Some Women Read Online Free Page B

night to either of them.
    â€œI’m sorry.” Piper placed her hand on top of Todd’s.
    â€œGo ahead.” He motioned toward Fern’s room with a tilt of his head. “She needs you.”
    â€œShe can’t just act this way.”
    â€œShe can and she will. I’m pretty sure it’s normal.”
    â€œYou are amazing.” Piper stood up, cupped Todd’s face in her hands, and kissed him firmly on the lips. “What would I do without you?”
    â€œYou did just fine for thirty-plus years. Remember that.”
    â€œI love you. Give me five minutes.”
    Piper climbed the steps to Fern’s room. The door was slightlyajar. She’d expected to find Fern reading one of the many books that littered her shelves and the floor of the room. Again, like mother, like daughter. But she wasn’t. Her body was coiled into a little ball, and all Piper could hear was the faint whistle of her breath. She moved toward her, sat down on the edge of the bed, and rubbed Fern’s warm back. She would come around. She had to. They would find a way forward. Together.
    â€œMom?” Fern whispered.
    â€œYes, sweetie?”
    She rolled toward her. “I need you to do something for me.”
    â€œWhat’s that, baby?” Piper stroked Fern’s flushed cheek and was quite certain, in that moment, that she would do anything to make her daughter happy. Anything at all.
    â€œI need you to find Dad.”
    Anything but that.
    â€¢Â Â Â â€¢Â Â Â â€¢
    It had been one of those mornings. The arctic chill from outside was too formidable an opponent for the heat, which was cranking and grinding tirelessly in an effort to overtake it. Piper had lingered under the steam of the shower until her fingers were shriveled like sun-dried tomatoes, all too aware that as soon as she turned off the faucet there would be those grueling seconds, minutes even, between the refuge of the hot water and the insulation of her reliable black cashmere sweater.
    Fern hadn’t mentioned her biological father again. Maybe she’d forgotten all about it. About him. Was that what Piper really wanted? To erase him from their history? One dad out. Another, much more suitable and reliable “dad” in. It had all been going sowell. There were even days she could almost forget he’d ever existed. Almost.
    It wasn’t as though she thought Fern deserved to grow up without knowing the man who was responsible for half of her genetic makeup; it was that she thought he didn’t deserve to know her. Or to be a part of her life in any tangible way. Not that he’d offered. Not that she’d heard from him since last year around this time, just before Thanksgiving; three years had passed before that. He’d sent an e-mail saying he was on a ship in the South Pacific and that, if he had the opportunity, he’d try to send Fern something for Christmas. Piper hadn’t bothered to mention it to Fern, since his promises were notoriously empty. And by the time she’d tried to write back a few days later, his account had been shut down. Unfortunately, this was the most contact Piper had ever had with Max, since the day he’d left. For Fern’s part, she’d never even seen her father in person. Not even a photograph.
    When Fern was younger, Piper would purchase one elaborate gift each year and set it under the Christmas tree, affixing a tag that read,
Love, Daddy
. Without fail, it had always been Fern’s favorite present. And, at some point, this had begun to irk Piper. Why should this man who’d never so much as changed a diaper or been projectile-vomited on in the supermarket get to be the hero?
She
was the hero. The heroine.
Whatever.
Either way, it was a lie. She was deceiving her daughter in order to dull the inherent pain that came with having a father who’d fled for the hills shortly after she’d been conceived.
    She’d never told