Counting Stars

by Michele Paige Holmes

  That year she’d spent all morning at the park, thrilled she was finally old enough to be included in the also-traditional family football game. By the time dinner was served at four o’clock that afternoon, Jane had taken a bath, had her hair braided by Grandma, and had watched most of the The Wizard of Oz. Needless to say, she was starving.

  Her father said the blessing, and then the grown-ups began the thanking. All of the children from oldest to youngest were expected to follow. Jane sat at the far end of the table, swinging her legs impatiently. The basket of rolls was right in front of her plate, and she thought the fragrance of the fresh-baked bread was going to kill her if she couldn’t have a roll soon. Unfortunately, it was Karen’s turn to talk, and she wouldn’t shut up about her favorite teacher, winning the spelling bee, and making first chair in orchestra.

  Jane’s stomach growled and, ever-so-slowly, her fingers inched toward the rolls. Her parents were at the other end of the table, their attention focused on her chatterbox sister. They probably wouldn’t even notice . . . Jane lifted a corner of the cloth. A second later her hand closed over a warm, buttery croissant.

  Smack! Her brother’s hand came down hard on hers. “No fair,” Michael yelled, wresting the croissant away.

  “Give it back,” Jane shrieked, waving her arms in the air, trying to reclaim her coveted prize.

  “Children,” her mother reprimanded.

  Michael stuck his tongue out and tossed the roll toward Trent. Jane leaned forward to intercept it and dragged her new blouse through the cranberry sauce. The croissant missed Trent but hit the gravy bowl, and a drop splashed onto Emily’s sleeve.

  “Moth-er,” Emily wailed. “Look what Michael did.” She dipped a napkin in her water glass and accidentally knocked it over. Mom jumped up to get a towel as Emily frantically scrubbed the sleeve it had taken three painstaking weeks of home ec to sew.

  “That’s enough nonsense,” her father said sternly, pointing the carving knife toward their end of the table.

  Too late to heed his command, Jane watched as the olive she’d launched with her spoon sped toward Michael and hit him square between the eyes.

  “You little twerp.” Michael reached for her, but Jane ducked out of the way, and he decked Caroline instead.

  Time seemed suspended as Michael, realizing what he’d done, opened his mouth in horror. A chorus of gasps echoed around the table. Jane knew at once that dinner was a lost cause.

  Caroline was involved now. She made fights serious. From the corner of her eye, Jane saw her father push his chair back.

  Caroline stood and grabbed the bowl of peas from the table. She advanced on Michael.

  “I’m going to shove these up your nose.”

  Michael shrank in his chair. “Help me, Trent,” he pled. Trent snatched the serving spoon from the mashed potatoes.

  It happened fast—less than a minute, probably. Their father put a swift end to the food fight, spanking most of them and sending them to their rooms—without anything to eat except for whatever potatoes happened to be on their faces. Jane lay on her bed and bawled, distraught that she’d been the cause of such a disaster.

  “Don’t be a crybaby,” Caroline scolded, sitting down on their bedroom floor. “You’re not going to starve. I’ve got enough candy here to keep us for a week.” She flipped up her comforter and pulled a box out from under her bed. “What kind do you want?”

  Jane shook her head. “I’m n-not hungry. It’s all m-my fault. I ruined Thanksgiving.” She turned her face into her pillow, sobbing.

  Caroline shrugged. “Suit yourself,” she said. “I’m going to sneak a soda.” She got off her bed and went to the window. Opening it slowly so it wouldn’t squeak, she popped out the screen and climbed up on the dresser. “I’ll bring you back a lemon-lime.”

  Jane lay on her bed crying as Caroline jumped to the ground then muttered when her shirt became caught on a Barbary bush. A few moments later two sodas appeared on the windowsill.

  “Give me a hand, Jane,” Caroline whispered loudly.

  Jane got off her bed and went to the window. She moved the sodas, climbed up on the dresser and reached down to Caroline.

  “Thanks,” Caroline said a moment later when she was safely back in the room. She put the screen in, closed the window, and sat on her bed. “You can quit being upset now, cause guess what I heard?”

  “I don’t know,” Jane said sullenly.

  “Mom and Dad and Grandma and Uncle Jerry are all in there laughing about what happened.”

  “Are not,” Jane said, scowling.

  Caroline popped the top off her soda. “It’s true. I heard them through the garage wall. And Dad says that from now on we get to eat before we thank. Isn’t that great? You did a really cool thing, Jane.”

  “They’re laughing about the food fight—really?” Jane asked, hope in her voice.

  Caroline nodded. “And they’re going to come get us for dinner in fifteen minutes. So either drink that soda or hide it.”

  Jane stuck the pop in her Barbie box—next to another soda and a pack of Twinkies Caroline had previously snuck for her. But the sudden relief she felt dictated some kind of celebration, so she took out the Tootsie Pop she’d been saving since Halloween. She lay back on her bed, the sucker in her mouth, as she thought again about the scene at dinner. She was glad her parents were laughing now, because the look of disappointment on her mother’s face had just about killed her.

  Jane hated disappointing anyone. She hated conflict, and it seemed her family had plenty of that with nine different personalities interacting each day. She vowed then and there that never again would she cause a fight like she had that day. She would not let her mother down again.

  Remembering that lofty goal she’d made as a six-year-old, a wistful smile touched Jane’s lips. Growing up she had done a good job of not upsetting her parents. But since then . . . It seemed her whole life was one disappointment after another—until now.

  Over the past two months, her parents seemed to have accepted Paul. Today there would be no conflict. With a man at her side and a baby on her lap, she wasn’t a disappointment to them. She had something genuine to be thankful for.

  “And I’m thankful our 401(k) is doing well again. You know for the past two years we’ve just watched it decline, and we weren’t sure how we’d ever retire or . . .”

  Karen was still going strong. Jane turned to Paul and rolled her eyes. “Sorry,” she mouthed. Paul leaned closer, his hand draped casually across the back of Jane’s chair.

  “I guess every family has to have at least one person who drives everyone else crazy,” Jane whispered.

  Paul smiled mischievously. “Maybe you should launch an olive at her.”

  “How do you know about that?” Jane demanded.

  “I had to do something this morning while you played football.”

  Jane bit back a smile. “No fair,” she whispered. “I don’t have any way of learning your family secrets.”

  Paul’s eyes seemed to darken. “Don’t worry,” he said quietly. “You will soon enough.”

  She looked at him quizzically, uncertain what he meant. “Do you have an estranged aunt hidden somewhere—or something else I should know about?”

  “Just a brother,” Paul said. He nodded toward Karen as she finally finished and sat down. “It’s almost your turn.” He leaned back in his chair, his attention seemingly focused on Jane’s brother, who was now speaking.

  Jane pushed Paul’s confusing comment to the back of her mind and waited for her turn to speak. Michael—as much a man of few words as Karen was a woman who could talk your ear off—finished in about thirty seconds. All eyes focused on Jane.

  She looked around the table. “I am thankful for each of you—for such a fun, fabulous, supportive family. And—” Taking a deep breath, she spoke the words it seemed she’d waited forever to say. “This year I’m thankful to have someone special here with me.” She turned to Paul and suddenly felt overwhelm
ed with emotion as her eyes met his. “There aren’t enough words to express how glad I am you came into my life. It is my privilege to be your friend, and the gift you’ve given me in trusting me to raise your children . . .” Jane felt her eyes water as she glanced down at Madison snuggled in her lap and Mark asleep in his car seat beside her chair. She looked at Paul again. “It is priceless—better than anything I could have ever imagined. I love Mark and Madison, and—I love you for sharing them.”

  For a split second, Paul had a stunned look on his face, but he recovered quickly before an awkward silence could descend on them. He smiled at Jane and took her hand in his as he cleared his throat.

  “I’m the one who has the most to be thankful for,” he said. “Jane, you’ve come into our lives like a miracle—an answer to an impossible prayer.” He looked at her parents and then around the table. “I am grateful to each of you as well, for welcoming me and my children into your home.”

  Jane’s parents and siblings nodded and smiled in response, but no one said anything—as if they expected Paul might say something more. When he didn’t, her mother spoke.

  “We’re so happy to have you,” she said as she rose from the table, signaling the end of the thanking. “Now who’s ready for pie?”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  “You did what?” Tara asked through a mouthful of peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich.

  Jane pulled two bottled waters from the fridge and set them on the table. Looking out at the weed-filled backyard, she sighed. “In front of my entire family, I told Paul I love him.”

  Tara looked horrified. “Jane, Jane, Jane.” She put her elbows on the table and buried her head in her hands.

  “I know. I’m a complete idiot.” Jane sat down across from her.

  After a moment, Tara looked up. “No, you aren’t an idiot. You’re just ignorant as to affairs of the heart, and that we can fix.” She smiled brightly. “Fortunately, you’ve got me to help you. Now tell me what happened after the major faux pas.”

  “Well, Paul didn’t say ‘I love you’ back, and then the floor didn’t swallow me like I wished it would.” Jane opened her water bottle and took a drink.

  “Never can count on floors,” Tara mused. She pointed to a plate of cinnamon rolls in the middle of the table. “May I?”

  Jane nodded. “They’re all for you. Consider it payment if you can help me get out of this mess.”

  Tara took a roll and put it on her napkin. “How has Paul been since Thanksgiving? You’ve had a weekend together. Anything different?”

  “I’ll say,” Jane said, resting her chin on her arms folded in front of her on the table. “Basically, he’s avoided me. He went to bed early on Thursday and stayed in his apartment most of Friday—said he had some work to do. I wanted to rent a movie or at least play Scrabble, but he turned me down for both. He was pretty much a recluse Saturday and Sunday. And then, after breakfast this morning, he left on his own for his appointment at the hospital. Usually, he asks me to drive him there.” Jane sat up straight, then rose from the table. “Just a minute, I think I hear Mark.” She left Tara to her cinnamon roll and the quiet kitchen.

  A few minutes later Jane returned holding Mark in the crook of her arm. “Would you like to feed him?”

  Tara looked scared. “No thanks. I don’t want to catch whatever motherhooditis has infected you.”

  Jane laughed and handed Mark to Tara anyway. “Then just hold him while I make a bottle.” She turned on the faucet and took a can of formula from the cupboard. “What do you think of the rolls?”

  “They’re fabulous,” Tara said as she jiggled Mark awkwardly. “I’ve eaten two already.”

  “At least my domestic skills are improving,” Jane said. She measured formula into the bottle full of water, then put the cap on.

  “But alas,” Tara said. “The way to a man’s heart is not through his stomach.”

  “Tara,” Jane warned. She settled in the chair with Mark.

  “All the men I’ve ever known,” Tara said, “need to have some physical connection to start feeling close to you. You have to kiss them.” She scrunched her napkin in a ball and threw it in the trash.

  “Fortunately . . . Paul isn’t like any of the men you’ve ever known.” Jane pulled the bottle from Mark’s mouth and wiped the milk dribbling down his chin.

  “That’s what you think.” Tara eyed the rolls. “Do you have a Ziploc bag or something I could take those home in?”

  “Second drawer to the left of the sink,” Jane said. “But not so fast. You haven’t given me any hope of fixing things with Paul. I mean, I can’t even get him out of his bedroom.”

  Tara stood, hands on hips, looking at her. “And there’s a problem with that?”

  “Yes.”

  Tara pointed her finger at Jane. “You’re going to have to be bold, Jane.” She took a bag from the drawer and began dropping rolls into it, thinking aloud as she did so. “But how . . . There has to be a natural lead in—something you already have in common.” Tara stopped. “Got it,” she said, snapping her fingers. “You and Paul play Scrabble together, right?”

  Jane answered warily. “Yeah.”

  Tara’s lips curved into a mischievous grin. “Good, cause tonight you’re going to play like you never have before. Now listen closely. Here’s the plan.”

  * * *

  Paul’s fingers gripped the soft leather arms of the wingback chair. He felt sick to his stomach—dizzy—and today it wasn’t just the cancer causing him pain. Across the dark mahogany desk, Richard Morgan’s brow furrowed as he read the papers from the manila envelope Paul had handed him five minutes earlier.

  Richard reached up to loosen his tie, and Paul fought anxiety as he watched the clock tick for another five minutes. To pass the time, he looked around the room, making a halfhearted attempt to notice if anything had changed since he’d last been in the attorney’s office. Except for a new family picture on the windowsill, everything seemed the same—exactly as it was the crisp November day nearly two years ago when Richard had called both him and Pete into his office to try to talk some sense into them.

  Richard hadn’t been successful. And now, today . . . Paul wasn’t certain Richard would see his side of things and help.

  At last Richard finished reading the first few paper-clipped pages, then scanned through the remaining packet. He looked up, one simple question forming on his lips.

  “Why?”

  Paul was prepared for this. “Because I haven’t got much time left, and it was Tami’s last wish.” He pulled the bandage wrapper from his pocket and placed it on the desk. “An EMT gave this to me the night she died.”

  Richard picked up the crinkled paper and read the words scrawled across it. He exhaled sharply as he finished. “I can understand why you think Tami meant Pete, but you don’t really think she expected you to go out and find some woman to—?”

  “That’s exactly what she expected,” Paul said, recalling the changed pictures in his apartment and Tami’s voice in his head so many times in the past weeks. “And considering Pete isn’t here, it makes perfect sense that the twins have a second guardian now.”

  Richard looked at him intently. “Does Pete know? Have you asked him to come home?”

  “From a war?” Paul shook his head. “No. Half the reservists in Iraq probably have circumstances where they should be with their families. And I know my brother. Pete wouldn’t ask for any special break.”

  “Hmm,” Richard murmured, neither agreeing nor disagreeing with Paul’s statement. He leaned back in his chair, his attention still focused on Paul. “You look terrible.”

  “Thanks,” Paul said sarcastically. “You were never one to mince words.”

  Richard smiled. “No point. Wastes everyone’s time. Pete doesn’t know about your cancer, does he?”

  “No point,” Paul shot back. “I’d rather he forgive me because he wants to—not out of sympathy.”

  “Maybe he already has,” Richard said.r />
  Paul shrugged. “Maybe.”

  “I’d think—in your shoes—that I’d want to patch things up. Forgive and forget.” Richard leaned forward over the desk. “I’d want to see my only brother.”

  Paul shifted uncomfortably in his chair. He looked out the window, waiting as a wave of pain rolled through his middle. He shouldn’t have gone without his painkillers this morning. But who’d have thought stress would hurt this bad. It was all he could do to keep from doubling over.

  “I do want to see Pete—or talk to him at least.” Paul looked pointedly at the papers on the desk. “It’s next on my agenda, after I’ve taken care of the legalities. Now are you going to help me or not?”

  Richard leaned back in his chair again and sighed. “Peter is my friend and colleague. It feels like betrayal to set him up in something like this. He’ll hate us both for tying him to some woman he’s never met.”

  “He’ll get over it,” Paul said. “Or maybe he won’t. Either way, it’s time my brother learned to stop holding a grudge.”

  Richard met his gaze. “I wonder if Pete is the one with the grudge? He doesn’t seem the type. In fact, I’d say he’s more the sort to be torn up over the fact that his only living family member hasn’t spoken with him in two years.”

  “Like I said—” There was an edge to Paul’s voice. “As soon as everything is in order, calling Pete is next on the list.” Trying not to wince, Paul rose from his chair. “So if your answer is no, I’ll just find another attorney to help me.” He reached for the papers on the desk.

  Richard stopped him. “Sit down.” It was an order, not a request. Paul hesitated a moment before he eased back into the chair again.

  “You don’t want some other attorney messing with something as important as this,” Richard said. “If handled incorrectly, your nominating joint guardianship could result in a custody battle somewhere down the line.”

  Paul frowned. “That’s not my intention. Trust me on this. Jane is already a terrific mother. You’d really like her. Pete will—”