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Lucas will soon be back at Clara and Daniel's house and will meet characters who were introduced several chapters ago, so I thought a list of characters in the story might be helpful before Chapter 20, which will likely be posted tomorrow. Character Gallery For each character, the chapter in which they first appear is listed. Lucas’s Hometown Lucas Andersen – graduated from high school a year ago and was working at a daycare for a year before studying geology at a university in another city (1) Peter, Mette, Katrine – three children at the daycare where Lucas worked (1) Lucas’s father (name not given) (1) Lucas’s mother (name not given) (1) Emma – Lucas’s younger sister (1) The University Town Daniel Meyer – Lucas's landlord; Clara’s husband (1) Clara Meyer – Lucas's landlord, Daniel’s wife (2) Clara’s family Elisabeth – Clara’s sister (7) Jonas – Elisabeth’s husband (7) Martin – Elisabeth and Jonas’ son, age 4 (7) Line – Elisabeth and Jonas’ daughter, age 1 (7) The family lives just a few kilometers from Daniel and Clara Daniel’s family Peter – Daniel’s brother (12) Ingrid – Peter’s wife (12) Johannes – Peter and Ingrid’s son, age 9 (12) Bertram – Peter and Ingrid’s son, age 5 (12) The family lives near Bergwald Forest The University Don Kingston – professor of geology (8) Kristina – Ph.D. student (8) Yvette – teaching assistant on the field trip (17) Students in Lucas’s class Lucas Mia – lives in a dorm (13) David – lives in a dorm (13) Jasper – lives in a dorm (13) Stef – is described in Chapter 15, but his name is first mentioned in Chapter 17. Stef lives with his older sister Anette and their father, who is a sailor and is therefore only home half the time. Saskia – married after high school, was a stay-at-home mom until the children started school (15) Flora (19) Hannah (20) Saskia's family Kim – Saskia’s son, mentioned without a name in Chapter 15; name given in Chapter 16 Sebastian – Saskia’s son, Kim’s younger brother (16) Paul – Saskia’s husband; his family owns a factory (16) The family lives in the same neighborhood as Daniel and Clara  

It wasn’t ment as disrespectful. I apologize if it came across that way. I deleted the previous post since it was read that way. I am sorry I am on the autism spectrum and not the best at communicating.

Chapter 37 The Other Ghost   “Are you ready, pet?” Auntie Eiboline asked the squirming jumping excited ten year old that was bouncing even as she pulled on her weller boots.   “Always,” her eyes shined in excitement and child-like wonder. “I love getting the water with Auntie-grandma!”   “Auntie-grandma, huh?” Eiboline laughed.   “Yeah. Because you are just like Grandma making stuff like muffins that are better than store bought, never really mad, but still expecting good girl stuff from me, and always teaching not just normal stuff, but stuff kids want to know. I love you so much!”   Auntie seemed to tighten her hands around her own pail handle, and she stiffened for a second, and then she relaxed in a heavy breath. “Now….”   Cait raced outside, just to the end of the drive but didn’t touch the gate. She looked into the fields beyond trying to squint to see Dairy-Daddy or Daddy Sean remembering he promised to have the lands ready for her to see tonight, but she still has a lot of growing up to do before he can let her wander, and it’s not about her being bad, but about her not knowing how to understand the animals in a way that makes them alarms and protectors against… the belt. Cait couldn’t help seeing a long thick strap that bit through her flimsy dresses and skirts and little girl panties leaving her sore, but having a great two teethed head that would sink it’s poison or… Uncle Sean called it… what? Ven…, ven…. She knew it was ven-some-what’s-it.... But it would be worse, and he didn’t want that belt to hit her. He was protecting her from the belt. The truth she didn’t tell Uncle, she liked the boy underwears because it was thick against belts, too, and so, too, were the boy jeans she happily wore around the farm. They were safer… in case the belt did come out.   “Cait? Wait for Grandma-Auntie, hon,” Eiboline took the name upon herself seemingly natural after the exchange in the mud room. “There’s still dangers out there, pet!”   “I know,” Cait turned and faced Auntie Eiboline. “I was just looking to see if I could see Uncle-Daddy out there!”   The tall lady smiled down at her, the wrinkles were like lines of deep embedded promises of ‘If you pee, you tell me, you don’t sit in pee, you just change and we keep playing.’ They were promises that Cait wasn’t dirty. Auntie-grandma had even pinned Kookaberry to her, and made sure the bear couldn’t touch the ground before they got ready to go to the well.   The long heavy gate groaned as Auntie Eiboline pulled it open and both she and Cait entered a small space created at one end of it, and then Auntie closed the gate. Cait didn’t understand why the gate had to stay closed. Looking around the field here, she didn’t see any animals large enough nearby that would be stopped by the gate, but she didn’t say anything. Her eyes immediately looked forward down the path that led to the hill where she knew she could see more of the farm.   They walked, was it fifty steps? Was it a hundred? Cait knew it couldn’t have been two hundred. But she suddenly noticed that Auntie stopped and put her free hand on Cait’s shoulder. “Quiet love.”   They were nearly even from to the right of the trail, that wild tangled fenced in jungle-grass field. Then they heard something in the grass. It seemed to make a sound like someone shaking leaves on a fallen stick that was covered like a branch. Wssst.   “Cait. Hon. Don’t move. Stay still. I don’t know where it is,” Auntie was whispering. “Those things can hear you when you walk. It hasn’t done anything yet, so that means we are either not quite close enough for it to react, or it’s just trying to get away.”   Shht! Whish. Shht.   She stood there, her hand gripping Kookaberry tight, and the pail, being plastic and a child’s toy, barely made any sound at all as it fell from the frozen child’s grasp. The one skill that she had down, was the ability to freeze.   Some snakes had a brown color, right? A copper-brown? Was copper light tan? Cait shivered. What was in the grass. Do Snakes slither through it quickly? Could she outrun it? Uncle Sean-Daddy and Auntie-grandma Eiboline told her to freeze if she saw a snake. It is probably too fast to out-fast-run it. Please… don’t be….   A small little whine came from somewhere behind them.   “Shadow? Is that you?” Auntie asked over the grass.   The body still slithered in and out of tall grass, but eventually came into view just feet from Cait. It looked at her with those large brown eyes. Cait looked at Auntie.   “Yes, Cait. You can go talk to her. If she’s not growling, there are no snakes to be worried about.” “Clever girl,” Cait asked Shadow. “Were you hunting the snakes and making sure they weren’t sending spies. That why you sneaking around? To protect us from Ninja snakes?”   The old dog looked up at her with those brown eyes that said… I’m just doing dog stuff. I don’t hurt or trick humans. I warn humans. I watch humans, and if I must, I’ll take a bite for a human. That’s what Cait whispered to Auntie that the eyes said.   “If you say so, child. You know they say a child can read a dog’s heart a lot easier than an old lady like me. But I will tell you this, she has stopped me stepping on a great snake, and she will watch you, too, if you listen to her, Cait.”   “I wish she could sleep in my room,” Cait looked up at Auntie-grandma while rubbing Shadow as she walk along side them up the hill.   “No, you don’t,” Auntie Eiboline whispered. “If she darted into your room, she’s knock over all of your bedroom town, and she’d bump my dresser with the still posed farm set on it.”   “I never thought old people supposed to like toys,” Cait whispered.   Auntie frowned and looked down. “Well, people don’t get to tell us what we do in our house, Cait. We don’t let them hurt your feelings no more, and they will not take that farm scene down no matter how nasty their words are.”   “You really like that farm scene,” Cait observed, her voice quiet as she looked up at Auntie who looked as though she was looking out past the road beyond. Cait sighed.   Auntie sighed. “Yes, it’s important not only to me, Cait. But someday, when you’re bigger….”   She started to walk again towards the well, down the hill and to the tree.   Cait’s hand went around Auntie’s back and she hugged her. Cait didn’t know why, but she felt like Auntie needed a hug, and she just did it, just like Auntie just gave her a bath, or Auntie just made her juice without asking. It was something that was easy to see. Cait wanted Juice, and Cait knew that Auntie-grandma wanted a hug.   They walked slow with Cait’s little arm behind Auntie’s waist and down the hill they walked, pails swaying and Shadow now starting to lead the way, it’s nose seemingly pointing the way.   Arriving at the well, Auntie-grandma took Kookaberry and tied him high on a branch. “He won’t get wet up there while we are here,” Auntie told Cait. “Don’t play near the well, but there is plenty of field where I can see from here, if you want to play with Shadow over there. Just freeze if Shadow growls and you don’t know why.”   “What about my bucket?”   “We’ll fill it before we leave the well, Cait. You play with Shadow, love. Shadow has been without a child’s love since… well, for a while.”   “You were going to say since the boy went away,” Cait looked at Auntie. “How come you don’t talk to me about it?”   “It’s just adult stuff, little lady. It’s not something we should bother children with. Go play?”   Cait nodded. “Okay. But I know you letting me wear the clothes… I heard you and Uncle the first time you put me in these. I know. These are from twelve years ago, and the clothes are special to you, but you put them on me. I have to tell you that I know that much. It would be like lying if I didn’t.”   “Cait? Sometimes, you don’t have to say everything you know,” Auntie whispered. “Sometimes, it’s okay not to say everything. Sometimes, it’s easier for someone not to hear what you know, even if you know something. It’s more important that you don’t say things that you don’t know the whole story to… otherwise… it might hurt.”   Cait looked up at Auntie. She wasn’t scolding. Her voice wasn’t harsh and her eyes weren’t locked on to her as if to target something fragile. Actually, her voice was sounding sorrowful and sad. She sighed and nodded her head over where she told Cait to play a moment ago. “Just go play with Shadow, Cait.”   Shadow laid on her back and as Cait rubbed her belly, her eyes glanced over at the well where Auntie Eiboline was drawing water.   “You are tongue-breathing a lot,” Cait whispered to Shadow. “Is it so hot for a dog already?”   Shadow didn’t seem to respond to Cait though. She just watched Eiboline so carefully, that eventually, Cait followed the dog’s eyes, and she saw something green in the grass. It had a white thing on it.   “What’s that, Cait asked Shadow.   Shadow licked Cait’s hand, but pulled her playfully down by the loose sleeve of her arm. Cait giggled. “I’ll get you down.”   It was a few minutes of rough play that landed Cait on her butt laughing when she looked over at Auntie again. She was staring off towards the house again, only, Cait didn’t think it was the house.   “Auntie?” Cait whispered. “Is it time to go back?”   “You can play a little more, if you want.”   Suddenly, Cait caugh a lint of silver-like metal on Shadow’s collar. It was a small tag in the shape of a heart. -I belong to Ron Kinsella- was written on the first line. -Call, and it had a telephone number- Was the boy’s name Ron? Sean was Uncle-Daddy and Eiboline was Auntie-grandma. Who else would Ron be, but the lost boy. But then…. The dog was actually the boy’s dog, not so much Uncle or Auntie’s dog, right?   “That’s why,” Cait whispered to Shadow. “Auntie hasn’t really been over-friendly to you, has she? She gives you supper and she doesn’t shoo you, but she doesn’t talk to you. It’s kind of like if ‘Ford’ Daddy’s car were real, as in alive, I couldn’t want to talk to it. It’s… it’s him. But at the same time, I wish I knew why Daddy didn’t love me.”   Shadow licked her hand.   “Except, I don’t think it’s she doesn’t love you, is it? It’s that she’s… she’s (apposed to) be strong, and she can’t if she likes you, so she pretends you are just something she feeds, but deep down, if you ran away, she’d… she’d not let you go.”   Shadow nuzzled her in the chest.   “You… you stay not for the food, but because of the boy, right? I watched Gray-Feri-yahs something. It was on last Christmas. A dog loved a man so much, he’d have starved on the dead buried spot if someone didn’t feed him. Yeah, it’s called Gray-Feri-yahs Boby.”   Shadow looked at Cait, and Cait whispered into it’s ears. “I know about you dogs, you know. All you animals, actually. I know you only look like you are one four legs because your real ways would scare us, and you don’t want to scare us, so you stay on four legs even around children because that’s the way parents tell us you are. But I know. You are really smart, just like people. You probably have some kind of job, too, that we don’t know about, right?”   “Shadow,” Cait frowned. “How often do the Snakes attack? Do you know what they want on the farm?” She looked into Shadow’s eyes. “You not allowed to talk human, are you? But if you could somehow give me something I could understand, maybe I’d be able to help you set up traps or something to keep them out, like Uncle does with the bulls and moving the animals around?”   Shadow sat up and breathed heavily at Cait, as if each little breath from its pant(ies)… was some whispered word that it hoped Cait could pick up on.   “How old are you, anyway?” Cait asked Shadow, but again, she was quiet except for her (panties), a word that once again, Cait just knows people say something like it to describe a dog with its tongue out in the heat, but in Cait’s world, these were actually whispered words that maybe traveled more than half the farm away for another dog or some other animal to pick up on and know what Shadow sees.   “Cait,” Auntie finally waved the girl over.   “I was talking to Shadow,” Cait looked up at Auntie. “She shared some secrets.”   “She did?” Auntie smiled. “Just remember, now is one of those times it’s okay to keep something to yourself until the right time. You don’t have to say everything you’re thinking, pet.”   “I know. But I can still hug you on the way back home. Can I?”   “Sure. What harm?”   My toes bumped the green thing in the grass that Shadow had seen and led me to see. It was a cracked, broken, old pail just like the one I had for fetching water with Auntie. I decided I best not draw attention to it. Auntie probably isn’t ready to see it, yet.   “I’ll just get Kookaberry from the tree, and then we can go back, Cait-a-kins.”   “You don’t have to hurry, Auntie. I want to talk to Shadow on the way back anyway, so take your time. I’m not allowed out here by myself until Uncle has the safe stuff done.”   “That’s right,” Auntie smiled. “We can take it slow, Cait.”   We walked up over the hill, and my hand was around Auntie’s waist. Shadow walked a few feet in front of us, now, instead of like yesterday, further behind us. She was accepted, well, I think she knew I accepted her, and she was protecting us as if she had a job again. Dogs are secret, angels, in case you don’t know.   We walked down the hill, and for a moment, Auntie stopped maybe 150 feets from the back door and she looked towards that old wild fenced in field that was so nicely trimmed around it. And as I looked through the heavy tangled grass, and the wild stuff there, it was like something was hidden. There was this little pole that was really hard to see, but as I stared into the grass, it was there, alright. It had a piece like a small ‘t’ maybe three parts of the whole was four up, and I blinked my eyes. You aren’t allowed to bury people or pets on your land.   Cait stepped back and let go of Auntie, who seemed to do a symbol of the small ‘t’ in the air. She mumbled something, and then she looked down at me. “I will have to explain, but right now….”   “It’s like I’m not ready to be fully use the toilet. I can pee my pants if I want, and you can hold your heart close a little more, until we both ready, right?”   “I guess… yeah, that’s what I’m asking of you. Give me time to hold this a little longer, but I know I’ll have to tell you someday. Just not today.”   Cait smiled. “I won’t ask again until you say something, then. I will just pee my pants until I can not do it no more, and you can carry this pre-something until you don’t need to pre-do it no more, too.”   Chapter 38 My own Space Outside, Not a Little Corner, a Real Yard!   Cait and Eiboline arrived in the mudroom with Shadow hanging around the door looking in at them.   “Cait, leave the door open for her,” Eiboline said. “Just to see if she wanders in on her own. We still need to make limits. I don’t want her going upstairs right now, but the kitchen, the living room, the mud room and the main hall… that’s okay.”   Cait nodded and propped the screen door open for Shadow.   “Cait,” Cait turned and saw her Uncle walking through the door in the kitchen. “It’s ready. I have a trail for you, but… there will still be rules. But for now, do you want to see where you can go on the farm?”   Auntie nodded. “Go ahead, Cait. I need a few minutes and your Uncle has been working his tail off to give you this. Please go with him, love.”   I looked up. “Okay.” And then I silently lifted my arms towards Uncle-Daddy. “Lift me?”   He kissed my cheek, but rather than defiantly brush it off as ‘gross,’ I smiled. It wasn’t gross when he showed me how much he cared. And I hugged him closer. He had a barrel like chest that felt so sturdy, that I didn’t think even a twister could pull me from his protective embrace.   “I’ve cleared out a field for you Cait. It’s a small little corral that’s been repurposed so you can lie there and watch me when you feel like just taking a break or wandering. It’s still small, I know. But it’s all I can do for now. I don’t want you going anywhere without your Auntie or me besides the house and this little field until I’m sure you can talk to the animals the same as I can.”   “So, you believe they aren’t even stuck in four legs and dumb sound makers?” Cait looked up at Uncle wide-eyed.   “Well, let’s just say that I know they aren’t just noise makers, and I know that they communicate with one another, Cait. But it’s not magical. You just have to learn their way of talking.”   “Oh.”   He put me down carefully on the path. “I want you to walk, love, so you can learn the path to the field made just for you. You can relax, and it has a gate to it that you can open and close for yourself. It’ll keep the bigger animals out until you get used to them, then you can leave your gate open as you get used to your animal friends.”   “Uncle Daddy?”   “Yes, Cait-a-kins?”   “You and Daddy and you…? You don’t say wander for the same thing?”   “What do you mean, Cait?”   “Daddy says wander is when I go somewhere and because I’m not supposed to be there. You said you made me a pen to wander to….” She put a finger on her chin, and tapped her chin with strong purpose while she was thinking this loudly enough to talk to Uncle about it.   “Well, little miss… Wandering can get you in trouble if you don’t pay attention to where you are going, but it doesn’t have to just mean going to places that get you in trouble. It really just means going somewhere without any real reason to go there. Sometimes explorers wander, and that’s how they discover places that can even change the world.”   “Really? But if ex-plod-ers can ex-change the word, how come people tell kids to stop ex-ploding places?”   Uncle Daddy bent down and touched her nose. “Well, most of the time, adults just want to protect their little ones even when they are big enough to wander, but in my case, I want to make sure you are safe from all kinds of dangers, not just snakes. As soon as you assume a Dairy farm, or any farm, really, is just a place to explore, and you forget that there are other beings there, you put yourself in danger.”   “Okay.”   “You know I wouldn’t keep you from going places that I feel safe letting you explore or that wouldn’t get you in trouble, don’t you?”   Cait looked up into his eyes for moments. They were grey-blue and they were looking into her eyes with all the seriousness of the word (world). “Yeah. I know.” She had only said after studying his eyes for maybe an (hour)…. There was a pole on a the trail, and it was like the same little pole had like two small ‘t’ crossings on it. One end of one ‘t’ points back to the house, and it had a small picture on it of a house. Then there was the same bar of that ‘t’ that pointed down the way that I could tell was the hill to the well. And he painted a glass of water on it. Then another ‘t’ bar had one end pointed off but it had a red X and then the other end of that bar, it had a girl on it.   “Can you read this sign?” Uncle asked me.   “It don’t got no words on it.”   “It has pictures, though, Cait. What’s this picture?” and he pointed at the house.   “It a house.”   “That’s our house, and then he taught me. These three places are where you are allowed to go, but you don’t go to the water place, the well by yourself yet. You go with Auntie until we feel comfortable with you being alone. When I’m in the field, you can go to this place, and that little girl is you and that means that it leads to your little pen where you’ll be safe. The red X, you never ever go there until I know you can actually understand the animals around you.”   “Oh, okay. But how come you said can I read it? It still just pictures.”   “Cait, there are lots of ways to read. Remember the picture books Auntie had you look at at the library?”   “Yeah?”   “You were reading. And maps often have little pictures because sometimes, pictures are better for reading maps than words all over it.”   “So, even big people read by pictures, sometimes?”   “Sometimes, Cait.”   “Uncle Sean? What if I peed my pants but I’m too busy looking at ants in my pen?”   He patted her shoulder. “It’s alright, love. Remember, you’re just not potty trained yet, and sometimes, we all forget to do things when we are caught up in the moment. I’m the adult. If I notice it’s lunchtime and you haven’t come to get me to take you potty or to change your pants for you, then it’s my job to make sure you get cleaned up before you eat. Eating in poopy panties doesn’t feel good, does it?”   Cait looked up at him. “No. But how come you can know that?”   “You don’t think I’ve never pooped my pants before?” he chuckled. “Sure, it’s been a while, but you don’t forget things like that, Cait. Someday when you are big enough to have a little girl yourself, you will have a chance to remember how it feels and a chance to make a choice about what you think she needs more, to comfort her or to correct her. You, I am sure, will do the right thing, but the right thing doesn’t always look the same to different children. You’ll see.”   “Does daddy try to tell me strong because he thinks I need to not be like this… stoo….”   “Cait? No! Change that word, little lady,” his voice was stern.   “I mean he thinks I shouldn’t pee my pants because I can’t read?”   Sean sighed and he bent down. “I don’t know everything going on in that man’s head, Cait. I do know he’s wrong, and he’s trapped in his wrongness. He really thinks those things about you, and I don’t understand why. The way he talked in the kitchen last weekend about you. He’s not being mean. He’s just… he’s trapped, little lady. He doesn’t know what to do, and you are too little to help him. I’ll tell you one thing though. That grown up drink he likes too much doesn’t help his thinking.”   “That’s why you don’t drink it?”   “I do drink it, sometimes, Cait. But I never make important choices when I’m drinking it. I find a safe place where I won’t bother people with it, and I only drink there, and nowhere else.”   “Daddy has it at funny loud restaurants that are like places that are not like yesterday. Those restaurants don’t really have food… that I want to eat. It just has drinks and drinks and drinks. I can get cola there, sometimes, but it has awful stuff that Daddy even pushed me to drink one or two (times), but I don’t like it.”   “Now. There will be no pushing adult drinks on little ones here,” Uncle told her. “There’s plenty of time for you to explore that when you are ready. You are a child for a short fifteen years or so, and then you a big person for over sixty years. You have more than enough time to think about big people drinks to not ruin your life as a child.”   “I know.”   He led me into the pen that he called small, but we walked along it, and it was bigger than the house. It was bigger than the playground at school. It was so huge. It was all dirt and a little short grass, but there was no big grass at all anywhere. There were these little fence things that were like tiny little wires and circles and something that went all the way up to the first of the five boards that went across the fence to keep things out, and me in.   “That’s chicken wire,” Uncle told me. “It’ll discourage snakes because it’s higher and more trouble to get over than just moving around it. It’s not a for sure thing that always works, so make sure when you come in, you scan the ground first for anything that doesn’t look right. If you see something on the ground that you don’t know what it is, you come and get me. If you have Shadow with you, she’ll let you know if it’s something she doesn’t like.”   “Okay.” Then Cait hugged him tight. “It’s the best thing I ever been given—ever! Thank you, Uncle Daddy!”   My underwears felt warm and a little sticky and wet. I think I got pre-pee in them, but I didn’t remember doing it. But I looked up at Uncle’s face and then Auntie’s face, and I suddenly didn’t care. I just stared for a moment.   “Well, we should get back to the house so we can give our little love some lunch and have her use the toilet,” Auntie said.   I looked down, spread my legs a little, for all the good that would do wearing pants and not a skirt, but still… habit. And I looked up and shivered for a second.   “You’re not going to just do it, right here bold as day, in front of (chomp). The ghost stopped talking as I pushed a little and pee started to fill my underwears and then darken my pants. I was looking up at Auntie while I just stood there, peeing my pants. Daddy would have said I was a brat.   Auntie smiled. “Actually, I guess she’ll just need some clean clothes then.”   Uncle Daddy bent down and lifted my chin to his eyes, and he smiled while I was still peeing. “Brave girl. That’s right, hon. You take charge of when you’re going to wet your pants if you think it’s too hard to get back to the house. No shame, here, little one.”   I smiled. I peed even harder now flooding the ground around my feet, and after it stopped coming out, Dairy Daddy picked me up and carried me back to the house.   Uncle took me upstairs and he started to strip my icky wet pants and underwears down, but then he froze. We were in the bathroom, and I don’t know what he didn’t like, but I could feel a shift, not anger but just seriousness.   “Eiboh! Come up here, please. Now?” It scared me that his now sounded more like a plea than his normal strong way that sounded more like he expected things.   Auntie came in.   “Her Underwears,” he passed them to Auntie. “This child has another runs accident and didn’t seem to notice. Have you taken her to the toilet and seen her poop normal, yet?”   “Well, I mean, I don’t watch her every second. I assumed she was like most ten year olds and didn’t just poop her pants.”   “But she was messy the other day like this. Eiboh, if she is not pooping like she should be… maybe she needs to see a doctor.”   I looked up at Uncle Sean. “I… I didn’t mean to do it.”   “Cait, no one is mad at you, little miss. I’m worried. Every time I’ve seen you poop, it’s been messy, not like just solid stuff in your pants.”   I shrugged. “Sometimes, some thicker stuff comes, when my tummy hurts.”   “Sometimes, but how often does this wet stuff come out?”   “I think every time? I wasn’t sure if it was coming out earlier at the well, but I didn’t feel it exactly until something was in my underwears. I thought it was just pre-pee?”   Auntie frowned. “Now I think about it, I don’t think she has ever gone to the toilet without me knowing, and I have noticed stains on her underwears, but until now, just thought it was not wiping good.”   “Eiboh. We need to do better. We can’t assume she knows anything right now about going potty. And now, with this, I don’t think she should be going on her own. We need to watch this, that is, if the doctor doesn’t do something else about it first.”   “We should take her to see the doctor.”   “I’m going to call Arnold. You get Cait a bath so we can take her to see a doctor. It will be telling if she messes up another pair of underpants on the way there. We’ll take these with us, too, just in case. I don’t know what is going on, and it’s scaring me, Eiboh.”   “Alright, well call Arnold. I’ll get Cait a bath.”   “I didn’t mean to ….”   “You didn’t do anything, sweetheart,” Auntie kissed my cheek as she helped me get my shirt off. “This is just something we should have caught earlier. It’s not normal to poop like this, and it’s not your fault. You are probably sick or something, Cait.”   “I don’t feel sick.”   “It’s okay, Cait. You are just too used to something that should have been treated probably before you came to stay with us. Just let me clean you up, child. And don’t be scared, okay? We’ll get to the bottom of this and help you.”   “Okay.”   Chapter 39 So… This?   Auntie put me in some clean underwears and the put pajamas on me. I didn’t ask. I never really been to a doctor before. I just knew they were scared, and I saw Auntie getting some extra underwears for me and an extra pajama bottoms for me.   “You’re allowed to poop your pants, Cait,” Auntie told me as she dressed me. “This is about finding out why you can’t control it, Cait. It’s not shame, okay?”   I frowned and nodded. “Okay.”   “Baby, you are going lie in the car this time and you can suck your thumb. No need to tell us if you pee again, baby. We’ll know because the doctor has to see. I’ll have to tell the doctor about the day you came and all your accidents because these are important clues to figuring out how hard your physical problems are, love.”   “So, he has to know I pooped in the bath twice?”   “Yes, sweetheart. It’s the only way he can understand what is happening to you. You won’t be in trouble, little lady. We just want to help you. You shouldn’t be struggling with runs every time you need to use the toilet, okay?”   “Okay.”   They laid me in the car, and Auntie sat in back with me, my head in her lap. “Suck your thumb, sweetheart.”   I smiled up at her. She kept telling me to do it, and once I started to do it, I realized more than ever, that I needed to do it now, of all the times I’d ever done it, this was… it was calming more than I knew. I felt some pre-pee again. I just hoped it wasn’t poop.   Sean had the little girl in his arms about forty minutes later, and they were walking into the emergency room of a hospital. Auntie Eiboline called out “Help! Now!” There in the lobby. The little redhead’s eyes were closed and she was breathing heavily, as though she were asleep. There was something squishy that seeped brown liquid down to the floor where Sean held the little girl.   A nurse came over. “What happened? What is the emergency?”   “I don’t exactly know what the emergency is,” Sean admitted. “But she’s been having runs all week, and no solid poops that we are aware of. This on top of a lot of other things since she came to stay with us. We need a doctor to figure out what is going on with her. We found her with a mess in her underpants earlier just before lunch…. Well, to not shame her worse because I don’t know if she’s awake or not, it’s enough to know that her little body isn’t going to the bathroom like a normal ten year old’s body, and it’s nothing to do with her being different in the way she thinks.”   The nurse nodded. “It’s just been this week?”   “I don’t think so,” Sean frowned.   “What do you mean, you don’t think so? Haven’t you been keeping an eye on your daughter?”   Sean sighed. “She’s a relative. She’s staying with us for the summer, and we just got her on Saturday. She’s been really struggling with a lot of things, to be honest, but this one… it’s not normal. You’d have to ask her how long she’s been pooping her underwear and how long it’s been nearly always liquid like this.”   “Well, I don’t know if the doctor can see her without a legal guardian’s presence.”   “Well, tell them that she’s had the runs for a week, and that she didn’t even notice she’d pooped her pants this last last time.”   The nurse frowned. “Do you have anyway to contact her parents?”   “I do,” Eiboline responded.   I was breathing heavy, and I had my eyes closed. It was the only way I could cope. My hands were tight around Kookaberry. I felt more stuff go in my pants… not pee. I hate pooping my pants!   The nurse gave the guardians some papers to fill out and then she went back into the little window office where she talked animatedly with others.   “Cait, hon?” Sean whispered. “I’m sorry to wake you, but we need help on these forms.”   “I can’t read,” Cait whispered.   “I know,” Sean patted her now dirty back. The mess was all over her back. She was in dire discomfort. But he had to be patient. The hospital had to know a much as possible before they’d see her. They didn’t seem to think this was an emergency.   “When’s your birthday, Cait?”   “November fifth?”   “Good girl,” Sean whispered while Auntie wrote it down. Cait felt more stuff leak in her underwears and pool in Uncle’s lap.   “How long have you been pooping your pants?”   “Do I have to?” Cait nearly whined.   “They won’t know enough without knowing a time frame.”   “Can’t I just say when I started to not always make it and it was more water than poop? Do I have to tell them that the teachers in second grade and third grade thought I was just….”   Sean sighed. “When did it become water-like, and you had trouble feeling it come out, Cait?”   “Um… this year? I think just after Christmas was the first time I had the runs for a few days. Daddy said I just had the flu. But then I had the runs again like before February. Daddy said I just didn’t get over the flu yet.”   Sean whispered. “That stupid….” but stopped himself. “Cait, when was the first time you remember pooping your pants at school… even first or second grade?”   “Second grade? I think. I just remember sitting there… peeing coming out in my chair for a minute, and I put my hand down not wanting the teacher to know I went in my pants… and then a second later, it started to poop myself. I was so scared. It was like hours… but someone noticed, a kid, before we went to recess. He told the whole class I sat there and pooped in my chair. I could only look down at the desk top, scared.”   “Did you know you were pooping that time?”   “Yeah. I kind of did it on… well, not purpose exactly. I was trying to keep it in because I knew Daddy would be mad if I pooped my panties, and I would lose all my friends if I did that. I already only had three friends because I was the only pee pee pants baby.”   “You listen to me, Cait,” Sean whispered desperately. “Ruth saw you, hon. She knows you’re not a baby, and she doesn’t mind if you poop your panties. You focus on that, if you need validation that going potty whether in undies or the toilet is a nice way to decide if people can be friends. You wouldn’t have wanted those people that called you names to be your friends, anyway, love. Trust me, I’ve had ‘friends’ in the past that I could have done without.”   Cait looked up at him. “Okay.”   “When you feel it coming out, does it hurt?”   “I don’t think so. Sometimes… it feels like a little fire, but it goes away as soon as I start going in my pants….”   “Do you ever have to push to get it going?”   “Um… that’s why I doing it on purpose, Daddy says. I am sometimes pushing because it hurts, but it won’t come out in the toilet right away. And then someone else needs the toilet, so I started not going to the toilet until I get pre-stuff. And the pre-stuff kept turning into real stuff sooner and sooner. And then… it started to not get control. And now, it just comes out.”   Cait was breathing heavy and her thumb went in her mouth as she squeezed her bear. She pottied a little more in her Undies. “It went again,” she whispered.   “It’s okay, Cait. As soon as you feel it, right now, I want you to just do it. No holding back right now, sweetheart.” Sean was sincere with her. “But if you feel it when it comes out or just before, it would be good to know how long you feel it before it comes out.”   “I’ll try. But it’s hard to notice sometimes, and other times, I just can’t wait more than a moment and it just comes. I’m not even pushing. Honest.”   “Does your tummy feel empty?”   “I don’t know.”   There was sudden yelling in the windowed office and a man in blue clothes that were like work clothes, maybe? And he came out of there his face red. “Stupid, stupid, I can’t believe this…. Permission from parents, yes. Leaving a ten year old in the lobby messing herself? How do they think they’d feel if they were the ones going all over the floor because someone said they couldn’t see a doctor?” Though the doctor was clearly trying mutter it, his muttering was loud enough that Cait heard him.   “Yeah, you people come with me. We’ll have you wait back here until we can call her parents, okay? Little miss, did you finish in your pants,” his questions were even lower now.   “I don’t know,” Cait said honestly.   “She can’t tell sometimes,” Sean said. “Her body hasn’t released anything in a while though.”   “She’s gotten you, good, hasn’t she?” The doctor smiled at Sean and Cait.   “She’s just been managing a problem she can’t and I’m just telling her to do it, until a doctor tells her the right way to fix this… I see no reason for her suffer, so I told her to just poop if she feels it coming.”   “May I see the clipboard?”   He looked it over and then handed it back. “Well, you fill out whatever else you think you can answer, and then whether the hospital wants to pay for my time or not, I will take a look at her. The bureaucrats can stuff it.”   Cait giggled.   As the doctors talked, Cait felt the sheets rub her thighs, and she felt a pinch in her arm. She hear the doctor say something to Sean. His speech was distant and almost like an echo that didn’t quite repeat. The space was closing in as her eyes shut on the examination table.   Cait didn’t really know what the adults said after that, she didn’t know if the doctor gave her something or what really happened. All she knew, was that there was nothing for a bit, and then, she was a little girl, maybe a first grader.   It felt like she was waking up or something, maybe she had fallen asleep in class, only she never used to sleep during class.   “Mrs. O’co(r)nner, Cait’s done did it again,” classmate points under her chair while other kids laughed.   Cait looked up at the teacher, her hands with scissors and paper in them, and her skirt a soggy wet pee-pee with a puddle in her chair and on the floor.   “Again? Cait?” Mrs. O’co(r)nnor asked. “This is the third time this week, it’s it? You tell everyone you have to pee when we are reading, and then you stay in there for almost the whole period but say nothing at art time? How stupid are you, girl?”   Her eyes blinked and she felt herself sitting in the office with her dad, principal, and her second grade teacher talking.   “Just make her sit in it,” Dad said pulling at his hair. “If you don’t take her bait, maybe she’ll stop pissing herself.”   “You know very well we can’t do that, Mr. Weimer,” the principal told him. “There is the health aspect of other kids, and there is also the message we’d be sending the other students….”   “The only message I see here, is that if you are going to purposefully wet your pants like that, then it won’t get you any undue attention. You do it to yourself, and you wear it.”   The nurse sighed.   Was this the third grade conversation, the second grade one, or the first grade one. Cait lost track.   “Well, we can’t do that.” Now the school nurse was talking to him. So I need you to start packing her clothes that she can change into. She wets herself twice a day sometimes, so two sets should be sufficient. If you have her bring them to class in the mornings, her teacher can send her clothes to me to make sure she’s changed when someone notices.”   “Fine. We’ll send clothes with her. But if you are going to do this for her and teach her it’s okay to wet her pants, you are going to deal with her pissing herself at school. I’m not taking time off work for this nonsense.”   There was a long period of silence, and then Cait started to get the blurry image of the time in the middle of March, this last school year.   “Cait!” Mrs. Evan frowned. “Honey! I told you to just ask. I’ll let you go to the bathroom rather than watch you poop all over yourself!”   Cait felt her stomach tighten as the teacher scolded her, and she blinked out of view again.   Cait had a note from school. She showed her mom. “You pooped your pants at school again, Cait? You know this isn’t good, don’t you?”   There was some quiet again. There was darkness. Slowly Cait started to feel the rub of the hospital sheets on her legs. She felt her eyes trying to pull open.   Cait started to feel herself waking out of a sleep she didn’t think was normal. Her eyes took a moment to focus while the doctor was talking to Sean.   “We did contact her mother. It seems that they were told some time ago that some kids just don’t like school and it seems to invoke some problems with bathroom control, but what seems to be the missing thing here, is that they either didn’t understand, or it was never convey to them that this condition rarely extends past first grade.”   “So….?”   “Well, I mean, the fact is… they seem to have limited money, which means, they likely went to the cheapest doctor available at the time.”   Cait frowned over at the doctor wondering how costing her dad more money could possibly make him love her move.   “I don’t know if it was incompetency, a bureaucratic decision to stop all treatments before any started, or what it was, but I think the parents may have been told wrong things about the little dear, and that’s why she doesn’t understand what is happening to her, and her parents keep shaming her instead of fixing the problem.”   “How do you mean?” Sean rubbed cait’s back.   “Well, unfortunately, Mr. Kinsella,” the doctor shifted in his seat and rubbed his chin.   Cait crawled into Uncle Sean’s lap and noticed they had removed her underwears and she was in a hospital gown.   “Some institutions are more about making money than taking care of the person,” the doctor shook his head. “We doctors, as individual doctors, take an oath that we see whoever we get regardless of ability to pay.” A flash of the look Crop Daddy gets when he goes for the belt flashed across the man’s eyes, but he wasn’t looking at Cait or Sean.   He was staring at her chart. “Likely, they went to a welfare doctor, and while they take the same oaths, sometimes the institution gets in their way.”   “Which means?”   “It means that there a lot of people at fault for her problems” he closed the file. “And none of which is the little miss.” The doctor frowned at the door. “She’s done everything she can to be normal, with a very abnormal situation that should have been fixed a long time ago.”   “So you know what the problem is?”   “The problem isn’t one problem,” the doctor shook his head, his eyes at the floor. This could take a long while. The most urgent problem is that she has a hernia, meaning her colon is out of place.”   “I’ve heard that term before, I don’t really know what it means,” Auntie whispered.   “Well, it means her intestines are supposed to be in the area we tell kids is the stomach on their body. When the intestines move, caused by weakness in the body tissues in multiple places in the body, that can cause blockages.   “So, her insides are not where they are supposed to be?” Auntie asked the doctor to be clear. She rubbed Cait’s arm. Cait suddenly realized that Auntie was an (a-dolt) and that means she knows stuff. She not asking about knowing it for herself. She asking for me! “How does this cause problems though?”   “Well, if for example, it gets trapped where it can share the space where she pees, it can cause her to retain urine, too, causing peeing troubles. But it can also cause it to bend sharp, too sharp, and that can make pooping flowing in her body to get stuck.”   There were several minutes of silence while Sean, Auntie, and Cait processed what the doctor said.   “The longer we leave this like this, the longer it causes problems for her. We can soften the stool and help her get rid of what is there, but it’s not a true cure. It’s a temporary solution until we find a way to make the hospital and government happy about who is giving consent for Cait’s care.”   “What do we do?”   “We need to immediately apply for a special permission for the state insurance to correct the hernia. Whether they accept and pay for it or not, this needs to be done immediately. Secondly, it will take time for her bowel to return to normal, so something to help her manage the problem without shame is best.”   “Not diapers?” Cait whispered interrupting the doctor.   “Why not diapers?” he asked her.   “I’m not a baby.”   Sean frowned. “No diapers, Cait. I promise. Let the doctor and me talk, sweetie. We are starting to understand some stuff. You just relax.”   “That’s only the most urgent issues we need to look at,” the doctor told him. There’s going to be more.”   “You mentioned that it could be the cause of her peeing troubles?” Sean frowned.   “Yes, Mr. Kinsella. It’s not a wonder her family being on welfare didn’t look into it. It’s an uphill struggle to get through everything that needs to be done.”   “Well, if Dan and Maire were to give custody of their child to me with a power of attorney, could I do something more to make sure she gets the help she needs?”   “It could get expensive real fast. I’d let Welfare cover as much as they are willing before you commit your own finances.”   “And that’s already worked so well…,” Sean frowned at the doctor.   The doctor seemed to tap a pen on his knee for minutes, as though that might help them come to a better understanding or cause something to open a door or something.   “This little baby has been suffering because of all of this, and it’s impacted more than her physical health.” Sean patted her leg. “Her mental state is a shambles, all caused by this stupid Goddamned state stuff! I don’t care to ask for another penny from this troll.”   The doctor frowned sadly.   “So…. Can I?” Cait whispered. “Can I ask?”   “Yes, child,” the doctor whispered to her. “It’s your health, child. You may ask anything you want.”   “So… when I pooped my pants on purpose, I mean, I didn’t do it like I wanted it in my pants, but…. I mean…,” blushed getting red in the face.   “Cait? This isn’t about what you did. Just ask your question, okay? I promise, no one thinks you pooped in your pants on purpose right now, at least not most of the time.”   “Well… when I pushed my stomach to get it ready so it would come out but then I couldn’t stop it, and it went in my pants…?”   “Not your fault, child. You were frustrated and you thought you were doing what you could to not be shamed for having less control than you have. You pushed yourself to poo, but likely did it too much because you were afraid of taking too long. Yes?”   Cait nodded.   “And that is what caused you to poop your pants, little lady. Not a will to poop yourself, but the desire to not be a problem, right?”   Cait nodded. “Like I said, you were the only one trying to do the right thing for a while, and when a child isn’t supported, especially in a situation like this, it’s going to cause trouble.” The doctor smiled a soft eye dancing understanding kind of thing. “Child? You did nothing wrong. It’s a tummy trouble, not a child doing gross, bad, or attention getting behaviors. Understand?”   Cait sat there thinking while the conversation worked itself back to Sean and the doctor.   “I will pay for the child, if I can get Dan to give me custody of her for a little while.”   “If you are sure about that, you’d need to get working on your relatives giving you specifically power of attorney in making decisions for her health and education for probably anywhere between the next six months and two years. She’s got a lot of problems, and if the mental issues are bad that are related, she’ll need counseling as well.”   “You can start treating her though?”   “I can start. I am not able to have blanket discretion though. If the hospital isn’t paid for its tests and other facility uses, they can make us do it without that support and that would hurt her recovery.”   “Don’t worry. I am planning on fully leveling this stuff with our dear old cousins and letting them know how severe it is,” Sean leaned in towards the doctor. “So I need to know what else is going on.”   “Her urine is indicating she’s had an infection for a bit long and while it hasn’t hurt her kidneys just yet, we can’t wait for it to reach that point.”   “We’ll contact them, don’t you worry. We want this little child as healthy as she can be.   “Uncle Sean? Am I still allowed to pee my pants, when I want?”   Sean looked at the doctor. “I was meaning to address that. So… we’ve been letting her have permission not to be potty trained for a while….” Sean looked him in the eye like this was important.   The doctor sat up and Cait saw him touch his chin thoughtfully, and then he whispered. “What do you mean by that?”   “We tell our little one that she’s just not ready to be potty trained yet, at least until she feels safe. That means not just with her physical ability, but she stops beating herself up mentally when she accidentally wets her pants out of some fear or some stupid rule that some people have made her believe is more important than her health.”   The doctor shook his head.   “Honestly, most people would find that hard to keep up with.” He shuffled in his chair a moment. It would require people around her to be willing to keep her dry and clean the whole time you are letting her do it this way….”   “Her mother’s cousin that she knows as Auntie and I have been trying to keep up with it, and we’re trying to get her to tell us when she’s peed or something.”   “Well, it could help if she’s not anxious about getting to the toilet in time. I’d caution that you let her decide so you’re not forcing her to pee on herself, but if she’s just not got control of herself, or she’s the one choosing to do it for her own agency, then it could help her.”   “But, she’d want to blame herself, doctor. You don’t understand the state she fights all the time. I can’t give her agency like that… not with her limited understanding of what deserves shame and what doesn’t.”   “Then take her to see a counselor,” the doctor frowned. “I am not qualified to tell you what is right when it comes to the mind. But I just want to caution you not to hurt her the other way because you care too much. You need to find the right balance at the right time if you want her to grow up healthy.”   Cait looked up at the doctor. “I want it to be okay that I pee my pants… just a little longer… that on takes out the belt, and they don’t’ asspect me to keep inside when it hurts, and I can just push, and be allowed to fully poopy my pants and they hug me and yell at me,” tears were in her eyes. “And I can keep Kookaberry and I can put my thumb in my mouth, and I can just… just be Cait even if I not like everyone.”   Sean looked from Cait to the doctor. “You tell me, is my keeping her not potty trained hurting her, for just a little bit, or is it hurting her? You were right there. I didn’t have any time to coax her. She heard you, and she heard me. Does it really harm her to potty train her right after we fix her issues with her body, and after she feels safe once her issues are fixed?” The doctor sighed. “This is a matter between you and your cousins. I don’t pretend to know what would mentally be the outcome. I just think you should have her see a counselor regardless of what is decided here. She’ll need time to process what happened to her either way.”   “Only if the counselor doesn’t make me use the toilet,” Cait frowned with her arms crossed. “Counselors, principals, school nurses, and everyone like them… they scary. I not going to promise not to pee my pants at the counselor. And I not promising to talk to them, too. Only if at least Auntie Grandma comes in with me because she strict, but she makes it feel like learning and not that I bad if I poop my underwears.”   “That’s up to the counselor normally, child. But I’m sure if you complain enough and won’t talk to her without your named role model at your side, the counselor will have to give in if they want to get anywhere, and especially if your Uncle threatens to take you somewhere else meaning they lose you as a financial resource. Sometimes, money matters to adults, little brave mouse.”   Cait pulled the gown closed around her trying to not show herself off. Mommy said only bad girls show themselves off. She had no real context, but she knew that one day, daddy caught Grainne without clothes on when Grainne was being silly. It was some time ago, but Grainne got in really big trouble for being in the living room in just panties and an undershirt. Cait remember the belt across her big sister’s butt like twenty times. That was one of the biggest no-nos ever, even bigger than Cait moving while she’s peeing her pants.   “Can’t I have my underwears back?” Cait whispered up at Uncle Sean. “Why still gotta keep me in this. My backside shows when I not in your lap, and it’s scary.”   “I’m sorry, pet,” Sean kissed the side of her face. “The doctor isn’t done. He’s waiting for permission, which is why your Auntie is in the hall trying get hold of your parents. If they can at least get word of mouth from your mom, the doctor said he can give you some medicine to help get the poopies out of your body tonight, and that will help you for a few days until we can get papers done to let them help you.”   “What if I peed or worse, pooped. I don’t have the underwears to stop it getting on the floor or stuff.”   “The doctor is already aware of how likely it is for you to wet or do another poopy, baby. He’s been discussing that very thing and how we move forward to getting it to stop, hon. We are talking of giving you full control of your body back, even if we choose to wait a little longer on toilet training. Better in a healthy body and choosing to poop your pants is better than being sick and unable to choose when it happens.”   Cait nodded her head seemed to take on this authority as if she was the one that knew what Sean said as the only expert in the room on it. She may well have been.   Chapter 40 The Quiet Before   A nurse came in and whispered something to the doctor.   “Excuse me a moment. I’ll be back soon. You stay here, Cait, and if you feel going potty again, don’t get scared or worried. Just stand up and get comfortable. There is a little potty chair over there if you can make it, but if goes on the floor, it’s okay.”   Cait put her thumb in her mouth and held Kookaberry tighter.   Sean took a deep breath. He glanced to Cait sucking her thumb, to the doctor’s desk, and yet his eyes…. Cait didn’t think his eyes saw anything. His mouth was tight. He seemed as though he was looking inside, like you to behind your eyes, only they are open.   “What are you thinking on?” Cait whispered.   “Adult stuff.”   “An dolt stuff that means talking Daddy about you paying doctors?” Cait asked.   “Sometimes, Cait, you observe too much,” Sean rubbed her head.   “Oh.” Cait remembered that Auntie says she talks too much, and it hurts sometimes. Maybe Uncle is hurting, and he needed her to be quiet of what she knew. “I’m sorry.”   “Sorry?” Uncle whispered as he patted Cait’s leg. “Hon, you need to stop saying your sorry for everything. You don’t do anything half the time to need to feel guilt.”   “But I talk too much.”   “You talk as much as you need to say what is important, Cait. You talk a lot less than most children your age.”   Cait settled in Uncle Sean’s lap a big deeper, and then feeling his quiet, much like she did when passing a place that made Auntie sad, a place that was her pre-something like Cait’s pre-pees, she hugged him. She can comfort with her body.   The overhead clock ticked, though when Cait looked it was still big hand between the five and the six. It didn’t move. There were muffled voices that passed the closed door to the room here and again. Whispers that could be about Cait, or maybe not. Cait didn’t know.   “Your Daddy will tell Uncle Sean that this isn’t good. You’re just a baby. Spending money to make you stop doing what you want to do…. Daddy will….”   Cait sucked on her thumb harder and narrowed her eyes at the ghost. It faded.   More sounds outside.   Uncle’s heart beat was strong, and his gaze at her when she looked up, was soft and kind. His gentle hand landed right on her bare back because the gown opened in the back. It was hard, but gentle. She could see why animals who needed to birth their babies to him trust him. He could catch them, and be gentle at the same time. She sighed.   Uncle didn’t react when her body squirted pee on him, and then did it again. He pulled her closer and rubbed her back with more attention, until she fully peed. “Good girl, pet. No more waiting. You either get yourself to the potty, or if you start peeing, you just do it, baby. No one cares here.”   She laid her face on his strong chest.   She looked up at the clock gain. The big hand had moved. It was on the eight.   The door opened.   Cait’s eyes immediately went to Sean’s lap where she peed on him, and then around her shoulder to the back to the floor.   The doctor came into the room with a nurse. They were talking about needing papers completed and the doctor was telling her that the director approved things as they were.   “Look, the director said to go ahead and treat her for now. We will do the paper work, and then we can do the big stuff when they get permission from their cousins. This can’t wait.”   “And what happens when their cousins don’t sign something over? We use our facility to do work that isn’t paid for. How is that fair to paying people?”   “Look, I’m in the patient’s room. You need to go talk to the director if you disagree with him. But for now, get out of my patient’s presence with that attitude.”

114. My Evolving Plan I couldn’t think of what to say. I’d told Kernigan roughly what I had in mind; but he had guessed all the details too. It surprised me that he had figured out the thing about the post it note. But it completely floored me that he had managed to come up with the exact words I’d been thinking of. Maybe I wasn’t as creative as I thought; or perhaps he knew his own designs well enough to have guessed at the kind of ideas they might inspire in people. “Yeah,” I said, slightly embarrassed. “I wanted to propose, and I know so many people now say that it should be a personal thing, like something that’s discussed between the two of you. But I wanted to show her that I really care. That she’s still number one in my life, even when we have our disagreements. And that I’m sorry I resisted getting into the hobbies she tried to introduce me to for so long. I would have been coming here for a couple of years now, if I hadn’t been so reluctant to meet people outside my normal social groups.” “I think that’s kind of my fault,” Isaac said quietly, and I was surprised. “I was flirting a bit too much, perhaps, and I never thought about how it would make you feel. I’m sorry.” “Thank you. And I’m sorry I couldn’t see past it. Maybe I should–” “Wait, flirting?” Kernigan seemed confused, and I couldn’t blame him “I thought you and… Frank, was it?” “It’s a bit of a joke. We’ve had the game group for a while, you know? And when we do roleplaying games, it always seemed that the DM would be making slightly creepy advances to someone at the table. Like, the slightly-creepy flirting NPC became a recurring joke. And I figured I should keep up the tradition when it was my turn. But to avoid unduly worrying my husband, I only flirt with lesbians. That way, he can be absolutely sure that it’s only in-character.” “Ffrances told me that,” I explained. “I just… My brief foray into dating guys was a disaster. I kind of learned never to trust them, and that’s something that’s hard to get over. I think if I’d gotten to know you more before seeing that side of you, I might have got it better.” I didn’t know what I was saying, but the words came so naturally. And once I had time to think about them, I had to wonder if perhaps they were right. There was a chance that I’d been spectacularly unlucky to meet all the worst kinds of men as I was growing up, and there were still some who were capable of basic human decency. It still seemed unlikely, but I had to allow the possibility. And, of course, these two were helping me so much with my plans to propose to the love of my life. So they couldn’t be all bad. “Anyway, I’ll do what I can to help you,” Kernigan said. “But I wonder if I might suggest something she could appreciate a little more. At least based on what I estimate of her personality, from all of her comments on the mailing lists. I’ve never really spoken to her. In fact, until today I had guessed that the face behind that name was a young man, maybe college age or just finishing high school, and hailing from somewhere in Eastern Europe. But if I can incorporate your message into something that will make her wonder how you ever managed it…” “You haven’t actually approved the final artwork for Golden Ring yet, have you?” Isaac guessed. “No. I haven’t. There’s one spread in particular where Mnemonic Harry is doing his usual schtick, reading thousands of other people’s emails all at once. And I always leave it to the last minute, giving the guys at the publisher a nervous breakdown, so that I can ensure some of the non-plot messages we see are topical close to the day of release.” “You could include Gabby’s message as one of the emails on the page?” He was laughing out loud now, and I couldn’t say a word. I was overwhelmed to think just how much Ffrances would love to see her name on the page. I’d seen a couple of similar pages before; the technomancer standing in front of a video wall showing a million emails, of which a dozen or so would be clear enough to be legible. References to current affairs, in a tangential way that made me smile when I recognised them, were mixed in with context-free statements that Ffrances had told me often came from the message boards where Kernigan’s fans congregated; as well as cryptic and obscure messages to or from characters who weren’t actually in this story. She’d told me that several times she had scoured a page of such notes, desperate to find one that gave a hint about one of the upcoming books. “I could,” Kernigan nodded. “Every time I do those pages, Ephemeral puts a great deal of effort into analysing which messages are real, and which might be relevant. So if she sees her own name in there…” “She’d love it,” I said. “I never imagined you’d be willing to go that far. Why …” “I like a good story. And I’d like my books to make a difference in the real world, even if it’s just to one couple’s life.” Kernigan nodded philosophically. “And for someone who works for a business services firm, Gabby is an exceptionally capable cheese dealer.” “You’d really do that?” I said, still unable to get over the surprise. “She’ll be over the moon. I think she’d be so excited to see you recognise her in print, the proposal would barely register. I’d be playing second fiddle then… But I don’t mind that, for something that she’s going to love so much.” And as I heard myself say those words, I was surprised to find that they were true. I’d wanted my proposal to be all about showing how much I loved her, but somehow my goals had shifted to giving her what she wanted more than anything else in the world. And it felt so right. I wasn’t usually one to trust my instincts; I’d built a whole life around making a plan and following it through. But I knew that in this case, I could trust my heart. This had to be all about her, and the things she loved. I discussed Kernigan’s idea with him, and we decided on the exact wording of the note. It would be a little strange; not giving her the message directly. And Isaac said that he would do his best to ensure that their mutual friends didn’t spoil the surprise if they noticed. He didn’t need to tell them what was going on; just not to spoil the new comic or any of its easter eggs for her. And then we were heading back to Upper Ashfields; while I prayed that nothing more had gone wrong in my absence. Today was the biggest moment in my working life, quite aside from all the personal stuff, and I couldn’t afford to screw this up. My heart was pounding as we approached the town again and I heard nothing. But as we were turning off Iris Lane, the radio on my belt squawked and I heard someone complaining that another Hollywood type wanted a drink and the bar was closed. I sighed, and waited to see if anyone was going to respond. I counted three seconds. “In the camping area?” Carter’s voice came on the line. “I can bring some of the bottles from the minibar here, ask him what he wants.” “I’ve got a bottle of vodka and a bottle of good scotch in my room, if that’s what he’s after,” I added a second later. “I half expected that somebody would be in need of a drink or a gift.” Seconds passed, and then we were just coming up to the Old House Hotel when the radio came alive again. It seemed that the troubled celebrity was after Italian red wine; and the hotel rooms where we’d put up several of the staff in case they found time to rest had something that might be suitable. I thanked Carter, and then headed back to HQ to check the radio logs, in case anything had happened in my absence that I might need to know about before morning. I could have gone back to my room and tried to sleep; I was sure that Carter had gone straight back after delivering some bottles of wine to an almost-celebrity. But after shaking hands with Kernigan, and the usual platitudes about how much I was looking forward to his next comic, I still felt wide awake. Well, that would be better if anything else went wrong. I didn’t have previous experience of this kind of conference, and I don’t think anyone else did either, but I expected the most likely time for something to go wrong would be around two in the morning. I would stay awake until then, and manage everything. Just so that there would be a record of my presence all night, in case Jessop tried to accuse me of sloping off home during my absence. I stopped walking when I thought about that. I really could have gone home then. It seemed that everything was going well without me, and if anyone asked why I was absent, I could have said that Kernigan had sent me on an errand. That would hold up to scrutiny, and I would have a chance to check on Tess before she went to bed. But that wasn’t my job. No matter how much I wanted to, I couldn’t bring myself to shirk my responsibilities. I would see them again tomorrow, and I told myself that should be enough. When I got back to my room, though, I realised that I still had other things to deal with. Like a new chapter of The Baby Button. I’d been putting off reading it for too long, and I was sure there would be a dozen comment threads with all kinds of speculation about what might happen next. Far from being the first to comment, I expected there would already be multiple pages of discussion. I sat down with my phone in front of me, and started to read. And the more I read, the happier I felt. It wasn’t that the chapter told a particularly happy story for the main character; in fact it should have been heartbreaking. The narrator was breaking down because the guy she had a huge crush on was marrying someone else; and as far as we could see, he was doing it just to prove that he was over her, giving himself to a spiteful narcissist. She was ready to tell him how she really felt; to come clean about everything, and promise that she would never keep secrets again if he would just give her a second chance. And she managed to find him, standing outside with a cigar during a bachelor party that was surely way too posh and demonstrative for his tastes. Everyone had been expecting this to be the big twist; the chapter where she could finally turn everything around and overcome the curse. But as soon as she said she had something to tell him, a passer by bumped against her, and she felt a finger touch one of the magical tattoos. The guy she loved said that she wasn’t even invited to the wedding, and he would never talk to him again unless she could tell him what was going on right now. And she found herself helplessly babbling in baby talk, unable to shape a single word. I was as sad as everyone else, until it came to the wedding scene. Then I saw the description of Kloe arriving at the church, and there was a part of me that couldn’t help taking it as some kind of omen. Her dress was described in exquisite detail; the kind of bold design that perfectly suited her abrasive and narcissistic personality. Taking all the elements of a classic dress, but putting them together in a way that made her tower over the other characters even more than usual; demanding to be the centre of attention. And it had to be an omen, because almost every detail of the description could apply to the dress I’d picked out for myself. It was such a coincidence, I wanted to believe that there was a logical explanation. Had TheAuthorsLittleSister seen a picture I had posted on the forums in the past few weeks? Of course not; I knew that it was bad luck to talk about those things before even getting engaged, so I hadn’t mentioned it to a soul.  In the comments thread for the new chapter, someone had already posted a picture of how she imagined the unhappy couple. Leo looked terrified in a tux, and Kloe looked resplendent in a dress on which almost every single line looked just like mine. If I could carry off that same confident manner, I knew that everyone would remember it. It restored my confidence in what would suit me; and made me certain that Ffrances was going to say yes. The universe wouldn’t have given me so many hints, so many details dropping into place just when I needed them, if this wasn’t what I was meant to do. I ordered the dress. I already had the tab open, so it took just three clicks to make the purchase. And after dealing with just a handful of late-night incidents, I went to sleep dreaming of a future that was now certain: Me, my wife, and our baby, together forever.

That's pretty disrespectful... it is a lot easier starting a story than ending it...