Page 45 - North Star Literary & Art Magazine

It rang for almost three minutes, so she put the phone back on the hook and went out to bring the child in. The sun was setting, and it was getting cold. She sat the child at the kitchen table and offered her a slice of pie.
The child hesitated, but then accepted.
She shoveled out two slices of strawberry rhubarb pie and dug in, taking the first few bites before she noticed that the child was just eating the slice with her hands.
She took a napkin from the holder and passed it to the child.
“So, where do you go to school? Is it around here?”
“I don’t go to school,” the child said between bites. “My mama and daddy teach me
everything.”
As she suspected, the child was homeschooled. Sounded about right for a little one
who was too ill to spend all day at school.
“So, does that mean you don’t play any sports?”
“No.”
“And you don’t play any instruments?”
“No.”
“And you don’t do anything extracurricular?”
The child giggled, strawberry rhubarb filling all over her face.
“What’s that mean?”
She hadn’t realized that she was smiling ear-to-ear, the child’s curt little replies
making her heat melt.
“It means the stuff you do when you aren’t doing schoolwork. Like with friends and
stuff. Do you have many friends?”
The child was thinking, then she shook her head.
It must have been hard to make friends. Especially with illness and homeschooling. It
wasn’t the first time she felt this badly for the child, and she was sure it wouldn’t be the last. She gave the child an understanding smile.
“That’s alright. I don’t have many friends either.”
She took their plates over to the sink, running water on them while the child watched. The room was peaceful, and she was happy to have a guest at her table after so long, even if it was this sick little person who was waiting for her mother and father to come home.
“Will you be my friend?” The child chirped.
She was taken aback by such a forward question, but if she remembered right, she knew that children were like this, always full of questions.
“Sure, there’s no reason why not,” was her response.
They had to hop to it. The evening was fading into dusk, and she decided it was time to take the child back home.
They walked together, across the road, Fifi trailing behind them.
On the way, she asked the child if she would be alright after this because she still didn’t seem quite right.
“The doctor said that I have a heart murmur. Like a little hole in my heart,” the child blurted.
“But mama says I shouldn’t talk about that.” She raised a brow.
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