Westbound (Love Travels West, Book 1)

Chapter 9. Jake's Story.

All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way--Leo Tolstoy

Chapter 9.

Jake's Story.

   "So like I said my father, Isaac Wade, was a farmer. In time he married my mother, Leah Carver, and pretty soon I was born. It was just the three of us for about three years and then my father died."

   "What did he die from?"

   "Not sure. I think he caught something, came down sick with whatever, even Momma never knew what it was the killed him. Doctors were hard to get back then. He suffered for about two or three days before givin' up the ghost. Honestly, I don't remember him at all, but folks spoke of him as a good, honest man. They did say he was kinda soft, maybe that's why he died so soon, didn't have the toughness needed to live a life out in the wild part of the country. My momma was left alone on the farm, and she was of course worried how she would manage all on her own. And then, 'bout a month after my daddy's death Ben showed up at our door. He was lost and all sick and dyin' like. Momma took care of him, nursed him back to health, and he stuck around after that and married her. He had some dark past he didn't want to talk about, he never went to town, and wasn't the social sort.That aside he was a strong, tough man, who could handle the demands of farmin' and that was exactly what Momma needed."

   "Did they love each other?"

   Jake shrugged his shoulders. "I wouldn't know, but at any rate they got along great and he was never harsh to her. Dan appeared before the year was up and two years later Rachel made her way into this earth." A shadow appeared on Jake's face when he mentioned his sister.

   "Was it hard for you to get along with your stepfather?" Dannie couldn't help from asking the question.

   "Nope," Jake shook his head. "I couldn't remember my father, so Ben was the only father I knew, and I'd say he was pretty good at being a stepdaddy. I remember Rachel always complaining that he was too stern, and it was true, Ben wasn't the kind of man who knew how to show affectiom, but he didn't play favorites and that was why I respected him. Never once did he make any sort of distiction between me and his own children, and treated us all equal. He made us work hard on the farm, but the work was always fair, and we were never asked to do more than our share. Things went on like that for a good while and then one day Ben had a heart attack and died. It happened in the summer of 1864. I wasn't around when it happened, by that time I had joined the army and was fightin' in the war." Jake paused here and looked at his hands. 

   "You mean the War Between the States?"

   "Yup, I was fighting for the Confederacy. I joined in '63 when I was seventeen. I know I was very young, but I just wanted to get away from the farm and figured the army was a good place to start. My momma cried, she said it was wicked of me, but Ben said that I needed to become a man and maybe the army would be the making of me. The day I left we shook hands and I thanked him for being the father to me even when he didn't have to be. I think those words touched him, of course he didn't show any emotion, but something like tears appeared in his eyes. I'm glad I parted well with Ben, because I never saw him again." Jake's voice died for a few seconds, and he looked off into the distance. "I ain't gonna talk about those war years, Dannie. I lived through hell and it took a long time for the nightmares to go away, but when I talk about the endless days I spent fightin' they all come back."

   "Don't," Dannie's voice was soft. "I don't care to hear about it anyway. If there is one thing I cannot stand, it is war. Just skip over those years."

   Jake nodded his head. For a brief second he closed his eyes, then he shook his head and opening his eyes went on with his story. "When I got back from the war, Ben was dead and things got pretty complicated."