Chapter 5 #3
That extended family now included her. A couple of hours ago, she’d had nobody. Right now, it appeared she had Harry and Sam and Mike. Ellen and Nicole. Merry and Grace. And another little niece on the way.
And a partridge in a pear tree.
Mike looked down at her, bright blue eyes so very observant.
“I’ll bet you didn’t think you’d end up eating lunch at a brother’s house today, did you?” He kept his deep voice low, only for her.
She smiled. “You’re reading my mind. Do you have psychic abilities?”
Mike snorted. “No, of the many things people have called me, psychic is not one of them. It’s just that you looked—so scared and anxious when you came. And now you look happy.”
She looked up at him, amazed at this instant connection she felt, such a rare thing for her. “I was feeling anxious and now I am happy, so you called it.”
Mike nodded his head forward, where Harry and Ellen and Sam and Nicole had already stopped at the elevator.
The cab arrived with a ping and they filed into it, shiny brass internal walls reflecting them so that they looked like eight happy people instead of four.
Ellen whispered something in Harry’s ear and he laughed.
“You can’t possibly be happier than Harry right now. And Ellen and Sam and Nicole.” He waited a beat, his hand tightening slightly on her elbow. “And me.”
There was no comeback to that one.
Harry was holding the elevator door open with one big hand. “Come on, honey,” he called out to her.
No impatience, just eagerness.
Chloe made people impatient sometimes and there wasn’t much she could do about it.
She simply couldn’t move too fast. Walking was a complex miracle for her.
It had taken her years and years of effort.
She simply couldn’t go much faster than a slow walk.
If she did, if she tried to hurry, she sometimes fell down.
It had happened a few times to her intense humiliation, and once she’d broken a bone that had been broken before.
The doctors had told her she couldn’t afford to break it a third time.
Better to walk slowly and absorb the impatience of others.
But Harry wasn’t impatient, just happy. Mike wasn’t radiating impatience, either. He looked like he could run a four-minute mile. Every line of his body spoke of power. Walking at her pace must have been excruciating, but you wouldn’t know it. He matched her slow pace, step by step.
In the elevator, Mike dropped his hand and Chloe nearly jerked with consternation. It was as if an electric current running through her had been switched off. She missed it so much it shocked her.
“I wonder if we can convince Manuela to make her blue corn tamales?” Harry asked, with a sidelong glance at Nicole.
“Maybe,” she smiled. “Or maybe not. Manuela has her favorites, she has like this little celebration menu going and I wouldn’t want to mess with that.” She turned to Chloe. “It’ll be interesting to see what Manuela’s menu is for celebrating the arrival of a long-lost sister.”
“O Happy Day, O Happy Day!” Ellen sang, voice clear and beautiful in the enclosed elevator, like someone ringing a perfect bell.
“O Happy Day,” Sam rejoined in a massively out of tune bass.
“Yesss!” Harry pumped his fist, kissed his wife’s cheek then Chloe’s.
“Women’s clothing, lingerie, hats, cosmetics and…sisters!” Harry mimed an old fashioned elevator operator calling out the items on a floor.
Everybody was giddy, Chloe included, by the time the elevator made it down to the subbasement level.
“See you at the homestead,” Ellen called out as Sam and Nicole peeled away toward their vehicle. “We’ll swing by the Del, get Chloe checked out and then we’ll come up.”
Nicole’s shiny black hair belled out from her face as she looked back at them, Chloe holding her group back, as usual. “Okay guys, champagne starts popping in an hour. If you’re not there we’ll just have to drink it ourselves.”
“We’ll be there,” Ellen called out. “Make sure it’s French! The real deal! None of that wimpy California stuff!”
Nicole didn’t turn around, just held up her hand and waggled her fingers. Her husband held the door open for her, helped her in, then rounded his vehicle and took off before Chloe’s group was even halfway across the garage.
How humiliating. Harry and Ellen and Mike were keeping pace with her, crossing the vast expanse of the garage floor like a party of snails. Chloe tried to keep her voice steady as she smiled weakly.
“I’m, uh, I’m sorry I walk so slowly. Go right on ahead.” She looked up at Mike. “You, too. I’ll get there.”
He shook his head, turned to look her straight in the eyes.
In the dim light of the garage his blue eyes glowed like twin rondels of sky.
His face was drawn, tight, serious. “Chloe.” He picked up her hand and tucked it into the crook of his arm, watching her face carefully, as if to make sure she understood what he was saying.
“Right now, there isn’t any place I’d rather be than right here with you. ”
Chloe blinked.
Oh. Wow.