Carolyne Aarsen - Cattleman's Courtship

Cara Morrison was anything but fragile.

And he was anything but over her.

She left without a word, he told himself. She couldn’t even break up with you to your face. She ran away instead of facing things. Get over it.

So why was he going to church knowing he might see her?

Because he wasn’t the kind of person to run away or get chased away.

He had some pride, he thought, finishing off his apple and tossing the core into the garbage can. And because, when he stayed away from church, his heart felt empty and his soul unnourished.

He said a quick goodbye to his father and ran to his truck. He was already running late.

Half an hour later a helpful usher escorted him to one of the few empty spots in the building. He sat down, got settled in and ended up looking directly at the back of Cara Morrison’s head.

He glanced around, looking for another place to sit, but then the minister came to the front of the church and encouraged everyone to rise and greet their neighbors.

Nicholas immediately turned to the person beside him and then Cara’s aunt called out his name. Was it his imagination or did Cara jump?

“So good to see you here,” Lori Morrison said, catching his hand. He shook Lori’s hand and then, with a sense of inevitability, turned to Cara.

She gave him a tight smile but didn’t offer to shake his hand. “Good morning, Nicholas. Good to see you again.”

“Is it?”

The words came out before he could stop them.

Well, that was brilliant. Nicholas watched Cara slowly turn away from him. Why couldn’t he be as cool as she was? Why couldn’t he return her greeting instead of running the risk of antagonizing her again?

Now she stood with her back to him, the overhead lights catching glints of gold in her hair. Three years ago she wore it short, like a cap. Now it brushed her shoulders, inviting touch.

He crossed his arms, angry at his reaction to her. It had been three years. It was done.

And Nicholas spent the rest of the church service alternately trying to listen to the minister and trying to ignore Cara Morrison.

He was successful at neither.

Finally the minister spoke the benediction. The congregation rose for the final song. As soon as the last note rang out and the minister stood at the back of the church, Nicholas made his escape.

He had his hand on the bar that opened the exterior door when he heard someone call his name. His first impulse was to ignore whoever called him. And he would have managed if the helpful person behind him hadn’t tapped him on the shoulder.

“I believe Mrs. Hughes wants to talk to you,” his neighbor said. He pointed out a thin, short woman waving at him from the top of the stairs in the foyer.

Nicholas smiled his acknowledgment and, with a sigh of resignation, walked back through the crowd of people in the foyer.

He had his hand on the handrail of the steps and looked up in time to see Cara walking down the stairs past Mrs. Hughes.

Cara caught his eye, then glanced quickly away.

Right behind her stood her uncle, Alan Morrison.

Nicholas caught Alan’s piercing gaze. It was as if he were making sure Nicholas didn’t “hurt” his precious niece yet again. Nicholas wanted to reassure him that as far as Cara was concerned, he had gotten the memo long ago.

Then Nicholas saw a look of puzzlement cross Alan’s face as his step faltered. Alan’s hand clutched the handrail on his right side as he cried out.

Then, as if in slow motion, he crumpled and folded in on himself.

Cara turned. Her aunt Lori screamed.

And as Nicholas watched in horror, Alan Morrison fell heavily down the rest of the stairs.

Nicholas was the first one at his side. Cara right behind him. “Call an ambulance,” Nicholas shouted to the people who now milled around.

“Stretch him out.” Cara pulled on Alan’s arm, falling to her knees beside him. “Straighten him out and open his coat.”

Alan’s face held a sickly gray tinge, his eyes like dark bruises, unfocused, staring straight up.

As Nicholas unbuttoned Alan’s suit jacket, Cara placed her hand above his mouth then, bending over, put her mouth on his and gave him two quick breaths.

Her fingers swept his neck, pressing against it.

“No pulse,” she murmured.

“I’ll do the CPR, you take care of the breathing.”

Nicholas counted to himself, one and two, pressing down on each count. Cara was bent over her uncle’s head, breathing for him.

Nicholas felt vaguely aware of the people around them as they worked, Lori crying, someone else telling people to move away.

But for Nicholas, the only thing that existed was the two of them fighting to save Cara’s beloved uncle’s life. A tiny cosmos among the shifting crowd around them.

He didn’t know how long they worked. It seemed like a few moments, a brief snatch of time.

Yet by the time someone called out to make room for the paramedics, the tension knotted his shoulders and the hard floor dug into his knees.

“I’ll take over, sir.” Hands pulled him back as others caught the rhythm he had maintained.

Nicholas caught the glimpse of two uniformed men and he got slowly to his feet, his legs tingling as the blood rushed back to them.

Another paramedic strapped an oxygen mask on Alan’s head, manually pumping life-giving oxygen into him.

Cara sat back, her hands hanging slack by her side, her eyes huge in her pale face.

Nicholas tried to work his way around Alan to be at her side. But someone else took her by the shoulders. Lifted her up. Held her as she visibly trembled.

That’s my job, my place, he thought, feeling ineffective and surprisingly possessive as someone else stroked her hair in comfort.

In a flurry of activity the paramedics had Alan on a stretcher and then wheeled him out the doors.

Beyond the double doors Nicholas saw the whirling lights atop the ambulance and the enormity of what had just happened struck him.

“Cara. Go with him,” Nicholas heard Lori Morrison called out.

Cara glanced around, looking confused at the sound of her aunt’s voice.

“Please,” Lori pleaded. “I can’t. I just can’t.”

Nicholas found her this time and gave her a gentle push in the direction of the ambulance. “I’ll take care of your aunt. You go. Be with your uncle.”

He gave her shoulder a quick squeeze before she whirled away, running after the paramedics.

Nicholas hurried to Lori’s side. “I’ll take you to the hospital,” he said, slipping his arm over her shoulder. “We’ll meet Cara there.”

Lori only nodded, clutching his arm.

He steered Lori to his truck and soon they were speeding down the highway to the hospital, trying in vain to keep up with the ambulance. Lori sat curled against the passenger’s-side window, a silent figure clutching her coat, her face strobed by the flashing red lights of the ambulance they were following.

While he drove, Nicholas sent up a quick prayer for Alan Morrison and for Cara, praying the ambulance would get to the hospital on time.

Sorrow, huge as a stone, lodged in Cara’s chest. Tears threatened, but she held them back. In the past couple of hours her aunt had cried enough for both of them.

She wanted time to rewind. She wanted to go back when her uncle was still walking around. Still talking and telling his terrible jokes.

Not strapped to a gurney with a paramedic working on him while they raced to the hospital in the swaying ambulance.

Myocardial infarction, the paramedics had said. Heart attack.

How could a heart suddenly decide to stop working? What triggered it?

Images flickered in her mind. Uncle Alan wheezing as he lifted a box. His unusually high color.