Tempered Glass

Chapter 3

SATURDAY - April 9, 1977

Midgie held the small pink blanketed bundle in the crook of her arm. Her face was glowing with adoration as she looked down on the baby's sweetly sleeping face. "Oh Sarah!" She cooed. "She is so beautiful!"

She ran a fingertip along the downy smooth curve of the chubby cheek, giggling when the small cupids bow lips drew up in a smile.

"She's smiling! She has a dimple! Oh, that's adorable!" Midgie's eyes opened wide as she looked up at Sarah, who only nodded.

"I know." Sarah reached from where she sat in a lounge chair beside Midgie and traced a fingertip in the groove in her infant daughter's cheek. "A present from her daddy."

She tossed her hair back and lifted her face up to the sun. There was a crisp smell in the air, the rays of the sun felt warm on her cheeks and the breeze still held a hint of coolness. Her mother's crocuses were up, their purple and white blossoms poked through the last crust of snow in the shadows by the house. Spring was finally here to stay, she could feel it. Time to start fresh with the new changes in her life.

Midgie rocked, watching Shannon's fingers curl and uncurl as she stroked her fingertip over the baby's velvety smooth skin. She glanced sideways at Sarah. She saw the tenseness under Sarah's calm exterior. She knew Sarah as well as she knew herself. Her friend was trying to hold herself together, to prove that she was a responsible adult and a good mother. And she was doing it without Sam and it was her decision that he didn't know about the baby. Midgie wondered if she was having second thoughts.

"You still think about him."

"Every day." Sarah drew in a deep breath, then exhaled slowly. "Shannon is going to look a lot like him, I think."

"I don't know." Midgie eyed the baby's face critically. "I see a lot of you, too. She has your hair color." She ran her finger over the baby's cheek and watched the lips pucker then relax. "I think she has the shape of your face. The same little chin."

Sarah smiled proudly. "Yeah, I think so too." She looked out at the blue chunks of melting ice that stubbornly rode the waves. She forced herself to stop comparing them with the blue of Sam's eyes, to stop searching each one to find the exact blue that matched his. "I think her eyes will stay blue...and sometimes I just see him in the expressions she makes." She tore her eyes away from the view of the lake and looked over, nodding her chin. "You can take her blanket off if you want. The sun is warm and she has a heavy sleeper on."

Midgie giggled nervously as she fumbled with the blanket. "I don't think I can hold her and unwrap her. I'm afraid I'll drop her!"

Sarah laughed at her friends awkwardness and reached out to help. "Here, I'll lift her up and you can take the blanket away." She slid her hands under the baby, smoothly cradling her neck and head with one hand and her bottom with the other. Shannon slept peacefully through it all, curled in a ball.

Sarah grabbed a baby bottle from the grass below her chair. "When she wakes up, you can give her this."

"I don't think she'll wake up soon. Do all babies sleep so much?"

Sarah lit a cigarette and blew the smoke out, slowly. Now that she wasn't breastfeeding some of her habits were starting back up. Her mother had banned smoking in the house and she was taking advantage of the outside to enjoy one now.

"Shannon spoils me. Not all babies are as good. She eats, poops and sleeps. At night she's up once to eat then goes back to sleep." She smiled as she looked down on the peaceful face. "She sleeps so soundly, just like Sam does."

"What about you?"

Sarah shook her head. "I don't have nightmares anymore, if that's what you mean. Strange dreams sometimes."