The Coach House by Florence Osmund Page B

may have known that the first minute I ever laid eyes on you.”
    “I love you, too.”
    The morning air was crisp and cold as it rushed Marie’s face when she went outside to check on Richard’s progress. His back toward her, he busily shoveled the sidewalk. She picked up snow in both hands and molded it into a small hard ball. THWACK! Her aim was better than she thought it would be.
    Richard slowly straightened up, his back still towards her. THWACK! This one came from another direction. THWACK! THWACK! Two more hit him. Marie took a few steps forward to see where they were coming from.
    Two small boys stood in the next-door neighbor’s yard laughing hysterically. Richard dropped his shovel and reached down for a handful of snow. “Run!” yelled one of the boys.
    “Come here you little varmints,” Richard shouted, running into the neighbor’s side yard. “I’ll get you for that!”
    Pretty soon the two boys came round the front of their house shouting singsong taunts, egging Richard on for more childish horseplay. “Nah, nah. You can’t get us. We can run faster than you!”
    The smaller child couldn’t keep up with his older brother. The poor kid had on so many layers of clothes, he could hardly run at all. Richard caught up with him, picked him up, and swung him around. “Ha! I caught you, you little imp, and now you’re going to pay!”
    “I didn’t hit you, my brother did,” the small boy pleaded. The two of them tumbled into the snow. It didn’t take long for the other boy to pounce on top of them. Marie watched Richard interact with the children. It was hard not to smile. It was hard not to imagine what life could be like living with this man, raising children with him, growing old together.
    Marie had formulated her fantasy family early in her childhood when she dreamed what it would be like to have siblings. She still had the dream, but now her wish to have siblings was replaced with the hope to have children, and she couldn’t think of anyone she would rather do it with more than the man playing in the snow.
    Richard broke away from the boys and interrupted Marie’s thoughts. “You started this, you know.” Each boy clung on to one of his arms.
    “Yes, I know. Isn’t it fun?” She walked closer to where they were playing and flung the snowball she had hidden behind her back at him. It hit him squarely on the forehead and slowly dripped down his face. The boys roared with laughter.
    “You’re going to get it now!” the older boy shouted at her.
    Richard stood there expressionless as he licked the melted snow that slowly ran down to his mouth. He squinted and pursed his lips. “Love you,” he mouthed.
    “You better stop fooling around.” Marie pointed to the section of sidewalk that was still covered in a foot of snow. “You’ve still got a lot of work to do!” With that she retreated to his apartment.
    They went to the Christmas church service and then drove home in silence, she thinking about whether she was ready to marry him and afraid he was already mentally planning the event. That evening they sat slightly apart on the sofa while dinner was cooking. Marie looked through the window at the snow falling. The flakes were larger and falling more slowly than earlier.
    “Penny for your thoughts?” he asked.
    She smiled as she searched for the right words. “I was thinking about something you said last night.”
    “What’s that?”
    “You were about to tell me that you haven’t felt this way in a long time, and then you changed it to you’ve never felt this way before.”
    “I meant it.”
    “You’ve never been in love before?”
    “Not like this.”
    “What makes this different?”
    He straightened his posture. “I’m twenty-five-years-old, Marie. I’ve dated a lot of girls, and I’m here to tell you that I thought I loved just about every one of them.” She closely watched his expression change. “And then, without fail, something would go wrong. It could have