I'll Be Home for Christmas and One Golden Christmas. Lenora Worth

went still inside. Trying to keep his tone light and casual, he asked, “Why would he do a thing like that?”

      “’Cause she didn’t have dinner ready on time,” Jesse said in a matter-of-fact voice. “She cried when he wasn’t looking.”

      Dinner. No wonder she’d tried so hard to make his dinner party a success. No wonder she’d been so shaken when it had gone bad. She was used to fixing things up, hiding her fear behind a false bravado.

      Patrick pulled on Nick’s sleeve, bringing him out of his numbed state. “I don’t want much, Mr. Nick. I just wish we didn’t have to leave here, ever.”

      Nick was beginning to wish that very same thing.

      Before Nick could reply, however, the door swung open and Myla stomped into the room, a mother’s wrath apparent in her expression. “What in the world! You two are supposed to be in bed! How’d you get up here?”

      “We snuck by you,” Patrick blurted out in spite of his sister’s glaring look.

      “That’s obvious enough.” Myla pointed a finger toward the door. “Get back downstairs with Miss Lydia. Do you both want to catch the flu?”

      “I didn’t breathe on them,” Nick said, glad to find a light moment in the children’s misdeeds. “And I’m glad they came by for a visit. I was getting downright lonely.”

      “Want us to stay awhile?” Patrick offered hopefully.

      “No, he doesn’t,” his mother interjected. “Go on down. I’ll come and read to you and help you with your prayers in a little while.”

      Nick managed a chuckle as he watched the children scoot out of the room. “Well, you certainly got rid of those two varmints.”

      She looked at his half-eaten food. “Why didn’t you eat your supper?”

      “I wasn’t very hungry.”

      “Are you feeling better?”

      “A little. I heard you and Lydia were plotting down there.”

      “Planning,” she corrected. “There’s a difference.”

      “I’ve never looked at it that way.”

      She started to take the tray, but his hand shot out to stop her. “Myla, could we talk some more?”

      “No,” she said, not daring to look at him. “I’d rather not.”

      “I won’t press you about your life before,” he said. “I just have some questions, about…this unconditional love about which you speak so highly.”

      She glanced up then, her eyes wide. “You want to discuss…religion?”

      “Yes,” he said, smiling slightly. “I think I’d like that.”

      And so they talked. She told him the stories of the Bible that he’d forgotten. As she talked, memories washed over him; memories of his mother, telling him these very same stories, her faith as strong and as shining as Myla’s. How could he have forgotten the beauty in that? How could he have let it slip so far away?

      After Myla said a gentle prayer for him to feel better, both physically and spiritually, he sat in the darkness alone, watching the fire. And realized he was tired of being alone in the dark.

      Then it hit him—Myla had said something earlier about being afraid of the darkness. They were so alike, he and his Myla. They’d both been out in the cold for too long. Together, maybe they could find the warmth of that unconditional love she’d told him about. Together, with the help of a higher being watching over them.

      Outside, the rain fell in cold, indiscriminate sheets and Nick shuddered, thinking again that she might have been out there tonight, all alone and frightened.

      But she wasn’t out there. For some strange reason, God had sent her to him instead. He wouldn’t take that obligation lightly.

      “Not again, Myla,” he whispered to the fire. “Not ever again, if I can help it.”

      Then he did something he hadn’t done in a very long time. He folded his hands and he prayed.