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  Barry pulled his car into the driveway, and Tory got out. She stood there, staring at the door, and suddenly realized that she couldn’t go in and face the babysitter, or the children. Not yet.

  “I need to be alone for a minute,” she told him. “I’m just gonna go for a walk.”

  He didn’t stop her. She knew that he, too, wanted some solitude to sort through his thoughts. But someone had to tend to the children, and she had asked first. As he went in, she launched out to the backyard, and crossed behind Sylvia’s house. She hoped the Gonzaleses didn’t come out and speak to her now. She didn’t have the patience to listen through their accents and explain the customs that made so little sense to them. They were still so curious about the upcoming Halloween that they had a million questions even she couldn’t answer.

  She pulled her sweater more tightly around her and passed behind the empty stables where the horses used to be. Her anger increased with every step as she trod down the path through the woods that came out to a pasture on the other side. The wind was crisp as it whipped through the trees and blew up her hair around her face, cutting through her clothes and making her shiver. She walked faster as she went, each step making the anger coil up inside her like the red-hot heat in a radiator. Tears stung her eyes and burned down her face, and she wiped them away with cold hands as she kept walking.

  She came out on the other side of the mountain, where she could see more of the hills that loomed behind their homes. A few thick clouds loomed over their peaks, and she looked up even farther above them, her eyes searching the sky for the God who watched over it all.

  “It’s not fair,” she whispered between her teeth, but the words seemed to get lost on the wind. She lifted her chin, still searching the sky. “It’s not fair!” she bit out, her voice undulating on the emotion that gave it wings. The wind whipped up harder, colder, against her face. She closed her hands into fists. “Why!” she screamed louder this time, the word echoing out over the valley.

  She fell to her knees in the grass and covered her face with both hands, weeping out her anguish as the wind rustled through her clothes and dried the tears as fast as they came. She was beginning to feel nauseous, just as she had this morning when she had awakened, and her head still throbbed with the pressure of her emotion. She wept and wailed, knowing that no one was nearby who could hear. No one would hear unless they lived downwind in the valley, and then they would only look up and know that someone was suffering somewhere. Maybe they would say a prayer for her.

  She heard a cat squall a few feet behind her, and she turned around to see her pet scrabbling down a tree trunk with a baby bird in its mouth. She heard fluttering above her and looked up to see a small nest with baby chicks rustling around their mother, chattering and chirping about the feline that had almost done them all in.

  She clapped her hands to startle the cat. “No, Babs! No!” But the cat wasn’t intimidated.

  The mother bird left the nest and flew down to the ground, a few feet away from the cat. Helpless, she watched as the cat dropped the chick into the grass. Tory got up and went to grab the cat, but he only darted away playfully, as if daring Tory to chase him. Tory turned back to the baby bird and saw that it wasn’t moving.

  All of her pain, all of her anguish, all of the wrenching anger that had gripped her heart and driven her to her knees, seemed suddenly to focus on that little wounded bird. The mother flew up to a low branch on the tree, but kept her eyes on the chick.

  She picked up the little bird, cradling it in her hands, and realized it was dead. There was nothing she could do.

  Tory wondered if mother birds grieved.

  That inexpressible sadness sucked her under again, and she laid the chick back down and turned away from the mother. They had no control, either of them. Their children were vulnerable to terrible things, and there was absolutely nothing they could do. Of all the jobs in the world, she thought, motherhood had to be the most frightening.

  Despairing that inside her a wounded baby grew, she wailed. She put her hands over her stomach. She was just as pregnant now as she had been this morning before she’d known what kind of child she was carrying, just as pregnant as she’d been two and a half weeks ago when she’d read that pregnancy test. This baby was as real as Brittany or Spencer had ever been, and just as much hers. It was as real as that dead baby bird on the ground.

  But God knew about the baby bird, she realized suddenly. He knew about the mother bird, still watching hopefully, helplessly, from her perch. He knew about the baby Tory was carrying.

  She sat back on the grass and looked up at those clouds again. She felt a raindrop hit her cheek, her nose, her eyelid. In seconds, it was raining on her and around her, a soft warning of the storm to come. But she had the sense that she wasn’t alone.

  “My baby,” she whispered, weeping for the child and all the heartache that might come to her in her life, for all the things she would never have and all the things she would miss. For all the things she would never understand.

  There was so much uncertainty, she thought. So much she wouldn’t know until the baby came and they saw how severe the retardation was. Until then, there was only one thing that was certain. This baby would be a part of her family, the little sister of Brittany and Spencer, the third and youngest child with the Sullivan name. Somehow, God would give Tory the grace to endure. This was her child. It was God’s child, too.

  She breathed in a deep, cleansing breath and got back to her feet, dusted her pants off, and let the rain drizzle through her hair and wash her face. But it didn’t wash the grief away. It still weighed her down, bending her and threatening to break her.

  Slowly, Tory started back up the path toward Cedar Circle, knowing her “why” would not be answered now. Sometimes there was no clarity, no sense to be made. Sometimes one just had to trudge through, trusting that there would be joy again on the other side.

  When the clouds passed, the rain would stop. Life would be cleansed and fed and sustained. Mothers would patch their hearts back together and move on, doing what had to be done. She would endure these rains somehow.

  CHAPTER Ten

  The rains were pouring harder in León, Nicaragua, as a huge hurricane swirled up from the Pacific. Sylvia had seen Internet reports that it had already reached deadly force. Unless it turned in another direction, it was headed straight for their coast.

  She stood just outside her open front door under the eaves of their house, watching the rain pound down and listening to the thunder. Because of the hard rain, business at the clinic had slacked off for the day, and Harry had been trying to update the files he kept on his patients. Sylvia had wanted to go out and visit some of his sicker patients, but there were areas of the city that were already flooding, and she feared that her car would get stalled and she wouldn’t be able to get back. That sense of having no purpose assaulted her again, and she longed for the days when she had two children at home, and didn’t have one moment to herself. Those moments had fled so quickly. And she longed for her friends in Cedar Circle. She remembered sitting on Brenda’s porch on rainy nights, laughing and talking as Tory grew and Cathy learned and Brenda taught. Sylvia had been the mother figure of the bunch, whether she’d wanted to play that role or not. But she had been older than the others, and already had her child-rearing work behind her. That made her an expert.

  Funny, she didn’t feel like an expert in anything now.

  She heard Harry’s footsteps on the parquet floor behind her and looked over her shoulder. He began to hum a tune, one she couldn’t identify, and he took her hand and swung her around with a flourish. “Rain always makes me want to dance,” he said.

  She laughed as he began to move across the floor with her, then dipped her, and pretended he was going to drop her. “Harry!” she cried. He pulled her up again, then crushed her against him and spun around. Harry always knew how to make her laugh. She pressed her face against his neck and listened to his deep humming. She loved his voice
. It was so strong and gentle, so full of compassion and joy.

  He spun her and dipped her again. Holding her frozen in that dip, he asked, “So tell me why a good-looking woman would be staring out into the rain with a sad look on her face.”

  The sad look was gone, and she grinned up at him. “You’re going to drop me, aren’t you?”

  “Not until you tell me what was on your mind.”

  “Then you’re going to drop me?”

  He laughed and pulled her up again with an exaggerated flourish, then let her go. She slid her arms around his waist and kissed his chin. He pushed the hair back from her cheek and gave her the understanding look that had helped her through so many trials. “Come on. What’s wrong?”

  “Just homesick,” she said. “Remembering.”

  He slid his arms around her and held her tight. “We have great memories, don’t we? And many more to come.”

  “Yeah. But I’m having trouble not knowing what those future memories are going to look like. What’s God going to do with me here?”

  “He’s going to use you to advance his kingdom. The same thing he’s done with you for most of your life.”

  “I know, but this…this is so concentrated. I feel like I have to do something quickly, or it’s not worth our coming. Days like today, with all the rain, I feel kind of helpless.”

  “Well, if that hurricane hits, we’re all going to feel helpless. There’ll be lots of work to do. Let’s take advantage of this calm before the storm. God doesn’t want us to use it feeding depression.”

  She smiled up at him. “Then what does he want us to do with it?”

  He grinned in that amazing way he had that reminded her why she had married him. “He wants us to dance,” he said.

  And as he began to hum again, they danced to the sound of rain just outside their door, and thunder cracking around them.

  CHAPTER Eleven

  The lights were off in Barry’s office. He had come in today and tried to do his work, but it was difficult when he hadn’t slept all night. The doctor’s words yesterday had plagued him all night, and the wrenching despair in his heart rendered him unable to think or do anything except dwell on the inevitable. Stripes of brightness from the sun came in from the slats in the closed blinds, providing the only light in the room, for darkness had seemed more appropriate. He sat in the shadows, staring at the potted plant that his secretary kept watered, while his mind saw something else entirely.

  He was ten years old, sitting on the stage of his elementary school, nervous about his first violin solo. It wasn’t much, just a few bars of Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy,” but he never liked to do things poorly, and he wasn’t sure he had practiced enough. He remembered looking out into the audience from that dusty stage with its faded curtains and seeing his parents sitting on the back row with his brother Nathan propped up in his wheelchair Nathan was whistling along with the strings after hearing the first chorus, and Barry remembered the sick, tight feeling that clawed at his stomach as the song ended.

  But Nathan’s whistling didn’t.

  Barry had fixed his eyes on his teacher, praying that she would quickly start them in the next song. He pretended he didn’t hear his brother’s loud, proud rendition of the song, shrilling out over the crowd. From the corner of his eye, he saw the heads beginning to turn, seeking out whatever rude soul was interrupting the silence between numbers. A few people chuckled, others shushed him, and he saw his teacher turn from the small orchestra and look to see who was whistling.

  He decided right then and there that he would never play an instrument again, never give his parents cause to attend a concert and drag his brother with them.

  Somehow, he had gotten through the song, but there was no longer joy in it, for he knew that the minute the song ended again, Nathan would be whistling it until someone distracted him with another tune. Guilt surged through him that he couldn’t just smile, brag that that was his brother, and admit how funny it was that he always whistled the last tune he heard. He shouldn’t be ashamed of the boy who had no choice in who he was or how he’d turned out. Barry should be happy that he was whole and healthy, that he could think and play violin, that he could sit up here with a solo and show his parents what it was like to have one child who could learn.

  But he had been ashamed that day, the last day he’d ever played his violin.

  Someone knocked on his office door, and he jumped and turned in his chair as they opened the door. Linda Holland from marketing stuck her head in. “Barry? I thought you weren’t in here. It’s dark.”

  “I had a headache,” he said. “The light was hurting my eyes.”

  She came tentatively into the room and set a report down on his desk. Her red hair looked as if she’d combed it in the car that morning. Rumpled curls cascaded around her face, and he wondered if she’d taken the rollers out and left them on the seat while she drove. Her dress looked wrinkled as if she’d thrown it on in haste without ironing it, and she walked in stocking feet. He wondered where she’d left her shoes.

  “I have some Tylenol if you want it,” she said, regarding him with concern.

  “That’s all right. I’ll be fine.”

  “Okay.” She kept looking at him as if he had a sign on his forehead that said his life was falling apart. “Here’s the report on the Hayes account.” She squinted in the darkness. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  “Yeah.” He got up, rubbing his forehead, and looked at his watch. “I’m gonna take an early lunch. I’ll read the report when I get back.”

  She preceded him out of the office. “If you decide you need that Tylenol…”

  He nodded. “Thanks.” He stepped into the light, squinting, and didn’t meet her eyes. His secretary, in the cubicle not far from his office, looked up to see where he was going. He mouthed that he was going to lunch, and she frowned at the early hour. But he didn’t care. He had to get out of here.

  He drove in silence across town, then got on the highway and followed it to the next little town, where his mother lived with his brother. His father had died over two years ago, and he felt a surge of guilt that he hadn’t done more to help his mother since that time. Her house needed painting and the porch steps were in need of repair.

  He pulled into the driveway and saw that her car was home. He knocked on the kitchen door to warn her that he was coming, then pushed the door open and stepped inside.

  “Barry!” she said, hurrying across the floor to greet him. “What are you doing here?”

  He smiled and leaned down to kiss his mother’s cheek. “Hey, Mama. I was in the area and thought I’d stop in and fix a sandwich.”

  “In the area?” she asked. “Way out here?”

  When he evaded the question, she added, “We have ham and turkey slices and peanut butter and jelly.” Her face glowed at the sight of him. “Help yourself. I was just feeding Nathan.”

  He looked through the door. “Where is he?”

  “Out in the garden,” she said. “It’s a beautiful day, so I’m feeding him out there.”

  He glanced out the window, saw Nathan, taller than he but so scrawny that he looked like his bones would break if he lifted an arm, propped in his wheelchair with his head held up by a brace at the back. He supposed his brother’s low weight was a blessing, enabling his strong mother to lift him. “Want me to feed him?” he asked.

  “He’d like that,” his mother said, handing him the bowl and the spoon she held in her hand. “I’ll fix you a sandwich while you do.”

  He took the bowl of mashed food and went outside to his brother. Nathan was whistling the theme song to “Wheel of Fortune,” and Barry knew he’d probably heard it playing on the television just inside the door. “Hey, Nathan,” he said as he pulled up a lawn chair next to the wheelchair and sat down.

  Nathan gave no acknowledgment that he was there, just kept whistling and staring into the flowers.

  “So let’s see what you got here today,” he said, looking into the
bowl. “Ummm. Egg, banana, milk, cereal.” It was no surprise. Nathan had that for every meal, for as far back as Barry could remember. Everything else he spat out, making a mess that was unpleasant for even his mother to clean up.

  He dipped out some of the food, spooned it into his brother’s mouth, and the whistling stopped. As he fed him, he tried to picture Tory in his mother’s place, with a thirty-five-year-old bigger than she was, who still needed his diapers changed and had to be fed. He tried to picture Spencer and Brittany feeding him, grown with children of their own, remembering back on their music recitals and the shame that they’d had to repent of time and time again.

  He let his brother chew in the messy way he had, then wiped his face with the napkin tied like a bib around Nathan’s neck. Nathan sat quietly, waiting for the next bite, his eyes fixed on the green azalea bushes as if waiting for them to bloom. It would be months before they would, Barry thought, but Nathan would keep staring.

  As he had a million times before, Barry looked into those vacant eyes and wondered if, somewhere behind them, there was a normal man in there, trapped and waiting to be freed. He pictured his brother in heaven, laughing eyes meeting his for the first time, his arm rearing back to throw a football across a meadow that he didn’t need a wheelchair to cross.

  He took the wheelchair’s arm, unlocked one side, and turned Nathan’s chair until they were face-to-face. He leaned forward, nose to nose with his brother, staring into Nathan’s eyes as he’d done every day as a boy, trying to make their eyes connect just because Nathan had nowhere else to look. He tried to imagine that Nathan saw him, knew him, that there was a flicker or a hint of intelligence in his head. “You’re smarter and better looking than any of us, aren’t you, buddy?” Barry asked in a low voice. “Deep down in there, you’re really getting it all, aren’t you?”