Angel Mine

by Sherryl Woods

  Despite the chill in the air, the sun was shining brightly and the breeze had a belated hint of spring in it on Friday afternoon. Angel was down for her nap, so Heather pulled a chair onto the sunny landing outside the upstairs apartment and settled down with a bottle of nail polish and an old issue of People.

  She’d just finished putting the first coat of bright pink polish on her nails when she realized she wasn’t alone. She turned her head to find Sissy Perkins standing halfway up the steps and watching her solemnly.

  It seemed to Heather that Sissy was way too serious for a ten-year-old. Although she was a beautiful girl, with her red hair, flawless skin and delicate features, she rarely smiled and she never laughed. In fact, she was just about the quietest, politest and most sedate child Heather had ever seen. When Heather asked Henrietta about it, the older woman said only that Sissy had been through a lot in the past year.

  Henrietta had adopted Sissy and her younger brother, Will, but that was about as much as Heather had learned. She figured Henrietta would reveal the rest when she was good and ready. She already knew that was Henrietta’s way, operating on a need-to-know basis, whether it had to do with customer idiosyncrasies or the location of extra creamers. She was talkative enough when she chose to be, but those times could be few and far between.

  “Hi, Sissy. Is school out?”

  The girl nodded and crept up another step. “Am I bothering you? Henrietta said not to bother you.”

  Heather smiled. “Nope. I’m just doing my nails.” She glanced at Sissy’s nails, which had been chewed off practically to the quick. “Want me to do yours?”

  Sissy hid her hands behind her back in obvious embarrassment. “No, thanks. I bite mine.”

  “Maybe if they were a pretty color, you wouldn’t want to bite them,” Heather countered.

  Sissy considered that, then sighed. “It probably wouldn’t matter. It’s a nervous habit, that’s what the shrink says, anyway. He says I’ll stop when I’m ready.”

  Heather was startled by the casual reference to a shrink, but she didn’t pursue it. If this child needed a psychiatrist at her age, it was none of Heather’s business. That didn’t mean she couldn’t try to be Sissy’s friend.

  “So, what are your plans for the weekend?”

  Sissy shrugged. “Nothing special.”

  “You’re not going to see any of your friends?”

  “No. I guess I’ll help Henrietta around the house. And I’ll baby-sit Will.” Her expression brightened a little. “I could baby-sit Angel, too, if you want. I’m real responsible.”

  “I’m sure you are, but you should be doing something fun. What’s your favorite thing to do?”

  “Reading, I guess. You can go anywhere in the whole world you want to go in a book.”

  Heather heard a wistful note in the girl’s voice, as if she longed to be someplace else. It was a longing no ten-year-old should be feeling. She should be living in the here and now, surrounded by friends and family and laughter.

  “What about outdoors?” Heather asked. “Do you like any sports?”

  Sissy shrugged again. “I guess so, but I’m not very good. Nobody ever chooses me for their team.”

  “Then how about something you can do on your own? Cycling, maybe.” She was struck by a sudden inspiration, something she could share with this obviously lonely child. “How about in-line skating?”

  Sissy looked intrigued, but she shook her head. “I don’t know how. Besides, I don’t have any skates.”

  “I could show you,” Heather offered. “And I’ll bet my skates would fit you. We might have to stuff some paper in the toes, but they’d work. If you like it, we can talk to Henrietta about getting you your own skates.”

  “Really?” the girl said, a spark of excitement in her eyes.

  Heather seized the moment to try to do something to wipe that sad expression from Sissy’s face. “I don’t see why not. Let’s give it a try right now.”

  She went inside and grabbed some tissues, which she wadded up, and the in-line skates she’d brought from New York because they were her favorite form of exercise. She’d already discovered that the sidewalk along Main Street was nice and level and mostly deserted, perfect for blading. She’d been out at dawn several times this week already, drawing stares at first, but friendly waves of greeting ever since.

  Outside on the landing, she handed the skates to Sissy. “Let’s go downstairs and you can try them on.”

  “What if Angel wakes up?”

  “The door’s open. I’ll hear her. Angel makes a lot of racket when she’s ready to get up. She’s always afraid she might be missing something.”

  Sissy nodded. “Will was like that, too, when he was little,” she said, then fell silent. Her lips quivered and she added in a low voice, “Till Daddy would get mad.”

  As she spoke, a tear tracked down her cheek, followed by another and then another. Obviously Sissy had touched on something almost too painful for her to bear. Heather stared at her helplessly, then reached out to gather her close. At her touch Sissy froze for an instant, then released a shuddering sigh. She relaxed in Heather’s arms and gave way to noisy, gut-wrenching sobs. The sound brought Henrietta running.

  “Oh, baby,” she murmured, taking over from Heather. “What is it?”

  “She said something about her dad, and then she just started crying.” Heather had rarely seen such a heartbreaking display of anguish.

  “I’ll explain later,” Henrietta mouthed, then led Sissy away.

  Heather stared after them, shaken by the child’s misery. Her own childhood, in upstate New York, had been happy, if a little dull. She had considered her parents too strict from time to time and maybe they hadn’t been as supportive as she’d wanted them to be of her acting career or her decision to raise Angel on her own, but all in all, she’d had no experience with the kind of torment that Sissy was evidently going through. Even the wild mood swings of adolescence hadn’t brought anything like Sissy’s tears.

  She recalled the bleakness in Sissy’s eyes when she’d mentioned her father. And those tears, they hadn’t been about sorrow, but something deeper. Suddenly it struck her. There had been anger, maybe even hatred, in that outburst. Could a ten-year-old child experience that kind of rage?

  Later, after the diner had closed for the night, Henrietta poured two cups of coffee and beckoned Heather to a booth.

  “After what happened earlier, you must have a lot of questions,” she began.

  “It’s none of my business, but obviously I did or said something that set her off. Maybe I should know at least enough so that I won’t inadvertently do it again.”

  Henrietta nodded. “Here it is in a nutshell. It’s not pretty. Sissy lost both her parents a few months back. The long and short of it is that her daddy had been abusing her mama for years. One night he started after Sissy. Her mama stepped in and shot him. Lyle survived, but at my urging Barbara Sue left him and she and the kids moved in with me. Lyle just couldn’t handle that. She was working for me here. As soon as he could get around, he came over here with a gun. Jake tried to stop him, but Lyle shot Jake in the leg, then killed Barbara Sue. The sheriff shot Lyle. That’s how I wound up with the two kids. I figured I owed it to Barbara Sue, because I was the one who all but forced her to finally take a stand.”

  Heather was horrified. No wonder Sissy’s impulsive mention of her father’s anger had brought terrible memories flooding back. How many violent episodes had she witnessed? One would have been too many for a young, impressionable girl. And even at six, Will must be devastated.

  As for Henrietta, she was clearly living with a burden of pain that shouldn’t be hers. Heather reached across the table and clasped her hand, giving it a squeeze.

  “Don’t you dare blame yourself. It certainly wasn’t your fault,” Heather said. “The blame lies totally with that awful man. How could you possibly have known it would turn out the way it did? You told her what anyone would have, to get out and protec
t herself and her kids.”

  “Yes, but…” Henrietta sighed. “I supposed you’re right.” Then her voice took on a trace of anger. “But there was no way to protect her, not really. It seems as if there’s not a damned thing the system can do until it’s too late!”

  The door opened and the judge walked in just in time to overhear Henrietta’s last remark.

  “You’re blaming the system for one fool’s misdeeds,” he said. “No one could have stopped Lyle Perkins. He was a mean kid and a rotten adult.”

  “And everyone, including the sheriff, turned a blind eye to it,” Henrietta countered, scowling at him. “Oh, I don’t know why I waste my breath trying to talk to you about this,” she said, and headed for the kitchen.

  The judge sighed and slid into the spot she’d vacated. “I doubt she’ll ever stop blaming herself,” he said sadly. “Or me.”

  “What did you have to do with it?” Heather asked.

  “Since Lyle was never brought into court, nothing. That doesn’t stop Henrietta from thinking I should have come swooping in and locked him up, anyway. Barbara Sue never filed charges, so how could I? My hands were tied. And the one time Barbara Sue did try to defend herself by shooting him, she wound up in my courtroom. I was tough on her, said she couldn’t go around shooting people just because she thought they deserved it.”

  A rueful smile settled on his face. “You should have heard Henrietta. She stood up in the middle of that courtroom and blasted me from here to kingdom come. I could have held her in contempt and tossed her in jail right then and there. Probably should have, just to keep some decorum in the courtroom, but what she said had some merit. I took it into account when I let Barbara Sue off with probation. We got a restraining order against Lyle, too, so he couldn’t go near Barbara Sue when he got out of the hospital.”

  “But that didn’t stop him, did it?”

  He shook his head. “There’s no way to stop a man who’s determined to get even, not unless he messes it up the first time and gives us reason enough to throw him in jail. Unfortunately, Lyle didn’t mess it up. There’s not a minute that’s gone by since that I don’t ask myself what I could have done differently, but I have yet to come up with an answer.”

  “Henrietta must understand that your hands were tied legally.”

  “In her head, yes. In her heart, I doubt she’ll ever forgive me.” He gave Heather a wry look. “Not that there’s anything new in that. Henrietta’s made it her life’s work to hold a grudge against me.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I foolishly let her down once, a long time ago. The woman has a good memory.”

  “But you keep coming back,” Heather pointed out.

  “So I do. Somebody told me once that persistence is a virtue. Henrietta might take exception to that, but I figure one of these days I’ll wear her down.”

  “And then what?”

  “I’ll marry her, of course, assuming we’ve both retained enough mental capabilities by then to repeat the vows,” he said wryly.

  Heather chuckled. “Maybe you need a new strategy.”

  He stared at her. “I’m listening.”

  “Flowers, maybe. All women love flowers.”

  “Henrietta’s allergic. She claims she sneezed for a week the first time I sent roses. That was thirty years ago and she’s never let me forget. Said I was trying to kill her.”

  “Candy?”

  “Won’t touch it. Says she gets all the sweets she needs in her own pies and cakes.”

  “Is there something else she’s fond of? Does she collect anything?”

  “Henrietta lives and breathes this diner. It’s as much her home as that place she lives in a couple of blocks from here. The customers are her family. She fusses and fights with ’em like they were, too.” He shook his head. “No. I’m afraid the usual courting would be wasted on her. Not that I haven’t given it a try from time to time.”

  “Well, there has to be something,” Heather said, undaunted. “I’ll think about it.”

  The judge regarded her curiously. “Now why would you do that, young lady? You barely know me or Henrietta.”

  Heather patted his hand and gave him a wink. “I’m a romantic. I like happy endings.”

  His expression brightened. “I’ll be much obliged if you can figure out how to go about getting one for the two of us before we’re both too danged old to enjoy it.”

  Todd didn’t set foot in the diner all weekend long. Henrietta was about to storm over to his place to check on him, but Heather managed to talk her out of it.

  “Give him some time,” she begged. “He needs to wrestle with this news I’ve dumped on him. It just hit him out of the blue, but he’ll adjust. That’s what Todd does. He accepts facts, searches for solutions and moves on.”

  But when he hadn’t surfaced by midweek, even she began to get concerned. Since the ever-busy Starlight was the last place she wanted to confront him, she decided a drive to the studios might be in order. She could explain her presence simply by saying that as an actress, naturally she was curious about the production facility Megan had created.

  Wisely, though, she opted to leave Angel with Henrietta. The two of them were already thick as thieves. Heather couldn’t help thinking what a shame it was that Henrietta hadn’t had kids of her own years ago. But she was making up for it now with Sissy, Will and, lately, Angel.

  Angel trailed “’Retta” around like a little shadow, mimicking her activities. She insisted on helping to set the places at the booths—all of which had to be reset the minute her back was turned—then carried a “coffeepot”—an empty plastic milk jug that Henrietta assured her was better for little hands—from booth to booth, pretending to pour. She chattered away at her imaginary customers as she went.

  When real customers came in, she was often the first one to reach the table, greeting them with her sunny smile and asking, “Take your order?” as if she could actually do it. Fortunately Henrietta was never so far away that she couldn’t step in and actually write down whatever order the grinning customers gave.

  “Where you going?” Angel asked when Heather headed for the door.

  “Just to run an errand,” Heather told her. “You’re going to stay and help ’Retta.”

  “Okey-dokey.”

  She turned and toddled off to find Henrietta without a backward glance. After all this time being Angel’s primary caregiver, Heather wasn’t at all sure how she felt about such ready abandonment. Today, however, it suited her purposes.

  Following Henrietta’s carefully written directions, she drove to the outskirts of town, where she had no trouble at all finding the production facility. Unfortunately the first person she ran into was Jake.

  “What are you doing here?” her lawyer asked.

  “I thought maybe I could see Todd.”

  “Not a good idea.”

  “Why?”

  “He’s grumpier than a bear with a thorn stuck in its paw, for one thing. For another, Megan’s protective instincts have kicked in. She knows something’s wrong and she’s pretty sure you’re the cause of it. She won’t welcome you and I won’t have her upset.”

  The door to the facility opened and Todd looked out. “Jake, what’s up?” He spotted Heather and the color seemed to drain from his face. “I’ll handle this,” he said tersely.

  Jake hesitated uncertainly, then shrugged. “Whatever you say.”

  When he’d gone, Todd scowled at her. “What are you doing here?”

  “I just thought I’d take a look around.”

  “It’s not a tourist destination, Heather. It’s a place of business.”

  “Believe it or not, I know my way around a studio, Todd. I know not to talk when the red light is on. I know to stay out of camera range. I even know how to tell which camera is live at any given moment.”

  He winced. “I know that. I just meant—”

  “You just meant that you don’t want me anywhere around you.”

  “Not
at work.”

  “If not at work, where? You haven’t been by Henrietta’s in days. She’s about to send out a search party.”

  “I’ll get by sooner or later.”

  “She’s worried about you. Worse than that, she’s blaming me because you’re staying away. She’s figured out what’s going on, Todd. I didn’t say a word. She’s seen us together, knows we’ve known each other longer than a few days. All it took was a good long look at Angel for her to figure out the rest.”

  “That’s all I need,” Todd muttered. “Henrietta’s like a pit bull once she gets a notion in her head.”

  “Then stop by and ease her mind.”

  “Okay, okay. I’ll make it sooner rather than later.”

  When she didn’t take that as his final word and simply go away, he jammed his hands in his pockets and stared at her. “What? Is there something else you wanted?”

  She started to say yes, that she wanted him to be a part of his daughter’s life, but he already knew that. That was exactly why he’d been giving the diner a wide berth.

  “Angel’s been asking about you, too,” she said, instead, trying to gauge his reaction.

  Surprise flitted across his face, then disbelief. “Why would she ask about me? She doesn’t even know me.”

  “She’s afraid we really did send you to your room for not eating your dinner that night last week. She thinks we locked you in. And if we could do it to you, we could do it to her. She’s worried.” It was only a slight stretch of the truth. Angel had expressed concern that night.

  “Tell her I’m just fine.”

  “She won’t believe me. She needs to see you for herself.” Admittedly it was a sneaky tactic, but she told herself it was only a tiny fib, and if it got Todd and Angel together again, it was worth it.

  His gaze narrowed. “You’re making that up just to get me back to the diner, aren’t you?”

  She regarded him innocently. “Would I do a thing like that?”

  “In a heartbeat,” he retorted succinctly.

  “Well, I guess the only way to find out for sure is for you to come in and check out her reaction for yourself.”