Mike Sorrell and June Calloway were engaged only weeks before the world came apart - a promise made, a ring given, no wedding date yet set. A year of hiding in separate hollows followed, never certain the other had survived. They found their way back to each other days before the sky split open, and came home glorified, ageless, and whole to the mountains they'd never really left.
What waited for them was a heartbreak neither expected: by the Lord's own plain word, the marriage they'd hoped their way toward is no longer theirs to have - not in any form they've ever known it to take.
An old granny-woman named Orpha Justice helps them find what's offered instead: not a wedding, but a bond simply given, the way Eve was first brought to Adam. On a bald above their home hollows, where the rhododendron blooms early and will every year after, an angelic messenger joins them with a single word. No vow. Just done.
A quieter ache runs alongside their joy - loved ones lost to their own unbelief before the Tribulation came. And, in time, a family neither saw coming.
A cozy, tender homecoming story for anyone who's ever feared the Lord might return before they got the life they were hoping for - and an answer, gently, in hope.
Note: This novel was written with the assistance of artificial intelligence tools.