The Dark Side - Danielle Steel Page 0,54
was an improvement, and made her think that she had been too extreme with her worries. Maybe Jaime had just been a rambunctious toddler, as they said.
His brother arrived shortly after that, and they talked about their respective plans for Thanksgiving. Both his brothers were going to their in-laws’ and his parents had decided to go on a cruise for the first time. Usually, they all got together in Sag Harbor for Thanksgiving, but not this year. Zoe’s father and Pam always invited them to Santa Barbara, but they never went. Zoe didn’t want to be forced to make a choice of which parent to visit, so she visited neither. And her mother was working that day. She hated holidays and had ever since Rose’s death. Austin and Zoe would be spending the holiday at home, which was different but didn’t displease him.
After a big lunch, and time for the children to play, Austin and Jaime drove back to the city. Zoe had set the table and bought Mexican food for dinner, which they all loved. While they ate, Jaime reported on her day with her cousins, uncle, aunt, and grandparents, and her account of the day made both her parents laugh. Little by little they relaxed. After dinner, Austin stayed to talk to Zoe for a few minutes. They didn’t speak of the ear tubes again, but Austin knew that from now on, something would be different. The person he trusted most in the world had lied to him, and he knew that no matter how hard he tried, he wouldn’t forget it, and he would never fully trust her again. He was no longer rabid about it, or even angry. He was just sad.
Chapter 11
Despite Zoe’s good intentions with the ear tubes, from September until Christmas, Jaime was constantly sick, with illnesses she picked up at school from the other kids. Nothing serious, colds, flu, bronchitis, croup where she barked like a seal each time she coughed, and a stomach bug. She was absent as often as she was present. She was even sick over Thanksgiving. She didn’t get another ear infection, but she had everything else. She was sick for all of Christmas vacation and had roseola, to add insult to injury, which wasn’t serious, but unpleasant. All their Christmas photos showed Jaime in pajamas with a red rash on her face. She spent most of the time in the bath, with Zoe putting calamine lotion on her afterward. As an only child, she had had no exposure to other children and their maladies until then, except at the playground. Austin called it the Disease du Jour, and Cathy tried to encourage them. She said it was totally normal for her first year at preschool. The school expected it too.
They had a nice Christmas anyway, although they couldn’t go to Austin’s parents as usual, which was disappointing. Jaime wasn’t well enough to go, and his parents didn’t want to catch any of her maladies. Santa Claus showed up right on schedule and left everything that Jaime had asked for in a letter she had mailed to him on December 1. She even got a pink bike with training wheels which Austin assembled for her at midnight. They took it to the park for her to try out, with a matching pink helmet, on the first day after her roseola had disappeared. She got to go ice skating with her parents at Rockefeller Center on the last day of Christmas vacation too. Santa had brought her new skates, and had been extremely generous with her. She said it was the best Christmas of her life, and in fact, the only one she remembered. Santa had left her a letter too, which Zoe wrote in red pen, telling Jaime how proud he was of her, and Mrs. Claus and the reindeer sent their love.
The atmosphere between Austin and Zoe had relaxed again. He had forgiven her for the ear tubes incident, and realized it was well meant, and she had solemnly sworn not to lie to him again. He believed her. He thought she had learned a lesson. It had taken them a month to get close again. But the holidays had been very special, and even Jaime’s roseola and cold hadn’t ruined them.
Jaime reported on all of it to her friends at school, and told them about the cold and rash she’d had, which several of her classmates had had before her, which was how she’d gotten