Eva had also agreed it would be better if I knew nothing until they settled the matter. Just when the plans were finalized, the child came down with a fever high enough to send her to the hospital.
“Please, Eva,” I begged. “Are you telling me my sister’s baby didn’t make it?”
Eva put her arms around my shoulders and held me close. I braced myself.
“Luis, could you help me, please,” she said, still holding me tightly.
I heard him open the door to the adjoining suite and speak in Spanish. I turned and saw he was carrying a baby with dark brown curls, a heart-shaped face, and wide silver-gray eyes. A thick gold chain holding Stella’s locket fell almost to her waist.
“Grace,” he said. “Meet your niece, Señorita Emma Grace.”
Epilogue
“Emma Grace, you did not just give Miss Scarlett a cheese doodle, did you?”
My three-year-old daughter and the dog ignored me and continued to share the bag of salty treats. I picked up the protesting toddler and swabbed a wet wipe over her face, smearing it with orange residue. Scarlett followed my every swipe.
From that day, over two years ago, when I brought my niece home, Scarlett had been Emma’s dog. She still loved me, but when the baby was in the room, she refused to leave her side. And my dog’s shift in loyalty was only one of the many changes that came with Emma.
After Eva put Stella’s child in my arms, Luis and I struggled for over half an hour to get the car seat positioned and Emma Grace strapped in. Driving away from the hotel, I wondered what in the world my sister had been thinking to leave someone like me, a woman barely capable of handling her own life, in charge of another human being. Most mothers have at least nine months to consider how parenthood will change their lives. I hadn’t known my new daughter existed until a few minutes before Eva appeared with her.
A few blocks from the hotel, I gasped for air and was sure I was having my first panic attack. I pulled into a grocery store parking lot and turned to the baby.
“I guess it’s me and you, kid.”
Emma Grace regarded me with solemn eyes.
“Well, not just you and me,” I said, as much to reassure myself as to comfort my niece. “You’ve got a new grandmother and a step-grandfather, and…” I wasn’t sure how to classify Justin but felt certain he was on the team. “And you’ve got this great-looking guy to help take care of you, plus you’ve got an uncle—okay, he’s a little on the crazy size, but he’s the best friend anyone could ever have. Whatever, you’ve got your very own Lesroy.”
“See? You’ve got this.” My sister’s voice was strong and clear, as if she were sitting beside me.
“Looks like he isn’t the only insane one in the family,” I said to my new daughter. But the sound of my sister’s triumphant words comforted me, and I couldn’t wait to call Mom. I explained I had Stella’s baby and asked her to please meet me at my house because I had no idea what I was doing. I hung up before she could respond.
By the time I arrived, she and Mike were waiting in the driveway. Both had tears in their eyes as we unloaded the baby and all her accouterments. Emma Grace regarded her new grandparents with her trademark wide-eyed stare, remaining calm and unimpressed. Lesroy burst through the door. “Oh, my, God! She is the most beautiful little girl in the entire world,” he said, dancing with excitement. Emma Grace allowed him to carry her around but never cracked a smile, not even when he swooped her over his head.
The only one who could get a giggle out of the child was Justin. He was in a meeting when I left him a convoluted message and was home in less than thirty minutes. At the sound of his voice, the baby turned toward him and broke into a snaggle-toothed grin. When he blew on her tummy, she dissolved into fits of laughter.
In the weeks and days that followed, my terror at becoming a mother eased into a state of hyper-vigilance, like that of most new mothers. Some days the sunlight played across Emma’s face, transforming her into a replica of my sister, paralyzing me with longing. Other times a shadow of her father appeared, and while it frightened me at first, I came to realize it was not the visage of the Adelmo I saw at the trailer, the one filled with an incapacitating blood lust. It was the gentle man I sat with on the garden bench, my sister’s devoted lover and friend, one from whom I had nothing to fear.
. . . . .
“Please be still, Emma Grace.” One cheek was free of cheesy goo, but the other was covered in orange snail trails. And my daughter was approaching her limit. She stiffened her body, and her lower lip trembled with the onset of toddler fury. Sensing the approaching storm, Scarlett took over, sending Emma into fits of giggling, as she licked away the last trace of doodles.
My husband called from the backyard where he and Lesroy were drinking beer and waiting for twilight. When I opened the door, child and dog tumbled out to join them.
Emma ran toward the men but stopped and turned her face to the sky, where a squadron of tiny blinking lights descended on her. She raised her arms, and fireflies settled on the tips of her fingers.
“Wait for me,” Lesroy shouted, grabbing the jar by his chair.
He cupped his hands over my daughter’s and transferred the flashing insects into the container. Emma Grace pressed her solemn little face to the glass. Their fairy flashes sparkled in her eyes. She pushed away the lid and danced as they flittered around her before flying into
