Chapter 1
As she was sitting at her kitchen table grading papers, Amanda heard the tune that signaled she had a text message. Picking up her phone, she quickly glanced at the readout. The number was unfamiliar. She clicked on the message to read it. “Stephanie gave me your number. She said you might be interested in texting with a lonely farmer.”
Amanda read the message again, and a slow smile spread across her face. Stephanie had told her that there was a man in her church that she thought would be perfect for her. This must be him. She quickly keyed in a reply. “I think I would be interested in texting a lonely farmer, but only if you tell me your name.”
Stephanie had been her roommate at the small Christian college she attended. After graduation, Stephanie had moved to Wisconsin, with her preacher husband, Bob, to plant a church. They now had four children, two boys and two girls.
Jason was surprised at how quickly he got the alert signaling he’d received a reply text. He picked up his phone holding his breath. Would she be interested? He tapped the phone and the message appeared. His face lit up with a grin. He tapped out a response and sent it on.
He had surprised himself by agreeing to text Amanda, his pastor’s wife’s friend. He lived in a sparsely populated area of Wisconsin, and just didn’t have time to go out and meet women. When Stephanie had suggested her friend might be interested in marriage, he took her number, but didn’t think he’d ever actually do anything with it. He’d gotten in early this evening, and as he’d sat on his couch, vegetating in front of the television, he’d thought about how nice it would be to not be alone anymore. So he’d dug the number out of his wallet and sent a text.
Amanda picked up the phone again. She’d barely had time to get one paper graded before he’d responded. “I’m Jason. I understand you live in Texas? What do you do there?”
She grinned and her fingers flew across the screen as she answered. “I do live in Texas about an hour south of Dallas/Fort Worth. I’m a homemaking teacher. Where do you live?”
The answer came back quickly. “Stratford, Wisconsin. Small town not far from Wausau, if you’ve ever heard of that.”
Amanda hadn’t, so she opened up her laptop and Googled it. It was barely more than a crook in the highway, but that was fine. It wasn’t like she was marrying the man. She was texting him. “And you’re a farmer? What kind of farming?”
“Lol. Dairy, of course. I’m a Wisconsin farmer.”
She grinned. “Do you like farming?” She pushed the papers aside. She could grade papers tomorrow night. It was Friday night after all. She did a little more searching on the town Jason lived in.
“I really don’t know anything else. I even studied agriculture in college. Do you like teaching?”
She thought about that. She’d been teaching for ten years now, and wasn’t sure how she felt about it anymore. “Sometimes. Sometimes not. I’m at a point where I need a change.” She hadn’t really realized that before he’d asked.
“I understand. Have you had your spring break yet?”
“We just got back this week. The kids are all wiggly and don’t want to learn.”
“Lol. I’m glad the cows don’t get that way.”
“Do you teach the cows?” She smiled to herself as she typed that, wondering what his response would be.
“Not typically. I wish I could sometimes.”
“What would you teach them if you could?”
Jason grinned as he read the question. What would he teach those silly cows? “I’d teach them to read so they’d understand why I keep having the vet give them shots.”
Amanda laughed out loud at the thought of cows reading. She’d never had a full conversation by text message before. She didn’t know the abbreviations or the jargon. She hated not typing out the full words anyway. It looked like Jason was the same. Should she ask him to call her? Would that be too forward? “That would be interesting, I think. If you manage to do that, would you come to Texas and teach my students how to sit still?”
“I keep trying to imagine your words spoken with a Texas drawl. Do you say y’all a lot?”
She smiled. “Not a lot. It is a pretty common word around here, you know. I’m trying to imagine a Wisconsin accent when you text, but I’m not sure I’d know one if I heard one.”
He read the words and smiled. How would she react if he just called? It was late, but he knew she was up. He had her number. Would she mind? He took a deep breath and threw caution to the wind, clicking the button to call her instead of sending her another text.