Finding Happily Ever After by Marie Ferrarella

Author:Marie Ferrarella [Ferrarella, Marie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Matchmaking Mamas, Category
Publisher: Silhouette
Published: 2010-07-31T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nine

W ith Joel’s distraught cry ringing in his ears, Chris rushed to his nephew’s room, getting there just ahead of Jewel.

At the very least, he expected to find Joel lying on the floor, hurt and bleeding, a victim of some kind of bizarre accident. But, at first glance, there didn’t seem to be anything out of order in the room. No books on the ground, covering him, no chair that had toppled backward with Joel as its occupant.Instead, his nephew was standing in front of his small, secondhand bookcase, sobbing as if he were never going to be able to stop.

Though Chris was the first one to run into the room, it was Jewel who was the first to get to the boy. Dropping to her knees, she quickly looked him over to find the cause for this heartbreaking display of grief. Not finding any obvious injuries, she put her hands on Joel’s heaving shoulders and asked, “Honey, what’s wrong? What is it? Please tell me.”

Joel couldn’t answer her at first. The sobs were all but choking him. He was crying as if his heart had been shattered into a million tiny pieces.

Her hands still on his shoulders, Jewel quickly scanned the room, looking for clues. It crossed her mind that Joel might be having a delayed reaction to his mother’s death. But what had triggered it?

“Is it about your mother, Joel?” Her voice was kind, coaxing.

Still trying to catch his breath, the boy could only point to the bookcase.

Jewel felt helpless and frustrated. Had Joel seen a photograph or something else that he associated exclusively with his mother? Was that what had brought on this uncontrollable flood of tears?

“What is it, honey? I don’t see—”

And then, the second she said it, she did. She saw what had reduced the little boy to tears. Saw what had served as a catalyst.

In the middle of the books, knickknacks and things that only a little boy’s imagination could turn into treasures, she saw a dingy-looking fishbowl. There was a crack on the side of the glass, near the top. But that had no bearing on its function as a home for the bowl’s occupant. Or, more accurately, former occupant. For the turtle who had obviously been living there appeared to be dead.

There was no movement, no struggling on the turtle’s part. He was on his back, and his tiny feet were still.

Very gingerly, aware that Chris was watching her every move, Jewel reached into the bowl and extracted the turtle. She brushed a fingertip across his head, but there was no reaction. No attempt to bite her or to even pull his head into his shell. She had no idea what a turtle was supposed to feel like, but the one in her hand was room temperature. And very, very dead.

She laid him back down and turned to Joel. “I’m sorry, Joel. He’s gone.”

“He was my friend,” the boy said in between hiccupping sobs.

Watching this, Chris was utterly stunned. “You’re crying over a turtle?” he asked incredulously.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.