Plain Fear: Forgiven: A Novel by Leanna Ellis Page A

something for you. Wanna read it?”
    He huffed out a breath. What did this Wagler girl want from him? To torture him more because he couldn’t read as well as the rest of the kids his age? “Why would I wanna do that?”
    She gave him a slow, steady look, and he threw the rock as hard and as far as he could. But it broke apart midair and made tiny plops in the creek.
    “I’ll read it to you if you want.”
    “I don’t want.”
    “But I wrote it for you.”
    He scooped up another rock and tossed it impatiently. “I reckon then, go ahead. If you have to.”
    She studied the paper, her lips moving over the words as she read silently, then she gave a tiny nod. “Okay, here it goes. Words are like seeds. They help you to read. Plant them deep in your head, and you’ll be well read. ” She raised those soft brown eyes toward him. “Was it dumb?”
    “Nah, it wasn’t too bad. You really wrote that?”
    She nodded. Then she tore out the page and held it out to him. “You can keep it.”
    With a scowl, he snatched it from her, folded it, and stuck it in his hip pocket.
    “You can learn to read.”
    He hurled the rock, and it crossed the creek and landed on the other side. “What if I can’t?”
    “Then we’ll just have to try harder.”
    Samuel leaned on the feed barrel, fond memories of sitting beside Hallelujah Creek on warm afternoons swimming around in his thoughts. That Wagler girl had helped him stumble through the fourth and fifth grade readers. She never laughed at him, never grew frustrated. And finally, he’d made progress.
    It had been a long while since he’d thought of those relaxing days, and remembering soothed a ruffled part of his soul. He set the book back on the shelf for when he had more time, finished feeding the livestock, and gathered eggs in the henhouse. He hoped breakfast was ready because he was starving.
    With the sun’s rays turning the horizon pink, Samuel carried the plastic bucket of eggs toward the house. No frost this morning, so maybe winter was finally behind them. But the influx of warmer air had brought wisps of fog that swirled and hovered over the fields. Pale light shone around the green shades in the windows along the side of the house where the kitchen was located. His stomach was already rumbling.
    He barreled through the side door, leading into the kitchen, and nearly mowed over someone standing in his way. His arms came around the slight form. The bucket swayed precariously, and he joggled around, holding on to what he now realized was a girl, as if they were dancing, but he simply tried to keep them from falling splat onto the floor and scrambling the eggs.
    “My goodness, Samuel,” Hannah said, laughing as she stirred something on the stove. “You must be awful hungry to be in such a hurry.”
    Samuel grinned, then looked down apologetically at the girl…woman, whose brown eyes instantly transported him back to another time, another season. Those upturned, solemn eyes had once upon a time captured his attention.
    Naomi’s face brightened with embarrassment. Once he was sure she wasn’t going to go sprawling across the floor, he released her and backed away, rubbing his damp palms on the back of his trousers. With her face scrubbed as clean as summer-dried linens, she looked far younger than someone like Andi. Back at Miller’s schoolhouse, she had captured his interest, and he had quietly (without anyone knowing) gone to see her in the middle of the night once they were of running around age. She was like a still water, quiet and reserved, but thoughts and truths ran through her like a deep undercurrent.
    “Samuel,” Hannah interrupted his thoughts, as she clinked a spoon against a pan, “do you remember Naomi?”
    He cleared his throat to dispel the emotional congestion. “Sure. Sure do. Yes.” But she was no longer the girl fixated in his mind from memory. She was a woman full grown. “It’s good…I mean, fine to…uh, see you again.”
    She gave a