Taking a Chance on Love by Mary Razzell Read Free Book Online

Six

    My father came home unexpectedly on a few days’ leave from the Air Force. He was on his way to the Queen Charlotte Islands to run the power station at Alliford Bay.
    One morning while we were all still eating breakfast, the priest, Father Smith, called in at our house. He refused the coffee my mother offered.
    â€œI have other things on my mind,” he said to Mom, but looking at Dad. “I’ll get right to the point. In the eyes of the Holy Church, you two are not married. You are committing a sin if you persist in having a physical relationship.”
    â€œNot married? What kind of crazy talk is this?” said Dad, standing up and pushing his chair back.
    â€œBecause you are a divorced man, Mr. Woods. The Church does not recognize this marriage. The only way you can continue to stay together is if you live as brother and sister.”
    Dad reached over and took Father Smith by the scruff of his neck and hustled him out the back door.
    â€œYou damned excuse for a man,” he yelled. “Get out of here. And don’t come back. How dare you interfere between a man and his wife? If I ever catch you around here again, I’ll beat the living daylights out of you.”
    I watched from the window as Father Smith started to crank his old Chev. His face got redder and redder. Finally the engine caught, and he jumped into the front seat and left in a black cloud of burning oil.
    Mom was crying and trying to hush Dad at the same time.
    Whenever my parents fought, I found it better to leave and stay away as long as possible until things cooled down. That’s what I did, wishing that I could talk to Amy. She was still in Vancouver. I went down to the beach and skipped stones across the water for the next half-hour.
    The next morning, there was a note for me from Glen at Mrs. Hanson’s.
Back from Vancouver. Have to see you. Will be waiting for you when you get off work. Glen XOX
    I wondered if Mrs. Hanson or her daughter Anna had read the note. They must have because as I got ready to leave at eleven, Anna handed me two small brown paper bags, the kind the guest house packed for those who wanted a picnic lunch. Anna winked. Whoops. Had Bruce told them that I had winked at him?
    Glen was waiting for me outside Mrs. Hanson’s back gate. I had forgotten how handsome he was. We took the path down to the beach. Finding a warm spot in the sun, we propped ourselves against a log. The tide was out, and the sand lay glistening before us.
    â€œTell me everything,” I said. “Start with your mother.”
    â€œI’m still trying to sort things out,” he said. “My mother’s husband seems okay, though I don’t think he’s overjoyed to have me join his family. Can’t blame him. My half-sister and half-brother are kind of bratty and want to hang around me all the time … It’s what I thought I wanted, but … I don’t know. I don’t feel comfortable.” Then he dropped his voice so that I could barely hear him. “I still feel empty.”
    â€œOh, Glen.”
    He took a deep breath. “They want me to come live with them in Vancouver. Go to university there in the fall.”
    â€œI thought you were only seventeen.”
    â€œI am, but I finished grade twelve, and I have university entrance. We’ve already been out to see the campus.”
    â€œThen you’ve decided to go?” I said.
    â€œNot really … I’d have my own room. They’ve got this huge house … My own father will be furious. Probably cut me off financially. But my mother says I can count on her for cash, that she has money of her own.”
    I couldn’t help wondering if Glen could count on his mother. I’d asked him once if she had ever tried to get in touch with him after she’d left him when he was so young, and he’d said no. “I blame my father totally for her absence in my life,” he’d said. Again I