Page 6 of Finding Her Heart
It was hard not to stay in the barn with the mother and newborn calf, but it was already late, and the morning sun would come too early with the demands of living alone on the farm. She rushed through her evening routine and wash, feeling the pressure of responsibilities starting to mount.
Dried in the sun, stored with mint and river green, her sheets smelled like the clean shores of the Peace River, a smell she found comfort in since she was sixteen. Fresh this morning, this set of tightly-woven linens gave her a satisfied feeling, filling her head with scent and memories, sun-crisp against her skin. Warmed by the heat of the room below it, her bed sat in the loft, tucked above the iron stove. She had been sleeping naked for months now, after shucking her gown and woolens on a humid, too warm night. The decadence of nudity made her feel wicked. In a good way.
"Annabell Roe, what have you done?" her mother's voice complained. Mark's ghost stood at her shoulder in disapproval.
Annabell ignored them both. She longed to be touched. To be loved. Her husband was gone. And her mother's nagging was silenced with sweeter thoughts.
There was no one to see.
No one to see when her hands wandered over the skin of her thighs. Using the pungent, clover-scented mixture Mark used on the animals on sores kept her from forming calluses. The smell wasn't nice, somewhere between wet hay and rancid fat, but smoothing the sticky stuff all over after washing gave her the skin of a girl rather than that of a farmhand.
She missed the hope of touching.
Mark never wanted much touching. The memory of his grimace was etched in her mind. Once considered passably attractive, his constant rejection showed her the truth of things. She was plain and needy, not worth his time. The farm required his attention.
Discovering after her marriage ceremony that she could not please him, his desire to save her from herself and get a child from the deal, had hurt. Every day the silence of his absent-minded condemnation carved grooves into her heart.
Hands crossed over her chest, she breathed deep. The night was quiet, her heartbeat loud. Not everyone thought her not good enough or feared her curse.
Opening her palm over the swell of her chest, Annabell felt the emptiness in her breast. Mark never touched her there. No one had. She squeezed the weight, full of unanswered questions. Would other hands feel different? Would her nipple tighten under male fingers? Would it feel forbidden or delicious? Would she like it?
Her brothers talked about women's breasts and bottoms all the time when they thought their little sister wasn't listening. She made a point of trying to listen. It was the only information they passed to her about men and women. Good thing she lived on a working farm and could figure out some things for herself. Because her brothers didn't talk to her.
Breathing deep, she took in the smell of her sheets. Remembered the sun on her skin and being young. So young. Remembered the world when she still had hope. Her fingers moved, counted her ribs, smoothed over her belly to her thighs. Deeper.
She was a woman, and she was alive.
Chapter 2
Smells Like Woe
There was no help for it. She was going to have to go to town. The supply list was as long as her arm.
"Needs must. Why do you dawdle so, Annabell Roe?"Mama admonished from the back of Annabell's mind. Her voice was always there, reminding Annabell to be proper and patient—tidy and quiet.
"I'm not dawdling," Annabell said to the empty family room.
She pulled out a chair to sit and tie the laces on her favorite pair of her boots, running her finger over the slot in the heel. Tucked inside, sat a packet of hidden homemade matches her father taught her to make before he died. She'd never used them-doubted she ever would. But Papa said light and fire were essential for survival. The stockings were old, the red stitched boots were her favorite, and those matches felt like a legacy, a gift her father left her with.
"Dawdling and distracted. Look at this frock! What will the neighbors think when they see you?"
"They would as soon spit at me as look at me, Mama." With no one around to see or care, Annabell let herself fall into the habit of answering Mama’s voice in her head out loud. Now she did it without thinking.
Mama's memory floated in a misty haze. A missed one. Annabell could no longer remember the exact color of her eyes in the sun or feel the warmth of a good night forehead kiss. But Mama's words and way of speaking were embedded in Annabell's head. The last threads of the past, a connection to her father and the days before the Curse of Woe.
The hardest thing about living alone was the silence. No footsteps. No humming. No grunting. No arguing. No sounds of conversation or arguments. No signs of life.
Her six brothers had made constant noise.
Marriage sounded quieter.
Alone for two years, there was no partner to care for, cook for, lay down for. There was no heartbeat filling up the empty spaces, adding warmth to a bed, making sure there were no left-over meal scraps going to waste. Mark had not been a talker, but he'd been fully alive until the sick took him—his presence changed the atmosphere of a room from empty to filled just as good as any.
"It is only quiet because you are hiding under your bed. Time to brush yourself off and face the consequences. I have a wooden spoon all ready."
"No wooden spoon for me. I have to get to town and catch Kejere before he's too busy with that fine, perfect family of his. My brother married before me, with no grandchild for you. Why don't you complain about that for a change, Mama? Kejere's Lurann hasn't done her duty." Annabell argued in her head. Even in the quiet of her own home, she could not do right and her brothers and their wives could do no wrong.
"Lurann is cream and you are my daughter,"Mama's ghost reminded her.
