Meant To Be Read online

  Ted slapped his knee and nodded. “You know what, Esther. You’re right. We’re lucky you came along when you did.” He ignored Megan’s gasp. “I do want to make a good home and I can’t think of anyone better to do that with than Megan. Now, if you don’t mind, I think I’ll take her shopping so she can pick out a new…” Good grief. What did women buy when they shopped? He shrugged. “I’ll let her decide when we get to the general store.”

  Esther smiled. “Good for you, Ted. That is a good way to start this marriage off on the right foot.”

  One look at Megan’s rigid body told him that she wasn’t at all happy with the outcome of this conversation. “I saw a toy train you might want to buy,” he said, hoping she’d read into his code.

  Fortunately, she did. Jumping up from the chair, she hurried to the door. “Yes. I do want to get that train.”

  Esther frowned. “What is so important about a toy train?”

  “It’s a wedding gift,” he lied. “I thought it might be nice since we met on the train.” Okay, so that was a half-truth.

  Esther’s frown turned back into a smile. “When you return, we’ll have lunch and then you can get some food from the general store. Then we’ll take you home. We’ll have to get you two a wagon and a horse. That way, you can have transportation. Actually, we might be able to get you set up before you go home.”

  Even if Esther had her quirks, her heart was in the right place. Ted simply thanked her and joined Megan who was already on the porch, looking as if she were ready to run all the way to the train station. After they made it down the porch steps and to the sidewalk, he breathed a sigh of relief. They were almost home.

  “Do you remember the train number we were on?” he asked.

  Megan stared straight ahead, her cheeks still flushed with anger, but she managed a curt “Yes” before she looked both ways and then crossed the street.

  He followed her, careful to avoid the horse droppings that littered the dusty streets. He reached the sidewalk. “Meg, come on. Give me a break.”

  She whirled around to face him.

  He bumped into her before he had time to stop.

  “You enjoyed that back there, didn’t you?” she asked, her hands on her hips.

  “I just told Esther what she wanted to hear so that we could get out of there.”

  “And it seems to me you didn’t have any trouble doing that.”

  Sighing, he relented. “I thought she had some good things to say.”

  “Of course you did. After all, what am I but a slave to do your bidding?”

  “She didn’t tell you to be a slave.” He grabbed her arm to stop her as she took a step away from him. “Look, all she did was point out that marriage is a win-win situation if both parties work together. It’s like any relationship. If you divide up the workload, it works.”

  “Hmm…My part has me sweating in the kitchen, cooking and doing laundry and making sure the house is all sparkling clean. Then I’m supposed to put on a smile and act like I’m happy to see you.”

  “I don’t know what your problem is. I’m the one who’s been cooking.”

  She jerked her arm away from him. “And then you denied it in front of the guys.”

  “You bet I did. Do you have any idea how embarrassing that was for me when you told them I made the cobbler?”

  “I don’t understand why it was a big deal. No one thinks anything of a man cooking.”

  “Not in the future. But here in the past? Megan, this is not the 21st century. There are things men and women do, and men don’t cook.”

  “I bet there are some that do,” she replied, the fire still burning in her eyes.

  Oh, for goodness’ sakes. This woman was on a crusade, and she wasn’t going to give up until he admitted defeat. He considered relenting until he examined the tight line on her lips, her furrowed eyebrows, and her flaring nostrils. Fine. He could meet her challenge.

  “If other men are cooking, their wives know better than to yap it all over town,” he retorted. “You humiliated me in front of the men I work with.”

  “Worked.” She pointed her finger at him. “That’s past tense.”

  He shoved her hand aside. “Don’t point your finger at me.”

  “I’ll do anything I want to.” She pointed it at him again. “You don’t own me.”

  “I do while we’re in the past, honey. I’m your husband, remember? I’ve had all I can take of this.” He grabbed her hand and led her down the sidewalk. “What you fail to realize is that it doesn’t matter whether or not I cooked. It was my last night here and I wanted to enjoy it.”

  “And did you?” she sarcastically asked as she struggled to keep up with him.

  “No, not really.” How could he fully enjoy himself at a barn dance without a woman to dance with?

  “Well, like you said, it doesn’t matter because you’ll never have to see them again.”

  Her nonchalant attitude bothered him. He stopped and turned to her. “You don’t get it. That was the only time we had to go to a barn dance and you ruined it for me.”

  She shrugged, as if she didn’t care. “Don’t act surprised. My fiancé dumped me because I was difficult.”

  Ouch. He winced. He recalled saying those words to her in the heat of anger, but he hadn’t realized how much they must’ve hurt until she repeated them to him. “I’m sorry I said that.”

  A moment past and her face softened. “And I’m sorry I told the men you made the cobbler, though I honestly didn’t think I’d embarrass you.”

  His hold on her hand relaxed. “Thanks.”

  “I’ll be glad to get back home, won’t you?”

  He glanced around, noting the houses that lined the streets, the horses pulling buggies and wagons, the children playing in the yards and the people stopping to talk. It was hard to believe they’d arrived here last week. For some reason, he felt as if he’d always been here, as if this was where he was meant to be. “I don’t know. I kind of like it here.”

  She grimaced. “Speak for yourself.”

  “I thought I was.”

  Her lips curved up. “Touché.”

  Dragging his attention from his surroundings, he faced her. “Where do you live?”

  She blinked. “What?”

  “In the future. Where do you live?”

  “Indianapolis.”

  “I’m not too far from you. I’m in Minneapolis.”

  “I notice those cities rhyme.”

  Still holding her hand, he led her in a leisurely stroll. “Do you have an email address?”

  “Who doesn’t?”

  “Well, will you tell me what it is?”

  She glanced at him, her expression full of curiosity. “Why?”

  “Do I have to spell it out for you?” This was hard enough without having to be obvious. When she didn’t respond, he hedged, “I want to keep in touch. It’s not every day I get stranded in the past with a woman and then have to marry her. I thought it might be fun to laugh about this after we get back.”

  “I guess that’d be okay.”

  He didn’t know how to take that. She didn’t seem excited by the prospect. Then again, maybe she didn’t feel the same way he did. It was hard to explain but he thought they made a good match. Why, he wasn’t sure. She was nothing like him. He’d never go up to a group of people and demand they do something or bang the bars of a jail cell to get the marshal’s attention. But at least she saw something she considered to be an injustice and did something about it. He had to admire her for her ability to speak up, especially when no one ran to her defense.

  They reached the train station and he let go of her hand so he could dig into his back pocket and pull out the money Ray had given him. Once he paid for their train tickets, they sat on a wooden bench and waited for the train to arrive.

  She glanced over her shoulder and whispered, “Remember that newspaper guy who got us in jail?”

  Ted nodded.

  “He’s staring at us.”
>
  He turned to look at the bald man but she yanked on his shirt sleeve. “Don’t look.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I don’t want him to know we’re talking about him.”

  “Maybe if I stare back, he’ll mind his own business.”

  “No,” she protested, settling her back against the bench, the side of her body pressing nicely against his. “It doesn’t matter. I just want to get out of here. Do you think we should stand in the middle of the aisle where we were when we traveled here?”

  “That’s the most logical thing to do.”

  “Then we’ll do that.”

  The train arrived and as soon as the conductor called for people to board, they did.

  “Did you bring any luggage with you?” the conductor asked as tore their tickets in half.

  “Oh,” Ted began, trying to think of a good excuse.

  “We’re not going that far,” Megan filled in.

  He silently thanked her for her quick thinking.

  Since the train was heading east, they sat down and waited until the train was about to reach the point where the time travel happened. They stood up in the aisle, ignoring the questioning looks from the other passengers. The good thing was that Megan was fully dressed this time, so she didn’t have men leering at her.

  As the train continued down the track and they held onto the seats to steady their balance, he waited for them to be transported to the Amtrak they’d been riding a week before. But it never happened. They waited for another ten minutes. Nothing. They remained in the same train, stuck in the past, still attracting the same strange looks from several passengers, though most of them had turned to something else. They returned to their seats.

  He peered out the window, wondering what went wrong.

  “Hey,” she started, placing her hand on his arm, “maybe we were supposed to be going west toward Fargo, instead of east.”

  He turned to her in interest. “That is the direction we were heading when it happened. Okay. Let’s try it.”

  And so they did. But it didn’t work. As they got off the train in Fargo, Ted actually experienced an odd sense of relief.

  Megan, however, wasn’t happy at all with the turn of events. She slumped forward on the bench and put her head in her hands.

  Sitting next to her, he rubbed her back and leaned close to her. “We’ll figure it out.”

  “I don’t want to be stranded here.” Her voice cracked, and he realized she was crying.

  “It’s not that bad.” When she didn’t respond, he softly asked, “Is it?”

  “I don’t like it here.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I don’t want to be who others want me to be.”

  “Then don’t.”

  She didn’t respond.

  He sighed, wishing there was something he could say to ease her mind. Unable to think of anything, he continued to rub her back. He didn’t understand why their trip back to the future didn’t work. Then he recalled that they had been thrown together. Someone had run into them. It all happened so fast that he wouldn’t recognize who’d run into them. But that didn’t matter. It wasn’t like he had to worry about the man who’d plowed into them. And it wasn’t like that man had anything to do with their time travel. Whatever it was, it had to be an abnormality in the space-time continuum.

  When she sat up, wiping the tears from her cheeks, he asked, “Do you feel better?”

  “No. But I guess we’re stuck here, whether we like it or not.”

  She stood up, looking as if she’d been sentenced to a lifetime of misery. Considering that this meant they’d have to stay married, he wondered if he was part of the reason she was depressed. He decided not to dwell on that.

  “We’d better shop for groceries,” she glumly said. “But I’m not cooking. I don’t care what Esther says. I’m no good in the kitchen and I never will be.”

  “I’ll cook,” he assured her as he stood next to her. “And it’ll be our secret.”

  She nodded and they left the train station.

  ***

  Two weeks later, Esther threw a lid on top of the flames of a burning skillet. Miriam rushed to the cupboard and grabbed a container of baking soda. Opening the lid, she threw the baking soda at the curtains that had caught fire as well. Once the small grease fire was out, Esther placed her hand over her heart and stumbled to the kitchen chair. She sat down and gasped for air.

  Megan, too stunned to speak, simply stood to the side of the cookstove, holding the spatula tightly in her hand.

  Shooting a sympathetic look at Megan, Miriam grabbed a cup of water and gave it to Esther to drink.

  Esther gulped the water and set the cup on the table, her hands trembling. “I give up. I can’t do it.”

  Miriam hurried to Megan and took the spatula and set it in the sink. “Come on. Sit.”

  “That’s a good idea. Get her far away from the cookstove,” Esther agreed, waving them over.

  Megan finally found her voice. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to start another fire.” She sat across from Esther and placed her hands in her lap. She never knew fire could spread so fast. “I tried to watch the skillet this time.”

  “It’s not your fault,” Esther quickly assured her. “You aren’t meant to cook. It’s not what God wants, and I’m tired of fighting Him. I should have known the night you made us sick from your first meal that it wasn’t going to work out. I’m not going to be bullheaded anymore. Ted will have to cook for now on. We just won’t tell anyone.”

  “Yes, that’s probably best.”

  Ted actually seemed to enjoy it, and he was good. Despite Megan’s failures, she thought it was sweet that Esther had spent a good two weeks faithfully coming out to instruct her. Megan tried to succeed, but no matter what she did, something went wrong.

  “At least you can do laundry and clean the house,” Miriam said, smiling in her usual cheerful fashion.

  Megan nodded.

  Esther took a deep breath and slowly exhaled. “We’ll just have to convince Ted that you can do other things to be a good wife. Cleaning and laundry are admirable.” She tapped her fingers on the table. “I know! We’ll teach you how to sew!”

  “Sew?” Megan dumbly asked. The woman couldn’t be serious. She’d never even sewed a button on a shirt, let alone sew clothes.

  “That could be your hidden talent.”

  “No, it’s not.”

  “Have you tried it?”

  “No.”

  Miriam’s jaw dropped. “You’ve never sewn anything?”

  “I haven’t had a need to,” Megan answered, wondering why it was such a big deal. Did all women in 1898 have to make clothes? Weren’t there enough clothes in the mercantile to relieve women of that burden? Really, there seemed to be enough catalogues in that place for people to order clothes.

  “Buying clothes can get expensive,” Miriam softly stated.

  “Just what exactly did your parents do?” Esther asked, leaning forward in interest.

  Megan shrugged. “My mother was a teacher and my father was a…” She paused and studied their curious expressions. She couldn’t exactly say x-ray technician, could she? Did they have those in this time period? She decided on something vague. “He worked for a doctor.”

  “Hmm,” Esther replied. “I wonder why your mother never taught you to cook or sew.”

  “And what was she doing teaching?” Miriam asked. “Did she quit once she married your father?”

  “No. She worked after she married him.”

  “Surely, she quit once you were born,” Miriam insisted, holding onto the back of the chair in front of her.

  “No. She worked the whole time I grew up.”

  Esther glanced at Miriam and shook her head, as if she couldn’t believe her ears. Megan couldn’t understand why the women found this news so shocking. Surely, there were women who worked in this time period.

  Miriam pulled out the chair and sat down. She took Megan’s hands
in hers and gave a gentle squeeze. “Who cooked and cleaned and sewed clothes for you while you grew up?”

  “My parents. Well, no one sewed,” Megan explained.

  “They must have had someone in your town who did those things,” Esther said, quick to make a judgment.

  Megan realized that it was easier to let Esther fill in the blanks so she didn’t have to be grilled anymore. It was rough to keep explaining her life to these women. If she wasn’t careful, she’d end up slipping and reveal the future to them.

  “We’re here to help you,” Miriam said. “Don’t be shy about asking for help.”

  “Okay,” Megan agreed, knowing what was coming next.

  Esther stood up and picked up her purse. “We need to make a trip into town to gather some sewing supplies.” She glanced at the cookstove. “We’ll also pick up another skillet.” Her gaze drifted up to the half-burned curtains. “Our first project will be making curtains.”

  Mindful of her duty to humor the women, Megan joined them to the front door. She motioned for the dog to go outside. She refused to let Buddy stay in the house while she wasn’t there to make sure he didn’t use her clean floors as a toilet. Buddy obeyed and she patted him on the head before joining the women in the wagon to go to town.

  Chapter Ten

  Cole was exhausted. In his escape from Blake, he’d lost track of where he was and ended up walking along the flat prairie for days. He wasn’t sure how much time passed. The days and nights blended together as he traveled the uninhabited land. He drank rain water and managed to kill a couple of prairie dogs to eat. The grassy land became his bed. The howls of the coyotes no longer woke him at night. The wind cooled the heat from the May sun. His skin was already sunburned, and more often than not, the thirst bothered him much more than his blistering feet and aching legs. But still, he pressed on, knowing that he had to find that chip. The only saving grace he had was the time travel device which showed him the way to Fargo. As long as he traveled the path, he’d get to his destination.

  Another night and day passed without any rain, and the prairie dogs did little to alleviate his nagging thirst. At the end of the next day, he collapsed.