My Three Girls

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER ONE

DANA TUGGED at the collar of her sleeveless cotton dress, feeling a damp film of sweat on her sternum. Indian summer in California’s Panoche Valley was just more of the same—dry and brittle, the victim of a scorching summer. Cattle on the rolling hills searched for shade and found it at the chain-link border of a one-room schoolhouse, a green oasis of non-native shade trees nestled in a valley of brown.

Dana glanced at the large clock on the wall. It was nearly six on a Friday, but it wasn’t strange that she was still at work. When she was twenty-four, Dana had taken on the role of principal and teacher at one of the smallest schools in California’s Central Valley, a job that took someone who was either a loner or a certified workaholic.

Dana was both.

For the past five years, she’d embraced the isolation, hoping that work and the dark, still nights could wrap her in a protective blanket. It hadn’t always been that way. There was a time, new teaching credentials in hand, she had taught in an urban school filled with low-income children even more thirsty for the safety school offered than for the subsidized cartons of milk. She’d had colleagues then, a few she might call friends, but those faces were a blur now. The only face she saw with heartbreaking regularity was the one she tried not to see, the one permanently imprinted in her vision like a sunspot. Round cheeks, clear brown eyes, a shock of black hair.

Dana reached over and jerked down the shade. The temperature of her west-facing office dropped ten degrees. Now wasn’t the time to be thinking about him, what he’d be like as a teenager. With brisk movements, she began to sort through the forms on her desk, prioritizing the night’s work. Even though she only had twelve students, she needed to fill out the same reports that the larger schools did. Fire safety, student evacuation plans, building and lighting requirements.

If she filled out enough forms, if she buried herself in her work, the unbearable pain became a dull knot where her heart once was. That had been a successful strategy for five years, but now that the frenzy of developing lesson plans, organizing the school year and implementing the latest state-mandated curriculum had become more routine, the grief she’d thought she’d been able to sidestep dogged her relentlessly. Her mother had told her in her no-nonsense manner that the loss of a child, even if the child wasn’t hers, was something that no one ever got over, and that she needed to face her grief rather than run away from it. Dana disagreed. Grief could be put off if one kept busy enough.

Which was why this situation was perfect for her. After all, how many people could boast of no commute, no neighbors, no true boss, except for the school board who supported every one of her efforts to update the small school? When she finished her day’s work, which generally wasn’t until nine or ten in the evening, she just walked fifty feet to the district-owned, two-bedroom cottage she called home, ate a sandwich or a bowl of cereal and flopped into bed. On Saturday, she would return to the schoolhouse to work on the endless list of minor repairs it needed. On Sunday, she would clean and set up the classroom for the following week. It was a wonderful system that had kept the terrible waves of depression at bay for years.

“Hellooo?” a singsong voice called.

Dana’s head snapped up at the intrusion. No one ever came onto the school property after school hours unless it was parents’ night. But that only happened twice a year. She pushed away from her desk and poked her head up over the file cabinets.

“Hello? Miss Ritchie?”

Dana groaned when she recognized the person and the oh-too-sweet-voice at the same time. Beverly Moore. The only parent she had personality conflicts with. Maybe it was because Mrs. Moore was new and hadn’t quite acquired small-school etiquette. Most of her parents traveled as far as forty miles to drop off their children, and Dana did what she could to accommodate their schedules, since they didn’t have a lot of time for chit-chatting. Most lived and worked on ranches or farms so rural that running water was a luxury. Like the school’s, their electricity was gleaned from a generator. When the parents picked up their children at two-thirty, they were single-minded in their efforts to get back to their properties. Livestock needed to be fed, fences needed to be mended. Dana used the snatches of time before and after school to update them quickly on their children’s progress or lack thereof.

Mrs. Moore, whose three daughters had enrolled at the last minute but made up a quarter of her class this year, was a parent of a different caliber. The family lived in a house just two miles from the school, and Beverly Moore seemed to believe that Dana was a built-in baby-sitter. Dana could count on the fact the Moore girls would be the first ones dropped off in the morning, some times an hour early, and the last ones picked up—often by two or three hours. They were occasionally dropped off on weekends so they could play on the school grounds, too.

Dana didn’t appreciate the added responsibility, but the girls kept to themselves and weren’t destructive in any way, so she let it slide. Eventually she’d become used to hearing Karen bark orders at her younger sisters, and Ollie, the youngest, scream with delight.

“Miss Ritchie?” The voice was getting closer, along with the distinct clicking of high heels.

Mrs. Moore’s perfume reached Dana before she did.

Dana summoned a stiff smile and called, “Yes?” She stepped out from behind the file cabinets.

The other woman stopped short. “Oh! I’m so glad you’re here. I knocked on your door, but when there wasn’t an answer, I took the chance you’d be in the school. I saw your car, so I knew you hadn’t gone anywhere.”

One good reason why Dana should park in the garage.

“What can I do for you?” Dana said, her voice as crisp as she could make it. She even crossed her arms over her chest, hoping that Mrs. Moore was attuned to nonverbal communication.

No such luck.

“I need the biggest favor from you.” She smiled as if Dana were her closest and dearest friend, then placed a manicured hand on Dana’s forearm.

Dana worked not to flinch; she didn’t want people touching her. She removed herself from the contact. All that did was give her a better look at the other woman’s ensemble. The manicure, the heels, the perfume all set off an impeccable beige linen suit. Dana eyed the cream silk camisole with something that she might have called envy a lifetime ago. Despite the heat, Beverly Moore looked cool and composed. Dana felt every inch the dowdy schoolmarm.

“I know it’s an imposition,” Beverly continued, as if Dana’s silence was consent, “but I’ve been called out of town and I’m just not able to get a baby-sitter.”

“No.” The word was out of her mouth before Dana could stop it.

Even Beverly looked taken aback. “No? You don’t even know what I was going to ask.”

“To baby-sit, maybe?” Dana raised an eye brow, her voice dry.

Beverly had the grace to flush. “It would only be for the weekend.” She spoke rapidly as if speed would convince Dana to grant her the favor.

“No.” Dana had been down that road once before. First, it was baby-sitting, then foster care, then— “No!” She turned her back. “School is out for the weekend.”

“It’s a very important business conference I need to attend. I’ll be back on Sunday.”

Sunday? Dana didn’t dare look at the woman in case eye contact would be considered assent. What would she do with the Moore girls for two whole days?

“I can pay—”

Dana turned, feeling her face get red. “I don’t need money.”

Beverly Moore shrugged, looking at Dana’s clothes, her gaze fastening on Dana’s serviceable shoes. “I’d make it worth your while.”

“I don’t think you could,” Dana replied. “Now, if you’ll excuse me I have a great deal of work to do. I hope you find someone.”

The woman’s lipsticked mouth pinched tightly together, but finally she nodded and left, heels clicking across the linoleum. With the final bang of the closing door, Dana expelled the breath she was holding. Then she crossed the room and locked the door before settling back in her chair and picking up the form on the top of the pile. She studied the fine print and began to fill it out.

The front door handle rattled.

Dana’s back stiffened. Surely Mrs. Moore couldn’t be back.

“Miss Ritchie?” The voice came sailing toward her through the locked door, as cheerful as if they hadn’t had the previous conversation. Dana stayed silent, hoping Mrs. Moore would think that she’d gone back to the house.

“I know you’re in there,” the woman said. “I know you haven’t gone. The girls say you don’t ever go anywhere.”

Dana kept her head down and tried to concentrate on the form in front of her. Then a persistent knocking started.

How long could she keep that up? Eventually, her knuckles would be raw and—