Chapter 1

	“You need a man out there at that house, Miss Johnson,” kindly old Mrs.
Witherspoon said, in her best ‘advice-giving’ voice as she stepped up beside her
husband at the counter of the local hardware store.  The woman, in her early sixties,
meant well, of course, but Sandy could almost hear the tsk-tsk in her voice and see the
slight shake of her white-haired head as she spoke. 
	Sandy smiled sweetly at the woman. “I could use a plumber, an electrician, and a
good carpenter most days, but I definitely have no need of a man, Mrs. Witherspoon,
but thank you for your concern.” 
	Marjory Witherspoon clicked her tongue and turned to walk her slightly plump
figure back behind the cash counter. Her husband, Herbert, shot a wry grin after her,
then lifted a silent, knowing glance to his customer.  Sandy liked the old man, and
shared a wordless smile with him before drawing his attention back to the task at hand.
	“Now what did you say I would have to do with this, Mr. Witherspoon?” she
asked.
	Herbert turned the part in his hand as he picked up his explanation of how Sandy
would have to install the new faucet parts for her kitchen sink, while his attentive
customer nodded after each set of instructions. It sounded easy enough, she thought.
	“You do have a wrench, Miss Johnson?” he asked, as he placed the part back in
its box and handed it to her. His glance was concerned and clearly told her that although
he knew she was trying to be independent there were things she may not have thought
of -- like whether or not she had the correct tool for the job. It was four-thirty on a
Saturday afternoon, and he would hate to send her home with the part and no way to
install it. 
	Sandy screwed up her face and chewed on the corner of her her lower lip. “What
type of wrench is it I need?” she asked, a hint of hope mixed with a larger helping of
doubt in her voice.  Herbert smiled and motioned for her to follow him down the aisle to
where he picked up the wrench she would need and showed it to her.  He could tell by
the look on her face, and the reluctant sigh, that she did not own such a tool, and he
placed it gently in her outstretched hand. 
	“That should do the job for you perfectly,” he said, an encouraging smile on his
face.  “I’m sure you’ll have no problems.”  His manner was both friendly and confident
and Sandy rewarded his diplomacy with a genuine smile.
	Sandy liked Herbert Witherspoon.  He was a thin man, a few years older than his
wife, with grey hair and wrinkled skin, and a welcoming smile. The first time she had
walked into his hardware store she had been warmed by that friendly smile and helpful
manner, and as she became a regular customer she learned to appreciate the fact that
he never patronized her while always thinking of every little thing she would need.  She
had, in fact,  become quite a regular at Witherspoon’s Hardware since moving to
Silverside a month earlier.  She knew she had become the talk of the town when she
had bought the big old house known locally as the old Clarkson place.  A young, single
woman, living alone in a house gravely in need of repairs and renovations, was cause
for gossip, but Herbert Witherspoon never gave any indication that he was partaking in
any of it.  Why she had chosen that house, and why she was living there alone, was
none of his business.  He never questioned her desire to fix everything herself, like his
wife did, but rather tried his best to provide her with the parts, the tools, and the
knowledge she needed to complete the task.  Only when she asked did he ever offer
her suggestions on who she could call for hired assistance.  
	That’s not to say that Marjory Witherspoon was an unlikable person. She
probably didn’t have a vindictive bone in her body. Sandy knew she always meant well,
but she did tend to pass judgment more often than not.  If her husband were not around
when Sandy came in looking for the things she needed for a particular job, Marjory was
always quick to point out that there were several qualified men in town who could do
those jobs, and even drop a name or two.  Despite the fact that she had worked
alongside her husband in the hardware business for over forty years and probably knew
what Sandy needed just as well as Herbert did, she very rarely offered up the
information.  At least, not until Sandy would smile politely at her, remind her that she was
looking forward to doing the job herself, and re-state her request.  Sandy wasn’t sure if
the woman really thought the jobs were more than a woman could -- or should -- be
doing, or if she was just trying to find a ‘man’ for her, and that was one thing that Sandy
Johnson had no use for!
	“Thanks Mr. Witherspoon, Mrs. Witherspoon,”  Sandy smiled warmly and nodded 
at the couple as she took hold of the shopping bag that the older woman handed her. 
“I’m sure I will have no trouble at all, you’ve explained everything perfectly.”  She
directed her last comment to Mr. Witherspoon and then raised her hand in a wave and 
turned to leave the store.  As she swung around, juggling her shopping bag and purse
instead of watching where she was going, she almost bumped right into another
customer as she stepped away from the counter.  
	“Excuse me,” she mumbled a polite apology without really looking at the man she
had nearly run into, and side-stepped the imminent collision and made her way out into
the late afternoon sun.
	Sandy liked Silverside as much as she liked its hardware merchant. It was a
small town, full of friendly faces that she had soon become familiar with.  People were
friendly.  She liked the fact that shopkeepers did their best to help and that a baker’s
dozen at the local Bakery still consisted of thirteen buns. She liked the colourfully painted
shop fronts, the tree-lined streets with little gardens here and there complete with old
fashioned park benches nearby.  And she liked the fact that people talked to each other
as they passed on the sidewalk or waved across the street to each other. Most of all,
she liked the fact that no one in Silverside knew why she was there.  More importantly,
why she was there on her own, and no one whispered about her as she walked past
them.
	Two years ago, Sandy would never have imagined herself living alone in a
run-down house in a small town hundreds of miles away from home, where she knew no
one and no one knew her. Now, she considered it a blessing.  But then, two years ago,
Sandy Johnson was preparing to become Mrs. Jonathan Michaels.
	Sandy paid little attention to the large black motorcycle that was angle parked
directly outside the door as she left the hardware store. She gave it a casual glance as
she passed it, for no other reason than that she knew there was no one local in
Silverside who owned a motorcycle, then carefully stepped around it as she crossed the
street, lifting a hand at Karen Smithers who was walking her baby in a stroller on the
other side of the street and waving at her animatedly as if trying to get her attention.  The
only reason she took a second look at the machine was because Karen seemed
extremely interested in it. 	
	“Who do you suppose that belongs to?” Karen bubbled, pausing to talk to Sandy
when the two of them came alongside each other on the other side of the street. 	Sandy
looked back at the motorcycle. It was all black and chrome, and shining in the afternoon
sun.  On the back of it was a large saddlebag, and the plate was not local. 
	“Tourist, probably.” Sandy said, shrugging.  Karen was a young mother in her
early twenties that Sandy had met at the Library.  She was friendly enough, though
Sandy didn’t know the girl as more than a casual acquaintance.   Karen was obviously
more impressed with the bike than she was, Sandy thought,  for the girl didn’t take her
eyes off it until her baby began to swing his legs boisterously in an attempt to get the
stroller moving once again.  Sandy cooed at the little boy to amuse him for a few
seconds, while his mother took one last dreamy glance at the motorcycle, then they
parted company.  Karen could stand there all day waiting to see who owned it if she
wanted, Sandy thought, but she had a water faucet to fix.
	She sighed as she walked along the streets towards her house.  It had taken her
two hard years to get to where she was today, and she reminded herself every day how
thankful she was to be there.  It was refreshing to walk down the street and not see
people leaning their heads together and whispering, and know they were talking about
her; to receive a friendly wave and a cheery greeting instead of pitied stares and
whispers behind her back.  Back home, everyone knew who she was, and even after
two years she was still the talk of the town. Here in Silverside, if anyone talked about her
at all it was only to say that she was that nice young lady who had moved into the old
Clarkson place and accepted the librarian’s job down at the town library.  She could hold
her head high knowing that the hurt and betrayal she had suffered weren’t being talked
about over and over again in the shops and hairdressing salons as often as the plot line
of the ladies’ favourite soap operas. Back home, her life was an open book.
	Jonathan Michaels had taken care of that.  
	It all seemed so long ago now, but in her mind -- if she let herself -- Sandy could
still see the church full of people, all turned to face her as she waited in the church entry. 
She could still hear the hushed whispers as the guests leaned close to each other and
discussed her predicament.  She could also clearly see the front of the church, where, a
good half hour after the ceremony was supposed to have begun, two men in black
tuxedos fidgeted nervously where there should have been four. And never would she
ever forget the pathetically apologetic look on the face of Clint Manley, the best man, as
he finally emerged from the door at the side of the altar -- alone. 
	He had whispered to the other groomsmen as he passed, but had never taken
his eyes off Sandy. The churning in the pit of her stomach had increased as she had
watched him walk what seemed like a painfully long distance down the aisle towards her,
and the look on his face when he’d reached her had made her feel like throwing up.
	“I’m sorry, Sandy,” he had said, in a pained voice.  Then with a nervous glance at
her father he had leaned in a little closer to her, “We can’t find Jonathan.”
	Bells had begun to ring in her ears, and the best man’s voice had seemed very
far away. Suddenly it was very hot in the vestibule of the little church, and her knees
threatened to buckle underneath her. 
	“What do you mean, you can’t find him?”  Garnet Johnson had demanded in a
hushed voice, gripping his daughter’s arm firmly as he felt her sway slightly.
	The best man cleared his throat.  “I’m sorry Sir.  He didn’t show up, and we’ve
had people out looking for him everywhere we can think of. He’s just -- disappeared.” 
Clint turned a pitiful glance towards Sandy, and, had she not been trying to stop her
head from spinning and her legs from folding up beneath her, she would probably have
felt sorry for him.
	Instead, Sandy had felt herself sway as if an invisible force had reached out and
pushed her, and her father had quickly placed his arm around her back and led her to a
nearby chair.  She had felt flushed, and dizzy, and had really, really wanted to throw up.
Nothing that had been said after that had registered at all.  Somehow she had managed
to walk as they had whisked her out of the church and into the car -- the car that was
supposed to have taken her and Jonathan to the hall after the ceremony, as husband
and wife.  But she didn’t remember the trip, and she only vaguely remembered being
ushered up the stairs at her parents’ home with her mother fussing over her as her veil
and dress were removed, allowing her to breath a little better, though not much.  She
didn’t hear a word her mother said, though she was aware of constant  talking, and
words like my poor girl and there must be a reasonable explanation.  Then Mikki had
arrived, and Sandy had been scooped into her sister’s arms. That was when the tears
had finally started.
	Anger.  That had been her first reaction.  She hadn’t been  aware of the deep
hurt in those first few hours, simply an overwhelming anger that the man she loved had
had the gall to go through all the wedding preparations -- including standing there at the
altar, smiling at her the evening before at the wedding rehearsal -- and then just not
bother to show up at the church.  She had paced the floor of her bedroom, alone with
Mikki, after she had requested that her mother and all the rest of the family leave, and
spouted all manner of obscenities directed towards her absentee groom. 
	Hours had passed and her insides had felt like they were being fed through the
wringer of an antique washing machine. Mikki had stayed with her the entire sleepless 
night, bless her soul, and in the morning when the sun had risen outside her bedroom
window, nothing had managed to look any better than it had the night before. 
Reluctantly she had swallowed one of the pills her mother kept on hand for those
occasions when she couldn’t sleep, and at last her heavy lidded eyes had succumbed to
desperately needed sleep. 
	A brief period of worry had followed.  Worry that he might actually be hurt
somewhere, maybe even alone in a coma in some hospital bed somewhere.  Had the
police been called? Had the local emergency ward been contacted? She even allowed
herself moments of considering him dead somewhere, which, though a morbid thought,
seemed a more acceptable explanation than his outright rejection of her.
	But when the hours had turned into days, and the days had turned into weeks,
the anger had resurfaced, along with the hurt, and by the time the truth had finally
surfaced, she was a bolt of lightning ready to strike.
	Jonathan and Sandy had been engaged for six months prior to their wedding
date.  He had swept her off her feet, and made a big impression on her family as well. 
He had been orphaned at a young age and raised by his wealthy widowed grandmother, 
and that woman had welcomed Sandy as the perfect match for her grandson.  It
seemed like a match made in heaven.  At twenty-four years of age, she had thought she
knew enough about life and love by then to recognize love, and she had been madly in
love. So too, she had thought, had Jonathan. 
	That, obviously, had not been the case.  
	“Sandy, I’m sorry, I just couldn’t go through with it.”  His voice had sounded
hollow as he had spoken to her on the phone that fateful night. On the phone for
heaven’s sake! He hadn’t even had the guts to face her in person!  She remembered
the day like it was yesterday.  She had known it was him on the phone by the look on
her mother’s face when she had walked into the room, and had steeled her courage to
face whatever he had to say, whatever explanation he might have had to offer.  In the
weeks since he had left her standing in the church she had considered many possible
excuses, but she still had not been prepared for what he would tell her that night.
	“Why, Jonathan?” she had asked. Of all the questions she had for him, why was
the one that had nagged at her heart the most. Why had he left her there? Why had he
allowed her to be humiliated in front of a church full of family and friends? Why?
	“It just wasn’t real.” he’d offered, by way of explanation.
	“It felt very real to me.” she had countered, her voice sounding artificially
controlled.  “The wedding dress I was wearing was very real, Jonathan, so was the
church full of people waiting for us to exchange vows. Just what exactly was it,
Jonathan, that wasn’t real?”
	“Love.” he had said, his voice sounding strained.
	“Let me get this straight, Jonathan. What you’re telling me is that our love wasn’t
real? You’re saying that you left me standing at the church in my wedding dress
because you didn’t really love me?”
	“Sandy, please, don’t be upset.   I didn’t mean to hurt you, I just couldn’t go
through with it.   I knew it was better to pull out before the ceremony than after.  I was
trying to do us both a favour.”
	“Oh yes, a very wise decision, Jonathan!  Pull out before the ceremony.  You
most certainly  did me a favour.  The whole town knows exactly what favour you did for
me! Perhaps you might have considered pulling out before the rehearsal, Jonathan? Or
better yet, why not before the preparations -- or even better still -- why didn’t you just pull
out before the proposal?”  As she had spoken her voice had become more and more
agitated, and she had found herself breathless at the end of her tirade.
	“Sandy, please! Calm down,” he had urged her.
	“I will not calm down, Jonathan.  I do not have to calm down.  I’ve been living a lie
for the past six months. I’ve been humiliated in front of both of our families and countless
friends.  You didn’t have to stand up there and wait, and wait, and have them all looking
at you like some mutant.  I even imagined that maybe you were in a coma somewhere
fighting for your life.  But no -- the explanation is much simpler than that, isn’t it Jonathan.
You just didn’t really love me. Well, did it never occur to you to tell me that before I got to
the church?”
	“I couldn’t.” His voice had taken on a husky tone. “Things got out of hand. I
thought I could just go through with it and make the best of it, but I -- I couldn’t.”
	“Make the best of it!” Sandy had nearly choked on her words.  His words hadn’t
made much sense to her at the time.  Why would Jonathan pretend to be in love with
her, and plan to make the best of a marriage with her? Why would he have let things go
as far as they had if he didn’t really love her?
	“Hush, Sandy. Please, just let me explain. My grandmother is a very strong
woman, you know that.  She likes you, and it was what she wanted.  I thought I could do
it, but it wasn’t what I wanted. In the end, I knew I couldn’t put you through that. I couldn’t
marry you if I didn’t love you.”
	Sandy had clutched the phone with white knuckles, and concentrated hard on
breathing  while staring at a tiny speck of dirt on the wallpaper behind the phone.  This
was all supposed to make perfect sense, of course, but none of it was. Confused, she
had been about to hang up on him, when she had heard another voice in the
background, and Jonathan’s muffled whisper as he hushed the other person. 
	“Who is that?” Sandy had asked point blank, for the voice on the other end of the
phone was unmistakably female. 
	“It doesn’t matter, Sandy. I just want to make sure you understand.” he had
hastily replied.  “I couldn’t let this go on any longer, I had to call you.”
	“Jonathan — who was that I just heard?” Sandy had spoken through gritted
teeth.  He had paused, then she had heard him heave a heavy sigh.
	“It’s Maggie.”
	“Maggie? Maggie who?”
	Jonathan had coughed, and the silence that followed had been heavy before he
had finally answered. “Maggie Pruitt.  We — we got married, Sandy, we...”
	Whatever Jonathan had said after that, Sandy hadn’t heard him.  She had stood
for a few long seconds staring into space before dropping the receiver into its cradle and
walking away in a trance.  The words had repeated themselves over and over in her
mind. Jonathan had married Maggie Pruitt. He’d left her standing at the altar to run off
and marry Maggie Pruitt.  Oh no, he hadn’t just not really loved her, hadn’t just had cold
feet and not been able to go through with the marriage. He hadn’t just felt pressured by
his grandmother to marry the girl she approved of.  He’d rejected her for Maggie Pruitt!
	It hadn’t taken long for the rumour mill to start.  If Sandy had found anything in
the situation to be thankful for, it would have been that Jonathan had managed to let her
know himself before the local gossips got hold of the information. Of course, the reason
he had called her at all was soon very evident.  Maggie wanted to come home, and to
do that, Jonathan had to face his grandmother — and the rest of the town. Soon
everyone knew that Jonathan Michaels had run off to Vegas in the middle of the night —
the night  before his wedding to Sandy Johnson — and married Maggie Pruitt, the local
bleached blonde, gum-chewing, hairdresser.  All the sordid details were common
knowledge around town, even how Jonathan had been carrying on with Maggie secretly
for months while at the same time planning his upcoming wedding with Sandy. In fact,
Jonathan had been seeing Maggie even before he had proposed to Sandy!
	Every time Sandy walked down the street there was someone to pat her on the
arm and tell her how sorry they were, and shake their heads and remark how much
better off she was without him. Everywhere she turned, heads were shaking, voices
whispering and fingers were pressed against pursed lips.  It had been more than Sandy
could bear.
	And then of course, there had been all the wedding gifts to return.  Mikki had
been an angel with that, and taken care of everything.  She had spent the last few
weeks of the summer getting everything done before she had left for Elmdale to begin
her very first job, as a teacher at Elmdale Primary School.  The two girls were very close,
and Sandy had missed her greatly after that, but somehow she had managed. 
	
	Sandy sighed and lifted her face to the breeze.  It all seemed like such a long
time ago now, and a whole new life loomed ahead of her.  Two years of hurt, two years
of feeling sorry for herself and knowing everyone around her felt sorry for her too, had
been enough.  Now she was determined to start over where no one knew her past, and
keep it that way.  She had put it all behind her and she felt like a new woman.
	She smiled and took a long, deep breath of fresh air, swung the shopping bag in
her hand, and took the steps onto her front porch two at a time.  First things first, of
course. Before anything else, she had a faucet to fix.