An Easter Story--Part Five by Debra Clopton

The sun was setting, a glow of orange in the background as Jeff stared at the woman in front of him. “Carla,” he said, getting over the shock of seeing his old girlfriend. It had been almost seven or had it been eight years since they’d gone out? Her blonde hair glistened in the light of the porch and her dark eyes glittered as she frowned. He remembered that frown. That unhappiness.

Remembering back, they’d only gone out about two weeks before she’d started talking about marriage…he was ashamed to say that it had been two pretty intense weeks but her push for marriage had hit him like a wakeup call and had him drawing back and reevaluating his behavior and his wants out of life. The relationship had gone down hill from there.

Carla had tried to sweet talk him into loving her. He'd told her that a man and a woman couldn’t fall in love that quickly. Sure he’d seen others do it, Sammie’s in-laws had known each other for a sum total of three days when Dan Sr had asked Marjorie to marry him. They’d been married for thirty-five years and by all indication were crazy about each other. But even with that as proof that there were cases of people falling in love quickly Jeff was more cautious than that.

When he fell in love—if it ever happened—he wasn’t going to rush things. His own parents had dated for a couple of years before they’d married and at the time of their deaths when he was in college they’d been as happy as teenagers. Jeff was more like his parents and looking at Carla now, he was glad he hadn’t let her rush him. He hadn’t been a Christian back then but now that he was he wanted to make certain he waited for the woman God had for him—not that he wasn’t getting a little impatient lately on the Lord’s timing. He was ready for his wife to be to walk into his life…Of course he’d been right where Carla was concerned. She’d dropped him like a hot potato the minute he’d said they needed to slow down their relationship and she’d moved on to someone else before the week was up! He’d heard later that she’d done the same thing to the guy she’d dated before him. Looking at her now he wondered if she’d ever married?

If she’d found what she’d been looking for.

"What are you doing here?” she asked.

“I live next door. “ He’d lived in an apartment when she’d known him.

“Oh, I see.”

"Jeff, who is it?” Sammie asked coming up beside him.

“This is Carla Jensen,” he said, as he looked down into Sammie’s eyes. His heart skipped a beat looking into her golden brown eyes. He’d seen plenty of brown eyes before, Carla’s included, and he’d never felt the pull of attraction and nerves that suddenly tangled up inside of him looking at Sammie.

Sammie smiled, and pulled her eyes from his to focus on Carla. “Hi, can I help you?”

Carla looked from him to Sammie and an uncomfortable pause filled the space. “Yes,” she said, at last. “I need to talk to you. In private.”