A Baby for Easter

Daniel was a good man and a great preacher, but he could sometimes be a frustrating boss.

“Alice,” he called out from his office. “Where’s Jobes?”

Alice Grantham was sitting at the desk in the outer office at First Presbyterian Church in Willow Park, North Carolina, but Daniel’s booming voice carried easily through rooms. She looked up from the bulletin she was putting together for Sunday. ”What?”

“Jobes. I need it. Weren’t you going to bring it to me?”

With a sigh, she stood up and walked over to the credenza against the wall, on which were piled dozens of books. She was pretty sure Jobes was an author’s name since she remembered seeing it as she organized all Daniel’s books three months ago when she first started working for him.

If the book was on the shelves in his office where it belonged, he would have gotten it himself, so she figured it must have ended up in one of these piles. The credenza was like the island of lost books, where anything he’d lent out, left in another room, or taken home and then brought back ended up until Alice took the time to return it to his bookshelves.

She knew he was working on an adult Sunday School class on Hebrews right now, so she scanned the spines for something by a person named Jobes about Hebrews.

“Is it there?” Daniel called, after about forty-five seconds.

“I’m looking.” She had to speak loudly to be heard through the office, but she did try to keep her tone from sounding impatient.

Working for Daniel twenty hours a week was better than having nothing except the ten hours the local library was able to give her, and being rude to her boss was probably not the best way to commend herself to him.

Six months ago, she’d been living in Asheville. She’d had a nice apartment, a good job at a university library, and a fiancé. After six years in college and graduate school and one failed engagement, she’d thought things were finally lining up very nicely for her. She was preparing for a happy, comfortable life.

Then Bill, her fiancé, dumped her because he decided she wasn’t what he needed in a wife.

Then two months later she’d been laid off at work. They liked her at the university, but she was the library’s newest hire, and the budget cuts they were facing were too severe to keep her position.

So she’d had to move back in with her parents in Willow Park and try to resurrect her life.

She was forced to cobble together part-time work while she kept looking for another full-time job. First Presbyterian, the church she’d grown up in, had money in its budget for a part-time assistant for the pastor, so Daniel—who’d only started preaching at the church recently himself—had offered her the job.

If things had gone as she’d expected, she would have been married this coming Saturday, but instead she was back in her hometown, searching for a random commentary for a sometimes exasperating pastor.

Whom she’d known since she was four years old.

She finally landed on a book by Jobes that had Hebrews in the subtitle, so she grabbed it and brought it into his office. She held it up. “Is this the one?”

“Yes,” Daniel said, looking up from the notes he was scrawling on a yellow legal pad. He was around thirty, good-looking, and very happily married. “Thanks.”

As she handed him the book, she was tempted to tell him he’d never actually asked her to get it for him a first time, as he clearly believed, but she decided it wasn’t worth the effort.

He was already opening up the book and flipping the pages. “I’ve been needing this.”

“Then you should have gotten up to get it yourself,” came a female voice from the doorway.

Because she was watching, Alice saw Daniel’s face change as he processed the voice and raised his eyes to see who was now standing in the office.

It was impossible not to see it—that softening, that transformation from focus into pleased surprise at the arrival of his wife.

Jessica was grinning as she approached the desk, carrying what was obviously a lunch she’d prepared for Daniel.

Despite his evident delight at the arrival of his wife, he must have listened to her words. His eyes flicked back to Alice. “Sorry. Was I being rude?”

She shook her head. There was no way to stay annoyed with the man. “No. It’s totally fine. Only you hadn’t actually asked me for the book in the first place.”

His dark eyes widened. “Oh. Sorry. I thought I did.”

Jessica shook her head and gave Alice a long-suffering look. “You deserve a reward for putting up with his absent-minded-pastor routine.”

“Hey!” Daniel objected. He’d gotten up, and now he reached an arm out to pull Jessica against him. “I thought you liked absented-minded pastors.”

Jessica’s face softened the way his had earlier. “Only one.”

When he leaned down to kiss Jessica, Alice turned to leave the office since she was feeling a bit like a third wheel now.

She liked Daniel and his wife. She generally didn’t mind working as the church’s administrative assistant. She was even glad to be back in Willow Park since she’d always wanted to eventually move home again.

But for the past three months, she’d felt like she was on the fringes of existence, without a real place in the world, desperately trying to establish her life again.

She was only twenty-six, but she’d already had two failed engagements, the one with Bill and one with the boyfriend she’d had all through college who finally said he’d just outgrown her.

She’d never been particularly career driven, but she’d enjoyed working in a library and felt like she was good at it. Her dream was for the local library in Willow Park to be able to hire her full-time, but they hadn’t yet been able to fund the position.

She hated feeling at loose ends this way, and she was determined not to let it continue. Although she’d never actually believed she’d had to be married to really start life, she’d spent too long acting like that was true. She wasn’t looking for a husband anymore—she’d given herself a set of rules so she wouldn’t be stupid about men again—and she was trying to reorient her priorities. She thought about it as resurrecting her life since Easter was only a few weeks away.

She’d always loved Easter with its promise of hope, healing, and new life—even more than Christmas—so it seemed fitting that it should be the landmark for her newly shaped life.

Despite her resolution, little things like seeing how secure Daniel and Jessica were in their relationship just reminded her of what she didn’t have.

“Did you want a sandwich?” Jessica called after her. “I brought one for you.”

Alice turned around in surprise. “Oh. Thank you.”

She took the sandwich and the bottle of water Jessica handed her, thinking it was really nice to be remembered, even drifting on the fringes of life.

She’d gone back to her desk and was busily typing up the bulletin, occasionally taking a bite of her sandwich, when another voice surprised her.

This one was male. Deep. Pleasant. Very familiar. “Hey, Alice.”

She almost choked on her bite and had a rather embarrassing moment as she attempted to swallow without coughing or spitting out the mouthful.

When she managed to get the bite down, she looked over to where Micah, Daniel’s brother, was standing in the doorway.

He was two years younger than Daniel and just as good-looking. Better-looking, Alice thought, with his vivid blue eyes and warm grin.

Not that he was grinning now. For some reason, he never smiled at her the way he smiled at everyone else.