Every Time We Say Goodbye. Liz Flaherty

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СКАЧАТЬ THE TOE, Arlie asked Jack to get the mail out of the rural box at the end of her driveway while she went inside and made peace with Caruso. “I know I’m late,” she told the fussy cat, scooping her food into her bowl, “but it couldn’t be helped. Have you been a good girl today?”

      Caruso ignored her, going to the front door with her tail twitching.

      “Well, fine. He’ll be right in.” Arlie shrugged at the cat’s lack of loyalty and took bowls from the open cupboards above the counter. The chili smelled good and it had been a long time since she’d had a bologna sandwich at lunch.

      “Your mail’s a lot livelier than mine.” Jack’s voice came from inside the front door. Caruso meowed sternly.

      “Not another frog, I hope—the neighborhood kids do that occasionally. It scares the mail carrier to death when she opens the mailbox.” She set the table with soupspoons and cloth napkins that matched the quilted table runner then put a sleeve of crackers into a basket.

      Jack came into the kitchen carrying a stack of mail in his right hand and something else in his left.

      Something fuzzy that definitely wasn’t a frog. Winding around her ankles like a blue-gray wool muffler, Caruso meowed again.

      “What is it? I don’t think I’ve ever gotten any mail I’d describe as ‘lively,’ unless you count the obscene birthday cards Holly sends me.” Arlie came to where Jack stood. “Oh, it’s a puppy. A teeny, teeny one. Look at its little white feet.”

      His eyes danced behind his glasses. They were standing so close she felt his breath against her temple. It was a warm feeling she didn’t want to think too much about. “You get puppies in the mail here on the lake?” he asked. “It must be really interesting when someone has a baby. Do you deliver them after you deliver them?”

      She crossed her eyes at him. “It’s so little. I’ll bet it’s too young to be away from its mother. Where’s your baby basket, Caruso?” Arlie went into the laundry room, scrabbling through the cupboard above the dryer until she found the old Easter basket Caruso had slept in until she figured out how to climb onto Arlie’s bed.

      “He’s cold.” Jack cuddled the puppy between his hands. “Do you want me to go get him some formula?”

      “I made it when I found Caruso. It should be the same for a puppy, shouldn’t it?” Arlie scrounged out the cloth diapers she’d used to keep Caruso warm when she was a kitten. “I’m afraid I’m going to be a hoarder—I seem to keep way too many things.” She wrapped the diaper around a rice bag, microwaved it and tucked it into the basket.

      “You have room.” Jack laid the whimpering puppy on the soft flannel bed and stroked his little fuzzy head with his index finger.

      She foraged for the ingredients for homemade puppy formula. “Caruso was only a few weeks old when we found her,” she explained, opening a can of evaporated milk and pouring some of it into a glass measuring cup. “Jesse taught me to do this stuff. He’s a great vet.” She added thick corn syrup and an egg yolk and poured in some distilled water, then whipped the mixture with a whisk. “You want to feed him while I brush the cobwebs out of my hair and finish getting dinner on the table?”

      “Sure.”

      She handed him the cup of warmed formula along with an eyedropper and wondered for a heartbeat how Chris would have responded to that question. He was a good person—funny and smart and generous—but nurturing was so far down his list of attributes she thought it probably wasn’t there.

      Of course, she didn’t think Chris had any secret children he hadn’t mentioned, either.

      A short time later, they put the snoozing puppy in the basket on the brick hearth in the living room. Freshly showered—the cobwebs had made her feel sticky all over—and with her hair once more in a towel, Arlie lit the gas fire, petted a curious Caruso and joined Jack at the table.

      “So, what are you doing at Llewellyn’s Lures?” she asked, laying a napkin across the lap of her favorite brown sweatpants.

      “Getting ready to sell it.”

      She looked up in dismay. “Really?”

      He shrugged. “Neither Tucker nor I are interested in running it. Most of my business concerns are in Vermont and his are in Tennessee.”

      “Llewellyn’s has been here for a hundred years.” Wasn’t it enough that he walked away from things so easily? Did he have to be so cavalier about the nearly sixty employees whose jobs he was selling off?

      “And I hope it stays. I truly do,” he replied quickly. “We’ll do everything we can to keep the status quo, to pass Llewellyn’s on to someone who wants to keep it in business and run it the way it has been. After all, it’s a profitable company.” His expression didn’t change, but his eyes did. They looked distant. Sad. And conflicted. “The truth—for me—is that Charlie lives in Vermont most of the time. I don’t have custody. I don’t even see him nearly as much as I should. But he’s there, and I need to be there, too.”

      She couldn’t argue that, though she’d have liked to. She’d have liked to throw things and shout at the top of her voice, What about our baby? She’d be fifteen now.

      But he didn’t know. Other than Gianna and Holly and herself, the only ones who knew were the medical staff who had attended her the night of the accident, the ones who told her the trauma was too much for the fragile life she’d carried.

      Gianna had wanted her to tell Jack about the pregnancy, but Arlie had refused. It had been over nearly as soon as it began, one more loss added to a night already too full of them. He’d had enough on his plate, she thought, losing his father and dealing with the knowledge that Victor Llewellyn had caused the accident. She would tell him later, she’d promised her stepmother, when life was calmer. He would share her grief and make it easier to bear.

      But by the time “later” came, Jack was gone from her life. Only in her heart did she know the lost baby had been a girl. Only in her heart had she nursed her, dressed her and taught her to sing. Only in her heart had she named her Sarah Angelina after her grandmother and the woman who’d been the only mother who mattered.

      Most of the time, it was easy. As the nurses in the hospital had promised, time had healed the wounds of the accident—even the emotional ones. Grief had settled and smoothed and memories had dimmed. Delivering babies had provided healing and joy beyond what she’d been able to imagine even when she was training in midwifery.

      “You’re right.” She felt as though she was speaking from the end of a tunnel, and she cleared her throat. “You need to be with him.” She smiled, thinking of the boy with the beautiful eyes and shiny dark brown hair. “He’s a sweet kid. Ornery. More like Tuck than you, I think.”

      “He is.” Jack sounded surprised. “He looks like his mother and biological father, and he definitely got his mother’s brain, but he does have a lot of Tuck in him.”

      Arlie frowned, not understanding. “Is he adopted?”

      “Not exactly.” He gestured with his spoon. “This is really good.”

      “Thank you.” Arlie was glad he liked the chili, but wouldn’t be diverted. “Would you want to explain ‘not exactly’? I don’t remember the term from my nursing or midwifery СКАЧАТЬ