Twelve Days

by Teresa Hill

  "I remember," she admitted. "It's just... It's easier in a way, when you're hurting that much, to not feel anything at all. It hurts sometimes just to touch you. To be close to you."

  Sam said nothing, just stood there.

  "I'm sorry," she said again.

  "Me, too."

  And that appeared to be that. "Thank you for letting the children stay," she said.

  "Sure."

  "We can try to have a nice Christmas, can't we? We can..." Pretend, she thought. They'd gotten so good at pretending.

  "We'll see that they have a nice Christmas. And then they're going. Don't forget that, Rachel."

  "I won't."

  He was going, too. If she thought her house had been lonely before, she couldn't imagine what it would be like then. No children. No Sam. No nothing.

  Sam left, and Grace finished her bottle. Rachel burped the baby, then they just lay there in the warm, soft bed and dozed for a while longer, and Rachel had another dream. She dreamed her baby hadn't died. That it was nearly twelve years ago. She was eighteen again, and they were in Rachel's bedroom on a cold winter's morning close to Christmas, Rachel and her baby, with their whole lives ahead of them. Sam still loved her, and life still held all the promise she'd ever imagined. She was still so young, so hopeful, so sure that everything would work out just as it was supposed to.

  Then she woke up and remembered it all once more. She lay there for a moment, almost feeling justified in feeling so bad. She remembered telling Miriam she felt like one of those punch-toys, with no bounce left in her, and Miriam saying, "Then you can lay there, Rachel. Are you ready to just lay there on the floor forever?"

  Rachel sensed that she was at a crossroads—her last chance to decide what she was going to do with the rest of her life. At the moment, it seemed certain that things were about to get worse, and there didn't seem to be anyone ready to pick her back up again. It was all up to her.

  Surely she wasn't so weak that she couldn't save herself. Surely she wasn't ready to just lay here and wallow in her misery for the rest of her life.

  Grace stretched and cooed and started to fuss once more.

  "You're not going to let me fall apart, are you, sweetheart?"

  Grace seemed to agree. She burst into a grin and tried to grab on to Rachel's cheek with one pudgy baby hand.

  "Then I guess it's a good thing you're here," Rachel said.

  After all, she didn't have time to fall apart. There'd be time enough to dwell on all the bad things later, if she simply couldn't help but do that. For now, she had things to do.

  Get up, Rachel, she admonished herself. Move.

  * * *

  Rachel got up. She got Zach bathed and dressed, and Emma took care of herself. Then Rachel and Emma bathed Grace.

  At Emma's suggestion, they put her in the deep sink in the kitchen. Rachel just about worried herself to death over something as simple as giving the baby a bath. There was the water temperature to consider—baby skin was so sensitive. The temperature in the room; she didn't want Grace to get cold. It was nearly impossible to hang on to a soapy, squirming baby, she discovered. Grace loved the water and patted her hands on the surface, dousing the front of Rachel's clean shirt, but the baby giggled and looked so pleased with herself, Rachel just smiled and decided to live in the moment.

  She worried over getting soap in Grace's sensitive eyes and worried over how to get her hair wet and rinsed and about Grace trying to eat the washcloth again. Emma hovered right behind Rachel, and Rachel thought Emma's devotion to the baby was adorable.

  "I have three sisters," Rachel told the girl. "All older than I am. My oldest sister, Ellen, claims she spent all her time taking care of me when she was a teenager."

  "I don't mind taking care of Grace," Emma volunteered.

  Rachel smiled. "I didn't think you did, and you're very good with her, Emma. She's lucky to have you."

  They got Grace out of the tub and wrapped in a big blanket, then took her into the living room and laid her on the sofa while Rachel wrestled with her over the business of getting her dry and dressed. Grace cooed and swung her arms and legs and kept rolling over and trying to crawl away.

  "Is she always like this?" Rachel asked.

  "She's always busy, and she doesn't like to be still anymore," Emma said, staring at the pictures on the mantel. "Is this you and Sam?"

  Rachel picked up the wriggling baby and glanced over her shoulder to the photograph. Oh, God, she thought, feeling another big tug on her heart. Sam.

  "That's from the summer we first met," Rachel said.

  "He's kind of cute," Emma offered.

  Rachel laughed. "You're going to be twelve soon, right? I was about your age when I saw Sam for the first time."

  Emma said nothing, just blushed, and Rachel sensed that she was shy at the idea of boys as Rachel had been when she was almost twelve. Seeing Emma now and that old picture, Rachel remembered so clearly being thirteen and absolutely breathless at the sight of Sam McRae.

  "He was the first boy I ever really noticed. The only one, really. You know what I mean? When I was just discovering boys and deciding there was something wonderful and interesting about them."

  "Yes," Emma whispered, wide-eyed.

  "Do you have your eye on a certain boy?" Rachel asked.

  "No," she said, too quickly. "Well, maybe, but I don't think he even knows I exist."

  Rachel nodded. She knew how that was, and she would bet Emma didn't have a lot of time to waste admiring boys. Poor Emma probably spent her time taking care of her brother and sister. She wouldn't have lazy afternoons to spend wandering through the mall with her friends, giggling and whispering over every boy they passed, or going to parties or anything like that.

  "When you first met Sam," Emma asked, "what was it you liked about him?"

  "Everything," Rachel said. "Absolutely everything. He was only a year ahead of me in school, although he's two years older than I am. He's from Chicago, but after his parents died, he missed a lot of school. By the time he settled in here in Baxter with his grandfather, he was a year behind. He seemed so much older than the other boys, so much taller and broader and more solid.

  "He was quiet, kept to himself, and all the girls made fools of themselves over him. He had those black eyes and black hair, and he was so intense, so serious. I don't think he was very happy here. You know how some people, particularly when they get old, seem to have permanent scowls on their faces, and they're always mad about something?"

  "Yes," Emma said.

  "Sam's grandfather was like that. He was rude and unhappy and kept to himself. I can't imagine he was thrilled to have Sam with him, and Sam must have felt the same way, because he never seemed to be there. I'd walk into town with my mother or my sisters, and I'd see Sam standing on the corner of some street, just watching everyone. Or he'd be in the park, planted against the trunk of a tree as if he were the only thing holding it up. He made people nervous, I think, because he was so big and had a way of watching everyone, hardly saying a word or ever smiling. My mother called him 'that wild boy.' "

  Emma laughed.

  Rachel laughed, too, then shook her head. "Nobody here really knew him or what he was like then. They just knew his grandfather and didn't like him. Small towns can be like that. People watch everybody else, and they always have an opinion. I don't think they were fair to Sam back then."

  "But you liked him?" Emma said.

  "Yes. I couldn't stop thinking about him. I had long, imaginary conversations with him in my head, because I was too shy to talk to him in person, and I just stared at him, the way he stared at everyone else."

  "Did he like you?" Emma asked.

  "Mostly, he ignored me. He called me a little girl one day and told me to run along home to my mother. He didn't even know my name, and I was absolutely crushed. I was sure he was a much better person than anyone realized. He got into some trouble as he got older. Mostly just fighting with the boys his age, but he was so much big
ger than the other kids, and people were ready to blame him for everything. It wasn't fair at all."

  "So how did you get him to notice you?" Emma asked.

  "I didn't really. Jimmy Richardson did. Jimmy was an obnoxious boy, but his father owned the Ford dealership in town and unlike Sam's grandfather, everybody liked Jimmy's dad. I was fifteen and Jimmy was pestering me, grabbing me and trying to kiss me. I think it was his way of flirting, but I didn't appreciate it. One day after school, Sam grabbed Jimmy and told him that when a girl said to take his hands off her, Jimmy had better do it. Or else. Jimmy didn't appreciate that at all and they got into a fight. Sam got into trouble. Jimmy didn't.

  "I tried to tell everyone what happened, but no one really listened. They all said Sam overreacted, that everything would have been fine if he hadn't grabbed Jimmy like that. But I was there. I know what happened. I didn't want Jimmy's hands on me at all, and Sam was just trying to help."

  "So you were friends then?"

  "More or less. I spent a lot of time defending him to anyone who'd listen, and Sam spent some more time ignoring me and telling me I was wasting my breath trying to change anybody's mind about him. But in the end, we did get to be friends. He's the best friend I ever had."

  Rachel's voice broke. She had to work hard to clear her throat.

  He'd been so big and tall and handsome, quiet when she got him alone, intense, sexy in a way she was just beginning to understand at the time. But kind to her, protective of her, gentle with her. Sometimes she thought her heart would burst from happiness, just to think that someday she might be his.

  Her parents had been horrified—their daughter was smitten with that wild boy who had to be up to no good. But nothing they said could convince Rachel to forget about him.

  She and Sam hadn't dated much. She hadn't been allowed to date until her sixteenth birthday. But she saw him at school. They'd arrange to meet at the edge of town and go for long walks along the river, and they'd talk about everything. He loved listening to stories about her family, and he told her how much he wanted out of Baxter. He was actually very smart, though he didn't often let it show. People had wrongly judged him, and he took stubborn pride in showing them exactly what they expected to see in him.

  People also blamed him for her pregnancy, as if she hadn't gone eagerly into his arms, as if everything everyone had always said about him was coming true. But she'd been happy then, despite how scared she was. Because she knew he was a good man. A very good man.

  And now he was leaving her.

  "Are you okay?" Emma asked quietly.

  "I'll be fine," Rachel claimed, looking over at the rocking chair. This could have been like any other day in her life recently. She could just let life knock her flat on her back and not get back up. Instead, she had children to take care of. She was going to give them a good Christmas and have a few more days with Sam. She wasn't going to let herself think beyond that.

  "Let's go find Zach," she said.

  * * *

  The boy followed Sam around like a lost puppy desperate for attention. He didn't even look where he was going, sometimes stepping all over Sam's heels, and he was way too eager to please. He'd smile up at Sam with those puppy-dog eyes and that quirky little grin, and sometimes he still looked afraid. That part got to Sam every time. Zach was still afraid but not enough to leave Sam alone.

  "I thought Rachel was taking you to buy clothes this morning," Sam said.

  "I got clothes on." Zach shrugged, as if he didn't care in the least. "She made me wash behind my ears and brush my teeth and ever'thing."

  Sam stared back at him, seeing himself at Zach's age and someone else entirely. Someone else Sam had loved and lost. Any instinct he'd ever had about how to deal with kids seemed to have deserted him in this moment. He didn't like feeling so inept.

  "So... where's your mother, Zach?" he tried. If he couldn't deal with them, maybe he could find out where they belonged.

  "I'm not s'posed to tell," the boy whispered.

  "Why not?"

  "She told me not to."

  "Who told you not to tell?"

  "My mom."

  "Before she left you at the motel she told you not to tell anyone where she was going?"

  Zach nodded solemnly, looking a bit upset. Damn. Sam truly didn't want to upset him. But it was for the kids' own good and Rachel's. Rachel who looked so perfect, so content with a baby in her bed in the morning. Rachel who'd finally noticed he was sleeping somewhere else and said something about it. He almost thought it would have been easier if she'd never noticed.

  Sam looked back at the boy, thinking the kid just had to go. All of them had to go before Rachel started thinking that maybe these children would stay and that everything would be better. Neither one of them could afford to think like that, and he could question a lost little boy if he had to, to protect Rachel.

  "So, your mother... What else did she say, Zach?"

  "That she's comin' back. We were s'posed to wait for her. Right there. Because she's comin' back."

  Sam doubted that. "Has she ever left you before?"

  "With Emma, y'mean?"

  Sam suspected Zach got left with Emma a lot, and Emma was great with him. But she was just a little girl herself. "I mean has your mother ever left you anywhere and not come back? Not for a long time. Like days?"

  "When she went to get Grace out," Zach said.

  "Out?" Sam grinned in spite of himself.

  "Of her tummy. Grace grew in her tummy. From an egg," Zach whispered. "You know, kinda like a chicken. I don't understand it all. But they had to go to the hospital to get 'er out."

  Like a chicken? Grace would love hearing that someday. Zach laughed a bit. He was a cute kid when he laughed.

  "So, that's the only time your mother ever left you? Overnight?"

  Zach nodded. "She's a good mommy. She's comin' back. Maybe we should be there. Don'cha think? How's she gonna find us if we're not there?"

  "I bet Miriam left a note or something, Zach. If she comes back, Miriam will tell her where you and Emma and the baby are."

  "I love 'er a lot," Zach said solemnly.

  Sam nodded, his throat going tight again. He hadn't been much older than Zach when his own mother died. He remembered being bewildered and so eager to please, to find a place to belong again, and worrying that he never would. Damned if that fear wasn't coming true now. Soon he'd have a room over a garage and not much else.

  Sam started to wonder where the children would go, too, after Christmas. Miriam couldn't have been serious about splitting them up.

  "What's your mother's name, Zach?" he said with new urgency.

  "Mommy," he said.

  Sam sighed. "What's her last name? You know, when people say Mrs. So-and-so, what do they call her?"

  He refused to say a word.

  "It'll help us find her, Zach. You want us to find her, don't you? Then you should tell me everything. Where did you live? Before you came here?"

  "Lotsa places," he said.

  "In Ohio?"

  "I think so."

  "What town?"

  "I dunno."

  "Did you ever memorize your address? For school? Have you ever been to school, Zach?"

  Zach shook his head. "Is that bad? Am I gonna get in trouble?"

  "No."

  " 'Cause Emma has to go to school. We get in trouble when she doesn't."

  Sam nodded. He wasn't surprised she had missed a lot of school. And he wondered what he could get Emma to tell him. She'd know so much more.

  "Zach," he tried one more time. "If you'd just tell us what you know, I promise we'll do our best to find her."

  "She's gonna come back," Zach said stubbornly.

  "I know she said that, but..."

  Tears welled up in the little boy's eyes. "She's comin' back!"

  "What are you doing to him?" Emma yelled and ran to Zach's side. She put herself between Zach and Sam, like a mother defending her child—she probably thought Zach was he
rs—and attacked. "You made him cry!" Emma put her arm around the little boy. "What did he do, Zach?"

  Zach sobbed. "He made me talk about Mommy."

  Emma glared at Sam. "He's just a little boy."

  "Emma, if you know where your mother is, you should tell us so we can find her."

  Unmoved, Emma didn't say a word, just stood there holding Zach against her side. Sam looked up and in the open doorway saw Rachel with the baby in her arms, looking as angry as Emma. He turned back to the children.

  "She told you not to tell, right?" Sam said. "Before she left you at the motel. She told you she'd be back, too, but she didn't come back, and now we need to find her. Do you understand that? You need to help us find her."

  "Sam! That's enough!" Now Rachel planted herself between him and the children, telling Emma, "Take Zach to the house, okay? I'll be right there."

  The girl nodded, in tears herself now.

  "Everything will be fine," Rachel reassured the girl. "You'll see."

  "She's coming back," Emma said, her lip quivering, her expression forlorn.

  "Emma," Rachel said, trying to undo the damage he'd done, "we're going to take care of you. You'll be fine here. I promise. Now I need to talk to Sam. Please take Zach into the house and let him eat his breakfast. I'll be right there." Emma nodded. Rachel turned to the boy. "Zach, Emma and I were worried about you. We didn't know where you were."

  "I was with him," Zach said, pointing to Sam.

  "Well we didn't know that. You shouldn't come out here without telling us. You shouldn't leave the house at all without me or Sam or Emma, okay?"

  " 'Kay," he said solemnly.

  "Go inside with Emma and eat." The two of them left, and Rachel, looking like a warrior woman, wheeled around to Sam and said, "What did you think you were doing?"

  "Trying to find out where they belong," he said. "If they have a home, that's where they should be."