Page 9 of My Heart Will Find You

When Etta woke up, her mind was fuzzy, unclear. It made no sense, but she seemed to be standing in a church. It was crudely built, looking like it had been slapped together in a weekend. There were rough pews to her right. When she had trouble turning her head, she realized that she wasn’t fully awake, so she must be dreaming. There was something very tight around her middle. The bed covers?

She heard a voice she recognized and looked toward it. It was her father! He had on an old-fashioned dark suit with a black string tie. With her gone, had he started doing cosplay? He should have let her get the suit cleaned. It was wrinkled and dirty.

He was angrily glaring at Etta, not something he’d ever done before. “Do you or not?” he snapped.

“Do I what?” she asked. “I do think—”

“Those are the words,” he said. “You’re married. Now get out of here.” He turned and walked away.

Bewildered, Etta watched him leave.Married? What does that mean?When someone took her left hand, she was startled, and looked down at it. A male hand was slipping a gold ring onto her finger. It seemed to go on very slowly.I bet Henry’s questions about why I’m not married made me dream this, she thought.

When the ring was on, she looked up into the dark eyes of a gorgeous man. NotVoguepretty, but rugged. Unshaved whiskers, square jaw, skin that showed he’d never used sunscreen. The hand holding hers was as rough as sandpaper, the palm one big callus. He too was wearing an old-fashioned suit.

“Congratulations, boss,” said a man to the side. He was smaller, and he smelled like sweat and horses. Like her father, he was doing cosplay and wearing clothes from a Hollywood Western.

This dream is certainly realistic!

The taller man, the “boss,” her so-called “husband,” moved away from her. Three men, smelly and dirty, surrounded him. They were laughing and congratulating him as they took turns signing a piece of paper on a little table.

The boss stepped back, looked at Etta, and held up a pen. It was steel, and there was a bottle of ink she was to dip it into. “What? No rollerball?” she asked.

The four men stared at her in silent confusion.

I certainly dream authentically, she thought. When she took a step forward, she almost fell.

Heaven help her, but she had on a skirt that nearly touched the floor. How was she supposed to walk in the thing? The men were watching her, so she grabbed the front and walked with all the grace she could muster.

She made it to the table. The paper said Marriage License at the top. Henrietta Lily Wilmont to Maxwell James Lawton.

Etta started to refuse to sign, but it was a dream, so what did it matter?

She signed, then stepped back. “So now I’m a married woman?” She was beginning to think her dream was hilarious. She couldn’t wait to tell Henry. Her unconscious had combined his books and questions into the most vivid dream anyone had ever had.

“Too late to change your mind now,” one of the men said.

He really should take a shower, she thought.And who dreams with smells?

“You got the worst man,” the second one said to Etta. “He’ll put you to work at dawn. Won’t let up until the moon shines bright.”

“Then therealwork begins,” the third one said, and they all snickered like pubescent boys.

“Out!” the tall man ordered. “I want that fence repaired by sundown.”

The men backed toward the open door with leering grins on their dirty faces. “Just sundown, boss? I could last longer than that.”

“That’s not what Freida says.”

The three men fell into loud laugher, then scurried out the door as the man took a menacing step toward them.

“I apologize for them,” he said.

Etta just blinked at him. What an odd dream. She would have put money on it that if she’d made up a marriage dream, it would be with a man who was madly, passionately, insanely in love with her. Except for when this man put the ring on her finger, he’d stayed several feet away. And now he was looking at her as though sizing her up. There was certainly no love in his eyes. There wasn’t even familiarity. It was like he’d never met her before.

“Ready?” he asked as he picked up an old leather hat off a pew and put it on.

“Sure,” she said. She was gradually becoming more awake. Or more... She wasn’t sure “awake” was the right description for a dream. More aware of her surroundings.

When she again tripped, she looked down at what she was wearing. A long, heavy, dark skirt. The top was as tight as a sausage casing, but there was a little lace jacket over it. While the outfit was heavy and cumbersome, what was really awful was what she could feel under it. Only a corset could be that tight. Had someone used a tire iron to pull the laces together?

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