Echoes Page 0,121

going to do?” He knew how strongly she felt about her vocation, but it seemed wrong to him, it always had. She was too beautiful and loving a woman to hide in a convent for the rest of her life. But it was the life she'd said she wanted since they met.

“Do we have to decide that right now? I'm not sure if I've committed a terrible sin, or if this is what was meant to be. Maybe this is what God has in mind for me. Let's just see what happens, and pray about it for a while,” she said sensibly as he held her close to him. She had no idea where God would lead her, but she knew she had to explore this new path for now. It felt oddly right to her.

“If anything ever happens to you, Amélie, I'll die.”

“No, you won't. I'll just wait for you in Heaven, and we'll have a wonderful time when you arrive.” There were tears in her eyes, but she was so happy with him. She had never been as happy in her life. It was different than her love for the convent, but there was a definite sense of joy to this new life that she loved. For the first time in her life, she felt frivolous and young. For once, life didn't seem quite so serious, the tragedies all around them not quite as acute. This was what they both needed to counter the realities of their lives, at least for now.

“God, how I love you,” he said with a broad grin, as they sorted themselves out, suddenly giggling like schoolchildren, and he started the truck up again. He wanted to ask her to marry him, but he didn't want to ask for too much too soon. She had made a big step that night. And maybe she was right, if it was meant to be, the rest would come. All in good time. They didn't have to decide everything in one night. If he had anything to say about it, she was going to be his wife, and the mother of his children. He just hoped that God agreed, and that Amadea would be willing to give up her dreams of returning to the convent now. But it was way too soon. She was still stunned by what they'd done, and so was he.

They talked quietly on the way home, and he kissed her and held her before she got out. “I love you. Don't forget that. Tonight was just the beginning. It wasn't a mistake,” he said earnestly, “or a sin. I'll start going to church again regularly,” he promised, and she smiled. He hadn't been since his brothers died. He was still too upset at God.

“Maybe that's why He sent me to you, to get you back to church.” Whatever the reason, she looked as happy as he did, in spite of the shock of what they'd just done. Much to her own amazement, she didn't feel wrong about it, she felt happy, and in love. She knew too that it would take a long time to sort this out. It was one of the aftershocks of war.

As she lay in her bed that night, thinking of him, much to her own amazement, she didn't have a crisis of conscience, or even regret it. Oddly enough, it seemed right to her. She wondered if this was what God had in mind for her after all. She was still thinking about it when she drifted off to sleep. And when she woke up the next morning, he had dropped flowers off to her on his way to work. He had come by his un-cle's farm and left a tiny bouquet of winter flowers outside the barn with a note, “I love you. J-Y.” She tucked the note in her pocket with a smile, and went in to milk the cows that were waiting for her. She felt like a woman for the first time in her life. It was an unfamiliar sensation to her in every way. She was suddenly experiencing all she had denied herself, and had planned to deny forever. Her life had turned around entirely, and it was impossible to know which path was right, the enticing one she had just embarked on with Jean-Yves, or the one that had meant so much to her for so many years before. All she knew, and could hope, was that in time the answers would