Page 12 of Chance

He tugged a journal out of a backpack and opened it up to a page.

A drawing of a shoal caught her eye, along with what appeared to be a broken arrow.

“My dad wrote some of these symbols down in his journal. Let me know if you see them.” He pointed to the journal. “There are also several other pictures of different plants, maybe a palm tree or maybe a marijuana plant. I’m not sure.”

“Why were these in your dad’s journal?” She hesitated. ”I was sorry to hear about his passing. He was a good man.”

He jerked to face her, then turned back to a picture on the wall of the Savior on the cross. “Thank you.”

She riffled through the journal. “You’re also looking at crosses?”

He hesitated, then moved on to a stained-glass window that had different pictures inside each pane. “Yes. No. Honestly, I’m not sure. Just keep your eyes open for any of those and let me know what you think.”

The stained glass seemed to be depicting the whole story of Christ, including his birth and some of the miracles he had performed. She studied it for a long time, thinking about all of the times her grandmother had her read the Bible and how they would talk about Jesus and all he’d done for them.

“What’s up?” Chance softly nudged her.

She jolted. “Nothing. I was just thinking about reading the Bible with Grandma and how much she loved the stories of Jesus.”

Chance softly chuckled. “Yes, she did. I remember her making us read with her before we left for a date.”

She hadn’t thought about that in a long time. It made her tear up.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I just miss her sometimes.”

Chance put his arm around her shoulders. It should have been weird, but it felt so normal. “Yeah, I miss her too. And my parents.”

They stood like that for a long time.

“Do you believe it?”

Chance turned to her. “What?”

Kelly nodded to the depiction of Christ’s life. “That someone died for our sins? That we needed a Savior?”

He frowned. “Of course. Don’t you?”

She shrugged and pulled away from him. “I don’t know anymore. Maybe it’s just a story.” She moved on to another picture and stared blankly at it.

He moved to her side. “I believe it because I feel it.” He tapped his chest. “Right here. Always have. Don’t you?”

It was nerve wracking, having this man put her on the spot. She turned to him and was stunned to remember how plain and honest he was. He did believe it. She wasn’t ready to keep discussing it, so she pointed to another cross. “There’s a cool cross.”

Chance tugged a phone out of his pocket and snapped a picture of it. Then he snapped a couple pictures of other parts of the stained glass. “Good catch.”

Her curiosity grew as they kept walking and he took pictures of different things. She paused when she saw a chest in the side corner that had a skull carved on it. She wouldn’t have noticed it if she hadn’t been looking for those symbols. “There’s a chest, although it seems out of the way.”

Chance froze and then rushed over to it. “Another good call.” He took a picture and then carefully examined the whole thing from the front. He looked around, then pulled it out from the wall.

Touching old things made her nervous—not just because it wasn’t good practice, but because of her schooling and her dealings with antiques. “You probably shouldn’t be doing that.”

Her objection seemed to fall on deaf ears. “Just keep a lookout, would you?”

She glanced around. They could get in trouble for this. People took antiques seriously, and she was one of those people. “What are you looking for? Why do you need to know about these symbols?” She snapped a picture with her own phone. “The same chest was in the shoals cave.”

He nodded, and then, before she could say another word, he opened the chest. “Yep.”