Footprints - 2

Anna shielded her eyes from the bright sunlight and turned away from the huge bay window she’d once loved. How many lifetimes ago was that? A pain commenced in her chest and radiated outward, encompassing her whole being. Only one lifetime ago. One precious, all-too-brief lifetime ago.

The distant cooing of a mourning dove echoed her own inward keening, her own soulful mourning. What reason did she have for getting up? She’d given up trying to work months ago, turned all her clients over to her law partners and sought the sanctuary of Seascape. She’d needed to get away from well-meaning friends, domineering relatives and solemn-faced business acquaintances who could bowl her over in pain with nothing more than a sympathetic glance her way.

Unfortunately, she’d gotten what she wanted. Solitude. Now her days were spent alone. She had nowhere to go. Nothing to do. No one to love.

Once she’d cherished this ritual of waking up, loved the simple things that made her life so perfect. Not so long ago the bedroom door would open softly and Susana’s bare feet would pad across the hardwood floor. Then she would feel her child climb into bed and curl up at her back.

She pushed back the memories and pulled the light summer quilt over her head. Her eyes hurt. Her head pounded. Why had she let her mother convince her she needed sleeping pills?

A sudden sound from somewhere in the house caused her to freeze. Under the quilt, she lay absolutely still, every muscle in her body taut, every cell in her brain instantly awake and alert.

Then she remembered. Sam was sleeping in the guest room.

She was certain, though, that this noise couldn’t have come from Sam. This noise had come from downstairs and had sounded incredibly like a young child crying.

Anna shot out of bed and across the large room as if being pursued by demons. She flung open her bedroom door and held her breath, not daring to suck in even a tiny gulp of air. An instant later her vigilance was rewarded. Out of nowhere, the crying came again. This time it was louder, and this time it reverberated through her soul like the lament of a ghost child from the past.

On legs which threatened to buckle beneath her, she swept down the wide staircase. When the cry ceased suddenly, she stopped in her headlong dash and stood clutching the hand rail as if it were a lifeline to her sanity.

The resumption of the child’s crying, more fussing now than actual wailing, prompted her frozen limbs, and she continued down the staircase, this time more slowly. Seconds later, she stood trembling in the doorway to the kitchen watching Sam fit a sipper lid onto one of Susana’s old toddler drinking cups.

What drew her startled gaze, though, was the toddler standing next to Sam and clinging to his pant leg as if Sam would disappear if released. What the devil was Sam up to? Whose child was this?

Dressed in blue sleepers with feet, the toddler was surely a boy. Anna guessed his age at between a year and eighteen months. The fact that his full head of hair was midnight black, not goldenrod yellow, like Susana’s, sat like a lump of cold oatmeal in her gut.

For one brief, crazy moment she’d thought … she’d hoped ….

Anna sighed and slumped against the door frame. Not Susana.

Struggling to stay upright despite the weakness invading her knees, she turned away. How dare Sam bring another child into this household and expect her to accept it as a replacement for Susana. And there was no doubt in her mind he was trying to do just that. How dare he?

How dare he?

In spite of her escalating anger, she could not stay here and confront him when she was shaking so hard her legs would hardly hold her. Sam could make his explanations later. In fact, he damned well would make his explanations. But later.

For now, she needed the solitude of her bedroom, and perhaps another of her mother’s little white pills.