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“Nobody’s using it?”

  “Not that I know of. You know how tradition runs. The line belongs to the Keejik family.”

  Yes, trap lines were inherited on the reserve. Bridget’s stomach grumbled at the thought of Mom’s homemade rabbit stew.

  She glanced back out the window. Coming here was supposed to lift her spirits, but the dull ache continued to steep in her heart.

  “Do you think he’ll change?” Mom stood at the kitchen counter, cutting the dinner vegetables.

  Bridget spanked another patty into the shape of a hamburger. No surprise there that Mom didn’t even use Adam’s name. “I don’t know.”

  “How does Kyle feel?”

  “He’s happy. Also scared.” Which was the truth.

  “Scared?”

  Bridget had better throw up the stop sign before Mom and Dad poked any further into her business. “He’s seven. During his formative years he’s only known me. He doesn’t want to live anywhere else. It’s only natural.”

  “Did you tell your caseworker this?”

  “Yes.”

  “Does she also know what happened during your engagement?”

  “Yes. I had to give her my life story to become Kyle’s foster parent. Remember?”

  “Did you contact a lawyer?”

  “No.”

  Mom heaved a heavy breath.

  Great. Bridget was pissing off her mother with Adam-esque brusque answers.

  “You should consider a lawyer. He’s my grandchild. If this is all an act for the benefit of the social worker so Adam can obtain full custody, we’ll lose Kyle. Adam’s the only biological parent Kyle has left.” Mom placed the vegetables into the steamer where water bubbled on the stove.

  Although Mom spoke the truth, since Kyle’s mother had died from an overdose and his biological grandparents preferred alcohol over children, Bridget didn’t need a lecture about lawyers and whoever else to involve themselves in her personal life.

  “Did you hear me?”

  “Huh?” Bridget dug in the bowl for more ground beef.

  “I said we should ask Father Arnold to speak on our behalf. He is Saint Patrick’s pastor.”

  “It’s something to consider.” Three cheers that Bridget had answered nicely, even though the defensive armor she’d worn from her teenaged years—whenever Dad offered suggestions or barged in on Bridget’s personal problems—remained wrapped tight around her body.

  “Your father’s concerned. I’m concerned.” Mom reached into one of the many cupboards Dad had refinished to a country blue. She retrieved a bowl. “Kyle’s as much a part of this family as Noah and Rebekah.”

  Maybe Bridget was being selfish by keeping her problems under wraps. Kyle adored Jude’s children. Noah’s being the same age meant they attended the same school where Jude served as principal. The BFFs golfed, swam, and played on the same soccer and hockey teams.

  “It’s not fair to Noah and Rebekah, either. Kyle’s been a big part of their lives ever since you met Adam.” Mom shut the cupboard door.

  Bridget set the last patty on the plate. She’d speak to Emery.

  There was so much splashing going on, a whale might as well have flopped in the lake. The culprits responsible for the ruckus were Kyle, and Emery’s husband, Darryl. The two were tossing a beach ball back and forth in the water.

  Bridget relaxed in the lawn chair beside her brother. The dock in front of their parents’ house was the best place to unwind. At seven o’clock, the sun remained well above the tree line.

  Inside, Mom and Dad cleaned up the dirty dinner dishes, having shooed everyone outdoors fifteen minutes earlier. More like Dad wanted Bridget and Emery to talk, because Dad had suggested Darryl accompany Kyle for his evening swim. Dad couldn’t fool Bridget. The planets had aligned in his favor.

  “It’s normal to feel anger. Adam caused you a lot of grief.” Emery sipped his iced tea. His legs were stretched out and crossed at the ankles.

  “Would you have reacted the same way?” Right. Little brother wasn’t capable of anger.

  “I’m not you and you’re not me. You reacted as you’d react.”

  Emery’s logic and understanding, combined with his soft-spoken voice, reaffirmed he’d make a wonderful and compassionate individual or community counselor.

  “And how did you expect me to react?”

  Pink spread across Emery’s fair skin.

  “That bad?” Her brother’s embarrassment produced a giggle.

  “As I said, you’re you, not me.” A dash of humor salted Emery’s light tone.

  “I’d say I was pretty tolerant.” The imp in Bridget fluttered to the surface. “I only gave Adam one stink eye at his visitation. Okay, maybe two.”

  “Two? That’s pretty good. You didn’t slap him into next week?”

  Bridget stifled a snort. She let her gaze roam to Kyle and Darryl still tossing around the beach ball. “I wanted to. Believe me.”

  “How else did you feel?”

  “Don’t go there.” Her brother could put away his counseling hat. “He’s the father of the child I’m fostering. Nothing more.”

  Emery shifted in his lawn chair.

  Tension seeped across Bridget’s forehead.

  “You know, I spent a lot of time denying my true feelings...”

  If this was Jude, Bridget would’ve slipped on the gloves, because his debates produced ten rounds in the ring that left her staggering from his sharp words thumping her chin. As for Emery, for such a tall man, little brother was too gentle and nice. Bridget would feel like a bully if she gave him attitude, so she swallowed the snark.

  “Mind you, I wasn’t angry at Darryl. And he didn’t do something to betray me. But when I took the time to really listen to what he had to say, we reached an understanding. I concentrated so much on my own beliefs that I failed to open my mind to other possibilities—possibilities that maybe he was right.”

  “And your point is... “

  “I don’t know Adam that well, so I can only assume. From what you told me, he had a tough life. Maybe he feared happiness? People who don’t experience happiness and love while they’re growing up can be scared of the positive feelings they produce, especially if they’ve only known negativity.

  “Abusive situations are out of their control.” Emery looked out to the water. “When they leave that kind of environment, they’re conditioned to believe they’re not worthy of anything positive. They even fear positive relationships because a loving environment elicits new emotions they’ve yet to experience, and they’re unsure how to process those emotions.”

  Emery faced her.

  Too bad he had on sunglasses, leaving Bridget unable to read his bright green eyes.

  “Remember, not having control over their environment led them to control their emotions. When one is flooded with new emotions they can’t control, their first response is to destroy or flee, because this is what they did while being abused. They hid under beds and in closets. They learned not to cry. They learned to remain silent. They controlled their feelings as a way to survive in their environment.”

  Emery did have his Bachelor of Social Work. In seminary, he’d taken pastoral counseling, too. People were his job, what he’d made a career of. Although he’d been in London at Saint Michael’s Seminary when Bridget had met Adam, her brother could assess anyone based on their background.

  “So you’re going to take his side?” Bridget cringed. She sounded ten years old, pouting that her friends had chosen the enemy’s word over hers.

  “There’re no sides to take.” Emery sipped his iced tea. “Only a situation involving three people. You don’t want to lose Kyle. As a father, Adam wants to rebuild his relationship and become a full-time dad again. Kyle wants you in his life because you’re his mother.”

  “Oh, I get it. We’re supposed to become one big happy family after what he did.” The bitterness in Bridget’s sarcastic words matched the sour taste in her mouth.

  “I didn’t say that.”
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  “Then what did you mean?”

  “I’m saying if you try to force your hand, you may not get the result you desire.”

  Chapter Six: Wearing Your Heart on Your Sleeve

  Adam sat in the folding chair, a chair meant for people of average height and build, and even they shifted and moved to try to get comfy.

  Each twelve-step meeting room was the same. Outdated furniture from the seventies. Outdated paint on the wall. Outdated cheap-tiled floor. The upstairs lounge at the United Church wasn’t any different, smelling of fresh-brewed coffee.

  Logan sat beside Adam. The chairs formed a circle around two coffee tables and a round table. One thing about alcoholism and drug addiction—the disease didn’t discriminate. Every race, religion, education, occupation, and social class was welcome to sample its dark depths, from the nurse sitting adjacent to Adam who’d been charged with drunk driving to the lawyer whose wife and children had left him. Then there was the chief from one of the northern reserves with a former penchant for crack-cocaine, who was in the city on business, and a prior two-bottles-a-day-wine-drinking homemaker.

  A couple of young Anishinaabe-kweg sat on the blue sofa. They whispered and giggled while stealing peeks at Adam and Logan. The girls must be new, so they didn’t understand these were meetings of recovery, not for checking out the opposite sex.

  Adam glanced away. The only woman for him was Bridget, but she was gone for the weekend. Starting his job on Monday would keep him busy during the days.

  The chairperson finished the announcements. Now that they’d completed a reading from the big blue book and everyone had refilled their coffees, they’d discuss the story they’d read.

  “Adam, would you like to start?” The chairperson was a well-groomed Anishinaabe-kwe in her forties. She had kind brown eyes. A dash of softness speckled her clear, firm voice.

  “Sure.” Adam set his coffee on his knee. “I’m Adam and I’m an alcoholic.”

  Everyone offered the usual, “Hi, Adam.”

  “Good reading.” He squeezed his toes. “I like the part where he learned acceptance is the answer. Sometimes we got no choice but to accept. If we don’t, it makes life a helluva lot more tough.”

  He ran his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “I can’t control how people feel or how they react.” Like Bridget, the biggest example. “All I can do is accept their answer. It doesn’t mean I gotta give up. It means I gotta be a little patient.”

  Patience was a must with Kyle and Bridget. “Respect their boundaries. Work within their boundaries. That’s it. All I got to say.”

  * * * *

  Bridget stood in the laundry room, sorting through the clothes she had to wash now that they had returned from Ottertail Lake.

  Tomorrow, she’d drop off Kyle at Jude’s house, where he stayed during the day from Monday to Friday while she worked.

  Adam’s request continued to invade Bridget’s thoughts. A teenage girl might have been murdered. Too many youths from the northern reserves stayed in Thunder Bay to attend school if their communities didn’t have adequate education facilities. And six had died so far.

  She sat on the Indigenous Women’s Alliance board of directors for this reason. Since Kyle was asleep, she’d call the halfway house.

  After she started the laundry, she plopped on the sofa and picked up the cordless phone. With a glass of red courage in hand, she speed-dialed the halfway house.

  “Good evening. Joseph Howarth Society.”

  “This is Bridget Matawapit. I’m the caregiver for Adam Guimond’s child. Might I speak to him?”

  “One second.”

  Bridget sipped at her wine. The alcohol warmed her blood.

  “‘Sup, kwe?”

  Against her hardened resolve, Bridget’s skin tingled at Adam’s deep, rough voice he always softened for her benefit, and Kyle’s. “I made my decision.”

  He grunted.

  Bridget banged the off button on the TV remote. What did he have to be annoyed about? “I’ll help you and Logan.”

  “How was your weekend?” He kept the same soft tone, his words a rowboat dabbling across the water of a pond.

  “Uh...” Saliva coated Bridget’s mouth. “It, uh, it went good. Very good.”

  “Yeah? Kyle have a good time?” His voice remained bright—well, as bright as his perennial threatening bark could manage.

  “He always has a great time at his...” She shouldn’t say grandparents’. Adam might protest to Mrs. Dale that Kyle was becoming too integrated into the family. He also might demand another foster home.

  “He always has a great time at the rez. We, um, flew in Saturday morning. Kyle went swimming with his new uncle. We barbecued. Visited. Went to church.”

  “You get in this evening?”

  Bridget pressed the wine glass against her chest. “A couple of hours ago. I’m... doing laundry.”

  “I got mine done. Start work tomorrow.” He sounded as proud as Kyle when he’d dashed to the door at Jude’s to show Bridget a project he’d completed at school.

  “At Benny’s?” Tilting the rim to her mouth, Bridget managed a gulp. Mrs. Dale had mentioned Adam’s boss from Winnipeg had referred him since Benny’s was a chain restaurant.

  “Yep. Short order cook. Morning shift.”

  “The morning? Will you be able to make your scheduled visit on Thursday?” Confidence was failing to come out in her words. Failing ever since Adam had decided to have a conversation like a normal person.

  “I gotta talk to The Hawk. Tell her we have to reschedule the visits.”

  “The who?”

  “The warden. Mrs. Dale.”

  “Oh...” The tight ball pressing against Bridget’s ribcage vanished, and something resembling floating bubbles climbed up her throat. The laugh sprang from her mouth. She’d forgotten how Adam nicknamed people based on their dispositions or physical appearance. “I guess she tends to have some bird-like features.”

  “Yep. A hawk. Looks like one. Acts like one.”

  Bridget suppressed the giggle and managed to say, “Will we be considering evening visits?”

  “Tuesdays and Wednesdays are good. My days off.”

  “I’m sure she’ll contact me once she talks to you about rearranging your visitation schedule.” She set her feet on the coffee table and let the wine glass lounge on the armrest.

  “Wednesday night would be a good time to hit The Gator.”

  “Have they released any information on the body they pulled from the river?”

  “Yep. Family was notified. Cutter called yesterday during his phone time. It was Sheena.”

  Bridget’s heart resembled a grape shrinking to a raisin. “I’m sorry.”

  “So am I.”

  There was a long silence eerier than a haunted house. If the creepy quietness continued, Bridget expected to hear a door creaking and a nasty hot breath on her ear. She moved her feet off the coffee table and sat cross-legged. “Adam?”

  “You gonna make arrangements for Kyle then? Wednesday night?” His voice grew hushed.

  “Yes. Yes. I’ll talk to Jude. During the summer break, he watches Kyle during the day.”

  “Sounds good. Get me around seven-thirty. I gotta be back here at nine. Curfew time.”

  “Okay. I’ll see you Wednesday night, if not, before then when you visit Kyle.”

  “Gotcha. Later.”

  Bridget switched off the phone. She gulped back the remainder of the wine.

  Going to The Gator should scare her under the bed, not having a conversation like two normal people with Adam.

  Bridget held Kyle’s hand and led him down the hallway to the same door they’d opened during their last visit at the Children and Family Services building. Instead of Thursday morning, they were meeting on Wednesday during her lunch hour. Once she got clearance from the board of directors, she’d rework the visitation to late Wednesday afternoons.

  When they opened the door, Adam stood on one side of the room, a
nd Mrs. Dale sat on the chair she’d previously used, the one by the pop cooler.

  Bridget’s gaze whipped back to Adam. It’d been almost a week since she’d last seen him. He still had his cream-colored cowboy hat, the one with the curling brim that made the waves of his hair kink in every direction. A tank top hugged his dark skin. A jean shirt caressed his broad shoulders.

  Adam nodded. His dark eyes brightened at Kyle.

  “Go ahead. I’ll be right there.” Bridget managed to eke out the words while pointing at the chair beside Mrs. Dale.

  Kyle inched toward his father. His lips spread into a big smile, flashing his missing tooth.

  “Hey.” Adam shifted to his haunches. “How ya doing?”

  “Awesome.” Kyle ducked his head and blushed.

  Bridget sat. Kyle’s bashfulness was a good sign. She choked the handle of her travel mug. Maybe too good of a sign. If Emery was present, who’d previously visited convicted felons in prison during his discernment at seminary, he’d tell Bridget that Adam deserved this chance.

  She gave her head a good shake, anything to get rid of Emery’s nagging voice.

  “Thank you, Dad.” Kyle clutched a bag. “May I have this one?” He held up a monster cookie, his favorite.

  “You can have ‘em all. I made them for you.” Adam led them to the small table.

  “Really? Let’s color this one.” Kyle pointed at the Z Men coloring book.

  “We sure can.” Adam set his big hand on the back of Kyle’s chair.

  Against her will, Bridget’s skin warmed. Kyle used his imagination wonderfully, and she prohibited him from becoming absorbed in TV, computers, or other technological devices. Jude felt the same way and limited his children’s time in front of the too-many screens available to youngsters.

  For Kyle’s sake, she should buy a house. Not only would he benefit, this might help her chances at keeping him permanently. With a home, he’d have a backyard to play in.

  The real estate market was expensive, but Bridget could broker a sweet deal on the condo to acquire a sizeable down payment for a house. She’d paid off the truck early, leaving her a bi-weekly mortgage payment and the usual bills.