A Family for Thanksgiving
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M. K. Stelmack
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18
CHAPTER ONE
NATALIA GARIN GLARED at the watercolor, scarcely a foot square, that hung in the art gallery. The painting depicted a wide curve in the Peace River, the mighty artery that cut across Northern Alberta. Cliffs bound this section of the river, rising and then leveling off to the suggestion of meadows and pines beyond, unmarred by human presence.
“Pretty,” Brock Holloway said, beside her, his voice echoing through the sloped gray-walled walkway where other paintings of the Peace Country were exhibited.
“That’s because it’s missing the flies, heat, cold, swampy smells and crazed bison.”
“True. Painting would need to be bigger to get all that in.”
Was he making a joke? Humor in conversation threw her like a stick in wheel spokes. But then, most everything about this man threw her. His very presence in the Grande Prairie courthouse had sent her, dry-mouthed and shaking, into the women’s washroom to regain her composure. On top of the heartache of the past few days, he had walked in and proposed to take away the one good thing that remained from her brother’s sudden, recent death.
He had applied for guardianship of her four-year-old niece, Sadie Garin. Technically, their niece. Sadie’s mom and Brock were siblings, until Abby had died from childbirth complications. Natalia was sister to Sadie’s dad, until Daniel’s death eight days ago. Drowned in the frigid April waters of the same river that flowed wide and gentle in the painting before her. His body was found two days later caught up in shore debris. Local police had identified the body. She was spared that particular horror.
Natalia turned away from the canvas with its misty blues and greens and browns, and pretended interest in another painting of trees in autumnal shades. This one showed a sturdy log cabin amid dense, tall trees, not much different than the prison she’d grown up in. Daniel and Abby had taken it over after marrying, a wedding gift from the Garin parents who retreated farther north into the Yukon wilderness. A chamber of bad memories for her, as it had to be now for Sadie. She’d sat with her doll for hours, waiting for her father to return before calling for help on the ham radio.
These false images sickened Natalia, but the gallery provided a quiet space for her to hash it out with Brock. The judge had cleared both of their applications and turned it over to them to come up with a workable solution.
They’d left the courthouse and begun walking together because, Natalia supposed, together was what the judge had ordered. Half a block away she’d glanced over at the art gallery, and he’d asked if she’d wanted to go inside. It was starting to rain and she had no idea where else to go. So yes, she’d gone inside with Brock, and they’d drifted into the exhibit.
“Too bad we can’t hear from Sadie what she’d like,” Brock said. He’d stayed at the first painting, perhaps sensing her desire for space. “I’d like to know her thoughts, and take them into consideration.”
It irked her, too, that the authorities hadn’t allowed either of them to see their niece. Both her parents and Brock’s parents south in Arizona had declined to travel, and had shown no interest in their grandchild. Her own parents had gone so far as to tell her that death was not to be mourned and Daniel’s remains should be returned to the wild. He rested in an urn in her hotel room because she would not abandon him to bug-infested muskeg.
Brock and Natalia had asked separately and together to see Sadie, who currently resided with a foster family. But to avoid more turmoil in Sadie’s life, the deal had been that they would first hammer out an arrangement. Dangling a carrot, the judge was.
Sadie would choose Brock. He was a typical handsome cowboy—tall, broad-shouldered and lean-jawed. Not that Sadie would register his good looks, but she would pick up on how Brock hooked onto a person, as if you were the only one in the room, as if you mattered above all else. Anyone who might feel alone or...unloved would blossom from just being around him.
In the end, though, she was better for Sadie. But how to convince him? She could sell candles and home décor like there was no tomorrow. If she had to sell herself, she’d gather dust before expiring on some discount table.
She touched the ammolite pendant on her necklace. “I’m not sure how much weight we could place on her thoughts right now. She’s grieving.”
Again, his warm gaze rested on her. “You are, too.”
There, that...pull, reeling her into his orbit. She wrenched herself away to focus on a stylized map of the local area, part of the exhibition to show where each of the paintings came from. There was no marker even close to where Daniel and Sadie had lived, thirty miles east of Fort Vermilion, which itself was a hamlet of a few hundred. Most were clustered around Grande Prairie. The first time she’d come here when she was seventeen, Natalia had really believed it was a city. Until she’d rode the bus farther south to Edmonton. In the fourteen years since, she’d traveled on holiday to Singapore, London, Buenos Aires and dozens of other spots, including Amsterdam, when the Canadian embassy there contacted her about Daniel. Those were cities. This so-called city was a scraping out of streets and buildings from the surrounding wilderness.
“I’m fine,” she lied. Her last visual contact with Daniel had been four months ago, at Christmas. She had sent Sadie a huge box of gifts she’d wrapped in rolls of thick glittery gold wrapping paper with intricate red bows, and Sadie had opened them over a video call from the Fort Vermilion library, where there was cell reception. They’d talked regularly since then over ham radio. The last time she heard Daniel’s voice was when he extracted a promise from her to do a video call when she arrived back from Amsterdam. Among all the promises she had broken to him, this was the one she would’ve loved to have kept.
“Still,” Brock said. Abby had been torn from him the day of Sadie’s birth. He must have had the same aching hole inside she now had. Might still have it.
But mutual sympathy would not resolve their present dilemma. Best get on with it. She forced herself to look into his mesmerizing eyes and say her piece. “I don’t doubt the sincerity of your intentions, but I think I’m a better fit to be Sadie’s guardian. She wouldn’t be alone. I work, but I have found a day care close by. There are other kids her age and programs, lots of stimulation.”
“That in Calgary?”
“Yes. I manage a warehouse there. I also make sales calls.”
“What do you sell?”
He didn’t know? Then again, how would he know that his chance remark at their siblings’ small wedding eight years ago had sent her career on a completely different trajectory? “I’m a partner in Home & Holidays. It’s a home décor company. We sell into shops.”
“Sounds as if it keeps you busy.”
She detected censure. “No busier than your work. You still on the rodeo circuit?”
He shook his head. “I got out of that racket last fall while I still had all my body parts. I’m working full time at a ranch near Red Deer.”
“Oh. Is that...stable?”
From the slight thinning of his lips, he had understood the bend of her question. “My position is secure. I know the owner well and we get along.” He paused. “You?”
She had single-handedly pulled the business operating out of her landlady’s triple-car garage into a going concern with twenty employees. A landlady and roommate who became her boss and was now her partner. “My company is secure, too.”
The corner of his mouth flicked upward. “I guess we’re even on that score. What hours do you work?”
“It’s not a nine-to-five job,” she said. “But the day care has flexible hours.”
“After the kids go home, Sadie would be there, waiting for you?” Brock stood higher up the sloping walkway, making him rise above her even more than he normally would.
Natalia leaned against a railing to appear relaxed, though really it was for support. “They close at seven, so obviously it wouldn’t be for too long.”
“Seven. That’s practically bedtime. Definitely past supper time.”
He was right. “It wouldn’t be every day. Once a week at the most. What about you? I imagine your hours aren’t regular.”
“I spoke to that in the report. I stay on the ranch. It comes with its own support system. Knut—the owner—already said he’d back me up. And his daughter, and her husband. They’ve got a boy. A one-year-old. And then in a pinch, there are families around. There’d always be someone around.”
He had her there. She was pretty much on her own. She had Gina, but she had no experience with kids and probably wouldn’t want to babysit during her precious free time. And she had no friends close enough to call upon for emergency childcare.
Natalia crossed her ankles to bolster her relaxed vibe. “I don’t intend to raise Sadie apart from others.” With its one and a half million residents, Calgary must have some kind of support for single caregivers. “Far from it. She’ll be fully immersed.”
“Immersed?” Brock walked down the tilted walkway toward her, slow and easy. She tensed.
“Given opportunities. Allowed to make friends. Go shopping. Use playgrounds. Go to the zoo, the science center. I will see to it she has everything she wants.”
Brock leaned against the railing alongside her and stretched out his legs. Was he trying to project the same ease? No. Nothing rattled him. “What if she doesn’t want that?”
Natalia blinked. “Not want what?”
“What if she doesn’t want to live in the city? With all the people and noise? What if she wants a life closer to what she had here?”
“You have obviously not led the life she has or you would not even consider the idea.”
“What are you saying?”
“Daniel’s—Daniel was a great father, but there was nothing, nothing for her in that place.”
“It might’ve been quiet, but then again she’s only four—”
Natalia pushed off the railing and paced the flat portion of the walkway. “Four is old enough. You stay in the bush too long and you’re stunted forever. Any ability to communicate with others, to laugh in the right spots, to make friends, to...anything.” Her voice was quivering. She clutched the ammolite. Its deep rainbow colors complemented her every outfit, and her every mood. It never failed to calm her.
“The ranch isn’t isolated,” he said softly. “Sadie wouldn’t be alone. If she didn’t want to be.”
And if he made a point of socializing Sadie, which she didn’t trust him to do. Still, he had an available network and she needed time to build one of her own. “If she stayed with you,” she said, “would she have her own room?”
“I already talked to Knut. We can live in his house, and there are three available bedrooms.”
“And how far from the nearest town are you?”
“Quarter of an hour along graveled roads and pavement. Town’s population is around ten thousand. Stores, schools, playgrounds.”
“Would you take her there?”
“If she wants.”
“Oh, she’ll want. Trust me. And is there a chance for her to socialize? A kindergarten or a prekindergarten?”
“I imagine so. One of the moms up the road takes her daughter into some classes. I could find out.”
“I’ll find out. And I’ll pay for that.”
Brock stiffened and blew out his breath. “Fair enough. Are you saying that I get her, then?”
Natalia had been grinding through her own mental calculations. “Three months. How about you have her for the first three months, until the end of July? I will take the next three months to the end of October, and then we can reach a decision about her permanent home. This way Sadie will see both kinds of life and we can feel assured that her wishes are rooted in knowledge.”
Brock looked through the wide windows at the lazy spitting rain. Finally, he brought his gaze back to her. He had the darkest brown eyes she’d ever seen. She hated all shades of brown. It reminded her too much of the spring mud in the Peace River. But there was a quality to his brown. “That works.”
Natalia found herself smiling, without even trying to. “Then let’s go tell Sadie that she has a home now.”
SADIE WAS A dead ringer for his sister. Brock had visited Daniel and her a couple of times, but seeing her now on the couch in the foster parents’ living room, he was struck by how she seemed like a smaller replica of Abby. Same thin face, same watchful dark eyes, same boniness, same quick, birdlike hands. Only her hair was different, redder and curlier, like her father’s. Like Natalia’s. A reminder that as much as he might not like it, Sadie was not his alone.
The foster parents had a busy household. There were toys, backpacks, kicked-off shoes everywhere. A bike lay on the carpet with its front wheel missing. Some kind of long vine crept along the back of the couch above Sadie. Natalia, sitting next to her, had repeatedly eyed that plant, as if it might lunge and strangle their niece. Protective...or paranoid.
A social worker sat in a kitchen chair off to the side, pen over notepad, poised to record the slightest misstep. Brock kept forgetting her name, but he did recall how she’d said three times in five minutes that she was retiring in less than four months. In other words, she was counting the days and Sadie was just one more kid to deal with. Good thing he and Natalia had worked out an arrangement to get Sadie away. One that made him the caregiver of a small child he’d only met three times before, and talked to for as many minutes on the phone. Three months under the scrutiny of her suspicious aunt. Nothing in his thirty-three years had prepared him for this pressure.
“So, Sadie,” Natalia said, her long, pale fingers coming to rest on the cushion above Sadie’s head in such a way that the vine fell down behind the couch, “what do you think of our plan?”
If possible, Sadie hunched her shoulders even more and darted a look upward to Natalia before staring down again, her knees pressed together so hard they’d leave red marks. She opened her mouth but clamped it shut again. In awe of her aunt. Brock could relate. The first and only other time he’d seen her in person, at his sister’s wedding, she’d left him dry-mouthed, heart racing. Like he’d slipped onto the back of a bronco.
He crouched down in front of Sadie, taking a page from his friend and neighbour Will who did this when reasoning with his three-year-old daughter.
Up close, Brock saw that maybe it wasn’t just his sister’s looks that Sadie had inherited, but the same fear that the entire world was about to crush her. He had failed to rescue Abby from that fear. He wasn’t about to fail her daughter, too. Even if it meant dealing with Sadie’s intense, determined aunt.
He remembered a technique from when, as kids, he’d try to draw Abby, three years his junior, into conversation. “Do you want help saying something that’s hard to get out?”
A sharp nod.
“Okay. Is it something you want to tell me or Auntie Lia or us both?”
“Both,” she whispered.
“Both, then. Is it okay to tell us here or do you want to go someplace else?”
The social worker shifted, probably to state some policy, but Sadie whispered again. “Here’s okay.”
“Okay. Do you like it when you answer my questions? Or do you want to talk on your own now?”
Sadie pointed at him. “You ask me.”
“I can do that. Is it about staying with me or Auntie Lia?”
A nod.
“That’s good because it’s important to both of us you say how you feel about our plan. We can always change it.”
Sadie nodded again and then shook her head. “I want to stay with you, but... I don’t want to live with Auntie Lia.”
He saw Natalia stiffen and take hold of the gemstone at her throat.
“That’s honest. That’s good. You want to tell us why?”
She pulled on her T-shirt until the hem stretched over her knees and said nothing. Natalia was biting her lip so hard that it had gone white around the dark pink skin. Her hand still over the gemstone, she said quietly, “Would it be easier to talk to Uncle Brock, if I left?”
Sadie swiveled to her aunt. “No! Don’t leave me!” She gripped Natalia’s sleeve. If she hadn’t, Brock might have himself. Whatever their disagreements, he most definitely wanted Natalia to help Sadie and him hash this out.
Natalia relaxed in her seat. “Okay. I’ll stay and listen.”
Still holding on to her aunt, Sadie turned to Brock. “Auntie Lia lives in the city. And Dad said we can only go to the city together.”
There it was. “You don’t want to do anything your dad might not have liked.”
Sadie’s face cleared. “Yes.”
“But he didn’t say you couldn’t go to the city?”
“No.”
“Well, since your father has...is—Since your aunt and I are looking out for you now, you don’t need to worry about disobeying your father. It’s on your aunt and me to make sure we respect your dad’s wishes. All right?”
Sadie nodded and then addressed her aunt’s knee. “Is that all right with you?”
“It is.”
Natalia’s support emboldened him. “And Auntie Lia is welcome to visit us anytime. Okay?”
Sadie’s grasp on Natalia turned into a full-on hug. “You can come stay with me and Uncle Brock, too.”
Over Sadie’s head, Natalia’s eyes widened on Brock. “A visit,” she said quickly, “is a short stay. One or two days.”
Sadie sank back and her lower lip trembled. Brock and Natalia exchanged looks of mutual fright. She fussed with the stone on her necklace and then, in a single swift motion, removed it, the stone nestled in her hand. “This is the first time you’ve seen it for real, isn’t it?”
“It’s the most beautiful thing in the world,” Sadie said with all the conviction of a four-year-old.
“I think so, too,” Natalia said. “I don’t know if I told you that ammolite is only found here in Alberta. Down south of Calgary. It’s that rare. I think this piece has every possible color.”
Sadie studied it. “Blue. Red. Orange. Wait, I see purple! It does have every color.” She reached out a finger, then stopped.
“You can touch it,” Natalia said. “It won’t break or scratch.”
Sadie stroked it softly, as if the stone were a kitten.
“Remember the story of how I got it?”
Sadie curled into Natalia and her arm banded around Sadie in a half hug. The tension in Natalia’s posture eased, and Brock returned to his chair. There, all good.
Sadie drew a deep breath and, on the exhale, began. “You were shopping for a wedding gift for Mom and Dad, and you saw this necklace and you told Dad about it, and he called up the store and bought it over the phone for you and said that you had to come to the wedding in person to thank him for it. Only you came to the wedding but forgot to thank him. And every time you talked to him since then, you thanked him. I remember you thanking him. And Dad would always say, ‘About time, Lia.’”
Natalia clipped the ammolite around Sadie’s neck. “You keep it while you live with Uncle Brock. It’s a little magical. When you feel stuck, it will help you find a way through. There are lots of pretty things like that where I live,” Natalia said. “When you come to see me, I will show you them.”
Lots of pretty things where Brock came from, too. Providing he kept Sadie safe and sound to show them to her. Hopefully some of that magic rubbed off on him, because he was pretty sure he’d need all the help he could get for the next three months.
CAROLYN’S COLLECTIBLES LOOKED like Black Friday after closing. Brass gargoyles peeked out from under throws, plaques were slotted together like books instead of their words of wisdom facing out, candles were jumbled into a bin, a stack of hats curved up from the floor like a wobbly palm tree. Natalia ached to right the retail chaos.
But she would focus on her job or, in this case, that of her salesperson who had begged off from dealing anymore with Carolyn presently slouched behind the store counter.
“If you would like help displaying our merchandise, I’m more than happy to help,” Natalia said brightly.
Carolyn rolled her shoulders as if she had an itch square in the middle of her back. “I don’t need help. I need time.”
“The former often produces the latter,” Natalia said as she gave into impulse and plucked Home & Holidays soaps out of a very not-H&H ashtray and re-homed them in a company glass bowl. The owner watched like a drugged sloth. This was not like Carolyn. She was normally an A-list client; her reorders came in like clockwork. The drop-off two months ago on the spreadsheets had alerted Natalia, but she’d never supposed Carolyn would let her shop fall into such disarray.
“We would like you to be able to show off the Home & Holidays line, and we could assist with that so you can concentrate on other...things.” Like folding throws or hanging pictures or mopping the tacky floor or doing something about the smell of wet dog.
Limp, gray hair flopped over Carolyn’s smudged glasses. “I can’t focus. I’m worried to death, is the thing. It’s my son and grandsons.”
Oh, no. She was going to tell Natalia a sad tale and expect kind words in return, a shoulder to cry on or something that would make her feel better and not as if life was hopeless. “I’m so sorry to hear that,” Natalia said. “How about I just slip to the back, then, and bring out our merchandise?”
She didn’t wait for an answer but scooted around the counter and dived into the dim cavern of the back room.
Her phone rang. Brock.
She held her breath. Since Sadie had taken up residence with Brock a month ago, she’d talked twice weekly to him, and he’d reassured her that everything was going well. Sadie, too, seemed happy enough and kept asking when Natalia could come up. She had put her off. Brock had never renewed the invitation, so she’d supposed that he’d only said it to pacify Sadie at the time. Besides, she was swamped with work.
For the first time, he was calling her. “Hello? What’s the matter?”
There was a breathy pause on the other end and then came a voice strained and wavery. “Auntie Lia?”
“Sadie? Are you okay?”
“I’m okay.”
Natalia sank onto an authentic cow stool. “Hey, sweet daisy-do. Good to hear from you.” Natalia had read that kids liked pet names, and she and Sadie had spent ten whole minutes coming up with one. It was the most satisfying conversation Natalia had had in years.
“Good to hear from you, too,” Sadie repeated back.
“What are you doing?” Natalia had learned the usual “How are you?” proved to be an astonishingly abstract question for Sadie. “Besides talking to me.” She stuck to small talk, hoping the reason for the call would naturally tumble out.
“Nothing much. Sitting on my bed.”
“Oh. How was school?” Natalia had enrolled Sadie in a morning prekindergarten program.
“I don’t know. I didn’t go.”
“Why not?”
“Uncle Brock didn’t take me. He said I didn’t have to go if I didn’t want to.”
Natalia didn’t think he had made much of an effort, either. Never mind that she had paid for those classes. “I see. What did you do instead of school?”
“I visited the kittens, and me and Pike went for a walk.” Pike was the Australian shepherd and lab cross puppy Brock had bought her from a local rescue sanctuary. Apparently, Daniel had told Sadie that he’d get her a dog for her fifth birthday, and they’d settled on Pike for a name. Brock had seen fit to move up the timeline. Score one for him.
“Where did you walk?”
“I don’t know,” she said and added in a rush, “but it’s okay. Uncle Brock found me.”
Natalia breathed and then breathed again. “That’s good. Could I speak to Uncle Brock?”
“No. He’s not here.”
“Could you call him?”
“No, he’s gone off in the truck. The cows broke the fence again.”
“You are there alone?”
“I have your necklace. And it’s magical. It said to call you and tell you that I’m okay.”
Natalia found she was shaking so much she could barely hold the phone. At least Sadie had someone to call. Not like her parents, who had regularly gone off into the bush with Daniel and left her alone all day. Once overnight when she was just eight. “Sadie. How would you like me to come up and visit you?”
Her voice brightened. “Okay. When?”
She could clear Calgary in two hours, be at the ranch in another two. “In time to tuck you into that bed you’re sitting on.”
