in his hands. He’d smirk or chuckle at the direction of those conversations, at times. I felt like me again. I was silly sometimes with my friends. I was a little quirky with my decorating the house for each season and fussing over our home being perfect. I baked. I made crafts for our house. I loved my job and I also liked being a homemaker, too, and he seemed to appreciate that about me.

  I also loved to read rom-coms and he’d sometimes tease me because my expressions while reading, he said, told the whole story. Funny. Suspense. Romance. He said he could see it all on my face while I turned the pages.

  And when he made love to me, he stared at me like I was the most beautiful and wondrous thing he’d ever set his eyes on. He was also incredibly adventurous and bossy in the sex department. And I truly was madly in love with him.

  4 – Now: The Reveal

  I stood in our bathroom, staring at my reflection, and aching to admit things to him, to tell him about the baby we’d lost, without telling him directly, but I wanted to do it while apologizing for it. I wanted to tell him I was relieved when I couldn’t get the abortion and that I was devastated when I began bleeding.

  I also yearned to tell him how much I loved how far we’d come, how his presence in my life made it so that I’d be willing to endure that first night over and over if I had to, in order to be with him.

  He was worth what I went through that night. He was worth the painful 364 days between our first meeting and the night he came back to me, took me into his arms, and proposed to me.

  I didn’t know how to communicate these things to him in a way that wouldn’t put us in danger, but the urge to find a way was so overwhelming, I couldn’t shake it. The longing. The guilt. My body was trembling with it all.

  He was already out in the fields or down at the cattle barn, maybe, but he’d be back in time to take me to school. I decided to call in sick. I knew my current state of mind would mean it’d be nearly impossible to function as a teacher, especially today, seeing all sorts of children dressed as The Headless Horseman.

  No way; I needed to find some way to get my own head on straight. And tell him he was going to be a daddy, without breaking any rules.

  A daddy. Holden would be such a good daddy. I failed at my attempt to bite back tears as I lifted my phone from my charging station, because it would work since Holden wasn’t in the house, and I wiped my eyes and called the office. Thankfully, I got voicemail, so I didn’t have to speak to anyone. I left a quick message, ignoring the call waiting that rang while I was leaving a voicemail to say I was terribly under the weather and couldn’t make it to school that day.

  It would be an easy day for anyone else teaching at Drowsy Hollow School. Halloween always was just a day of fun. I knew it was short notice, but Trina, my assistant, along with a co-op student we’d have in that day would be able to handle things. Watching It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown in the morning. Playing some games. Doing some Halloween arts and crafts. Reading some Halloween stories, including that story, and then the costume parade in the afternoon before the town Halloween potluck dinner and trick or treat event.

  I put on a cardigan over my cotton spaghetti-strap chemise nightie and slid into some shoes, deciding to head outside and find Holden.

  As my feet touched the wood of our porch and I let go of the screen door, I looked back, hearing our house phone ringing. I also heard his ATV, which he usually used to go back and forth between the house and the barn. I turned to watch him pulling his ATV up beside the house. He smiled in greeting and got off, heading toward me.

  I only got a few steps off the porch before he was there, right in front of me, smiling.

  “Good timing,” I greeted hesitantly. “I was about to come find you.”

  He wrapped me in his arms and scooped me up off my feet. One of my flipflops fell off.

  “It’s too cold for these silly things, kitty cat, what are you thinking? Shouldn’t you be dressed for school by now?” He strode to the porch, me still cradled in his arms, and climbed up the two steps, putting me on the porch swing before going back to fetch my shoe. I pushed my unruly bedhead of long blonde hair out of my eyes. He sat beside me, put the shoe back on my foot, then pulled off his baseball cap and ran a hand through his hair. I stared, chewing my lip, watching him.

  His eyes met mine and he immediately wrapped an arm around me, putting his lips to my temple and inhaling me.

  “You smell lovely, Isabella. Is that something new you’ve spritzed on?”

  I wasn’t wearing any perfume. I was about to tell him this when his eyes met mine and his expression went serious.

  “Something’s wrong,” he observed.

  I blew out a breath. “I called in to work sick.”

  He put his palm to my forehead. “You’re pale, but you don’t feel feverish. You feel too cool, in fact. You aren’t dressed warmly enough for this weather, sweets. We should go inside.”

  “You know what day it is today, right, Holden?” I asked.

  His eyes went guarded. “Of course. Thirty first of October.”

  The guarded look in his eyes switched, to alarm.

  I hadn’t decorated our porch for Halloween, but I had decorated it for Fall, with a hay bale, some dried corn, and a fall themed wall hanging that hung just beside the door. The porch also had several big pots of Fall mums. I’d done some season décor changes in the house a few weeks back, switching out the shower curtains, our quilt, the throw pillows, and the tablecloth for my Fall-themed things. Just then, I realized there was a medium-sized pumpkin sitting on top of the hay bale beside the front door.

  “Where did that come from?” I gasped.

  “I’m sure you can guess,” he told me. “Just one grew. That one. I thought it would look nice with your display.”

  “Funny I would get this news today,” I mumbled, chewing my thumbnail.

  It was so unlike either of us to drop hints about our secret history. Then again, this was the first full Halloween together in the way that we were now.

  “What news?” he asked.

  Oh. I hadn’t meant to say that out loud.

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; I straightened up and took his hand into mine. I rubbed my thumb across his wedding band. The day before, I’d picked up the pregnancy test on my lunch hour, getting a knowing smile from the pharmacist as he rang it up for me. I’d stashed it in my bag and pondered the test all night.

  I hadn’t told Holden I was late. I also hadn’t talked much about Halloween, though two weeks earlier he’d snickered as he entered our bedroom, seeing me hanging up my planned costume for today. A scarecrow.

  “Interesting choice,” was all he said as he headed for the bedside table where he’d fetched a book he’d been reading.

  “Wizard of Oz theme for all the staff members. It’s a, uh, classic movie. Will you be coming to the party at the school, do you think?” I’d asked as I closed the closet doors.

  “No. Definitely not, Isabella.”

  “Oh.”

  “I’ll pick you up afterward, though, so you don’t have to travel home alone. What time do you think I should come?”

  I’d rolled my eyes good naturedly. “I think I’ll be okay.”

  He’d winked and slipped out of the bedroom saying, “I insist. Lots of things go bump in the night, sweets. I’m the only one you’re allowed to bump into.”

  My mouth had dropped in surprise. My man-of-few-words did have a wicked sense of humor and he often teased me good-naturedly.

  Of course it’d be odd for him to see people dressed in that costume. I’d have avoided the party if I could, in fact.

  The day before, he’d sat beside me in the family room, reading a book while I marked Halloween-themed spelling tests with photos of witches, ghosts, and jack-o-lanterns in the margins. I saw his eyes skate over the stack of papers and read something as ‘off’ in his eyes.

  ***

  “What news, Isabella?” he repeated, taking me back to now.

  “I’m…”

  I blew out a breath. I wasn’t ready for this. I hadn’t thought through how I’d talk to him about this.

  He waited.