Chapter 6

© Copyright 2006 by Elizabeth Delayne

s the service ended, Dave stood. He waved absently at them.

“You guys wait around for a minute. I’ll be right back.”

“You think he’s going to get Noel?” Becca asked.

Carter watched Dave slip once again through the side doors. He glanced around the church. “I don’t know if she’s here.”

There would be time later for Dave to work out his differences with Noel, if it needed to be done. Maybe Carter had been expecting too much for it all to be tied in a neat bow around Christmas. For now, he was content to sit back with his family.

He needed them, he thought. He just needed his family.

“Why don’t we find a place to wait,” Pop’s said after awhile, motioning them out of the pew. Carter looked over and saw Gran wiping tears from her eyes.

He stood with Becca, and they filed out, with Charlie and Lee joining them, talking excitedly about the play, the props, the applause. Pop’s ushered them through the front door, and suggested they wait in a side room.

It happened so quickly that Carter had barely had the time to wonder why they were going to wait in a room.

The answers were inside.

Hanging on a rung with a collection of robes, were five tuxedos in different sizes–or four, one being a tailored dress in black.

A tux…one for him, one for Pops, one for each of the boys, and a dress for Becca.

Becca pointed at it.

“This is...that’s...wait, there is...Noel wanted...” she spun around as Dave stepped into the doorway. “This is like...”

“A wedding?” Dave asked as he finished buttoning the cuffs of the stiff formal shirt.

“You didn’t break up with Noel?”

Dave grinned and ran a hand over her head. “Break up with Noel? Where would you get an idea like that?”

She looked accusingly at Carter.

“You mean,” Carter said, finding his voice, “you’re getting married? Tonight?”

Dave chuckled. “Surprise.”

He grinned as Charlie and Lee both shouted out questions.

“Yes, you’re all in the wedding. We couldn’t leave you out. Noel and I wanted to surprise you–all of you. Now get dressed Carter, I want you to be my best man.”

“Really?”

“And Noel sent word. She wants to see you before the ceremony. We don’t have much time. We’re asking people to stick around if they can.”

“She’s here?”

Dave laughed. “She better be.”

Carter looked at Gran. “You knew about this. All of us having to take showers and everything, being especially clean. Everything. And you let me go through with it.”

Gran only reached up to gently cradle his cheek, her eyes sparkling with unshed tears. “I couldn’t stop you from being a hero. Now hurry up and get dressed. Noel’s waiting.”



There was a room of girls, including Noel’s mom and Gracie, with her when Carter stepped to the door. They were dressed in elegant black, with long, flowing skirts. When they saw him, they fell silent and slipped out of the room past Carter, leaving him to go into see Noel alone.

He felt Gracie’s hand on his arm as she stepped by him, but he didn’t turn to look.

He was captivated by Noel. She was radiant in her white dress. It wasn’t that he was attracted to her—he had always seen her as beautiful, but in that good kind of sister way.

And here she was, about to become his sister for real.

He could remember...well, probably not the first time he saw her, but the first time he was glad to see her or at least one of those times in the early days. Noel, just graduated from college, was already in the youth room talking to one of the girls. She turned as he walked into the room, and she smiled, so easily.

Just as she was now.

They always shared a close bond, long before Dave had finally asked her out.

She held out a hand to him. “You’re not mad at me, are you Carter?”

“Why would I be mad?”

“Because we set you up a little and made you think that Dave and I were breaking up.” As he took her hand, she shrugged. “You’ve been staying at home a lot lately, so we knew you’d be there when everyone else was gone on a shopping trip together. It wasn’t hard to guess you would want to know what was in the box. That’s been you since the day I met you.”

Carter shrugged sheepishly. “Hey. I’m an open book.”

“And that book’s been sad. It’s okay to be sad Carter.”

He looked away briefly, remembered the manger scene. The pit wasn’t as deep now as it had been before. He still hurt, but it was like … it was like he could breath again.

“I think I’m figuring that out. But why did you want me to think that you and Dave had broken up?”

“Because we were afraid you wouldn’t want to join in our happiness, that you wouldn’t want us to disrupt your family again. We wanted you to want the marriage. Not just to say you wanted it, but to know for yourself that you wanted it.

“Marriage isn’t easy, for anyone, and that frightens me. It frightens both Dave and I. It would be so much easier to start things on our own but that’s not the path we’ve been given in life. We’re committed to this marriage, but we’re also committed to this family, to you. We want you all to be committed to us as well.”

“But when you got into the car–you were crying.”

Her grip on his hand tightened, and she took a step closer, drawing his hand to her cheek. “Because you sang to me. You sang our song. It’s been so long since you’ve done that–and to see you open up, try to cheer me up–because of what I was making you think, when you were so sad it was too much. Do you realize, Carter how much I love you?”

He stared at her for a long time. The years of knowing her seemed to pass before his eyes. Her smile, her encouragement, her laughter. She’d been such a positive force in his life for so long, directing him toward better things, toward God.

“All I ever wanted, Noel, was for you to be my sister for real.”

“Then we’re okay?”

He grinned–what he knew she would think of as his Carter grin. Long ago, from the first days they'd known each other, she told him he had the smile of a pirate, that would one day charm the ladies. He doubted it, but it didn't stop him from hoping.

“We’re okay.”

And somehow, it was.


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