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She escorted him to the front door and waved as he left. Just the motion of her hand was enough to set her shoulder-length curls bouncing.
Liam left the office not sure what had happened.
He’d simply wanted to arrange a babysitter.
And he was leaving with Anna Chapel coming to the house tomorrow.
No. That meeting hadn’t gone the way he’d expected.
CHAPTER TWO
THE NEXT DAY, Anna arrived at the Franklin house promptly at nine. She was as prepared as she could possibly be. She’d read Colm’s thin file. He’d been oxygen deprived at birth. The medical term was hypoxia, but medical definitions weren’t her concern.
He’d been labeled slow by one doctor, intellectually disabled by another. The last assessment had placed his cognitive age at eight. She put all those previous reports aside. She didn’t care how he’d been tested and labeled. She only cared about how she could use that knowledge to help Colm live his life to the fullest.
His brother, Liam, had certainly been on the defensive yesterday. Anna knew some people might find it off-putting, but she found the way he defended his brother attractive. Unfortunately, it was just one of many qualities she found attractive about Liam Franklin. But since he was Colm’s guardian…No, she couldn’t think of him as attractive in any way.
She took a long, deep breath to clear the image of Liam from her thoughts and instead, concentrated on the weather.
It was one of those balmy, mid-April days that made it easy to believe another winter was officially over.
The minute she saw the Franklins’ white two-story house surrounded by a blaze of red tulips, she was struck by a case of porch envy.
Some people dreamed about picket fences or tons of acreage or living in the right fashionable neighborhood.
Anna dreamed about porches.
Porches like this one.
It extended at least eight feet away from the house, and wasn’t simply a front porch, it was a wrap-around one as far as Anna could see from the sidewalk.
Of course, the porch was a bit barren-looking. Only two old folding lawn chairs sat on it, and the paint had long since started fading and peeling. But with a little elbow grease…
Someday.
Someday she’d move out of her apartment and buy her own house with a huge front porch. Then she’d paint it some merry color—maybe green—and furnish it with big white wicker furniture that had overstuffed cushions. In the mornings she’d sit on the porch, have a cup of coffee and read her paper before going into work. Then in the evenings, she’d come home, and after dinner, she’d be on her porch watching the day turn to dusk and maybe smiling at neighbors who strolled by.
Anna sighed. It was a lovely fantasy.
But right now, she didn’t have time for fantasy. She had a job to do.
She walked onto the beautiful object of her porch envy and rang the doorbell. A matronly looking lady who reminded Anna faintly of Aunt Bee on the Andy Griffith Show answered the door. Tinier even than Anna, and roundish, the woman had salt-and-pepper hair, with a heavier emphasis on the salt. When she saw Anna, she smiled and a pair of dimples swallowed her cheeks. “Hello, you must be Ms. Chapel. Come in, dear.”
Once Anna was inside, the woman introduced herself. “I’m Betty Taylor.”
The fact that Anna had a mere second ago thought that the woman resembled Sheriff Andy Taylor’s aunt on the Andy Griffith show made her smile.
“Liam wanted to be here, but he had a last-minute emergency with some local account and had to go. He wasn’t very happy he couldn’t be here to meet you himself.”
Anna almost laughed at one of the biggest understatements she’d ever heard. She was positive that Liam had wanted to be here to monitor her meeting with Colm.
“He said you’d be coming and that you’d be wanting to meet our Colm,” the woman continued. “This way, dear.”
She showed Anna into the living room where there was a man who looked remarkably like Liam Franklin. More than remarkably like him—he looked exactly like Liam. They were twins. Somewhere around five-ten. Dark-brown hair and very blue eyes that were so much more open—happier—than Liam’s had seemed. Where Liam peered at her distrustfully, this man smiled as he got up from his Lego and hurried over to her. “Hi, I’m Colm.”
“And I’m Anna.”
He hugged her and said, “Hi, Anna. You wanna play Legos?”
“Why don’t I let you two talk,” Mrs. Taylor said and left them alone.
“Aunt Betty is makin’ cookies for us. She said we feed company. Aunt Betty likes to feed people. She really likes feedin’ company, but we don’t have much of that since Mommy and Daddy went to heaven. Liam, he’s too busy for company.”
As if that was all the introduction and information Anna needed, Liam returned to his building bricks. When she didn’t immediately follow, he waved his hand in her direction impatiently. “Come on.”
Anna sat down next to him on the floor and surveyed the pile of blocks. “So what are we playing?”
“I’m building a magic school like they got on the Wizards show I like. It’s on Disney, and Liam likes Disney ’cause there ain’t no bad words, so I get to watch it lots. I need the blue bricks.”
For the next hour Anna sat on the floor digging through a huge pile of Lego for the blue bricks, and handing them to Colm as she asked him questions about his likes and dislikes, how he filled his days.
She wasn’t sure what Liam had expected, but she always assessed her clients in as gentle a manner as possible. At thirty, Colm had long since passed the school system and his family had never enrolled him in any other community program or activities. “…and then I eat lunch. Sometimes, Liam’s here and works, but sometimes he works someplace not here and it’s me and Aunt Betty.” He dropped his voice to a very loud stage whisper and said, “She’s not really my aunt, but I love her, so she sorta is, and it’s okay to call her aunt, Liam says. Liam says our family is sorta small, so addin’ an aunt is good.”
“Liam says.” It was the phrase that had punctuated their hour-long conversation.
“Liam says bedtime’s at nine.”
“Liam says vegetables before dessert.”
“Liam says don’t answer the door.”
Liam said a lot of things. And the things he said seemed to illustrate a deep sense of caring and commitment for his brother. As bristly as he’d been with Anna, she suspected that he had an entirely different demeanor here with Colm.
It was easy to see that he strived to give Colm a stable, loving home. But Anna suspected Colm could do more than what his brother thought.
“Aunt Betty came to help after Mommy and Daddy went to the angels.” For a moment, Colm stopped building and looked at her with the first trace of sadness she’d seen in him. “I miss ’em.”
“My father is with the angels, too,” Anna told him. She’d only been sixteen when her father passed away. “I miss him, but it’s nice to think he’s watching over me.”
“Yeah, Liam says Mommy was always watchin’ me, so why would her being with angels stop her? He says that she’s probably makin’ the angels come watch me, too. She really loved me.”
Anna chased away the memories of losing her father. She’d long since come to terms with it, and though she missed him, she remembered the good times more than the pain. “I bet she did, Colm.”
“Liam says you’re gonna help find me a babysitter for when Aunt Betty can’t come. She don’t like spendin’ too many nights away from Mr. Taylor, ’cause he gets lonely.”
“Is that what you want, Colm?” Anna asked. “Someone to come stay with you?”
Colm seemed confused by her question. “That’s what Liam says. A babysitter for me is what we need.”
“Yes, it is. But what do you want?”
Colm stood up and started to leave the room. “I wanna get some of those cookies and milk. You want some?”
“Sure.”
He took her into the kitchen and said, “Aunt Betty, we want some cookies and milk, please.”
“You two have a seat and I’ll get them—”
Anna needed to get a feel for what Colm could do, so she said, “Actually, Mrs. Taylor. I was hoping you’d come sit with me for a minute. Maybe Colm would get us both some cookies and milk?”
Colm frowned. “I don’t pour milk, ’cause I make a mess.”
“Tell you what, you pour the milk and if you make a mess, I’ll help you clean it up,” Anna promised.
Colm looked to Mrs. Taylor. She nodded and motioned Anna to join her at the table.
Both women watched Colm go to the cabinet and take one glass out, walk it to the island, then go back for another….
“Mrs. Taylor, I’m sure Mr. Franklin told you why I was here.”
Her eyes never leaving Colm, Mrs. Taylor said, “Yes. I love Colm with all my heart, but I can’t be with him as much as Liam needs me to be. Daytimes are fine, since Mr. Taylor has his club, but he likes me home at night, and to be honest, I’m old enough that I need to be home at night. I like going to sleep in my own bed, in my own house.”
“I understand, Mrs. Taylor. I need to ask you honestly, do you think Colm is living up to his full potential?”
“Until this very moment, I wouldn’t have even asked myself that.”
Colm had all three glasses lined up in perfect order on the counter. He got out the half-gallon container of milk, left the refrigerator door open and slowly removed the cap from the carton.
“Colm, you should probably shut the door to the fridge,” Anna said, then looked back to Mrs. Taylor who was still watching Colm pour the first glass of milk perfectly.
“Maybe we have coddled him. He’s doing fine, isn’t he?”
When all three glasses were poured, Colm put the lid back on the plastic container, returned it to the refrigerator and carried the glasses over one at a time.
He started to pick up cookies from the rack that they were cooling on, and Anna said, “It’s probably more polite to put them on a plate, Colm.”
“Oh, yeah. Aunt Betty always does that.” He hurried off to the cupboard and grabbed a salad plate, piled it high with a stack of cookies, and with one hand on the top of the pile, and the other holding the plate, made his way to the table. He set the plate down carefully, but when he took his hand off the stack, the cookies tumbled. “Oh, no, I goofed. I can’t—”
Anna picked up a cookie and put it back on the plate. “Hey, cookies fall. No biggie. If they fall, you pick them up.”
“Ten-second rule?” he asked Mrs. Taylor.
“They’re not on the floor but the table, so there’s a lot more than ten seconds when something falls on a table,” the older woman assured him.
Colm broke into a smile and repiled the cookies. He looked proud as he announced, “There, I did it.”
“You did,” Anna agreed.
“I didn’t even spill the milk. I was real careful.”
“You did great,” she told him. “But even if you’d made a mess, you could have cleaned it up. If you spill milk, you wipe it up.”
“Yeah. If you knock cookies down you pick them up, and if you make a mess, you clean it.”
Anna hadn’t realized he was going to take her off-the-cuff comments to heart. She’d have to remember that. “Right, Colm. Everyone has accidents. All that matters is that when you do, you clean them up and try to do better the next time.”
They all ate their cookies, and Anna caught Mrs. Taylor giving her furtive looks as if she were trying to decide whether Anna would be good for Colm. Anna suspected if Mrs. Taylor decided that she wouldn’t be good for him, she’d be as fierce defending Colm as Liam had been.
When they finished, Colm said, “Hey, I’ll clean up ’cause I brought it all over. I can do it.”
“I’m sure you can, Colm,” Anna told him. “Thank you.”
He looked to Mrs. Taylor and the older woman offered him another dimple-filled smile. “That’s lovely, Colm. I’m going to sit here and let you wait on me.”
“Yeah, I’ll do that ’cause you’re old and get tired. Aunt Betty’s feet ache sometimes and she moans like this,” he made a loud wailing sound, and continued, “so maybe if I help, her old feet’ll feel better, huh?”
“I’m sure they will, Colm.” Anna tried desperately not to grin.
Mrs. Taylor watched as Colm tidied up. “It never occurred to me to let him help. His mother, Maire, was a dear friend, and she waited on him hand and foot, and when I started to help Liam out after she passed…” She paused as if her friend’s passing was still hard for her to talk about “…well, I simply continued on as she’d always done.”
“That happens. Sometimes it’s hard for a family to step back and see a person’s capability. Well, if Liam will let me work with Colm—that’s why I’m here.”
“Oh, he’ll let you. I might not be his mother, or even related by blood, but I’m as close as the boys have to a relative, and I have some clout. I’ll use it on your behalf.” Mrs. Taylor’s bravado seemed at odds with her dimpled smiles.
“Thank you, Mrs. Taylor.”
Mrs. Taylor reached across the table and patted her hand. “Now, you call me Aunt Betty. Everyone does. And you tell me what you need from Liam, and I’ll see to it that you get it. I can’t tell you how much I’ve worried about Colm. I’m not getting any younger and I don’t know what Liam will do when I’m gone.”
“Mrs. Taylor—”
The woman gave her a look and Anna hastily amended, “Aunt Betty. I’m sure you’ll be here for a long time, but I really think there’s a whole world of opportunities for Colm, and I’d like to show them to him, if his brother permits me to.”
“Like I said, you don’t worry about Liam. I’ll take care of him. When do you want to start?”
“Tomorrow morning at eight?”
“That sounds great to me. We’ll see you then.”
Colm was busily putting the dishes in the dishwasher.
“Colm, would it be okay if I came over again tomorrow?” Anna asked.
He turned around and grinned. “Oh, yeah. We can finish our buildin’.”
“Sure we can. And maybe we could try a few other things, too.”
“Okay, that’d be good, Anna.” He hugged her goodbye and Anna didn’t mind his wet hands as she hugged him back. “Yeah, I’ll see ya tomorrow, Anna.”
