“Hey,” she greeted like I was a surprise visitor at the front door.

I stared at her. Then Fin seeking solace and getting it from a sweet, bashful teenage girl and not from his mother hit me and I decided it was time to take another shot.

So I walked into the room and informed her, “Clarisse Haines is gonna come over to study with Fin and she’s staying for dinner.”

Rhonda cocked her head to the side looking mildly perplexed.

Then she stated, “I have two packages of chicken br**sts. The boys each eat two. If you and me both have one, I’ll have enough.”

I’d just told her, essentially, that Fin was starting to see my new boyfriend’s daughter who lived across the way and all she had was chicken br**sts?

I walked further into the room and informed her on a grin, “He likes her, like, a whole lot.”

“Of course,” Rhonda replied. “She’s pretty.”

“She is,” I agreed. “And I think this is good for him because she’s sweet. You know, to have something nice like this with Darrin gone.”

Her eyes immediately drifted across the room.

“Rhonda,” I called and it wasn’t sharp but it was attention-getting so she looked back at me. When her eyes hit mine, I changed the subject. “Did you call Mimi about going back to work like we talked about?” I asked.

“Yeah. She said she was real sorry but she had to hire someone else to cover my shifts.”

Damn. Rhonda needed a focus, something to do with her days. She needed to be around people. She needed a reminder that there was life outside the loss of her husband and this farm.

“You want me to talk to her? See if she’ll take you back on? Maybe there’s frequent turnover at the coffee house. Could be, you could pick up more hours. Maybe go full-time. You’re great at baking, maybe you could help her in the kitchen too,” I suggested and Rhonda’s eyes got wide.

“I can’t do full-time,” she told me.

“Why not?” I asked.

“Well, ‘cause I got a house. I got things to do.”

“Rhonda, honey,” I moved to the bed and sat down beside her. “You clean the house once a week. Those boys, they eat, I’ll give you that but you do a weekly massive grocery shop. Women with full-time jobs see to their house and their kids all the time.” I grinned. “And, think you noticed, they’re good kids, responsible. They’re doing good. They’re keeping on. Not to mention, I’m here to help out.”

She stared at me and replied, “Darrin didn’t think I needed to do full-time. He liked me home.”

I reached out, grabbed her hand and held it firm when I reminded her softly and gently, “Darrin isn’t here anymore, honey.”

Her eyes drifted.

I gave her hand a squeeze but didn’t get her eyes back. Still, I kept at her.

“You need to do something that doesn’t include lying in this bed, Rhonda. You need something to fill your time, something to think about. You need that for your boys and you need that,” I squeezed her hand again, “for you.”

She sighed, her hand limp in mine.

“Rhonda, would you please look at me?” I asked, she kept her eyes across the room, I scooted closer and repeated, “Rhonda, honey, please. Look at me.”

She gave me her eyes. Hers were vacant. Switched off. Totally.

I kept at her. “Think about it. I’ll talk to Mimi. I’ll get a paper. We’ll find you something you like to do. I promise you won’t have to do anything you don’t like. But the time has come for you to stop spending all your time in this bed and start to check back in.” I gave her another squeeze and said, “Think about it. Promise me.”

She stared at me then, more to get me to move on then to give me an answer, she nodded.

“Thanks,” I whispered knowing I was no further in my endeavors to get my sister-in-law to snap out of it.

I let her go and moved out of the room, out of the house and back to my wheel to salvage the vase that would one day make me two hundred dollars richer which would go a long way to keeping my baby girls in oats.

As I sat, before I got my hands back in the clay, I tagged my cell phone, scrolled to Mike and hit go.

It rang twice before, “Hey, Angel. In a meeting.”

There it was. Never any time to communicate.

“Right, can I just tell you a couple of things quickly?” I asked.

“Yep,” Mike answered.

“Hang onto your hat,” I advised.

“Shit,” Mike muttered and I grinned.

“Good news, no Debbie.”

“Right,” he prompted, saying the word slowly when I said no more.

“And the great news for two people we care about but maybe not for you is that Fin asked Rees out. So she approached me to approach you about letting her go on a real date. I gave her the bad news that you were firm about sixteen. But I also kinda guided her to the realization that car dates were not the only option. She’s studying with Fin now and since she’s got a lot of work to do, we’ve asked her to stay for dinner.”

This got me silence.

I talked through it, “Oh, and I’m teaching her to ride horses on Saturday then we’re going to the mall.”

“It’s good you bought the chore of takin’ my girl to the mall after you guided her to the realization that car dates weren’t the only option.”

He sounded peeved.

I pressed my lips together but I did this to stop myself from smiling.

“Jesus,” he muttered.

“It’s happening, you already knew it would, you gotta roll with it,” I advised.

“Right. No studying in his room,” Mike declared.

“Gotcha, already informed Fin it was the kitchen table.”

“And Saturday, she has the money she has from her birthday and trading the jeans. No more and, sweetheart, she’ll give you big eyes and sweet pouts but even if she sees stuff she’s real good at convincing you she has to have, she doesn’t. Presents are one thing. She’s still three weeks out on her allowance and I do not want what was becoming a habit of her begging and borrowing to buy shit she does not need actually to become that habit. You get me?”

I got him. I so got him.

But I needed detail.

“Can I buy her a coffee drink?”

“Yes.”

“If she wants another piece of jewelry from that place I got her present, can I buy her that so she’ll like me more, want me around and maybe she’ll be open to me someday soon spending more nights than four a month in her Dad’s bed, some of those nights she’s in hers?”