Lovey was quiet for a moment as she fingered the placket of Royal’s open shirt. “Do you ever feel like spaces are closing in on you?”
Royal was silent, so Lovey continued. It had been so long since someone had asked her anything truly personal. She was sick and tired of condolences and folks tiptoeing around her sadness. Death scared people. And there was nothing anyone could say that helped ease the hurt anyway.
“I needed to be out in the night.” Lovey allowed her gaze to focus on a loose button at the front of Royal’s shirt. “Somehow, the darkness comforts me, maybe because I can’t see the edge of it. And the infinite curve of the stars, while it does make me feel small, it also makes me feel like I’m part of something so much larger. Something so large that it’s untouched by my earthly concerns.”
Lovey watched Royal slip her arms free of her smudged shirt, her tanned shoulders extended past the tank cut T-shirt that remained.
“I’m sorry. You’ve just been in an accident and I’m rambling.” Lovey took the shirt from Royal and stood to hang it over a nearby chair. They had not lit the lamp in the bedroom, but indirect light spilled through the open door from the kitchen just down the hall.
“You’re not rambling. I asked.”
“You should rest.” Lovey lifted a folded quilt from the foot of the bed as Royal lay back on the pillow. Lovey pulled the handmade covering up over her still trouser clad legs to her waist. “Do you need anything else?”
“No, you’ve been extremely kind given I nearly ran you over.”
“But you didn’t. You sacrificed yourself instead.” Lovey tucked the covers around Royal. “And for that I’m very grateful.”
She lingered in the open door before pulling it softly closed behind her. “Good night, Royal.”
“Good night, Lovey.”
Chapter Four
Royal thought there’d be no way she’d fall asleep knowing Lovey was just down the hall, but she did. The pink hue of the approaching sunrise was just peeking through the window of the spare room when Royal roused. For a moment, she couldn’t remember where she was. She was lying under a quilt pattern she didn’t recognize, still partially dressed. She sat up and then her pounding head sent her a quick reminder. The wreck. She’d left her car upside down at the base of a large tree, and she’d spent the night in Reverend Abraham Edwards’s house. The only person in the tri-county area who professed to abhor moonshine more than the local revenuers was Reverend Edwards, and she was about to meet him at the breakfast table if she didn’t pull herself together and make a quick escape.
Royal paused for a moment as she was pulling on her boots, having to stabilize herself against the footboard. She took a long, slow breath, retrieved her shirt from a nearby chair, and pulled it on. Looking back at the bed, she decided to fold the quilt before climbing out the window. Lovey would no doubt wonder why she’d snuck off so early, but Royal felt confident she’d be glad at the same time. The last guest Lovey needed at the kitchen table was a known moonshine runner. She tried to be as silent as possible in the dim early morning light as she slid the window open and dropped between some rather stiff shrubberies.
She cursed in hushed whispers as she pulled stiff twigs from under her shirttail and extricated herself from the bushes. A light came on in a window several feet away from where she stood, which inspired Royal to make quick steps away from the house toward the road.
The two-mile walk into town did little to quiet her mind. Over and over, she ran the details through her head trying to figure out if Lovey had been flirting with her or just being nice, or maybe a little of both. If luck was on her side she’d find Frank before deliveries and catch a ride to her house, then later Ned could help her retrieve the car.
Frank was toting a large sack of feed out to a buckboard just as she walked up. Luck was on her side after all.
“Good Lord, Royal. Looks like you had a rough night.” Frank leaned on the feed sack he’d just deposited in the back of the horse-drawn wagon.
Her shirt was soiled, there was a bandage over her eye, and one boot clomped as she walked due to its shortened lace. “Actually, it coulda been worse.”
“Well, this is a story I’ve gotta hear.”
“Can you give me a lift home?” Royal was beat and didn’t feel like walking another mile to her mother’s place.
“Sure, take a seat. I’ve got one more thing to load and then we can be on our way.”
Royal nodded and gratefully climbed up onto the wooden bench seat at the front of the wagon and waited for Frank to return.
❖
Lovey woke with a start, remembering that she’d invited Royal to stay over in the spare room. She pulled on a robe and padded down the hallway in her bare feet. She peeked into the guest room. Empty. She took note of the folded quilt at the foot of the bed.
“Would you like some coffee?” her father called to her from the kitchen.
Her heart rate increased for a moment at the thought of Royal and her father having coffee together. She was oddly relieved when she entered the kitchen and saw him seated by himself reading his Bible.
“I’ll get it, thank you.” Lovey poured herself a cup and stood leaning against the counter. “You’re studying already?”
“Couldn’t sleep.”
“Really?”
“I thought I heard someone outside the house, in the bushes this morning. Once I woke up I couldn’t get back to sleep so I figured I might as well get started on this week’s sermon.”
Surely Royal didn’t climb out the
