And she took heat for it. For her outreach. Idiots chastised her for not watching him closely enough. For being a bad mother. If I’d ever seen a good mother in my life, it was this woman. My heart broke for her, but she carried on. Still carries on to this day.
I wanted her to know how exquisitely she was loved. How much her youngest son adored her. How her fight was worthy and commendable and needed.
With an older departed, I could write a letter or an e-mail to get a message to a loved one, pretending to be them. But with a two-year-old, I didn’t know how to get a message to the parents without upsetting them unduly. They were struggling to move on with their lives. How could I undermine that?
I would check on them. Keep an eye on them. Somehow I would let them know how loved they were. How loved they still are. Because he’ll be waiting for them in his blue ishy jammies.
I collapsed onto the cool beam, one cheek resting against it, legs and arms dangling over the side. It was for the best. I knew that, but I’d wanted… I’d wanted to hold him. To rock him and sing to him and tickle him until he giggled. All the things I couldn’t do with Beep. But he was with his family now, those who’d gone on before him. They deserved him much more than I did.
But I knew one thing for certain. No parent should have to go through that. No parent should have to be ripped apart like that. I had to find Dawn Brooks. I couldn’t imagine what her parents were going through, but if I knew the Fosters, and if they really took her, she was still alive. Somewhere. I had to find her.
I heard a male voice from somewhere below me. “Are you okay, pumpkin?”
Prying my eyes open, I looked down at Uncle Bob. He was dressed in a dark gray suit and had a file in his hands. I nodded, hoping he couldn’t see the drool I’d left on the beam. Then I realized the wetness was not drool but tears. I wiped my eyes and slowly, ever so slowly, sat up.
“Want to tell me what you’re doing?” he asked.
Glancing back at the ladder, I shook my head.
He nodded. “Okay. I have the file you wanted. It’s everything we have on the Dawn Brooks case.” He sat it down on our coffee table, then reached up and took hold of the ladder to steady it.
I flattened onto my stomach, swung a leg over, and began feeling for the rungs with my feet. When I found only air, I glanced back over my shoulder to guide my foot to the ladder, but it was gone. Vanished into thin air. I looked down. Uncle Bob had laid it on the ground and was messing with it.
“I think that’s as tall as it goes. I tried to make it taller.”
“Which would explain the homemade scaffolding.”
“Yeah.” I looked at Captain Kirk and the gang. Probably not my best idea.
“Well, this looks really dangerous,” he said, standing. “I’ll just leave it here.”
He’d separated it into two pieces. Two short pieces. Now the extension ladder couldn’t extend.
“Uncle Bob?” I asked, my voice as shaky as my scaffolding.
He looked up and shrugged. “Guess you’ll have to stay up there until we can call in rescue. That could be a while.”
“What?” I squirmed back into a sitting position. “Uncle Bob, you put that back right this minute.”
“Sorry.” He glanced at his watch. “I have to get to work. I’ll make sure someone gets over here aysap.”
“Uncle Bob!” I yelled to the back of his head.
He opened the door and walked out of it. Just like that. He left me hanging. Literally.
“Uncle Bob!”
When I got no response, I looked at the angel. I smiled. I pointed to the ladder and offered him my most pathetic expression.
He didn’t budge. The only sign of life I saw was his wings ruffling together as he repositioned himself.
I closed my eyes and gritted my teeth. This was not happening.
“Is there a reason you’re up here?”
The sound of Reyes’s voice, as close as it was, startled me. I jumped and began to slip, my bottom half proving heavier than my top. I clamped onto the beam with both arms before sliding to my death – or at the very least a painful landing – then looked over at my husband. He was crouched on the beam, his powerful legs holding him in perfect balance. He was barefoot, too, and wore only a pair of gray pajama bottoms with one arm resting casually on a knee. Casually! This was not a casual situation.
“I need the ladder. Uncle Bob moved it.”
“Ah.”
He glanced down. I slipped. He looked back at me. I slipped some more, sweat breaking out over my whole body.
“Reyes, the ladder.”
“I see it.”
“I need it.”
“I see that, too.”
I rolled my eyes. “Seriously?”
“I’ll get it if you’ll drop the case.”
I tried to gape at him, but I was too scared to move. I was literally holding on for dear life with both arms wrapped around the beam and the rest of me dangling underneath. Now was so not the time.
“Reyes,” I said, hoping to be heard over the grinding of my teeth, “if you don’t get that ladder…”
I left the threat hanging. It seemed appropriate. But he only studied me from beneath ridiculously long lashes.
I slipped some more, my sweat making the beam impossible to hang on to.
Cookie’s screech was both alarming and welcome. “Charley!” she yelled as she ran into the room. “Robert told me to come check on you. What are you doing?”
“Can you get that ladder?”
She looked down as Amber walked into the room and stopped short. “Aunt Charley?”
My arms were shaking so badly, I knew I couldn’t hold on much longer. I tried to fling a leg over, but the act only made me slip a little more. As Cookie tried to fit the ladder pieces back together, taking out a framed picture and a fireplace stand in the process, my hold slid another few inches until I was holding on by my fingertips. At least it felt that way.