Amber Meets Her Son

"Hi, Mom! This is Trey," Jade said after Helen had opened the door.

"Nice to meet you," Helen replied. "Come on in out of the cold."

Their arms laden with presents, Trey and Jade entered the house, where Aunt Maria and Amber sat together on the sofa. Jade introduced Trey to Aunt Maria, and they said hello and shook hands.

"Jade told me about you last year," Aunt Maria said to Trey. "It's nice to meet you. So are you all finished with rehabilitation now?"

"I finished that a long time ago," he replied. "I do data entry for the police department now."

"Glad to hear it," said Aunt Maria. "And how are your studies coming along, Jade?"

"Just fine. I did well on all my finals."

"That's great! What about you, Amber?"

"I got one 'C', in geometry. I got A's and B's in everything else."

"That's all right. You passed. That's all that matters."

"That wouldn't even have happened if it weren't for my friend Hannah. She's been tutoring me for most of the term and hasn't even charged me anything."

"That's wonderful!" said Aunt Maria. "Now maybe you can pass along the blessing. Find someone who needs help in something you're good at and help them for no charge."

"That's a great idea!"

"Are you still seeing Danny?"

"Oh, yes. He's spending Christmas with his family again this year."

"I'm sure they realize how fortunate they are. Very few people get the chance they're getting."

"Oh, I know!" It occurred to Amber that if only Danny were there, the day would be perfect, but she didn't want to be selfish, so she tried to put the thought out of her mind. Maybe he'll swing by later, like he did last year, she told herself.

After dinner, they exchanged presents. Amber was very happy with her new clothes, the earrings from Trey and Jade, and the book from Aunt Maria, but she still missed Danny just a little.

After a brief nap, she decided to take a walk to the park. Once there, she walked to the swing set she used to swing on when she was a little girl and just stood there, moving a swing back and forth with her fingers.

"Amber!" She looked up to see a smiling Danny holding a baby of about six months who was wearing a light blue sleeper. "Look who I brought to visit you!"

"He's so cute! Can I hold him?"

"Of course! You're his mother!"

"What?" Amber gasped.

"This is Nathaniel. I thought today would be the perfect day for you to meet him."

Amber held her son close, and he grabbed the front of her shirt and hung on. He smelled so sweet.

Tears came to her eyes. "Can I keep him?"

Danny's eyes were mournful as he shook his head. "I was only able to bring him for a little while. I had a very difficult time doing even that. Normally, babies aren't allowed to visit earth at all."

"Why not?"

"Having never known anything but a heavenly existence, even a short time on earth can prove to be very traumatic for them. I'll have to be very careful with him."

"And the reason living people can't visit heaven?"

"Is that they'd find it such a better place to be that they'd refuse to come back, therefore all the things they were meant to accomplish in life wouldn't get done. Haven't you heard the accounts of those who've had near death experiences? Usually they don't want to return, but do so out of a sense of responsibility."

"Can't I at least take him to meet Mom and the others?"

Danny shook his head again. "It would be more than he or the others could handle."

Nathaniel gurgled with delight as she settled him in one of the baby swings. She examined him closely for any resemblances to Bruce and was relieved to see no obvious ones.

"Who takes care of him in heaven?" she asked.

"The main responsibility has fallen to a woman who died in childbirth toward the end of the nineteenth century. She never got to know her own son as a baby, as he entered heaven as an adult casualty of World War I. She's been wanting an assignment like this for many years, and she's thrilled for the opportunity to care for Nathaniel. Others do care for him in turn, but she's the main one."

A thought occurred to Amber, one that made her quake inside. "Is Bruce one of those people?"

"No." An expression she'd never seen before crossed Danny's face, one that filled her with unexplained dread. "Bruce is in a dark, lonely place, one where he can never hurt anyone again."

Amber shivered involuntarily, but Nathaniel's happy squeals as he swung back and forth soon took her mind off the subject, and she and Danny took turns pushing the baby in the swing.

"We're almost like a family, aren't we?" asked Amber.

"Almost." Danny's voice was soft.

All too soon, it began to grow dark, and Amber started to shiver. "I guess you have to go back now, don't you?" she asked Danny as he took Nathaniel out of the swing.

Danny sighed. "Unfortunately, yes."

"Can you bring him back again soon?"

"I don't know about that. I had a hard enough time getting permission to bring him this time."

Amber clasped her son's small hand and placed a kiss on his forehead. "Thank you so much for letting me meet him," she told Danny.

"You're very welcome." Danny smiled the smile she'd come to love so well. "There's nothing I enjoy more than making you happy."

"What's the name of the woman who enjoys taking care of him so much?"

Danny hesitated a moment before he answered. "Her name is Hedda."

"And what's her son's name?"

"Ludwig."

Amber considered this for a moment, then understood.

"Oh, I almost forgot." Danny retrieved something from his pocket. "Here's your Christmas present."

Amber opened the small box to find a pair of earrings that looked like rainbows. "They're beautiful!" she exclaimed. "Thank you!"

"I got you a card as well." On the front of the card was a watercolor of a rainbow. Amber opened it to read the message inside. 'Dear Amber, After the storm comes the rainbow. May your life hold nothing but rainbows from now on. Love, Danny.'

Touched, she embraced him. "I got you something, too. It's back at the house."

"Just give it to me next time I'm over there."

She kissed Nathaniel's cheek, and Danny turned around and was gone. As she returned home, her heart was light as a feather. She knew she'd miss her son, but she also knew that he was happy and loved, and that she'd see him again some day.

She debated whether or not to tell her mother about meeting Nathaniel and in the end decided that she just couldn't bring herself to. Somehow, it seemed a sacred event, one to be cherished by Danny and herself alone.

That night, she dreamed that she, Danny, and Nathaniel were together at the seashore. She was standing with Danny and holding Nathaniel, who giggled every time a wave splashed at their feet, which were partially covered by wet sand.

She felt tremendously depressed when she awakened to find that it had only been a dream.

The evening before New Year's Day, Danny came over, dressed casually in jeans and a polo shirt, the shadow of a mustache over his top lip. He laughed when he saw that Amber couldn't take her eyes off it.

"I remember how you really liked the one I wore to the football game, so I decided to grow one for real," he explained.

"I'm glad. It looks really sexy. Now I can give you your Christmas present." She went to the closet and retrieved it. It was a box containing samples of various sausages, cheeses, crackers, spreads, and candies. "I couldn't think of anything else to get you."

"It's the perfect gift." He kissed her lips. "Thank you. Now we have something to snack on while we ring in the new year together. You are staying up, aren't you?"

"Of course I am!"

She found it more difficult than she'd thought, however. Although she chose her favorite movies to watch, she dozed off several times, and Danny had to either nudge or tickle her awake.

"Do you really not have to sleep anymore?" she asked him after the last time.

He grinned. "Nope!"

"Can you sleep, if you want to?"

"I can still eat, can't I? Although I don't have to anymore, I still enjoy the tastes of the same foods and drinks. It's the same way with sleeping. A nap every once in awhile is nice."

"When you do sleep, do you still have dreams?"

"I never have nightmares anymore, but sometimes I have good dreams."

"Am I ever in them?"

He laughed. "You're always in them!"

He stopped the movie so they could listen to the countdown on the television, and when it ended, Danny stood and kissed Amber's lips. "Happy New Year, Amber."

"Happy New Year, Danny."

"Now, get some sleep." He gave her rear end a playful swat and then left.

Amber went to sleep imagining that Danny's body was curled around her own in bed.

The first day of the spring term turned out to be cold and rainy. Amber's mother drove her to school and dropped her off at the entrance, and she pulled her coat around her body close as she entered the school, her breath coming out in little white puffs.

"Hi there."

She turned to see that Danny was walking at her side, smiling at her, and gasped in surprise. "You never meet up with me in school!"

"There's someone I want you to meet. See that girl over there?" He pointed to a tall, dark-haired girl who stood apart from the other students. "Her name is Leah, and her family just moved here from Minnesota. She has something called Asperger's syndrome that makes it very hard for her to make friends. I want you to be her friend, Amber. Introduce yourself to her and invite her to do things with you."

Amber took a step toward Leah, and Danny laughed and touched her arm. "Not right now. The bell's about to ring. Later today."

He disappeared, and Amber continued on her way to class.

At lunchtime, Trendi, Ashlynn, and Blake saved her a seat and called her over to their table, like they always did. At the same time, she saw Leah on the other side of the cafeteria, paying for her lunch at the register. She held up a finger to her friends to indicate that she'd join them shortly, then walked over to Leah.

"Hi, Leah!"

Leah was so startled she almost dropped her tray. Her eyes narrowed. "How do you know my name?"

"My friend Danny told me. I'm Amber. Would you like to eat lunch with me and my friends?"

"I guess so." Leah's face registered no emotion at all as she followed Amber back to where her friends were sitting.

"Everybody, this is Leah," Amber announced. The others made room for Leah, and the two girls sat down.

As conversation flowed around the table, Leah concentrated on her food, not saying a word to anyone at all. When lunch was over, the others all went their way, but Amber stayed beside Leah.

"What do you have next?" she asked.

"English with Mrs. French." Instead of looking at Amber, Leah looked down as she replied.

"So do I! That's cool that we're in the same class."

Leah just shrugged.

Amber watched as Leah walked to a seat in the back of the room. Although she usually sat between Riley and Jordan, she walked to the back and sat beside Leah, who seemed completely oblivious to her presence.

Class proceeded as usual until Mrs. French asked the students if they remembered the motivational stickers their teachers had sometimes put on their classwork and homework when they were little. Leah's face instantly came to life, and she waved her hand frantically and started speaking before Mrs. French even had time to call on her.

"Oh, yes! I still love stickers. I have gobs of them at home. I've been collecting them since I was five years old. Some of them are really rare, like my angel stickers from Japan. My Aunt Judy who's in the navy sent those to me. I have some Qbert stickers that were made in 1983, too."

Several students snickered, but Leah seemed not to notice them.

"And then there are my psychedelic mushroom stickers from the early nineteen seventies - "

"All right, Leah, that's about enough. Mrs. French chuckled. "Now, as I was saying, you're all practically adults now and shouldn't have to be reminded of when your assignments are due."

Class ended soon afterwards, and Amber headed for her final class of the day. Leah tagged along beside her.

"I really do have all those stickers I mentioned," she told Amber. "If you'd like to come over to my house this evening, I'll show them to you."

"OK."

Leah gave Amber directions to her house. It turned out she lived about a thirty minute walk from Amber's house. "I'll come over before dinner," Amber promised.

When she entered the house that afternoon, she saw Helen wasn't back from her beauty salon job yet. She left her mother a brief note telling her where she was going, grabbed an apple, and left the house, making sure to lock the front door behind herself.

She arrived at Leah's house to see that it was similar to her own - small and made of wood that was obviously weather-worn. She rang the bell, and a plump woman with colorless short hair and bags under her eyes opened the door.

"H, I'm Amber," she told the woman. "I'm Leah's friend from school."

The woman tilted her head to the left and stepped back so Amber could enter. "She's back there in her room."

Amber walked through the living room to Leah's bedroom. The door was open, so she walked in. Leah was sitting cross-legged on the bed, rocking back and forth. Rows of stickers in neat piles were in front of her, and she stared at them with a grin on her face as she rocked.

"Leah?" asked Amber. The other girl looked up, and her smile vanished. "Why are you doing that?"

"Doing what?"

"Rocking back and forth."

Leah's face blushed a deep red. "I just do that when I'm really excited sometimes," she mumbled.

Amber walked around the bed and sat on its edge. "So are those all your stickers?"

"Gosh, no!" Leah laughed. "These are just my favorites. The rest are in file boxes in the closet, organized according to category." She went to the closet and opened the door, revealing a row of neatly hanging clothes. Two shelves were above the clothes, and each shelf held four file boxes each. On the floor underneath the clothes were six more file boxes. Leah pointed to them in turn. "My animal stickers are in this one - this one has my food stickers - this one, my holiday stickers - "

"But why do you have so many? What do you do with all of them?"

"Sometimes I swap them with other collectors. I belong to sixteen different online sticker clubs, and I've met lots of people that way. Or sometimes, when I get bored or lonely, I just take them out and look at them, or rearrange them."

"Isn't the postage awfully expensive?"

"Not so much if it's inside the U.S.A. I save up my allowance, and sometimes my family members give me money for my birthday or Christmas." Leah began to take the file boxes from the closet one by one and show Amber their contents. The girls were less than halfway through when Leah's mother called her for dinner.

Leah grimaced. "I guess I'll just have to show you the rest of them another time. Thanks for coming over."

"Thanks for inviting me. It was fun."

"I had a friend back in Minnesota. Her name was Abby. I can't believe I've already got a friend here now."

When Amber opened the door, she was alarmed to see that it was almost dark. Leah's enthusiasm had proven to be contagious, and she'd gotten so caught up in looking at stickers with her new friend she'd lost all track of time. With a shiver, she walked down the porch steps and began her journey home.

When she reached the road, she felt a presence beside her and turned to look into Danny's smiling face. "I can't tell you how glad I am to see you!" she exclaimed.

"You didn't seriously think I'd leave you to walk home alone in the dark, did you?" he replied. "How did it go with Leah?"

"All right. I've never known anyone before with anywhere near as many stickers as her!" They both laughed.

They were about two thirds of the way to Amber's house when a man dressed all in black with a black ski mask pulled over his face jumped out in front of them and pointed a pistol at them. "Your money or your life!" he growled.

Amber froze in place, but Danny remained calm and kept walking. "Come on, Amber." He reached back for her.

Once Amber got over her initial shock, she saw that the mugger hadn't moved an inch since he'd spoken. Incredulous, she stepped around him and joined Danny, and a few seconds later, she glanced back to see that he was still standing there, frozen in place.

"How'd you do that?" she asked Danny, who merely laughed in response. "Are you just gonna let him stand there forever?"

"Only until the police get there," Danny told her.

Danny said goodbye to Amber at her front door. When she entered the house, she saw that her mother was eating dinner. Across from her was an untouched plate.

"You're probably gonna have to heat it up," Helen told her daughter. "You must really enjoy this girl's company to have spent so much time with her."

"She was showing me her stickers," Amber replied. "You'd never believe how many she has!" She didn't mention the mugger because she didn't want to scare her mother.

Leah sat with Amber and her friends at lunch again the following day and was much more talkative than she'd been before. The group continued to eat together for the rest of that week, and on Friday, Ashlynn slipped Amber a note underneath the table. When Amber got to Mrs. French's class, she opened the note and read it.

'Hey Amber, Blake's having a party at his house tomorrow night, and a bunch of us are going. We'd love for you to join us, just don't bring Leah, OK? See ya later, Ashlynn.'

When Amber got home that evening, she called Ashlynn. "Hey! Can you come tomorrow night?" asked Ashlynn.

"Why don't you want Leah to come?" asked Amber.

Ashlynn sighed. "Oh, Amber, who wants to listen to her go on and on about stickers? Talk about boring!"

"She can't help it, Ashlynn. She has something called Asperger syndrome."

"I don't care. She's no fun, and I don't want her around."

Amber felt depressed as she hung up. She loved hanging out with her friends, but she felt guilty about Leah's being left out. She wondered what Danny would say about the situation.

No sooner had she thought of him than there he stood, smiling at her. Startled, she giggled. "I should be used to that by now," she remarked.

"You know I'll always come whenever you need me," he replied.

"Well, I'm glad you're here, because I have kind of a dilemma."

"Want to talk about it over frozen yogurt?"

The next minute, she found herself at Dee-Lite, where Danny bought her a pina colada frozen yogurt with pineapple chunks and shredded coconut. "Ashlynn invited me to a party at Blake's tomorrow night, but she said Leah wasn't invited because she talks about stickers so much. She does talk about them an awful lot."

"Do you mind that?" asked Danny.

"I guess not, but it does get tedious sometimes."

"How important is this party to you?"

"Well, I do like hanging out with Ashlynn and Blake and the others."

"What if I told you there was something even more fun happening tomorrow night?"

"There is?"

He nodded. "Life Way Church is having game night tomorrow. Why don't you go and take Leah? Everyone will be playing games, so she won't have to struggle to come up with small talk that doesn't involve stickers."

"Are you gonna be there?"

"You bet!"

"That sounds like a great idea! I'll call and invite her as soon as I get back home!"

Jade and Iceas were eating lunch together when they saw a group of Cosmetology students enter the cafeteria. Shelby was among them. Jade waved and called to her, and she smiled and walked over.

"Let me get my lunch, and I'll come back." She joined the line at the front and returned about fifteen minutes later with a hamburger, fries, and a cola. "Is the food here good?" she asked Jade.

"Not as good as McDonald's or Burger King, but it's edible," Jade replied.

Shelby bit into her hamburger, then nodded in agreement.

"What's your morning been like?" Jade asked after she'd swallowed.

"Absolutely overwhelming! There's just so much to remember! I forgot school was so hard!"

"You'll get through it," said Jade.

"I sure hope so! I don't want to ring up groceries for the rest of my life!"

"My Mom has her own hair salon. She's always enjoyed that kind of work," Jade remarked.

"It would be cool to have my own salon," Shelby replied. "Maybe someday."

"She had to work really hard to get it going," said Jade. "That was right after Dad died. We were really poor for a long time."

"I've always admired your Mom," said Iceas. "Mine has had to work from time to time when things got tough, but she's never had to completely support the family."

"My Mom hasn't worked at all since she got married," said Shelby. "My Dad never wanted her to. He always said he didn't want people thinking he couldn't support his family."

"That sounds kind of old-fashioned to me," said Iceas.

"Trey told he his family's very traditional," Jade put in.

"That's right, you're Trey's sister, aren't you?" asked Iceas. "How's he doing?"

"All right, I guess," Shelby replied. "I haven't talked to him in a couple of weeks."

"He was fine when we went out Saturday," said Jade.

"Looks like there's gonna be a wedding soon," Iceas said in a singsong voice.

"We haven't even talked about that!" Jade exclaimed.

Iceas just giggled.

"You mean with a bunch of people I don't even know?" Leah was incredulous.

"You know me," Amber replied. "And the others are all really nice, especially Danny. I can't wait for you to meet him."

"I never know what to say to boys," said Leah.

"Danny isn't just any boy. He's a very special boy."

"Is he your boyfriend?"

"Sort of."

"I've never had a boyfriend before."

"You will someday."

"I've always wanted one really bad. I feel so jealous every time I see a boy and girl walking together holding hands in school."

"I'm sure there's a guy somewhere in the world who's perfect for you. Just be patient and never give up."

Leah sighed.