I pushed the hopeless case aside as best as I could and focused on Pa’s grinning face at the front of the church. Even that was impossible with the familiar blond head a few pews ahead of me.

Months had gone by with no sign of Vance Archer Cumberland, as if the years before had only been a figment of my imagination, but today he’d suddenly appeared. He was the same yet much different. Familiar yet a stranger.

Before I could look away, he glanced over his shoulder and caught me staring. Instead of offering me the typical dimpled, lopsided grin, Vance frowned. The ever-present sparkle in his grass-green eyes was absent.

I shook my head and glared a warning. Not today. He shook his head too but with resignation. He was too handsome to look so sad and I wanted to live in a world where I was allowed to make him happy, but it didn’t matter anymore. There was no point in wasting his or my time on what could never be.

I broke our gaze first and focused on anything else but him and the dang ache searing against my breastbone —Charlotte’s hot-pink jelly shoes, Pixy oinking and bumping into my leg, feeding Knox and Nash a snack, hushing Peg’s grumblings . . .

Pa concluded the service much like he began it. At the untuned piano, he played that thing like he was Jerry Lee Lewis. Shoulders shaking, long legs bouncing to the beat, singing a lively version of “Just Over in the Glory Land.”

Afterwards, I instructed Charlotte to take the younger twins to the house. “I’ll be there shortly. Just fix some eggs and toast for lunch.”

Charlotte fiddled with the end of her long, dark braid while glancing at Vance, who remained sitting in his pew. “You sure?”

“Yes.” I handed her the empty cracker wrapper and my Bible. Dusting my palms against my pants, I took a few steps forward and joined Vance on his pew. Staring forward as the door closed and blocked out the socializing in the small yard, we said nothing. I’d come to the conclusion there was nothing else to say, but his sudden appearance today said otherwise.

“I see you’re still wearing those corduroy pants and hippie sandals,” he commented.

The collar of my white V-neck T-shirt slipped off my shoulder when I shrugged. I pulled it back into place. “You popped up out of nowhere today just to poke fun at my outfit?”

“I’ve always loved your seventies style, Austin.” Vance angled in my direction and draped an arm behind me along the top of the pew. His boyish face now held more sharp angles and a shadow of facial hair. The once-wild, unruly blond curls had been tamed with a close haircut and styling product. In his blue suit, Vance looked like the CEO of Cumberland Finance that he would eventually become.