After cleaning up the girls and settling them into bed, she pushed open the bedroom door expecting to find Ty, but the room was empty and dark. Downstairs, only a single lamp was on, the TV off. Through the back window above the kitchen sink, she saw light in the barn. She took a deep breath and opened the door to the porch, slipped her shoes back on. She held the screened door so it wouldn’t slam shut behind her and ran through the rain that fell harder by the second.
That evening, during the picnic, laughter, and conversation, the air between them had been tense. Not unpleasant but taut. Waiting, wondering. As she stood in front of him in line for Solo cups of iced tea and sat next to him on the blanket, their shoulders close but not touching, the space between them felt warm and thick, almost alive. All she wanted to do was reach over and touch his cheek, his neck, his hair. Anything to bring him closer, to erase their separation, to prove they were okay.
The prospect of being alone with him now, though, was unnerving. She’d pushed away so much, for so long, she wasn’t sure how to pull closer now. But she had to try.
By the time she got to the barn door, her skin was wet, her hair damp, her clothes soaked with rain. She tried to wipe some of the water off her face and hair, then gave up the effort and looked around in the dim light for a clean towel.
“Hey.”
Betsy looked up. Ty stood at the back of the barn, the light from his office glowing out from the open door. In the half-light, he was only curves and angles. Shapes and shadows. Her heart was a knot of wires in her chest, each wire coming alive in succession.
She forgot about the rain on her arms and face and crossed the floor toward him. A moment later she was in front of him and all thoughts of speaking, of explaining herself, escaped into the night. She pulled him close and pressed her lips to his. Expecting to feel his arms around her, his lips moving in response, she was surprised when he gave her a small kiss, then stepped back.
“What’s wrong?” she whispered.
He gave a brief smile. “Wrong? Nothing, I just . . . I was working on . . .” He glanced behind him toward his office. “I was kind of in the middle of something. Can we talk later?”
“I . . .” Betsy stammered and no more words came. Heat crept up her cheeks and her heart hammered in her chest.
“Oh, were you wanting . . . ?” He chuckled, but stopped when she put a hand to her forehead. “I’m sorry. It’s been a long day and I’m exhausted. I don’t think I can . . .” He smiled. “Were you thinking we’d just . . . ?” He gestured toward the open door to his office. “In there?”
“No, I—I just thought . . .” Her whole body, fingertips to toes, tingled.
He waited, eyebrows raised in confusion. The fatigue, the strain, was right there on his face, but at the moment, she didn’t care. Anger ripped through her desire, and all thoughts of intimacy, of connection, evaporated. They might as well have been on opposite cliffs staring at each other across the divide.
“Forget it.” Without meeting his eyes again, she turned and strode through the barn and out into the rain.
“Betsy, wait,” Ty called behind her, but in her embarrassment, she didn’t stop. She stomped across the grass and pumped her arms, pushing against the downpour to get away faster.
On the porch, she kicked off her shoes and took the stairs inside two at a time. At the top, she remembered the girls sleeping in the room across from her bedroom and slowed her steps in response. She entered her bedroom and leaned against the counter in the bathroom, calming her racing pulse, trying to slow her hot, angry breaths.
Downstairs, the porch door opened. She closed her eyes and waited. A quick moment later, Ty blew into the room, wiping water off his face and breathing hard.
“Why’d you run? We need to talk about this.”
“Talk about what? How I came out there and you completely embarrassed me?”
“I embarrassed you? How?”
“Well, I . . . but you didn’t . . .” She was so frustrated, she couldn’t even form a sentence.
“Babe, this is not me rejecting you. But you’ve been all over the place lately. Now you decide you want me and you expect me to just drop everything? I have stuff going on too.”
She exhaled hard and covered her face with her hands, then pulled them down again. “I don’t get why you’re making this so difficult.”
“I’m the one making it difficult?” His voice was tinged with a brittleness he rarely, if ever, directed at her. “I’m trying here, Betsy, but I cannot figure you out. I don’t even know how to just be with you anymore. Lately, it seems like you’re happier around the girls than me, like I’ve done something wrong, but I have no idea what that is.”
He inhaled and turned around. Paced a few steps away, then came back and faced her. When he spoke, his voice was low and controlled. “I’m out there working every day, trying to provide for us, fixing broken machines, watching for storms, and now I’ve taken your sister’s kids in—what else can you possibly want from me?”
“You’re going to make this about the girls?” But she knew he was right. Not just about the girls—about all of it. She turned and grabbed a hand towel off the hook by the sink. She pressed it to her face, breathed in and out, then wiped her shoulders and arms.
“Well, I wasn’t
