A Marriage Left Behind novel · Chapter 13 of 24
Chapter 13: Her Old Room
The lodge came out of the pines at ten, with smoke already going up from the chimney.
I had seen it seven times and never from the front seat with nothing to carry.
Brady's father stood by the woodshed in his barn coat, waiting.
He didn't wave.
He walked to my car as I parked and opened my door for me, which he had never done.
"She's at church until noon," he said. "Decorating the altar."
"Then why the text?"
"Because I wanted you to see what I've seen."
He led me around the side of the lodge, through the mudroom, and into the little bedroom off the kitchen.
It was my room.
I had slept in it seven Christmas Eves, on a narrow bed with a quilt that smelled of cedar.
There was a rolling suitcase open on the quilt now.
A man's gray cardigan hung on the closet door, and two pairs of reading glasses sat on the nightstand.
On the door outside, I saw, someone had hung a small chalkboard that said Welcome Mr. and Mrs.
"Church friends," said Brady's father. "Four couples this year. They're paying for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, same as the guests the rest of the winter."
"They're in my room."
"She moved your things into the cellar. They're in a box by the furnace."
I stood in the doorway of a bedroom that was suddenly not mine.
"You knew," I said.
"I've known for years."
"And you let me sleep on that bed."
"I let you sleep on that bed," he agreed. "That's what I want to talk about, but not here."
He took a heavy cloth-bound book from a shelf by the door and put it in my hands.
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