"Ruin and Redemption"

A Warrior in Husband's Garb

Lizzie heard the door open from the bedroom where she was lying. Then she heard Scarlett greeting Josiah.

“Hi, Lizzie,” Josiah offered shyly, as Scarlett closed the door behind them. There was barely enough room for Josiah and Izzie. Rebecca was not with them at the moment.

“Hello, Josiah. Thank you for coming to visit, and bringing your sister with you.”

“Hi, Lizzie. You don’t have to talk like that. I’m right here,” Izzie said.

“I know. I’m just glad Joe saw fit to bring you, Izzie. I didn’t treat you very well before. I’m sorry and ashamed.”

“Don’t mention it, Lizzie, please. I don’t want us to think about that. I just want to be your friend now, and forget about when you lost your temper. Long as you don’t plan on doing that again, I figured we could just be friends now. It’s been awhile, hasn’t it? We can forget about it and be friends can’t we, Lizzie?” Izzie pleaded.

“I’ll try, Izzie. I can’t really forget or forgive myself. But I’ll try not to bring it up if you won’t.”

“Thet’s fine, Lizzie. Whatever you want.”

“Thank you.”

“Lizzie, I’m sorry about things…Rebecca and I were still working out some of the details…that’s why we hadn’t made it public, yet. We were engaged, but we weren’t sure if we should make the marriage public or keep it a secret when we saw the trouble you and Derrick were having. But Rebecca figures we won’t have the same kind of trouble because of her former profession. It won’t matter that she’s white and I’m a mulatto because of what she’s done. People won’t bother trying to keep us apart. We thought we’d risk it anyway, " Josiah explained.

“Well, I’m happy for you, Josiah. I’m sure she’ll be a fine wife for you. I know you were interested in her before. And now that she’s decided she wants to get married, things should work out well for both of you.”

“Yeah, Lizzie, it took some convincing. But I think it will be best for both of us. She can live on the farm and help out and she won’t have to worry about how to pay the rent. Everything’s already taken care of. And there’s room for Sarah in Izzie’s room. Plus we can build her a treehouse or something.”

Lizzie looked at him wistfully. Why hadn’t he and Michael and Derrick wanted to build her a treehouse? Why had they forced her to remain on the ground while they played?

Josiah caught the vein of her thoughts,“I guess now that I’m going to be a father, I can see that girls would want to play in a treehouse, too, Lizzie. It wasn’t right to keep you out. I’m sorry. We just wanted to have something, us boys, back then, to help us get along better, you know. You understand now.”

“Yes, but still, it hurt. I didn’t understand. And there were no other girls nor any treehouse for me to climb in.”

“Well Sarah isn’t going to have that problem. She’ll have a treehouse she can get up in. Maybe you can come over and help with the building once you’re feeling better. I think Izzie and me both are going to work on it, maybe Rebecca too.”