Baby Dreams And Wedding Schemes

“Word for the day. Compunction: anxiety arising from guilt.” Stupid word! Who needed extra guilt?

Some mother you’ll make, her subconscious chided. No empathy. She frowned, glaring maliciously at the cash register. She was as empathetic as the next woman and she fully intended to be the best mother since sliced bread. So there!

Sasha tossed her shining head back and considered her folly in moving to Allen’s Springs, Montana. Was it her fault poor old Henry had died right here in the middle of the store? she demanded of herself.

“I’m sure your father will understand when you explain it all to him.” There, her voice was kind but firm.

“Nah, he won’t.” The face drooped with misery. “He never does. He’s gonna be really mad. I just know it.”

Sasha closed her eyes in defeat as the tentacles of his mournful distress squeezed tightly around her heartstrings. With difficulty, she repressed the urge to push back the tumble of brown curls from his brow.

Softie. Don’t get involved. Not today. You’ve got that appointment to prepare for. If you’re lucky, you’ll soon have your own kids to worry about.

“Well,” she said in capitulation, knowing darn well she never took her own advice, “perhaps if I spoke to your father.” She glanced around the empty store and made a face. “I don’t think anyone else is coming in today anyway. That announcement of mine pretty well cleared everyone out.” She smiled grimly.

At least he had the grace to look downcast at her loss of business. Sasha handed him a tissue.

“Here. Blow.” Her tone was filled with resignation. “What’s your father’s name?”

“No! You can’t!” The boy’s voice trembled with fear. “I—I’ll tell him myself.” He was backing down the aisle toward the door now, one knobby knee showing through the wide tear in his black pants.

Sasha was amazed. What kind of an ogre was the child’s father, for heaven’s sake, to engender such fear in the boy? And where was he when his son needed him? This was the fifth time in as many days that she’d had the child as an afternoon visitor. Alone.

She darted past him and whipped the door closed, sending the chimes tinkling throughout the empty aisles. That was one advantage of having very long legs. She could outrun almost everyone. Of course, at five feet eleven and seven-eighths inches she also towered above every other living soul.

“I think you and I had better have a talk,” Sasha told him firmly as she closed her hand around one thin shoulder. “Come on. I made cookies yesterday.” He looked doubtful. “Triple chocolate chip with nuts.”

That seemed to decide the issue. He trailed along behind her, his black leather shoes clicking against the worn oak planks of the floor.

Black leather shoes?

Sasha took a second look at the child and grimaced. Most of the kids in Allen’s Springs wore jeans and a T-shirt with sneakers. This child was distinctly out of place in his white shirt, dress pants and leather shoes; the very same items he’d worn each time he’d visited her.

“What’s your name?” Sasha asked softly, leading him through the connecting door to her small living quarters at the rear. Somehow they had never gotten ’round to introductions.

“Cody,” he told her, gazing around with interest. “Is this where you live? I like it.”

His chubby fingers twiddled with the stuffed parrot that hung behind her sofa. “Trains,” he crowed, his eyes sparkling as he moved toward the display in the center of her living room.

Sasha watched as he lovingly gazed at the miniature machines, reached out a tentative hand and then dropped it back by his side. His eyes were huge, round saucers as he studied the red locomotives sitting silent on the tracks she had tacked to a board late last night.

“Four,” he half whispered to himself, nodding. “Here’s the engine and the c’boose. This one is for carrying stuff.”

Sasha pondered his rapt expression as she lifted the jug of milk from the refrigerator and poured a glass for herself and one for the child. Cody seemed mesmerized by her newest project. Good. The boy’s interest boded well for her expansion plans.

Sasha grinned as she removed several of the biggest cookies from the nutcracker cookie jar on her counter and arranged them on a tray. As the eldest of six children, if there was one thing she had experience in, it was kids and what they liked. Sasha grimaced. She should know; she’d played both mother and father in her own family for years.

The fact that this child was a little different from any of the children she’d baby-sat through high school and college just meant she needed a break from work. To get back her perspective! she told herself.

“Let’s have our snack in the backyard,” she told him, pushing the screen door open with one hip as she carried out the tray. “Then we’ll talk about Henry.”

At the mention of that name, Cody’s round face fell and he followed her out the door onto a tiny patch of lawn. “Henry’s gone,” he muttered disconsolately. “I didn’t mean to hurt him. I just wanted to take him for a walk.”

Sasha’s motherly heart ached at the sadness in his tone. Poor little waif.

“I was ever so careful to lift him gently.”

“Well, it was a nice idea, Cody, but I don’t think goldfish go for walks. They like their bowls.”

He shook his head sadly. “Doesn’t matter,” he whispered. “Everything dies.” It was a solemn denunciation of his whole five-year-old world.

Sasha ruffled his hair gently, enjoying the feel of those silky strands against her palms.

“Who else died?” she asked, waiting for him to look at her.

He didn’t. Instead one grubby fist dashed away the tears before he picked up one of her cookies and started chewing. His voice was quiet when he spoke. “Rocket.”

“Who’s Rocket?”

“My dog, o’ course.” Cody peered up at her then, as if to assess her mental age. “He got hit by a car when I letted him out of the gate.” He sniffed sadly. “An’ George and Gertrude.”

Sasha frowned. His grandparents?

“How did they die?” she asked softly.

“Ate too much.” He picked up a second cookie while his other hand grasped the glass.

Sasha was mystified. “Ate too much?” She tried to play along. Maybe this having kids thing was harder than she thought. “But that wasn’t your fault. People feed themselves. Except for babies, of course. No one could blame you, Cody.”

He shook his head doubtfully. “I feeded them too much birdseed.” His mouth was stuffed full of cookie and Sasha wasn’t sure she heard him correctly.

“Birdseed?”

He nodded. “Uh-huh. And I didn’t keep their cage clean ’nuf, neither.” Sadly, he scuffed his toe on the grass. “Dad said you can’t be pushing stuff at canaries all the time. They like to be left alone. Gertrude stopped singing one day and then she got dead.”

A smile twitched at the corners of her mouth as Sasha realized her error.

“And is that all?” she asked, unable to resist brushing her hand over his darkly shining head once more.

“Nope.” He slurped down the rest of the milk and then leaned over to pick a dandelion.

“Who else?”

His brown eyes peered up into hers. “Shelley—that was my turtle. And Rolly.”

“Who’s Rolly?” She was almost afraid to hear the answer.

“Gerbil,” he told her succinctly. “Got out of the cage and Dad stepped on him. Axidennnally, o’ course.”