by Gail Sattler
Copyright
ISBN 1-58660-378-7
© 2001 by Gail Sattler. All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the permission of the publisher, Truly Yours, PO Box 719, Uhrichsville, Ohio 44683.
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. niv®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.
All of the characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to actual events is purely coincidental.
Cover design by Jocelyne Bouchard.
Prologue
“I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you for this, Josh.”
Josh McMillian studied his brother. He couldn’t imagine the torment that had brought Brian to this decision. Once more, he read the piece of paper in his hand in an effort to let what the magnitude of what he’d just agreed to do sink in.
He cleared his throat. “Don’t worry. Everything will be fine.”
“I’m going to ask you one more time. I know the papers have been signed, and everything is all binding and legal, but it’s not too late to reverse it. Are you sure you want to do this? It’s a big responsibility.”
What he wanted to do and what he needed to do were two completely different things. The future of not only his brother and sister-in-law but also his nephews now rested with him and his decision. He couldn’t say no. They were all the family he had, and they needed him.
Josh stiffened and cleared his throat. “Yes, I’m sure. And I’m going to ask you one more time too. Are you sure you’re okay with this?”
Brian’s eyes watered, and his voice cracked when he finally spoke. “Yes. That clinic in Switzerland is the only hope we’ve got left. I have no choice. I’ve got to take her. Without the kids.”
“You know I’ll be praying for Sasha. And you too.”
His brother acknowledged his promise with a nod. “The treatment might take years, you know.”
“I know that.”
Brian extended his hand, and Josh met his handshake.
Tears flowed down his brother’s cheeks, as he gave Josh’s hand a firm squeeze. “I’ll see you at the airport tomorrow, and then that’s it.”
“Yes. That’s it.”
With those words, Josh knew his life would never be the same again.
One
“Why are my socks pink? I’m not wearing pink socks to school.”
“Help! Help! The toilet is spilling!”
“Who ate the last apple? That was for my lunch, and it’s gone.”
“It didn’t have your name on it.”
“That’s my shirt. You can’t wear my shirt. Take it off!”
“Hey, you guys! Be quiet! I’m on the phone!”
“Uncle Josh! Tell Ryan it’s my shirt!”
“I can’t get my science project wet, and it’s raining. I have to be at school early today to set it up. I need a ride, Uncle Josh.”
Josh stared in silence into his coffee cup, badly needing that first sip, but he thought the overflowing toilet probably should be his first priority.
Fortunately, he hadn’t had time to put on his own socks yet, so all that got wet were his bare feet when he reached behind the toilet to turn off the water. He said a silent prayer of thanks that not much water had overflowed, while he shooed Bradley out of the bathroom to split up the fight between Ryan and Kyle. He quickly sent Tyler to find the plunger while he wiped up the water with the dog’s towel.
“Where’s Andrew?” he called out, as he threw the dirty towel into the bathtub.
“I’m here, Uncle Josh.”
“Pack that science project in the van. I’ll be out as soon as I can.”
“All right!” Andrew jumped up, made a fist in the air, and pulled it down in triumph.
“How come he’s getting a ride? I want a ride too.”
Ryan appeared and started tugging on his shirt. “Me too! Me toooo!”
Tyler hung up the phone. “Can we give Allyson a ride? She can’t find her umbrella.”
Josh ran into his bedroom to find his last clean pair of socks, which fortunately were black, not pink like Kyle’s. Hopefully the rest of whatever else was in the washing machine last night wasn’t also pink, although he now had a feeling he knew where Bradley’s favorite new red shirt went.
“I guess so, Tyler. We’ve got seven seats, no sense in leaving one empty, especially first thing in the morning.” He noticed that Tyler didn’t pick up on his intended sarcasm, but then, Josh didn’t know if he would have understood adult sarcasm when he was fifteen, either.
Josh turned to Ryan and Kyle and Bradley, who were still fighting over shirts and apples. “Everybody grab your lunches, and I’ll drive you all if we leave now. Just make sure you brush your teeth first.”
The mad scramble and squabbling over the toothpaste answered his question about who hadn’t yet brushed their teeth.
“Come on, you guys. I can’t be late for work again. Get moving.”
He waited for everyone in the minivan, then began the round-trip of picking up Tyler’s friend and delivering all of them to their respective schools on time. When the van was finally quiet and empty, he made a quick stop at the house to grab his own lunch, which he’d forgotten in the rush, and continued on his way to work, hoping he could make it without being late after adding the unexpected delay.
He pulled into his parking space at the shop and ran into the building with one minute to spare—without a speeding ticket.
Before he accepted legal guardianship of his five nephews, he was fifteen minutes early every day. Because he now required six seats, he put his sports car into storage and started driving his brother’s minivan. Not that he had a very active social life before, but up until he started living with his nephews, he actually had time to date. He’d even thought he and Theresa had been getting pretty serious. Now, the only women he had seen lately were the sitter and the mothers of the other kids on the soccer team, all of whom were married and older than him by five or more years.
“Good thing you made it here early, McMillian. Busy lineup today.”
Josh checked the board for the schedule as he stepped into his coveralls, which were clean and pressed. He wondered if the company that laundered the auto shop’s coveralls also did residential jobs.
According to the list, it looked like any other day, full of tune-ups—a few transmission problems, some complaints about cars making strange noises, and a bit of warranty work. “I don’t see anything out of the ordinary here, Rick. You hiding something?”
“Mrs. Kabelevsky bought a car for her grandson, and she wants it running perfect. Right there in stall three.”
Josh cringed and ran his fingers through his hair when he recognized the old car. “She was in here yesterday with that thing, and I recommended against buying it because of the amount of work it needed.”
His boss appeared beside him. “And she said she appreciated your honesty. That’s why she bought it. Since you outlined exactly everything you saw wrong with it, she trusts you to fix it. She says it reminded her of her first car, and that’s why she wanted to give this one in particular to her grandson. She said she knows you won’t let her down. She’s our best customer, Josh.”
“Thanks for the reminder,” he grumbled as they walked to the car together and raised the hood. Josh stared blankly into the engine compartment. “I told her not to buy this.”
“You already said that.”
“Does she have any idea how much this is going to cost? It might be better just to get a rebuilt engine. The body isn’t in great shape, either. She’s going to pay more to fix it than she paid for it in the first place.”
“She said money is no object.”
Josh wondered if one day, when he had children of his own, and then grandchildren, if he’d ever be in a position to buy an older car and pay to have it fixed to his satisfaction.
He stopped himself from perusing that line of thought. It was never going to happen. Even though he was now twenty-five, his chances of getting married had decreased to somewhere below zero.
He’d been seriously dating Theresa for three years and was ready make their relationship permanent. Taking guardianship of his nephews required making some major adjustments to his life, but this one thing he hadn’t seen coming.
Theresa liked children, but apparently not as much as he thought. Not long after he moved into his brother’s house to care for his nephews, everything changed. He’d tried to tell her that even though the boys would be under his care for a few years, it probably wouldn’t be permanent. But, until his brother and sister-in-law came back, he was the boys’ only hope of staying together as a family. Theresa had argued that if it wasn’t permanent, his brother wouldn’t have gone through the proceedings of giving him legal guardianship.
He had understood that the reason for the proceedings to change the status of his relationship to the boys from merely “uncle” to legal guardianship was in case he had to make any formal decisions or other authorizations in the event of an absent parent or, heaven forbid, in case of some emergency, since Brian and Sasha would be extremely difficult to contact at the best of times and impossible to contact on short notice. However, the bottom line was that he really didn’t know how long the boys would be with him. The possibility existed that Sasha would never get better, and, if not, then because of her mental state, she might never be able to be a fit parent. Brian was doing all he could to help her, participating in a very specialized treatment plan while there was still a chance that medication and rehabilitation could make her better.
Until that happened, Josh accepted the responsibility of raising five growing and active boys.
After only two weeks of his caring for his nephews, Theresa told him that she didn’t want to see him again because she didn’t want to date a day care. He had tried to tell her it wasn’t like a day care at all. They weren’t toddlers by any stretch of the imagination. The boys were 6, 8, 10, 13, and 15. The oldest, Tyler, was more than capable of baby-sitting his brothers, even though it was sometimes difficult to pin him down long enough to get a commitment out of him. He especially didn’t want to press Tyler too far, because all of them felt not only the loss of their parents but also the stress of the new environment.
Josh let out a long sigh and returned his thoughts to his work, where they should have been in the first place. It was going to be a trying day, and he needed to be home on time. Tonight he had to help Tyler with a major French assignment, take Kyle to swimming lessons, and Bradley to Cub Scouts. He also had a couple of loads of laundry to do, and he had no idea what they were going to do about supper because in the scramble this morning he’d forgotten to take something out of the freezer. He also didn’t know if they had enough milk for bedtime cereal, but even if they didn’t, he doubted that he’d have time to go to the store before it closed. Somewhere in there, he had to try to do something about the wash load of pink socks, or else he would have to buy all the boys new socks.
In other words, today was just like any other day.
❧
Melissa Klassen checked the clock. “We only have five minutes left, class. If you haven’t finished your printing, then you’ll have to take it home. Everyone, please, tidy up your desks, and be quiet and courteous to everyone around you.”
She put on her best teacher smile on the outside, but on the inside, smiling was the last thing she felt like doing. After a hectic day she was more than just tired; she was completely exhausted.
Tomorrow was the school’s science fair, and, as usual, the grade one students’ plans and dreams for their projects far exceeded their abilities. While many of the children were rightly proud of their accomplishments, others were sadly disappointed with their finished projects, all of which were now on display in the school gymnasium ready for tomorrow’s judging.
Today she’d had to deal with frustration, disappointment, tears, and one very unpleasant incident that in the adult world would have been called “road rage.” In her class of six and seven year olds, Melissa called it a temper tantrum. For the first time in so long that she couldn’t remember when, she needed to go straight home and have a nap. Tonight was the monthly Sunday school teachers meeting, and they usually ran late into the evening. She needed to be alert to participate in the agenda planning.
“Miss Klassen? Can I go to the bathroom?”
Again, she looked up at the clock. She no longer had the energy to correct the child that the proper word in the context of the question was “may.” “The bell will ring in one minute, Caroline. Can you wait for one minute?”
The little girl squirmed in her chair. “Nooo.”
Melissa squeezed her eyes shut for a brief second. “Yes, you may go.”
The bell rang ten seconds after Caroline closed the door behind her.
“Class dismissed. Remember to push your chairs in, and go get your jackets and backpacks quietly. I’ll see you all again tomorrow.”
The room was quiet except for the shuffling of little feet for about five seconds before the energy of the class ignited into an uproar.
She didn’t have the strength to try to calm them. Besides, in four minutes they’d all be gone. It wasn’t worth the effort.
She waited for Caroline to return from the bathroom to claim her sweater and backpack, and then, except for the echoed noise of the clamoring in the hall, her classroom was quiet.
Melissa surveyed the room. Everything was relatively uncluttered, especially considering that today the children had completed the finishing touches to their science projects, which had been a month in the making.
As she walked between the desks to push the chairs in properly for the custodian and tidy up some of the stray messes, she lingered at Bradley McMillian’s desk, then closed her eyes to say a brief prayer for him.
Little Bradley had more than his share of worries. She wasn’t aware of the exact details of the situation, nor was it her place to know them. A month ago she had been advised by the office that his parents had left the country indefinitely, and Bradley and his four brothers had been left in the care of their uncle, who was now their legal guardian.
Although understandable and expected, the changes in Bradley’s behavior gave her cause for concern. Unlike before his parents left, he now often paid inordinate amounts of attention to fine detail in his printing and drawing. Other days she caught him with his work almost untouched while he stared blankly out the window, lost in his own world of thought. Her heart went out to him. Whatever the circumstances, even if it were not the case, any child would feel abandonment with his parents suddenly gone, and she worried about the effect of such thoughts, however misplaced. The heart of a child was a fragile thing.
After a few moments, Melissa continued to walk around the classroom to push in the rest of the chairs, then slipped on her jacket, picked up her purse and her briefcase, and left the building. Besides her own car in the parking lot, only the custodian’s remained. On her way to her car, she glanced to the school’s nearly deserted playground, where, in spite of the slight drizzle, three small boys played.
Ordinarily, she wouldn’t have lingered, but Melissa recognized one of the children as Bradley McMillian, so she stood and watched from a distance, her keys still in her hand. Before the change in his family situation, he socialized well and was generally a happy child, and it warmed her heart to see him ignoring the inclement weather to play and laugh with his frie
nds.
As the children frolicked on the playscape, a large dog loped through the opening in the school yard fence and ran toward the boys. The other two children remained on the top of the structure, but Bradley jumped to the ground and ran to the dog.
Instead of wagging its tail, the dog stiffened, flattened its ears back, and lowered its head when Bradley approached it. Because of the dog’s odd behavior, Melissa inhaled deeply, about to call out to Bradley not to touch the dog, but before she could get a word out, the dog jumped on top of Bradley, knocking the small child to the ground. Bradley’s terrified scream pierced the air.
Melissa’s heart stopped, then started up in double-time. She flung her briefcase and keys to the ground and ran with all the speed she could muster toward Bradley and the dog. Frightened cries from the other two children and the angry snarling of the dog magnified the horror of what was happening in front of her.
“Go away! No!” she screamed as she ran, hoping that her presence would scare the dog away.
The dog ignored her completely as it continued to attack little Bradley. He covered his face with his arms, sobbing and screeching in terror. Blood gushed from wounds on his arms, and he kicked his legs, but the dog continued to bite him.
The second she reached them, Melissa grabbed for the dog’s collar, but it had none. Failing something solid to hold onto, she frantically tried to grab a handful of the dog’s hair to pull it off of Bradley, but the fur was too short and too oily for her to get a grip sufficient to pull the frenzied dog away.
She gritted her teeth, wrapped her hands around its thick neck, and grabbed two handfuls of loose skin, but when she pulled, the combination of the weight of the dog, its oily coat, and the frenzied movement made it impossible to pull the dog away. She continued to scream, but she couldn’t distract the dog from its savage attack.
Melissa grabbed her purse, which was still slung over her shoulder, and started whacking the dog, hoping it was heavy enough to either distract it or goad it into defending itself and abandon its attack on Bradley long enough for him to get up and run away.
