Providence by Lisa Colozza Cocca Page B

I wasn’t worth the faith she was putting in me?
    When we got home, Rosie went straight to bed, but my insides were having such a battle that I knew sleep was a long way off for me. I sat in the parlor with the television turned low and my hands busy with the needle and floss. My heart said to tell Rosie everything. She had been so good to us; she deserved to know the truth. My gut said to wake up early and head back down to the tracks. I had done my best to turn a deaf ear to the questions and comments about me and Baby Girl. That might not have been the best thing—the safest thing—for me to do. Maybe it was time to move on to a town where folks were less prone to ask questions. And my brain didn’t agree with either my heart or my gut. It told me to stay put and be grateful for what we had. Sooner or later, even Dottie would get tired of asking questions.
    That night I pulled my notebook out for the first time in more than a week. I read my list of adventures from start to finish. My life sure wasn’t turning out like the stories in the books I’d read. When I finally turned in for the night, I still wasn’t sure which body part to follow.

CHAPTER 13
    Baby Girl and I were up and dressed long before Rosie on that next morning. I even made breakfast. I stuck to scrambled eggs, though, not wanting to give Rosie a reason to give up on me on that front. When Rosie sat down at the kitchen table, she was still dressed in her housecoat.
    “No work today,” she said. “We’ve earned a day off.”
    Even after sleeping in, Rosie looked tired. A full day of partying had worn her out. I decided that today could not be moving on day. “Are you sure?” I asked. “I’ll go in myself if you like, so you don’t miss any of the long weekend shoppers.”
    “I think folks will be picnicking with their families today. If they are shopping, they’ll probably go down the highway to the mall. No, let’s enjoy a day off. Maybe later on, we can take the bus over to the Mission Creek Mall. We can do a little shopping ourselves.”
    I must admit that the prospect of going to a shopping mall did excite me some. I had never set foot in one before; Mama and Daddy wouldn’t hear of it. Spending my afternoon surrounded by people wanting to get their hands inside my wallet was high on their list of ways to waste a day. I had to settle for hearing about the shopping center from Tammy Larson, whose texting skills would have put that girl in the library to shame.
    “I think I’ll just steal a little extra rest this morning.” Rosie pushed her chair back under the table. “Do you think you can clean this up on your own?”
    After I dried the last of the dishes, I took Baby Girl out onto the porch. I sat there rocking her and thinking. I wondered what Tammy was doing at that moment. When we were younger, we’d spend hours skipping rocks across the pond, racing through the fields, or making stories up behind the barn. But truth be told, Tammy and I had drifted apart over our high school years. Her time was filled with cheerleading practice, dances, and parties. Daddy, of course, would not give his permission for me to do any of those things.
    At first, Tammy prodded me to ask Mama to convince Daddy that it was all perfectly respectable. I explained to her again and again that Mama would never say a word against Daddy. Daddy’s word was law in our house and no one, including Mama, had a right to question it. Tammy, whose mama wore red nail polish and went away on business trips, couldn’t understand this. Eventually, she gave up on me and concentrated on new friends.
    Thinking about Tammy was making me sad, so I moved on to better thoughts. The prospect of window shopping outfits in the mall was positively thrilling. I had been wearing just the few clothes I had packed and some men’s colored T-shirts that came in neat plastic packages from a rack at Haystack’s. I started imagining myself in some of the outfits the girls back at