I laughed. “I just . . . I just can’t picture it.”
“Lucky for you.”
We sat there grinning at each other for a moment.
“I should get going,” I finally said, remembering Shayla and suddenly missing her.
“Can you hold off just a minute? I’ve been meaning to talk to you about something, and this seems like a good time to do it.”
“Is Shay still refusing to eat her vegetables?” Not that I could blame her. It showed she had good taste.
“Oh no, it’s not that. I’ve just been wondering if it wouldn’t be good for her to start going to kindergarten in the mornings. There’s a great one right here in Kandern. It might be healthy for her to have more contact with other children, don’t you think? She’d probably pick up the language in a matter of weeks, too.”
“Kindergarten?” I had visions of Shayla alone on a foreign-speaking playground.
“It’s just half days.”
“Is she . . . Is it too much for you to take care of her?” I’d worried that Bev’s child-care duties might have been too taxing, and this suggestion seemed to validate my fear.
“Oh, heavens, no, Shelby! Having her around is as easy as it gets. This has nothing to do with me. I just hate to see her cooped up with an old lady all day long when she should be out playing with kids her age. And since you’re in Germany now, why not give her some contact with the language and the culture? If there’s a good age to learn it, believe me, it’s hers.”
I felt irrational fear tightening my throat. “Really? You really think it would be good for her? I mean, with all the changes she’s gone through already this year . . .”
“Well, it would be another change, for sure, but the payoff might outweigh the adjustments. She’d be able to play with other children again, for one—something she really hasn’t done much since you’ve gotten here. And it’s so important to have that kind of social contact at her age. It’ll stimulate her mind and broaden her world a little in the process.”
“I don’t know. . . .”
“Hey, there’s no hurry. Think it over and let me know if you’d like to try it. I know one of the ladies who runs the place, and we could go visit the school together. You can ask around, too—find out how other BFA faculty children have fared. She wouldn’t be the first to go there.”
“I’ll think about it,” I said.
And I did. I thought about it from that moment all the way until supper, fretting and weighing and pondering, until Shayla’s wide eyes, gazing across the table at me, made me just blurt it out.
“How would you feel about going to kindergarten, Shay?”
She frowned a little. “Is that school?” She sounded suspicious.
“It’s school for kids your age.”
“Djoh-many kids?”
I nodded. “Bev said you could go a few mornings a week if you wanted to. Doesn’t that sound like fun?” I hoped with all my heart that she would shake her head and refuse to consider it. Maybe even throw a tantrum. Fling some macaroni.
Instead, she frowned a little less and said, “Only if my wabbit can come with me.”
Huh? Someone suggesting that I go to school in a foreign language, even at the ripe old age of thirty-five, would have encountered Hysterical Shelby, the one with the bugged-out eyes, shrill voice, and permanently shaking head. But Shayla? Four-year-old Shayla? She just frowned a little, like she wasn’t sure she liked the flavor of this particular conversation, then shrugged and decided her stuffed animal should come along. I wasn’t sure who was teaching whom in this relationship.
“You’re sure? I mean, you don’t want to think about it some more?” I told myself to shut up. This was about Shayla, not about me.
“Will there be Legos?” she asked.
“Um . . . probably. Or something like Legos.”
She pursed her lips. “Okay,” she finally said.
“Okay,” I repeated, a little reluctantly, peering at her closely to detect any minute sign of misgivings. But Shayla was back to concentrating on her macaroni, so I figured the conversation hadn’t exactly traumatized her. “Well,” I said lightly, “I’ll talk with Bev and maybe we can go visit the school this week.”
“Uh-huh.”
I had expected anxiety and tears and refusals from this child who had suffered such an overdose of change in recent weeks. Instead, her matter-of-fact agreement had put my own fears to shame. What felt like the beginning of a loss to me,