a careful spoonful of soup. "Yumm. Your toes must taste really good."
"Maybe right after my bath." Aervyn clambered into a chair beside Elsie. "I can put salt on them for you if you want to try a couple."
Elsie continued to smile, but her mind was oddly wistful. "I'm not a very adventurous eater."
Aervyn patted her hand, all small-boy comfort. "Maybe you just never learned how. We could be food 'splorers together. We can start with cookies - Mama makes about a hundred different kinds."
Lizard felt Caro's presence just before she spoke. "That boy is even better medicine than whatever's in the soup. Good to see her up and about." She looked at Lizard, assessing. "Have you eaten?"
The huge growl her belly let loose probably answered that question for both of them.
Caro shook her head. "The healers are going to be in worse shape than the patients soon. Take some soup with you and go sit."
"There are biscuits in the oven."
"I could smell that all the way from my place, girl." Caro's eyes twinkled as she turned toward the stove. "Why do you think I'm here?"
A week or two ago, Lizard might have believed it was for the food. By now, she was well aware their landlady's no-nonsense exterior covered a heart the size of California.
"Go on, sit down." Caro waved a spatula. "I even brought over some bacon - I'll just warm it up a little. I think some of our stomachs might be up for that now."
Lizard walked over to the table and sat, grateful. Bacon meant her life was getting back to normal - at least as normal as her new life got.
Aervyn looked over from coaxing Elsie through her bowl of soup. "Do you get to go to school soon, Lizard-Blizzard?"
She had to laugh. "I think you have to save the Blizzard thing for winter, dude."
"Nuh, uh. It just has to rhyme. Those are the rules. Know any other big words that rhyme with Lizard?"
That was a tough one, but she was learning that four-year-olds didn't actually want answers to their questions half the time. Anything interesting would do. "Nope. But did you know that 'masticate' is another word for chew?" She stood up again - maybe helping Caro would avoid any more rhyming questions.
"I can't matiscate soup," said Aervyn, cheerfully mangling his new word. He grinned, biting into the biscuit that suddenly appeared in his hand. "But I can scatimate this! Want some, Elsie-Belsie?"
Elsie started to shake her head, and then stopped. "You know, maybe I do." She grinned. "I had no idea little-boy toes were so good for yucky tummies. I should have had some before now."
Aervyn giggled. "I had to get them really smelly first. Mama said the fresh ones don't work very well."
Lizard watched the two of them together, amused - and a little weirded out. Two weeks ago, Elsie never would have permitted any toes in her soup, real or otherwise. The whole nice-Elsie thing was still kind of creepy. Not that she was complaining or anything.
Good, said Caro's mental voice. She's working very hard to discover who she is.
She's been lying in bed puking, replied Lizard dryly.
Sometimes change happens when you least expect it. She's a bird in a cage, that one. The cage door's open now, but the bars are still big and shiny. Contemplating the open door is work, and it can be done in a bed. Caro reached past Lizard for plates. How many pieces of bacon do you want?
Lizard snapped out of the lines of poetry swirling in her head, full of caged birds and shiny things. Not enough sleep. A biscuitful, thanks. She looked at Caro's solid back and realized that was a pretty big change too. She'd eaten plenty of bacon biscuits in the past few years - but very few of them had been served to her.
You've been serving plenty of folks lately. We take care of our own.
Yeah. She'd just never expected to be anybody's own. Lizard wandered over to the table, plate in hand, discomfited by the sudden feeling of belonging.
"So?" Aervyn was looking at her expectantly as she sat down. He repeated his question when she looked blank. "When do you go to college?"
Cripes. The kid had a mind like a steel trap. "I'm supposed to start on Monday, but I don't know if I'll be feeling well enough by then."
It wasn't a good sign when all the other people in the kitchen gave her the eye.
Aervyn patted her hand, just