Part 38: The First Incredible Adventures Of The Girl With No Shoes
Chapter 4: The New Home
Anne awoke with a start and opened her eyes slowly to the morning light. Anne held tightly still to her mother as the carriage jolted as it turned a sharp corner and glided down a long dirt road. The going was flat now with the steep mountain pass long behind them. Anne looked around but all she could see was the wall of large, lush green trees and their thick brown trunks.
Anne thought of the dream she had just awakened from. It seemed more real to her than the world she was awakening in now. She looked up at her mother. She looked at her little sister. She looked at the luggage piled high around her. She looked at the trees by the roadside and the rocks here and there. She took in this strange world around her as she returned to wakefulness. “I belong to the Light.” She thought to herself. “Was it all real? Was her dream real?” She wondered.
The sun had begun to rise on the horizon casting eerie shafts of light through the overhead canopy of tree limbs. The two massive walls of trees rose up to each side of the dirt road and for a while Anne couldn’t see anything but the trees all around her. Then suddenly the carriage rolled into a wide-open, dirt-covered clearing. It was then that Anne saw her new house for the first time.
Anne was surprised to see that there was no snow anywhere in sight. They must have gone down far into the valley as the night passed where the snow couldn’t reach them anymore. Everything looked a bit damp either from rain or from the morning dew, but Anne couldn’t tell which. Birds were chirping overhead singing their morning songs to each other. Anne had always liked the morning songs of the birds in the city.
The old, wooden house was very small. It was much smaller than their house in the big city. It was simple and made from wooden beams with what looked like a mud thatched roof. To Anne it looked old and tired, as if it had sat in that clearing for a hundred million years. Her heart sank. The ground around the house was just dirt and pine needles that had fallen from the trees above.
“Dirt, dirt, and even more dirt,” She thought to herself. The dirt seemed to be everywhere she looked all the way from the house to the wall of trees that surrounded it. The house wasn’t painted on the outside and was a very dull brownish color. In some places vines had grown up the walls of the house and had wrapped themselves with the thatch of the roof that hung down. She knew this probably meant no one had lived in this house for a very long time.
Her father and mother were both silently taking in everything for the first time as well. Her father had taken the house as part of his new job and would have to pay it off as he worked for the new company.
Her father pulled the carriage up to the front porch. He then pulled the horses to an abrupt stop calling out, “Whoa! Boys!” He turned and looked back at his small family. He smiled deeply and shrugged saying, “It’s not much, but hey, it’s home!”
Anne and her mother sat staring at the house in disbelief. Anne knew her mother was as shocked at the condition and look of the house as she was. Anne pushed the heavy blanket down her legs and rose to her bare feet. Sometime during the night, she had kicked off her shoes again, but she didn’t know when that had happened. The cold of the carriage floor sent a chill up her whole body, but she didn’t mind that in the least. She stood with her hands on the carriage door and just stared. The old, wooden house had a slight sag to it. Anne giggled as she thought the house looked like a very old man.
Her mother didn’t speak as she shifted the baby in her arms, rose to her feet, stretched a bit, and then opened the carriage door. She climbed down with the help of her husband. He must have seen the disappointment on her face because he said cheerfully, “Oh my love, this house will be perfect. It just needs some good ol’ fashion care and hard work. And with a little love it will be a home in no time.”
“Is there enough love in the whole world to make this a home?” Anne said laughing. She was suddenly overwhelmed with the newness of the place. This house, despite being old, seemed to have secrets and Anne was suddenly very excited to explore the place. She opened the opposite carriage door and leaped down onto the cold, dirt-covered ground.
“Anne, don’t go too far!” Her father yelled after her as she took off running toward the house. “Wait for us, little girl!”
Anne rushed across the small space between the carriage and the house and climbed up the three steps of the porch. The wood of the porch felt great on her bare feet as she ran back and forth, looking here and there. She returned to the old, wooden door of the house and pulled on the giant metal latch. It didn’t budge. It was locked tight in place.
“Father! Oh, hurry please!” Anne cried as she struggled with the unmoving latch.
Her father and mother walked slowly over to the house and climbed the steps to the porch. The baby was still fast asleep in her mother’s arms, not making a single sound. Her father took out an old metal key from his coat pocket and slid it in the door’s lock. It made a creaking sound as he turned it and there was a loud click. The door immediately opened pulling Anne into the house with it. A plume of dust greeted them as the door swung open. Anne rushed back to stand with her parents.
The three of them stood staring into the dark and quiet of the old house. Even the baby was now awake and looking into the darkness with her wide blue eyes. Birds chirped in the distant branches of the surrounding trees. The inside of the house was so dark they couldn’t see anything but the breath coming from each of their mouths as they breathed in the cold morning air.
A rat scurried out suddenly giving them all quite the start. Her father let out a laugh, but her mother wasn’t amused. Her father turned and walked to the carriage and returned with one of the lanterns in his hand. Holding it out in front of them he led his small family forward into the house. Anne and her mother stayed behind him, peering around in every direction as they entered.
The old, wooden house was only one story with four rooms and a single bathroom. Both bedrooms were empty except for the cobwebs that decorated the corners of each and a few broken wood beams above that served as the ceiling. The kitchen had a couple of cabinets badly in need of repair and a single wood stove for cooking. The living room was empty but had a beautifully ornate fireplace on one wall that seemed very out of place in the house. As the family toured their new home no one spoke. Anne thought the whole place smelled of dirt and wood.
Anne continued to walk in circles through the empty house trying to imagine a life here. Her father carried trunk after trunk of their belongings into the house from the carriage and then he took the horses to the small stable that sat beside the house. Luckily, he found some hay left by his new employer, the honorable Mr. Kirk Borders who managed the bank where he would be working in the small downtown area of Miracle Valley. The next few weeks of life were very difficult for the family as they settled in. Day after day their father purchased what furniture he could afford in town and worked on fixing up the house after he would come home each day from his job at the bank. Her mother was a master homemaker and quickly set things in order as much as she could. Jubilee was a delight, as always, and Anne’s mother seemed to make daily comments on how well-behaved Jubilee was compared to Anne when she was a baby. Anne would simply say, “Just you wait and see how she will be when she gets a bit older.”
Check back tomorrow for the next chapter!
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TBOBK Ministries - Benjamin Potexana Kareth 
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