tower. Had they ever gotten dirty? Had they ever been allowed to let their creativity run wild? She hoped that they had, but watching them yesterday, she wondered. Carrie decided that today they should play in the snow. What children don’t like to play in the snow? And there was certainly enough of it.
When she got out of the shower, she dressed, got herself ready, and grabbed the food-coloring bottles from her suitcase. She hadn’t heard from the kids yet. Were they with their father? Maybe she had been wrong about him. After all, it was only one night, only a snapshot of life in the Fletcher household. Perhaps they were all downstairs and he was making them pancakes or something.
She walked quietly down the hall until she reached their rooms, and checked on David first. He was in his bed, playing with a stuffed animal dinosaur.
“Hello, David,” she said with a smile. “Have you been up very long?” He looked over at her shyly, his eyes darting down to his dinosaur. He didn’t say anything so she asked, “When did your dinosaur wake up?”
“When the clock said six-oh-oh,” he said.
Six o’clock? she thought. That was an hour ago. “Have you really been up that long?” she asked. He nodded. She didn’t know what rules Natalie had put in place, but the last thing Carrie wanted was to have the children sitting alone in their beds for an hour. They were probably starving. “David, as soon as you wake up in the mornings, will you come and get me in Natalie’s room? Even if I’m asleep. Would you do that for me?” He nodded again. “Why don’t we go and check on Olivia?”
David rolled over onto his belly and swung his feet off the side of his bed, hopping off. He grabbed his dinosaur and stood next to Carrie. His curly hair was bunched in haphazard clumps on his head and his pajama bottoms were twisted, but he didn’t seem fazed as he darted over to the corner to grab his slippers. They were big, puffy things in the shape of lambs. He struggled to hold his dinosaur and get his heel into the slipper, but after a few tugs, he got it on and stood up.
“Ready?” He nodded again. As they walked down the hallway, she asked, “Have you seen your daddy yet this morning?”
David shook his head. “He goes to work.”
“Did he leave already?”
“I don’t know.”
That sadness that she’d felt earlier was back in full force. Why didn’t Adam’s own son know if he was in the house or not? Why hadn’t David felt that he could get up and go see his father? And why hadn’t Adam even checked on his children before he left? It was all a stark contrast to the warmth that she’d seen in Adam’s face last night. It didn’t make any sense.
She opened Olivia’s door, and when she did, the little girl sat up in bed and looked at them with groggy eyes. Her hair was in a braid, loose strands puffed out around it, falling down along the sides of her face. She rubbed her eyes. “Can we get up?” she asked.
“You can always get up on the mornings when I’m here. Just come and wake me up. I’ll get up with you whenever you’re ready to start the day.”
Olivia looked at David then back at Carrie, her face showing uncertainty. “Okay,” she said quietly.
These were the facts that she had: One, there were two children in front of her who clearly had not ever played or acted the way she expected children to act. Two, Adam didn’t seem to have prepared in the slightest for Christmas. And three, Adam had put her in charge.
“Kids, what do you want for breakfast?” she asked. They continued to look back and forth at each other. “What do you usually have?”
“Oatmeal and fruit,” Olivia said.
“Do you like oatmeal and fruit?”
Olivia didn’t answer.
“What would you rather have?” Carrie stopped in the hallway and kneeled down to their level. “It’s okay. Tell me.” Neither of them answered. They were only four. Perhaps they genuinely didn’t know what they wanted to eat. “Would
Morten Storm, Paul Cruickshank, Tim Lister