Carolyne Aarsen - Twin Blessings and Toward Home - Twin Blessings / Toward Home

Logan’s only acknowledgment of Karen’s statement was a curt nod. As he glanced at Karen, he couldn’t help comparing the two women. Sandra’s dark eyes, dark hair and wide smile. Karen’s light hair, clear eyes and composed manner.

Shaking his head, he pushed the thoughts aside. Karen had come to church. Sandra hadn’t. That should be comparison enough for him.

Karen stayed until late afternoon. She coerced the girls into a board game, talked with Logan about friends they had in common.

But when she drove away and he came into the cabin, he felt worn out and was thankful to be alone again.

“You’re not going back to her, are you?” Brittany asked as soon as he stepped into the house. She lay on the couch, Bethany on the recliner. Both had their eyes fixed on their uncle.

Logan looked at his more outspoken niece, weighing his words. “That’s not for you to say, Brittany,” he replied firmly, recognizing the need to set personal boundaries. “Karen is a good person, and at one time we had a strong relationship.”

“Why did she come back?”

“She just came for a visit.” Logan wasn’t going to delve into the real reason. Given the girls’ antagonism toward his former girlfriend and their not so subtle cheerleading for Sandra, he figured the less they knew, the better.

Brittany gave her uncle a knowing look. “I bet she wants you back.”

Logan was taken aback at Brittany’s perceptiveness.

“I’ve seen the way she looks at you,” Brittany said smugly. “What do you think, Bethany?”

Bethany gave a hesitant shrug. “I don’t know.”

Brittany snorted. “Of course, you don’t know. She liked you.” Brittany looked at her uncle. “I think she wants you back.”

“And I think you’ve said enough, Brittany,” Logan chided, walking past her to the kitchen. “Seeing as how you’re so full of advice, you can help me make supper tonight.”

But as they ate, the girls’ words reinforced what he already knew. Karen was sweet, kind and shared the same faith.

She just didn’t hold the appeal she once had. Her soft green eyes and her pale blondness seemed pallid.

Pallid compared to Sandra’s heavy brown hair and dancing eyes.

Logan added a few more flourishes to his drawing and stood to have a better look.

His first impulse was to throw it in the garbage.

His second was to rip it up.

Then throw it in the garbage.

He wasn’t exactly sure why he didn’t like it, just that it looked like every other house in Calgary right now. Boxy and choppy with cluttered rooflines.

“Uncle Logan, we’re done with the dishes.” Bethany stood in the doorway of his office looking especially demure.

He nodded absently.

“Can me and Brittany ask you a favor?”

Logan frowned and turned, giving his niece his full attention. “Since when do you girls ask if you can ask?”

Bethany lifted her hands and shoulders at the same time, signaling complete incomprehension.

“So, what is it?”

“Well, it’s Grandma’s birthday pretty soon, and me and Brit want to make her a present to give to her. We wanted to give her something real special and we had a good idea.”

“And what’s the point of all this?” Logan asked, stifling a yawn.

“Well…” Bethany hesitated, pressing her fingers together as if in supplication. “We thought it would be fun to make a stained glass sun catcher. Sandra said she would help us.”

Logan shouldn’t have been surprised. Since Sunday, the girls had been jockeying to visit Sandra each evening, and each evening he firmly said no.

“It would make a real cool present for her,” Bethany added.

“You girls just don’t quit, do you?” he said, shaking his head.

Bethany looked the picture of innocence, and once again Logan went through all the reasons they shouldn’t go to Sandra’s. She was their tutor, not their friend, and it was important to teach them the difference. She was much older than them and probably not a whole lot wiser, in spite of her degree. He didn’t like them hanging around with her. Period.

Although the last was becoming harder to justify. He had given her the responsibility of teaching his nieces, and in spite of their differing over her methods, the girls were understanding their work.

Brittany joined Bethany. Reinforcements, he thought wryly. “Come to add your two cents?” he asked her, his hands on his hips.

“We thought it would be a good idea to go,” Brittany said, ignoring his rhetorical question. “This way you could have some more time alone to work on your project.” Her eyes skittered to the drawing on his board, and her face fell. “Are you done?”

Logan didn’t even bother to give the rendering another second of his attention. He sighed. “No, I’m not. I thought I was, but I don’t like it.”

Brittany walked to the drawing and held it up. “It looks okay,” she said. “But not your best work.”

Logan bit back the quick smile at Brittany’s authoritative tone. She glanced at him, perfectly serious. “Looks like it’s back to the drawing board.”

“I guess.”

“So you’ll want some more quiet time,” she added.

Logan couldn’t stop his smile. “You’re more than just a pretty face, Brittany,” he said, his voice full of admiration. He knew exactly where she was headed.

“Maybe we should visit Sandra and she can help us with Grandma’s birthday present so you’ll have the house to yourself for a while.”

Logan held their innocent gazes and against his will he had to admit that he was beat. He raised his hands as if in surrender. “Okay, okay,” he said with a suppressed sigh. He crossed his arms over his chest and looked first at one, then the other. “I will bring you girls there and come and pick you up at exactly nine o’clock. Sharp. No excuses.”

“Okay,” they said in unison.

“Can we go now?” Bethany asked.

Once he had caved in, he couldn’t think of a reason.

Logan glanced at his watch. Eight-eighteen. Still too early to go and get the girls. When he had dropped them off at Sandra’s place, she’d been cool and reserved. Just as she’d been when she came to work with the girls during the day. They spent as much time outside as possible, as if avoiding him. They went for short walks into the hills and came back giggling and laughing. When, out of curiosity, he asked her what she was doing, she told him, but her tone was defensive. He didn’t like it.

Sighing, he picked up his pencil, made a few halfhearted doodles and glared at the result. This project was slowly losing its appeal, even though he couldn’t put it out of his head. Sure, it would be nice to get the Jonserads as clients, but this project was starting to consume him. He found no joy in it. And, he reminded himself, it wasn’t even a sure thing.

He got up from his makeshift drawing board and wandered to the living room.

He tried to analyze the peculiar restlessness that had gripped him since Sunday. He was sure it wasn’t Karen. When she left he had felt relief more than anything. But she was a reminder to him of what he had once had. A girlfriend. Someone who cared that he was spending his entire holiday on a project when he really should be sitting at the beach with his nieces.

She was also a reminder of his one-time freedom and the chance to make choices for himself. No responsibilities other than his own.

Since the girls had come into his life, he felt a keen pressure to provide for them, to make sure that they had food and clothes and that their schoolwork was done. To supervise them and to seek out their best interests.

He thought of Sandra again and begrudgingly realized that with her the girls were enthusiastic and did their work. He wondered what they were doing right now.