My Kind of Christmas

ladder. Our harvesting season is grueling.”
    “I can do that,” she said. “I’ve carried my nine-month-old in
a backpack and my two-year-old in my arms.” She flexed a muscle in her upper
arm. “Motherhood isn’t for sissies. Neither is being broke. I can do the work. I want to do the work.”
    He stared at her in shock for a moment. “Nine months and two
years?”
    “Berry will be three before long. They’re beautiful, brilliant
and they have a terrible addiction to eating.”
    “I’m sorry, Nora. I have all the people I need. Do you want to
leave a number in case something comes open?”
    “The church,” she said with disappointment. “You can leave a
message with anyone at the Virgin River Presbyterian Church. I’ll check in with
them every day. Twice a day.”
    He gave her a very small smile. “I don’t expect anything to
come up, but I know the number if something does.” He wrote down her name and
referenced the church phone number beside it. “Thanks for coming out here.”
    “Sure. I had to try. And if you hear of anything at all,
anywhere at all…”
    “Of course,” he said, but she knew he didn’t mean it. He
wasn’t going to help her get a job.
    She left that little office and went to wait by Noah’s truck,
leaning against it. She hoped he had a nice visit with Mrs. Cavanaugh since she
had inconvenienced him for no reason. No matter what Tom Cavanaugh had said, she
knew he had rejected her as not strong or dependable enough for apple
picking.
    Life hadn’t always been like this for Nora. Well, it had been
difficult, but not like now. She hadn’t grown up poor, for one thing. She’d
never been what one could call financially comfortable, but she’d always had
enough to eat, a roof over her head, decent if inexpensive clothes to wear.
She’d gone to college briefly and during that time had had a part-time job, no
different from most students. She’d had an unhappy family life, the only child
of a bitter single mother. Then she’d found herself to be very susceptible to
the flirtations of a hot and sexy minor league baseball player with no earthly
clue he’d turn into a hard-core drug addict who would dump her and their two
children in a tiny mountain town with no money, their possessions having been
sold for his, um, hobby.
    Even though times were about as tough as they could get as
income went, she’d been lucky to find herself in Virgin River where she had made
a few good friends and had the support of people like Noah Kincaid, Mel Sheridan
and her neighbors. It might take a while and a little more luck, but eventually
she’d manage to pull it together and give her girls a decent place to grow
up.
    She heard the slamming of a door—it had the distinct sound of
a wooden screen door. There was laughter. When she looked up she saw Noah with
an attractive woman with thick white hair cut in a modern, short, blown-out
style. She was a bit roundish with a generous bosom and just slightly plump
hips; her cheeks were rosy from either makeup or sun and her eyebrows shaped and
drawn on with a dark brown pencil. She wore lipstick and laughed, showing a very
young, attractive smile. Nora couldn’t guess her age. Fifty-eight? Sixty-four?
She looked like she should be hosting a country kitchen cooking show. And then
she let go a big laugh, leaning into Noah’s arm as she did so.
    Nora straightened, since they were walking toward her. She
smiled somewhat timidly, feeling so unsure of herself after being rejected from
the job.
    “Nora, this is Maxie Cavanaugh. This is her orchard and cider
operation.”
    “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Nora,” Maxie said, putting out
her hand. Nora noticed that she had a bit of arthritis that bent her fingers at
the knuckles, but her nails were still manicured in bright red. “So you’re going
to pick apples for us?”
    “Well, no, ma’am,” she said. “Your son said he had enough
pickers already and couldn’t use me.”
    “Son?” Maxie asked. “Girl, that’s my grandson, Tom, and I
raised him. Now what is it Reverend Kincaid told me? You have a couple of little
daughters and only part-time work at the moment?”
    “Yes, ma’am, but I think I’ll get more hours in the fall when
they need almost full-time help at the new school. I’ll get a discount on day
care, too. Thing is, it’s a brand-new school and still needs all kinds of
certification so we won’t get help from the county for a while and I got all
excited about a job