For Love of Mother-Not Read Online Free Page A

everything we could want, everything we asked for. All kinds of good food and toys to play with and …”
    A wealthy family brought to ruin, perhaps. She let him ramble on about the early time, the happy time, a while longer. What catastrophe had overtaken the boy in infancy?
    “How big was this family?” she asked. “We’ll call it your family for now. How many other boys and girls were there?”
    “I don’t remember exactly. Lots.”
    “Can you count?”
    “Oh, sure,” he said proudly. “Two, three, four, five, and lots more than that.”
    Sounded like more than just a family, though an extended family could not be ruled out, she knew. “Do ye remember what happened to them, and to you? Ye were all happy, and ye had lots of friends, and then something happened.”
    “The bad people came,” he whispered, his expression turning down. “Very bad people. They broke into where we lived. The people who watched us and fed us and gave us toys fought the bad people. There was lots of noise and guns going off and—and people fell down all around me. Good people and bad people both. I stood and cried until somebody picked me up and carried me away. They carried me down lots of halls and dark places, and I remember getting into some kind of a—car?”
    She nodded approvingly. “Probably. Go on, boy.”
    “I was moved around a lot. That was the end of the happy time.”
    “What happened after that?” she prompted him.
    “I’m not sure,” he said slowly. “It’s so hard to remember.”
    “I know ’tis painful for ye, Flinx. I need to know all about ye that I can, so I can help ye as best as I’m able.”
    “If I tell you,” he asked uncertainly, “you won’t let the bad people come and take me away?”
    “No,” she said, her voice suddenly soft. “No, I won’t letthem come and take ye away, Flinx. I won’t let
anyone
come and take ye away. Ever. I promise ye that.”
    He moved a little nearer and sat down on the extended leg support of the big chair. He had his eyes closed as he concentrated.
    “I remember never staying in one place for very long at a time. The people, the good people who took care of me and fed me, they kept the bad people away. They were always upset about something, and they yelled at me a lot more than before.”
    “Were they mad at ye?”
    “I don’t think so. Not really.” He licked his lips. “I think they were scared, Mother. I know I was, but I think they were, also. And then”—a look of confusion stole over his face—”I went to sleep. For a
long
time. Only, it wasn’t really a sleep. It was like I was asleep and yet like I wasn’t.” He opened his eyes and looked up at her. “Do you understand that, Mother? I don’t.”
    “No, I’m not sure I do, boy.” Her mind worked. Now who, she wondered, would take the time and trouble to sedate a child for a long period of time? And why bother?
    “Then some more bad people suddenly showed up, I think,” he went on. “I didn’t see them this time. But some of the people who watched me died or went away. Then there was just me and one man and one lady, and then they were gone, too.”
    “Your mother and father?”
    “No, I don’t think so,” he told her. “Anyway, they never called themselves that. They were just two of the good people. Then some other people came and found me. People I’d never seen before. They took me away with them.”
    “Were they good people or bad people?”
    “I don’t think they were either,” the boy replied carefully. “I think they were kind of in-between people. I think maybe they were sorry for me. They tried to be nice, but”—he shrugged—”they were just in-between people. They moved me around a lot again, and there were different places andlots of new children I didn’t know, and then there was yesterday, and you bought me. Right?”
    She put a hand to her mouth and coughed. “I didn’t buy ye, actually. I agreed to take responsibility for ye.”
    “But you