can’t imagine what it would be like to have a partner so devoted to you that he’d risk everything to give you a normal life and to be your one and only.
Most of us have to save ourselves. There’s honor in that, too. Except it’s lonely. Even now, I feel like an interloper as I wish them good morning.
“Hi, sweetheart,” Leah says. “I have a frittata in the oven. Should only be a few more minutes.”
“That sounds great.” Leah is a fabulous cook. So is Isaac. When I first arrived in Vermont I was so malnourished that I weighed less than a hundred pounds. I am grateful for every meal I’ve eaten at their table.
But I’m also conscious of the fact that I can’t sponge off them forever. They aren’t my parents. It was by design that they made themselves discoverable to runaways from Paradise. When I turned up, they were ready to receive me.
That was two years ago, though. So when Leah discovered I could get a hardship scholarship at Moo U, I jumped at it.
I go to the silverware drawer and pull out forks for everyone. I’m setting the table when Maeve decides that she needs my attention. “Lemme show you my fort,” she says, tugging on my hand.
“Okay, awesome.” I let her drag me into the laundry room where she’s draped an old set of curtains off a countertop to make a hiding place beneath.
“There’s a lantern!” she says. “Lemme turn it on.”
Childcare has been one of the only ways I can really help Leah. So whenever Maeve wants my attention, I’m willing to sit cross-legged on the floor in her latest hiding place, while she chatters to me about hiding from dragons and making pies to sell at the market.
Someone runs on quick feet past us, and I expect to be called to breakfast. But that’s not what happens. The bathroom door is flung open and there’s the sound of someone vomiting.
“Oh, heck,” I whisper.
“Mama,” Maeve says solemnly.
“Poor Mama.” And poor me, I add privately. I shouldn’t have come home this weekend. I can’t afford to get the flu. I still get sick more often than most people, because I grew up in an isolated community without the same germs that other people learn to fight off.
“Mama gets sick every morning,” Maeve says. “And sometimes at night.”
“Oh no!” That’s when it clicks. Leah is pregnant again.
“Oh yes,” Leah says with a sigh from a few yards away.
“Wow.” I push the curtain aside and climb to my feet.
“You okay, honey?” Isaac calls.
“I will be,” she says as the toilet flushes. “A few months from now.”
Isaac winks at me as I reenter the kitchen. “We’re pretty excited, but Maeve doesn’t know,” he whispers under his breath.
“When?” I mouth.
“May,” he says quietly.
The oven timer dings. “Will Leah eat breakfast?”
“Absolutely,” he says. “Whether she keeps it down is an open question.”
When Leah emerges from the bathroom, Isaac wraps her into a hug. My throat feels a little tight, and I have to swallow hard. They deserve this happiness.
I suppose we all do.
By eight, I’m at the Shipley farm up the road. That’s the thing about farmers—you can visit as early as you want, and nobody thinks it’s weird.
And I know just where to find Dylan. When I step into the dairy barn, I spot him kneeling on the floor, having a chat with Jacquie the goat.
“Look,” he murmurs. “I need a favor. And I wouldn’t ask, but it’s kind of important.”
Jacquie turns her pointy chin in his direction, ears flopping, and assesses him with her odd brown eyes. Goats have a strange rectangular pupil. And—unlike me—Jacquie seems unmoved by Dylan’s handsome face. She returns her attention back to the alfalfa he’s left for her in the feed holder.
“No, really,” he argues, his big hand rhythmically squeezing her udder, releasing the last few drops of milk into a shiny stainless pail. “You have to do a better job of staying inside the fence, or Griffin is going to make me sell you. Nobody wants that. You might end up down the road at the Mittson place. And I heard there are trolls under their bridge.”
Jacquie snorts, and I nearly do, too. I know that eavesdropping is rude, but he’s so cute that I stand there a moment longer.
With the kind of smooth movement that’s meant to keep an animal calm, Dylan covers the milk pail and then lifts Jacquie’s foot off the floor. She’s still munching away as he lifts the