Dinner was entertaining. Once she'd adjusted to the crowd of new people her nerves had settled a lot quicker than she would have anticipated. By the time it was time to eat she almost felt at home. Not that she had ever had this kind of home experience.
Warren's Aunt Barb was a hoot. She was by no means what Jolie would consider elderly but the old woman was spryer than Jolie would have imagined. She was like a tiny, sarcastic Martha Stewart ninja and Jolie just loved her.
She'd happily fallen into the routine of cooking while chatting and sipping Barb's strong cider after she'd relieved Sue. Sue was funny and sweet but she was also hugely pregnant and clearly exhausted. Jolie had insisted she go relax in a more comfortable chair than the small stool in the kitchen she had been perched on. The other woman had put up a token fight but quickly given up in search of a cushioned seat.
The kitchen was warm and well situated. It was the kind of place Jolie had dreamed about when she imagined her home with Luke. She sadly remembered all the magazine clippings she had amassed in the little basket in the kitchen of the home they'd bought. Luke had told her to collect ideas for the renovations they would do together once he got home. Like everything else, she'd left them behind when she'd run. She briefly wondered how the new owners had renovated things.
"Those frown lines indicate thoughts much deeper than the process of making a cheese ball." Barb chuckled and continued to stir the turkey gravy before her. "Care to share? I'm a fantastic listener."
The small woman looked nothing like the few memories Jolie stored away for review of her own mother but she radiated paternal care. Her warm brown eyes conveyed years of wisdom.
"I was just admiring your kitchen and thinking about one I used to have."
"Sell it; lose it to the bank or other?"
Jolie sighed softly. "Sold it. I couldn't live in the house anymore after...." She swallowed and willed herself not to get emotional. She reminded herself that the reality of the situation was that she was going to have to talk about Luke at times and she'd better get used to it. "After my husband passed. There were too many memories."
"The kitchen is the heart of the home; it contains the essence of the family within it. We get a lot of ourselves wrapped up in those emotions and it's very hard when someone passes. I'm sure all you could feel was the loss of all the plans and hopes you'd had." She spoke matter-of-factly but Jolie still felt the compassion in the words.
"That is exactly it. Every room, especially the kitchen and our bedroom, was filled with the ghosts of all the dreams and plans we had made. I couldn't breathe there. I couldn't breathe in that town. I felt like I was going to implode." She'd never truly voiced those thoughts or emotions to anyone else and found herself both relieved and incredulous that she'd just revealed so much to a person she knew so briefly.
"I understand," Barb opened the oven and removed a foil covered glass dish. "We lost our first child. I couldn't open the nursery door months. I practically ran down the hall to our room. I was sure Hal was going to have me committed. It wasn't until I found out Beau was coming that I started to pull out of it."
"I'm so sorry." Jolie had no experience with losing a child but she knew loss well enough.
Barb waved a hot pad at her. "It was a long time ago. I struggled with my sister Lorraine's passing but Warren coming home and moving into the house helped. It brought a new life and new feeling to the whole place. He didn't change a lot but it was enough."
"I didn't know..." The other woman's revelation made sense of all the little things Jolie had noticed. like the little homey features of the house that didn't add up to Warren's simple, militaristic personality. "How long ago?"
"Let's see, I'm terrible with time. It would be a little over four years now because it was right before Warren got out of the service. He came home for the funeral then had to go back for a while before he was done."
"What about his father?"
"His daddy died when Warren was eleven. He worked for the city and a drunk driver hit him while he was doing some road maintenance. It tore them both up for a long time."
Jolie sat in silence while she processed the load of information she'd just learned. She wasn't the only person in this world who knew dark tragedy or who walked the roads alone. Her heart ached for him. She knew the pain and wouldn't have wished it on anyone.
She looked at the small woman hovering above the stove and smiled. Warren had had family to help him through it; of that she had no doubt.
"My husband served with Warren." She blurted the words into the air. "He and Luke were in the same regiment. Luke re-upped before we met. We were going to wait to get married until he got out but he when he came home the last time he said he felt like he didn't want to waste a single minute more so off we went to the justice of the peace."
The other woman kept stirring and busying herself with small kitchen tasks as Jolie unburdened herself.
"We only had a few months to go. We were Skyping every few days and making plans for the house and our future....." She could feel it building in her chest. The anxiety and the pressure that always threatened to choke her when she thought about Luke's death. She focused on taking several slow even breaths around the soft ball lodged in her throat. Tears pricked the back of her eyes but she refused to cry in this warm cozy kitchen on this pleasant holiday.
"And then they drove over a roadside bomb." She ended abruptly and picked up the class of cider draining it in one long pull. If Barb had approached her, if she had tried to hug her Jolie was sure she would have crumbled but the other woman must have known that.
"Honey I'm going to start putting this food on the table. Could you go tell the heathens to come feed their faces?"
Jolie took a deep cleansing breath and blinked a few times to clear herself of the emotions and thoughts she'd been submerged in.
"Oh, yeah. I can do that."
"Thanks honey." Barb patted her shoulder as she brushed by with a large green striped bowl in her arms.
Jolie poured a little more cider in her glass before exiting out into the living room full of people to make her announcement. She saw Warren hanging back as the others filed into the dining room. He was wearing a dark gray henley that was almost tight on his well formed body and dark jeans. He approached and shook a glass at her but she declined his offer; she already felt a little tipsy.
Jolie studied his face in the light of all she knew about him now and found him even more handsome than before. Her face reddened and she stared at her feet when he paid her a compliment in calling her beautiful. Before she could do something embarrassing they turned and moved toward the dining room.
Her face flamed again and she caught her breath when he placed his hand in the center of her back to guide her. Note to self: no more booze cuz I'm a tipsy floozy.
She took her chair between Warren and Caleb's date Renee who turned out to be a nutrition specialist at the new health food mart that had recently opened. She tried to juggle multiple conversations in between bites of delicious food.
"This is really wonderful Barb." She directed toward her slight hostess. Barb acknowledged with a smile and a wave from down the table.
She and Renee were the unknown elements so they got asked the most questions. She didn't mind. She told them tales of the things she'd seen on the back of her bike in the last year and funny anecdotes from her days as a dispatcher. She was rewarded with embarrassing accounts of Warren and the boy's childhood.
"Warren was always the brains behind the project." His Uncle Hal explained. "I could count on one of my boys being caught red handed but when the story settled out it was always Warren's idea in the first place."
"Hey! I took my licks along with them."
"Yes you did and then you held your own when they came after you later too." Hal laughed until he coughed and Barb slapped him on the back. "You thought I didn't know but I did. I figured that was just how cousins were and since you held up, I didn't interfere."
"Sheesh!" Warren tried to look affronted but failed. "Good thing I was smart and stealthy!"
"He never let us catch him while we were together." Beau explained to a smiling Jolie who was enjoying the familial banter. "He knew he could take me or Tommy alone but not together."
"I just stopped trying and let Beau handle it. I wasn't dumb." Tommy had a smug smile on his face.
"And Beau thought you were handling it. So I was free and clear." Warren nudged Jolie with his elbow to join in on his glee at the look the revelation had produced on the brother's faces.
"I knew!" Caleb announced. "I knew his game but as long as I was safe I didn't care."
"Caleb was out chasing the ladies at an early age and bloody noses and bruises just weren't his thing." Tommy teased his younger sibling.
"What can I say; I'm not a fan of pain." Caleb agreed while buttering a role. Renee leaned in a little toward her date. Jolie heard a hushed reprimand at the ingestion of so much butter and alcohol. Caleb simply kissed her on the nose and picked up his glass of wine to follow his bite of roll.
*************
It was late, after midnight, when Warren and Jolie finally broke loose under the excuse that they both had to work the next day. In the dark cold of the cab Warren thought about how comfortable the day had been. Once everyone had gotten their ribbing in they'd settled down and accepted Jolie like she'd always been there. For the most part Jolie had seemed to really enjoy herself as well.
The woman in question was now leaned back into the passenger seat staring out at the wintery landscape.
"Good day?" He couldn't help but ask.
She turned those hazel eyes and dreamy smile his way. "The best. Thank you."
"It was all you. My family loved you. We were the lucky ones." Warren nosed the pickup into the garage and turned it off. They sat in the silence of the ticking pickup for a moment.
"Jolie?"
Hmmm?" She responded as she languidly gathered her bag and a few things from around her.
"What happened last night?"
She froze in her movements. "What do you mean?"
"We were getting along fine and then something happened. You froze up and hid from me until it was time to go to Aunt Barb's. Did I say or do something?"
"No. It was all me. It was stupid and nothing you should worry about." She tried to hustle out of the pickup but he stopped her with a soft hand on her arm.
"Please talk to me?"
He could feel her muscles tense beneath his hand and he could almost hear the war battling within her.
"I saw your tattoo. Same symbol, same place as Luke's and I just flipped out a little. There I was thinking things I should not be thinking and then there it was. I just......" Her hair blocked her face from him. He wished he could brush it out of the way. "Like I said stupid and not worth further discussion."
"It's not stupid. Grieving someone you love is not stupid. Trying not to think about him or to block those thoughts isn't healthy and it isn't going to help. You just have to let yourself feel what you feel and work your way through those moments." Of its own accord his thumb made small circles on the back of her hand.
"I can't. It will tear me apart, I can't handle it." She was almost inaudible but he was tuned in so closely that he heard her.
"You need to give yourself more credit. The woman I know, the woman I saw today, she is strong. It will hurt, but I don't think it will tear you apart." A tear dropped and soaked into her jeans. "If all else fails, I have Duct tape and super glue."
This shocked a raw hiccupping laugh from her. "I'm always here."
She nodded without looking at him and swiftly opened the door. She was in the house and hidden away in her room before Warren got himself inside. He stared for a moment at her closed door and prayed he'd made the right choice. It was a gamble pushing her. Warren hoped it would work toward her healing and not drive her away. He cared about her too much already to lose her so soon.