Elizabeth couldn't believe her week in Airdrie was already half over. She hadn't known what to expect; it was such a lovely surprise to be welcomed by Rebecca so completely, to see Jack taking to the ranch as if he had always known it, and to be able to ride with Nathan every day.
And the best part. Nathan's proposal, which still simultaneously made her laugh softly and feel tears come to her eyes whenever she thought of it.
Elizabeth wanted to take Allie and Jack out to the pergola, because she knew they would also see the wonder of it. It had always been Nathan's private place where he would go to read, to tend the flowers, wind the vines around the beams, and think.
He'd cleared the land and built the structure when he was around fourteen. Sarah hadn't really helped, but she would watch and give advice, and read to him, and they would tell each other their dreams for the future.
Today, Allie and Jack were on the quilt they'd brought out, just finishing up the last of their picnic lunch. Sunset, Rio and Buddy were lightly tethered nearby where they'd found patches of tender spring grass to eat.
Nathan couldn't just sit when he was here, so he and Elizabeth were walking around the pergola, gathering up the somewhat out-of-control tendrils of honeysuckle and tucking them in so they would grow up and around the pine posts.
Nathan suddenly leaned around the post they were both working on and kissed Elizabeth. She closed her eyes and the combination of the kiss and the sweet aroma of the flowers made her head spin a little.
"Not that I'm complaining, but what was that for?" Elizabeth asked.
Nathan's eyes were soft. "It was a thank you. I used to love it here so much, and it's felt like a dark place since Sarah died." He looked around him. "We spent a lot of time in this clearing." Nathan smiled and took a deep breath. "It feels light here again."
Nathan looked at Jack and Allie and then back to Elizabeth, and he shook his head. "I ask myself, how did my life get this perfectly full?" Nathan took her hand around the post. "It all started with you."
Elizabeth smiled gently. "It's true of me, too. And now we have our whole lives ahead of us. Together." She sighed and leaned against the post. "Do you have any idea how happy I am, Nathan? I wonder sometimes if you realize what an extraordinary person you are."
Nathan just looked at her, not speaking, but with a fathomless depth in his blue eyes.
Elizabeth smiled. "You see? There. At the beginning when you would look at me that way, I couldn't imagine what you were thinking." She laughed softly. "I would meet you on the street and try to make conversation, and it was like pulling teeth to get a word out of you. But I knew..." Elizabeth reached around the post and touched his face. "...I knew there was so much in there that you wanted to say."
Nathan said, softly, "I think I loved you the first minute I saw you in my office, Elizabeth. I'd never felt that before. I was afraid if I spoke to you that you would know somehow, or that I would just blurt it out one day. I almost did, so many times."
Elizabeth took another long stem of honeysuckle and wrapped it around the post. "Do you remember that day when I was with Jack out by the pond? You rode up and stopped to talk to us?"
Nathan nodded. "Yes, it was when I first realized that you were a writer."
Elizabeth laughed. "Funny you should say that, because I was having a little internal crisis that day about being a writer. I wasn't sure I was up to it."
Elizabeth continued. "You've always had this connection to little Jack, Nathan. From the very first, after his Christening, and, you must have noticed how he loves to just look at you and talk to you, reach his arms up for you to hold him. He's done it more with you than with anyone else."
She twirled a flower around her finger. "Remember? When you asked me what was in my heart? Jack said, 'Mama.'"
Elizabeth said, "By the time you rode away, I knew I would keep writing, and I knew what I would write about. By asking that simple question, you helped me find my answer."
Nathan raised an eyebrow. "But you know the other part of the question I was asking, don't you?"
"Yes. And I had that answer too. You were in my heart." She sighed, remembering. "Out there, among the trees, sitting so straight and tall in the saddle, in your uniform and so handsome. You took my breath away." She looked at him and smiled from under her long lashes. "And I did finally figure it out, Nathan."
Nathan smiled. "So if we'd said it then? If I'd told you I loved you, if you'd said what you were feeling? Would we have ruined it, or would it have happened sooner?"
"I don't know," Elizabeth said slowly. "I was so stunned that I was feeling something that strong again. My heart was pounding when you got back up on Bear. I'm not sure I could have put together a coherent sentence."
Nathan said softly, "For everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven..."
Elizabeth smiled. "Ecclesiastes. I love that one."
"I think it all happened as it was supposed to. And in its own time," Nathan said.
Elizabeth touched his forehead, gently. "I knew," she said. "I knew there was so much in here." Moving her hand down to his chest, just over his heart, she said, "And here."
"Thank you for sticking around long enough to find out," Nathan said, enclosing her hand in his on his chest. "I seem to have found my voice with you." He gave her his crooked smile, "Now you can't shut me up."
Elizabeth laughed. "I don't ever want to."
Nathan picked a small yellow flower from the vine. "Do you know why they call it honeysuckle?" he asked. He took the end of the flower and put it gently between Elizabeth's lips.
She tasted it and smiled. "Honey."
"Nectar," Nathan said softly. "Bees and hummingbirds love it."
Elizabeth sighed softly. "Have I told you today that I love you?"
"Nope."
"I love you," Elizabeth whispered.
When Nathan kissed her he could still taste some of the nectar on her lips. One by one, the dark memories were being replaced by the light.
They spent the day there, the four of them. Nathan had brought one of his favorite books and although he'd thought he would just read it himself, Allie and Elizabeth asked him to read aloud from his copy of "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer."
"Tom said to himself that it was not such a hollow world, after all. He had discovered a great law of human action, without knowing it – namely, that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain."
While he read, Nathan had his hand absentmindedly on Jack's back as he napped on the quilt. Allie and Elizabeth were braiding wildflowers into garlands for their hair.
Allie placed the garland on her head and Elizabeth said, "Oh, Allie. You look beautiful."
Allie sighed and Elizabeth could see a resolve come into her eyes.
"Uncle Nathan? Family meeting," she said suddenly, in a very business-like tone of voice, but quietly so she wouldn't wake Jack.
Elizabeth raised her eyebrows in a silent question to Nathan as he closed the book and put it down.
Nathan said to Elizabeth, "One of my mother's traditions. When we had things to say, we could call a family meeting, and everyone had to sit down and listen."
Nathan sat up, though he couldn't seem to take his hand from Jack's warm back.
"The floor is yours, Allie," Nathan said. Elizabeth thought he sounded a little like Bill Avery.
"I'm thirteen," Allie said. "I don't know when exactly I'm considered grown up, but I do get told to act grown up a lot, so I guess it's now." She took a deep breath. "And I'm wondering when I get to make some decisions about myself, instead of having them all made for me."
Nathan and Elizabeth were speechless for a moment. In truth, they were so proud of Allie, she could stop now and they'd think of her as grown up.
Nathan said, "That's fair, Allie. What kinds of decisions do you want to make?"
Allie looked at Nathan. "Well, you decided to change my name to Grant before I was old enough to tell you what I thought about it. That was a good decision. I agree with that one."
Nathan nodded without changing his expression. Inside, all he could think was how like Sarah she was right now.
Allie continued. "Mrs. Thornton and I have talked about this a little," Allie said, "And she told me that I needed to tell you how I feel."
Nathan raised an eyebrow and looked at Elizabeth. She said softly, "Confidentiality, Nathan. It wasn't my story to tell." Nathan smiled, remembering the last time she'd said that to him and how grateful he'd been. He looked back at his niece.
"Go on, Allie," Nathan said.
"I don't remember Sarah, my mother. I only remember you. I know you've told me that she loved me very much. You've never talked much about my father, and neither has Grandma. I guess he must not be a very good guy, because neither of you seem to like him, and he's never tried to meet me."
Nathan nodded again and then stole a look at Elizabeth. He wondered if she could tell that his heart was hammering a little in his chest. He thought he knew where this was going.
Allie took a deep breath. "When you get married, I want to be adopted. I want you to be my Dad, and I want Mrs. Thornton to be my Mom. I want Jack to be my brother. And when you have children, I want them to be my brothers and sisters, too." She stopped, and Nathan could see her eyes were full of tears just about to spill over. "You say we're a family. I want to be a family."
"Oh, Allie." Nathan reached out and she fell into his arms. Allie's tears were falling now, making soft wet spots on Nathan's shirt as he held her. Elizabeth sat a little apart with her hands over her heart, and she was crying, too. As Nathan looked at her over Allie's shoulder, Elizabeth saw his eyes fill as well.
Nathan said, softly, "I can't think of anything I'd like better, Allie." He reached out an arm and drew Elizabeth in. She put one arm around Allie and replaced Nathan's hand on Jack.
Allie was laughing and crying at the same time. "I can't breathe," she said, caught in the middle.
She looked around at the three of them. "But I could get used to this."
As they rode out, Nathan took one last look around, as he always did, to be sure he hadn't left anything behind.
He was remembering what Elizabeth had said a while ago, when they were in the cabin where she'd had Jack. How places are the same, but the way we feel about them can change depending on where we are in life, and who we're with.
Nathan used to think of this clearing as a place where he and Sarah had talked and dreamed, and then as a place where he grieved for his life without her.
Now it was a place where he'd asked Elizabeth to marry him, and where Allie had truly made them into a family.
Instead of just dreaming of his future here, it was now a place where his dreams had come true.
They rode back slowly, because Jack was in the saddle with Elizabeth. He seemed entirely at home on a horse now, and knew to keep his little hands tightly around the horn. He never fussed or seemed bored, and that made Elizabeth very happy. She loved that he would enjoy a life on horses, just as she was doing, as his father had, and as Nathan did.
They rode for a while in their own thoughts. It had been a momentous couple of days, and each of them had plenty to think about.
Riding closer to Nathan, Elizabeth said, "I need to know what you think about something, Nathan."
Nodding, he said, "Okay."
"Actually, two things. I know this is all very new, but the questions are; when, and where?" She knew he would know just what she was asking.
Nathan smiled easily at her. "Well, as to when, I would marry you tomorrow, so I'm afraid that's up to you. You probably think it's more complicated than that, and you're probably right but..." He reached out and took the hand that wasn't around Jack, "...I see it as a simple matter of standing before God and making a promise. I could do that right now."
Elizabeth laughed softly. "You have no idea how much I wish I felt it was that easy." She nodded. "So, up to me. I'll get back to you on that."
Nathan sighed. "And where? I have thought about that a bit." He raised an eyebrow. "Can we get married twice?"
Laughing, Elizabeth said, "I know! My thoughts exactly! And I've been wondering... What if we invited people here, and those that can make it can see us marry at the pergola... and then we go back to Hope Valley and have a huge party to celebrate?"
Nathan exhaled, his face completely open. "You would be willing to do that?"
"Yes. I think so."
Nathan squeezed her hand. "I have to admit, it has weighed on me a little... thinking about marrying you in the same church, in the same uniform as you did with Jack. I just don't think it would be possible for so many of the same people to focus on... us. They would be remembering the past, not looking to the future. Does that make sense?"
Elizabeth nodded. "Perfect sense. And I agree with you. I want this to be different. To be ours."
Nathan laughed softly, "So, what's your best guess on how many would take an eight-hour train trip, an hour in a wagon, and then another half hour on horseback or in a second wagon to see us say 'I do'?"
Laughing, Elizabeth said, "It might be just us!"
Nathan's eyes softened. "I'd be okay with that. And then when we get back to Hope Valley, we have Lucas open up the saloon and maybe the party spills out into the street. You think we could get him to do the lanterns again?"
Elizabeth raised an eyebrow. "You know the only person we need to ask for help, and it will be completely out of control."
They both said together, "Rosemary!"
Elizabeth felt her eyes filling with tears. "I love all of this so much, Nathan. A true celebration. A kind of rebirth, for both of us. Hope, and the future."
Nathan smiled back at her. "And Sunday is Easter. There's a little church in Airdrie that you'll see when we go for the sunrise service. It's sweet and easier to get to, but..."
Elizabeth nodded. "You still want the pergola."
She squeezed his hand tightly. "I do, too."
