A Baby In The House. Pamela Bauer

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      He patted the leather chair. “How about sitting right here.”

      Sitting had never been easy for someone as active as Dolly and today was no different than any other time he’d visited her. She squirmed and fidgeted, but he managed to complete the exam and was relieved when he found there was no cause for alarm.

      “Okay, that’ll do it,”’ he said, stuffing his stethoscope back into his bag.

      “I’m as right as rain, aren’t I?”

      “You are. How’s the hip?”

      “The only thing wrong with my hip is that it kept me from getting my hair done yesterday because I had to go to physical therapy,” she grumbled.

      He looked at her white curls. “I thought you said you had your hair done today?”

      “I did. My gal came back this morning. Made a special trip for me. Isn’t she just the sweetest thing?” She didn’t wait for an answer but continued on. “I think you’d like her. She’s pretty. Really pretty.”

      “Now don’t go getting any ideas, Dolly,” he warned.

      “I know better than to do that,” she said with a flap of her wrinkled hand. “Kryssie’s got too many boyfriends the way it is. She gets flowers all the time from this one or that one. They usually end up here…the flowers, that is. She doesn’t want reminders of a bad date.”

      Garret didn’t comment and she continued on, “You wouldn’t be interested in her anyway being you’re not looking to settle down just yet. You have too many things to accomplish.”

      “Yes, I do,” he agreed.

      “Are you still thinking about the Doctors Without Borders program?”

      Because Dolly’s husband had been in the Red Cross, Garret had told her about his interest in doing relief work. She’d shown him journals her husband had kept during his tour of duty overseas and shared stories of what it had been like to be a doctor’s wife during the 1940s. Besides being a very interesting woman, she was easy to talk to and encouraged Garret to use his medical training in whatever way he felt was best.

      “I don’t think I’ll be leaving until after the first of the year,” he told her.

      “I’ll miss seeing you, but I’m happy to share you with the rest of the world,” she said with a gracious smile. “You remind me so much of my husband. Dedicated. Passionate about helping people. A true gentleman.”

      “Thank you. I wish I had known him.”

      “You would have liked him. He was a good man.” A wistful expression came over her face as she talked about him. “We only had a few years together, but they were wonderful years. It’s too bad everyone can’t have a love like ours. There’d be a lot fewer divorces.”

      “You were lucky.”

      “Yes, we were. No amount of time can erase what we had together. True love is like that. It’ll go on forever…” She trailed off, her eyes glassy with a distant expression in them. “Even after all these years I still have so many clear memories. And of course I have Mavis. There is no greater reminder of a love shared than a child. Don’t you agree?”

      “I certainly do. And your daughter should sleep well tonight. Your lungs sound fine, Dolly.”

      “I told you it was only my allergies causing me to cough.”

      “Yes, you did,” he said, snapping his bag shut. “Do you have any questions before I go?”

      “Oh, you’re leaving so soon?” she said, suddenly sounding very childlike. “I was hoping you could stay and talk.”

      “I wish I could, but I have appointments this afternoon. I’m sorry.” His apology couldn’t have been more sincere. It was one of the aspects of his job he wished he could change—there were never enough hours in a day. He regretted not being able to spend more time with his patients and it frustrated him that he had to spend so much of his workday doing paperwork. He wanted to be helping people, which was why he was interested in doing humanitarian work.

      She nodded her head in understanding. “Mavis said you’re the hardest-working doctor at the clinic.”

      “I don’t know about that. All doctors work hard, Dolly.”

      She sighed. “You don’t need to tell me. When you do finally settle down, you’d better make sure it’s with someone who understands that.”

      “Of one thing you can be sure, Dolly, and that’s when I do finally get around to doing just that, you’ll be the first to know.” With that statement, he left her with a smile.

      THE FIRST TIME KRYSTAL HAD walked into 14 Valentine Place she’d felt at home. If houses had personalities—which Krystal believed they did—this one’s was warm and inviting and definitely female, just like its owner, Leonie Donovan.

      Contentment resonated in the polished wood floors and mahogany-trimmed walls. Krystal noticed it every time she stepped through the front door. Her landlady said it was because it had been home to a happy family. Three generations of Donovans had lived in the house and there’d been no divorce, no bitter battles over who owned what, no kids coming and going in split-custody arrangements.

      It was only after Leonie’s husband had died unexpectedly that the big old Victorian structure had been converted into a boardinghouse. Everyone understood why Leonie had decided to rent the rooms to women. She’d raised four sons and had reached a point in her life where she wanted to connect with the feminine side of life.

      Krystal had been one of the first women to rent a room and, like everyone else who would live at 14 Valentine Place, was treated like a member of a family. It was an extended family that included Leonie’s sons, her daughters-in-law and her grandson. It was a family rich in history, just like the house, and hearing the Donovan brothers talk about their childhoods reminded her how very different their lives had been from hers.

      That’s because home to her had been a series of house trailers, none of them double-wide. What little furniture they’d had was either rented or purchased at a garage sale or flea market. There had been no family heirlooms handed down from generation to generation. While Leonie’s home often smelled of lemon-scented furniture polish, the mobile homes where Krystal had lived had reeked of stale cigarette smoke.

      Not that Krystal had been unhappy with her childhood—she hadn’t. It was just very different from the one the Donovan boys had experienced, and not just because they lived in a house with a concrete foundation and plaster walls.

      She’d grown up in a house of women. She’d never known her father, she didn’t have a brother and she seldom saw her grandfather. If her mother had men friends, she and her sister Carly never saw them.

      Krystal knew it was because she was trying to be a good role model for her daughters. To Linda Graham, the most important lesson she could teach her daughters was not to make the same mistakes she had. She’d had not one but two teen pregnancies, and she’d made it clear that she wanted her daughters to have a different life than she’d had. It was why she had imposed such strict rules when it came to dating.

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