How Sweet It Is - Alice J. Wisler [46]
He does finish his coffee, but then, folding his hands, he looks at me. “What was his name? How old was he? What was his job?”
Twenty minutes later, I am still talking, finished with the answers to all of Jonas’s questions, and now focused on my own, explaining the situation. I tell Jonas how Lucas proposed to me and how I bought every bride magazine available to plan our wedding. I tell him how happy I was. Then Lucas rammed his car into the side of the Woodruff Center, and although he sent flowers, he never came to see me in the hospital. I push up my sleeves and show Jonas the scars, my own personal rivers carved on my arms, and tell him about the larger scar on my abdomen and the ones on my thighs.
Jonas looks like he might cry. He runs a hand through his hair. His bandana loosens, slips over the eyebrow near the Band-Aid. He slowly ties it again and then says, “My brother was in love, too.”
Jonas tells me his brother is kind and likes to do jigsaw puzzles, too. He tells me his brother raised him after their parents died.
“So he’s older than you are?” I ask.
“No. He is younger. He’s a young man, not old like me.”
I wouldn’t call Jonas an old man.
Jonas looks at me through his deep-set eyes. “My brother loved Abby. But she died.”
“She died?” I hope this time he might tell me how she died. Yet I can’t bring myself to ask what the cause of her illness was—like perhaps it is too private and I have not received the privilege to ask.
Jonas nods. “It was a long time ago. Long time.” He brushes his hair back, gently touches the cupcake Band-Aid, acts like he has said enough.
The cabin holds silence; we look at each other.
My eyes roam over to the painting by the couch. The kimono lady still holds her fan across half of her face, continuing to hide what she dares not uncover.
After a few minutes, Jonas says tenderly, “I’m sorry.”
“I’m sorry about your brother’s girlfriend, too.”
He picks up the mock-up for the cake brochure. I’ve left it on the end of the table.
“What is this?”
I clear my throat. “It’s a brochure for my business. I’m calling it ‘How Sweet It Is’—what do you think?”
He notes the chocolate ice cream cake on the front of the brochure. “Looks yummy.”
“I made that cake.”
“Does it taste like the velvet one?”
“Not as good, in my opinion.”
Simply, he asks, “What are you going to do, Deirdre?”
I could go on for days about what I would like to do, starting with running my dad’s tractor over Lucas’s size-eleven feet. “I need to get copies made so I can hand them out to people.” I wonder if Jonas will think my plan is silly.
He turns the brochure over and asks, “You print this? Lots of copies?”
“Yes, I hope to find a printer to professionally print it.”
“Custom Print on Everett Street. They do good work for a fair price.” He sounds like a blurb from a TV commercial.
“They do?” What do mountain folk think constitutes good work?
“I can take it when I go in to town.”
Can I trust Jonas with my brochure?
He grins at me; even the lines around his eyes are smiling.
Why not? If he fails to get the CD to Custom Print because it gets stuck somewhere in his truck, I can make another copy.
He is so eager and ready to help. “I can do this for you.” His eyes hold an intensity I haven’t seen in anyone in a long time.
“Okay.” I grab the CD, tuck it in the brochure, and hand it to him.
He flashes his Tennessee smile. “I’ll get them to do a superb job for you.”
Then, just because I feel relaxed and hopeful, I ask, “Do you read the Bible, Jonas?”
“Oh, yes.” He quotes three verses.
All three I recognize from the walls at The Center, especially the one about forgiveness. The forgiveness one will always hit a chord in my heart. “Wow! You’ve memorized a lot.”
“Don’t read the letters, Deirdre,” he says. “But I hear real good.