Page 40 of Hero for the Holidays

God knew that was where they would’ve ended up.

They could never have gone the distance. Landry tipped his hat. “See you ladies at dinnertime.”

She didn’t know why that made her smile. But it did.

She tried to suppress it

Which left her with Lila, who was looking at her somewhat suspiciously.

“Hi,” Fia said, her stomach going tight.

“Hi.”

She was looking up at Fia expectantly, because of course Fia was supposed to be the adult.

“You can call me Fia.”

“Okay.”

“I thought you might want to see my house. And we could...bake. You like baking?”

“Not really.”

“Well. Do you, um, do you know how to knit?”

“No. But...it looks kind of cool.”

“Or crocheting. I like to do amigurumi sometimes. And make little animals.”

“Oh yeah,” said Lila. “I’d like to do that.”

“I can teach you. And I can bake. You can watch if you want. I’ll get you set up with a round for your crochet.”

She wondered if it was normal that she felt a little bit like she was babysitting. There was also a strange, dull ache in her chest that wouldn’t go away, that let her know that this wasn’t just normal child-watching duties.

Was something wrong with her?

She’d wondered that before.

What was she supposed to feel?

What she felt was impossibly big, but she wasn’t sure it was the right kind of maternal. How did you know?

These were the kinds of things normal people could probably ask their mother. But Fia wasn’t normal. Her mother wasn’t normal. They never had been.

She couldn’t call her up and ask her. She’d have to also add,oh, hey, Mom, by the way, I had a baby just two months after you told me I’d be a terrible mother.

That would go down great.

She sat down at the table across from Lila and took out some of her crochet supplies, and a very simple pattern for a penguin. She’d taught herself to crochet years ago. It was good for her to keep busy, and at night sometimes she got a little bit overanxious. Especially now with everyone moved out, knitting or crocheting with the TV on was a great distraction.

“Um—” she picked up her hook and started a magic circle quickly “—this is going to be your base.”

She spent a few minutes explaining it to her, and she felt like a camp counselor. She wondered when her numbness would ease. There had been a rush of feelings right at first, and then she’d said all these things. The right things, she felt.

And now she felt afraid of what she might do or say. Like she might breathe in too deep and all of this would shatter.

She’d been afraid she wouldn’t be able to do this when she was sixteen. So confident she could do it now. But the initial rush had moved over her like a wave and left nothing but little pools of doubt and spiny sea creatures in its wake.

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