Page 48 of Candy Cane Dreams
"All right. I can start there tomorrow after I get home from school."
"That would be perfect, unless you have something else you wanted to do?"
"My intention was to be with Lilly and help you. That fits right in with all of my plans." She smiled. "Plus, I really want you to do well with the festival."
"I need to talk to my brother about selling my share of the farm, but even if he agrees, I'm betting that he won't be able to come up with the money right away. I'm going to have to be able to make enough money from the festival to tide the store over until the money from the farm comes in. So, with my big supplier pulling out, a lot hinges on this."
"No pressure." She smiled, but he knew that she was taking it seriously, and he appreciated that.
Her hand sat in the middle of the table, now that she wasn't holding her menu, and he slid his over and put it on top of hers.
She turned her hand immediately, and their fingers threaded together.
There was just something about that that made him feel connected and at peace. He watched their fingers for a bit, noticing the differences and loving the fact that they were not the same.
"You had things you wanted to talk to me about?" she prompted him when he was quiet for a bit.
He looked at their hands for another few seconds before he raised his gaze to hers.
"I guess I just wanted to tell you a little bit about Lauren. I felt like you deserve to know, and especially now that you've agreed to be with me, and we're thinking about the future together. Not that there's a whole lot to tell."
"You don't have to if you don't want to."
"I don't necessarily want to, but I think you deserve it. After all, I was married before, and she's Lilly's mother, and you should know."
"Lilly obviously adored her."
"She did, and Lauren was a good mom. But she really was focused on the candy shop. And... I think our relationship suffered some, because she felt like she needed to call the shots all the time. I wanted us to stay together, especially after Lilly was on the way, and that's why I left the farm, moved into the candy shop, and went to be beside her. I suppose a lot of me resented that. Maybe that's what came between us, but by the time she died, we were barely talking. I... I don't want to allow my relationship to get like that in the future. I should have told her how I felt, although in my defense, I did bring it up multiple times, and she told me that if I wanted to be a farmer, I could move back out to the farm and be a farmer, but she was going to stay right there. There was no discussion, and I felt like I made the only choice I could to keep our family together."
"Wow. I... I hope I don't do that. I hope I can be flexible enough that we can make a decision that benefits both of us."
"I guess that's where I was going with that. I feel like the candy shop is Lilly's heritage, but you and I have a life to live before Lilly grows up. I don't want to force you into being a candy cane maker's wife if that's not what you want."
"It doesn’t matter to me. If you make candy canes, if you expand the shop, if you sell it and become a farmer, I don't care. I'm with you."
That made him feel right and good the whole way down to his soul, and he squeezed her hand.
Kate wasn't the kind of person who said things just to make him feel good, and he knew she meant exactly what she said.
"Even if I want to move to California?" he asked, only half joking.
"Where you go I will go," she said, and then continued, "your people will be my people and your God my God." She laughed a little.
"You can say that with ease. God's done too much for me for me to ever turn my back on Him now."
"It's good to hear. It's nice to see gratefulness too. I think so many times we just expect that God owes us, and we forget that it's the other way around—we all owe a debt we cannot pay, couldn't even hope to begin to repay."
"Yeah. It's an unfathomable debt."
The waitress brought their food, and he waited until she left before he continued. "But we're to serve Him out of love, not because we have to."
"True. But following Jesus is one little decision after another, to not fulfill the lusts of the flesh, but to follow after the spirit. Each decision builds on the next, until you have a lifetime."
"That's the truth. Sometimes we lose sight of the big picture."
His food looked delicious, and they prayed and then began to eat.
"What did you want to talk about?" he asked.
