A Season of Angels Page 0,55

finished the dishes and wandered into the living room, until now, no more than an hour later. It wasn't that she didn't notice. One might have gone undetected, but not five. She could have sworn not a single one had been blooming an hour earlier.

Unexpected tears pooled in her eyes, the moisture hot and unwelcome. She brushed them away from her cheeks with the back of her hand. "It seems everything in this house is fertile except me," she murmured aloud, and headed blindly toward the living room to await her husband's return.

Sitting on the kitchen counter, her knees crossed, her foot swaying like a too-fast pendulum, Mercy heaved a gigantic sigh. Getting those flowers to appear hadn't been an easy trick. She would have preferred African violets any day of the week over cacti!

Everything she'd done for Leah had backfired. The flowers were supposed to be a sign of hope. A way of telling her that all was not lost and that there was someone out there who'd heard her prayer and was working hard to see that it was answered. Well, it was back to the drawing board.

Perhaps what Shirley had suggested about Leah experiencing joy before she could find her peace was what it would take. First Mercy had to figure out a way to manage that, but if she could coax cacti into bloom, then anything was possible. Right?

"Shirley." Goodness shot across the darkened family room of Jody and Timmy Potter's house in a vapor of speed and excitement. "Give me five," she cried, holding up her right hand for the other angel to slap. What a difference a few earth hours could make. For the first time since Goodness had accepted this assignment she was making progress. Real progress. Monica and Michael had gone to lunch together. It wasn't much but it was a start in the right direction.

"Oh, do be quiet," Shirley whispered heatedly. "You know better than to be exuberant when there're children around. Timmy might very well hear you."

"But I've got great news. Monica and Michael had lunch together and I arranged the whole thing without them suspecting. I tell you it was a work of art the way I got Michael to show up at the church office."

"Please keep your voice down," Shirley pleaded a second time, placing her finger against her lips.

"All right. All right, I'll do my best, but this news is too good to keep to myself."

Shirley whirled around so unexpectedly that Goodness was caught by surprise. A sleepy Timmy Potter wandered into the room, rubbing his eyes. He was wearing flannel pajamas with silly-looking armed turtles.

Shirley moved behind him.

"Mom," Timmy called.

A moment later Jody Potter appeared in a long flannel nightgown that had seen better years. Shirley had her work cut out for her if she planned to find this woman a husband any time soon. Her charge looked downright frumpy.

"Timmy, what are you doing up?"

"I thought I heard something."

Jody turned on the light and searched the room. The minute her back was turned, Shirley and Goodness righted the floral arrangement and set the magazines in order. Both headed straight for the ceiling, hovering there.

Jody searched the room, finding nothing out of the ordinary. "There's no one here."

"I thought I heard something," Timmy said with a yawn. "But I guess not."

"I guess not, too," Jody said, placing her arm around her young son's shoulders and steering him back to his bedroom. "Unless, of course, it was God's own angels looking down and smiling on us."

"You think it might have been?" Timmy asked excitedly, looking up. He paused and blinked, rubbed his eyes again, then looked back.

"Who knows?" Jody said and turned out the light.

Monica's attitude toward Chet altered drastically over the next couple of days. He was still a scoundrel and a no-good rogue, but darned if she didn't miss him. There was no explaining it, no possible way of reasoning it out in her mind.

She tried to fill the emptiness that surrounded her with a flurry of activity. The night before she'd dragged out the Christmas decorations and gone about setting them around the house and office. Her father, impressed by her initiative, assumed this burst of energy was somehow connected with her long lunch with Michael. Monica didn't correct him.

Monica knew she wouldn't see Chet again and wondered if he missed her. She wondered how he looked upon their time together or if he'd given her as much as a fleeting thought in the days