Long Time Running - By Hannah Foster Page 0,21

Keith the night before. "Is she okay now?" he asked with air of detachment in his voice that didn't make it to his heart.

"I think so. Keith arrived and kicked me out." She chuckled. "Isn't it ironic, I didn't know he existed till three days ago and he's kicking me out of her hospital room?"

"Yeah, I think he would say the same about you." Eric cracked as he rubbed his hands over his face wearily. "What do we do now?"

Sarah's response went unspoken as Jack and Andrew came through the door with Jack talking excitedly. "And then Darth Vader looks at Luke and goes..."the animated boy stopped midstream. "Hi, Aunt Sarah!"

"Hey bud." She smiled warmly. "Did you have fun?"

"Yeah! Drew let me have chocolate AND vanilla!" he said excitedly until a warm blush crossed his cheeks. "But I wasn't supposed to rat Drew out."

"It's okay, little man." Andrew spoke for the first time, his eyes meeting Sarah's. "I can take 'em."

Sarah fought the warm blush mirroring her nephew's as she cleared her throat and averted her eyes from Andrew's heated stare. "Well, we need to get going," she remarked with great efficiency, standing to grab her purse.

"Wait!" Eric and Jack exclaimed in unison, the younger not ceding the floor. "We have to talk about my birthday. You promised, Aunt Sarah!"

"You're right, I did."

"Awesome!" he exclaimed. "I wanna go to Pump and Jump and invite all the kids from my class and Drew and Eric and I want..."

"Dude." Andrew laughed. "Take a breath!"

Jack drew a deep breath while Eric chuckled. "Why don't we start with what you want for the big day, Jack. What's top of the list this year?"

In a split second the animated boy grew circumspect. "Well, um, I'm not sure how to ask for what I want."

"Jack," Sarah chided playfully, "you spent a full half hour with Santa Claus last Christmas telling him what you wanted. Why so bashful?"

Looking at the three adults, Jack pulled at his fingers as he did when he was anxious. Just like his mother.

"It's just, I was wondering," he paused as he looked around at the expectant eyes trained upon him. "If this year maybe my parents could come for my birthday."

Sarah's quick intake of breath was the only sound as stunned silence permeated the room. Andrew's eyes found Eric's and saw the visceral pain his best friend was feeling. Quickly, Sarah fell on her knees in front of the young boy. "Jack, honey, we've talked about this and I've explained..."

"I know," he said with quiet acceptance "my parents love me very much but they can't be with me so you and Eric are taking care of me," he recited but his voice was devoid of emotion.

"Little man, let's go check the surgery board and see if anything really gross has come up." Andrew offered as he grabbed the young boys hand and guided him out the door. He turned on his heel as he followed Jack and pinned Sarah and Eric with a glaring look. "You two need to fix this. Now. "

The slam of the door echoed as Sarah finally met Eric's glacial blue eyes. "We'll tell her tomorrow. Together."

Chapter 7

The cacophony of early evening Manhattan traffic echoed against the high rise buildings towering over the city's skyline. Nathalie, standing on the hospital roof and staring out at the city lights, found the noise both jarring and soothing. She missed the wide open spaces of her home in Africa; the way the night sky would be blanketed with stars and how you could hear the earth breathing. At the same time, the hustle and bustle of Manhattan reminded her of Chicago - the life she led there and then left behind. She had a foot in two worlds and was no longer sure where she belonged.

Thoughts of Jack had been swirling around in her mind since Sarah's visit earlier in the day. Sarah had wanted to talk about Jack but she couldn't. She was probably going to tell her she had found a good family for him and she knew he was well looked after but those assurances were of no comfort to her. It was important to her that he was happy and healthy but she didn't want the details - she couldn't cope with the details. It had been a monumental effort, in the intervening years, to bury the memories of him as deeply as she could. While the ache of giving him up never truly went away, she