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Her emotions had gone from complete sadness for the past several weeks, to terror at the thought of having to be with John David tonight, to joy at the thought that they’d never have to do that and that she could be with Harriet.

“Do you want to get into bed?” he asked. “Tomorrow, I think we might need to…” He pointed to the sheets on what would be her side of the bed for at least the foreseeable future. “Put some… Well, Pa told me that when ladies do that for the first time, they sometimes bleed a little. We might want to put somethin’ there in the morning. Ma will want to wash the sheets for us and show you how she does it because she wants to make sure you’ll take care of me and the house as good as she does.”

“Oh, all right,” she said.

“I’ll cut myself on the arm or something,” John David volunteered before he slipped into bed. “And… Uh… Well, sometimes, in the morning, you know, men, we get…” He looked down at his own body. “We can’t help it. I don’t know if you know that; if your mama told you that or not.”

“Oh,” she said.

“But it’s just what happens sometimes.”

“Okay.” She moved from her spot sitting on the bed to around to her side of it and climbed in. “That’s all right.”

“We have to talk about something else, though, Debbie.I don’t like havin’ to do it any more than you will, but… They’ll expect children, and it’s my job to make sure this farm carries on.”

She’d forgotten about that part… All the good news she’d just received about not having to sleep with John David and actually being able to fall asleep next to Harriet washed away in that moment.

“We can make it fast when we do that. Since neither of us wants it, we can make it as easy on both of us as possible. If I had brothers or sisters who were having kids already, I wouldn’t even worry about it because the farm would go to them, but it’s just me here, Debbie. I can’t let my family down. And you can’t let yours down, either.”

“Right,” she said, thinking about that moment.

“But we can lie to people for now. We can wait until my family is out of the house, and we can do it just once to see.”

“Okay,” she agreed reluctantly.

She could tell by his tone that he also didnotwant to do what they were talking about.

“I promise you that I’ll be a good pa to our babies. And if we have a boy, we don’t have to have another one, all right? I’ll help you with them. I have the farm to take care of, but I won’t be like my pa was with me or yours was, probably, with you. Harriet can be like another ma for him, if you want, and Jacob can be like another pa until…”

Deb turned her head and noticed that, for the first time that day, John David had tears in his eyes.

“Until he has to get married?” she asked.

He nodded.

“We can figure this out, John David.” She reached for his hand under the blanket and joined hers with his, giving it a squeeze and continuing to hold on.

“He’ll have to give her children, too,” John David said as a tear moved down his cheek. “And because she’s not like you, he’ll have to do things with her more regularly, or she might start to talk to her friends about why he doesn’t want it more often. We can’t–” He stopped.

“You’ll just have to remember that he loves you and that he’s doing that for the same reasons you and I will have to. We can’t let anyone find out who we love, John David.”

He turned his head to her and asked, “So, you do love her? I was right?”

Deb nodded and said, “Yes. I love her very much.”

“How long have you two been together? I wasn’t ever able to figure that out. And don’t you worry – no one else knows. I haven’t even told Jacob, which was why he wasn’t at our wedding today: he thinks I have to be with you tonight. But I didn’t want to tell him what I thought before I had a chance to talk to you. I’ll talk to him tomorrow, and he’ll be very happy.” John David laughed a little.

“We’ve been together forever,” she shared. “Since we were twelve.”

“Twelve?” he asked. “Well, all right there, Debbie. I thought maybe you two got sweet on each other not that long ago or something. I saw y’all with those bracelets.”

“I’ve always loved her.”

“So, today, when you whispered that‘I love you’and I said it back because I thought I had to, it was really for her, right?”

She nodded with a soft smile.

“Okay. Well, we should get some sleep. It’s been a long day, and I have to be up early, as usual, but I’ll wait for my ma to come in here and take care of the sheets so she’ll think we did our duty.”