The late afternoon sun was skimming the tops of the trees, low in the sky, as Diana and I raced down the road to the place she had first found Star. Our flip flops made loud smacks on the asphalt as we ran.
“It was near a pine tree missing some bark on the trunk, right by the edge of the woods,” Diana said, out of breath. “Right around here.” She angled into the woods, ducking under some branches and knocking others aside. I followed her, the sharp pine smell enveloping me. “She was kind of underneath a bush, where you couldn’t see her.”
We crashed through the underbrush, bending down and searching low under every bush we saw. I was peeking under some low-hanging branches when Mama’s ring tone sounded on my phone. My heart started pounding, but I didn’t pick up. She had left me and gone to Asheville. She could just worry.
The ringtone stopped.
“Wasn’t that your phone?” Diana said from a few yards away. “Why didn’t you answer it?”
“It’s Mama. I don’t feel like talking to her right now.”
Diana wound around a few pine trees, searching. “Seems like you’re pretty mad at her.”
I didn’t answer. I just wandered a bit deeper into the woods. “Do you think we’re getting too far away from where you found Star?”
Diana stopped and looked back out at the road. “Maybe. Let’s head that way.”
We headed back toward the tree missing the bark, slowly, and began to make concentric circles to try to make sure we’d covered all the ground.
“Your mom isn’t going to change,” Diana said. Our feet made silky hushing sounds as we rambled through the pine needles. “You’re always giving me such a hard time about not forgiving people. But it seems like you can’t forgive your mom.”
Diana’s words echoed in my head as I continued on the search. Thinking about what had happened with Mama, my blood pounded in my temples. I realized how mad I still was. But when would I learn? That was just the way Mama was.
Maybe Diana was right. Maybe she wasn’t going to change. Maybe I needed to follow the advice I was always giving Diana about forgiving people. Maybe I needed to forgive Mama. I drew a deep breath. I’d call her back tonight.
Finally, after twenty minutes of searching, Diana threw up her hands. “Well, I give up. It was a good idea, anyway, Steph.”
“Okay.” I followed her winding route toward the edge of the woods, scanning the ground. Diana was already standing in the open when I decided to look under one last small bush beside a rotting tree trunk.
And there, rising to its feet, was a tiny fawn even smaller than Star. With a gasp, I knelt, pulling back stray branches.
Its deep brown eyes looked at me searchingly. Its pear-shaped ears pricked anxiously in my direction.
I jumped to my feet. “Diana! Come here!”
I knelt again, examining the fawn. It held one of its hind legs off the ground, not putting weight on it.
Diana was beside me, staring. “Stephanie, you were right! Oh, my gosh, she’s probably starving.”
“And there’s something wrong with her leg.”
“Maybe.” Without hesitating, Diana reached under the branches and gently pulled the fawn out. It struggled, crying weakly. Diana clasped the little body to her chest, with the legs hanging down. “Come on!” She ran toward the house.
I followed. I couldn’t believe we had found another fawn!
We pounded through the yard and up onto the porch.
“Grandma! Grandpa!” Diana yelled. I opened the door and we burst into the kitchen.
Grandma came into the kitchen. “Oh, goodness! Not another one!”
Grandpa came from the back bedroom. “What’s going on?”
“Get a bottle ready, Stephanie!” Diana said. “Hurry!”
My hands shook as I poured the goat’s milk into one of the bottles that Grandma had just rinsed, put it into the microwave, and turned it on.
Grandma grabbed blankets and towels from the laundry room, lay them on the floor of the sun porch, and Diana gently laid the fawn on them. The fawn scrambled to its feet, bleating softly, standing unevenly on three legs.
“She’s starving!” Diana said.
“Well, we know what to do this time around,” Grandpa said.
I brought the bottle out on the sun porch, shaking it to mix it.
“Can I try?” I said. “Since I found her?”
Diana nodded. “Okay.” And then she started giving me all kinds of instructions.
“Okay, okay!” I tried letting the milk drip on her nose, and pushing the nipple between the fawn’s lips. Her little round black nose sniffed at me and at the goat’s milk.
“We need to call Kirsten again before she gets too far down the road,” Grandpa said. “She’ll need to come back.”
“Okay,” Diana said.
I kept trying to feed her while Diana tapped in the number she’d left on the pad on the counter. She got Kirsten right away.
“We found another one! We have her here on the sun porch. But she’s only putting weight on three legs. There’s definitely something wrong.” Diana listened, then scribbled something down. She hung up. “Kirsten says the leg might be broken. She says she’ll meet us at the vet’s office. She gave me the address.”
Suddenly, the fawn started to suck on the nipple voraciously.
“She’s got it! She’s got it!” She suckled eagerly and loudly, making loud gasping sounds.
“Look at that poor little thing,” said Grandma.
“She’s so beautiful. What should we name her?” Diana asked.
“What about Clover?” I said.
“I like that,” said Grandma.
“Well, we better get her over to the vet’s office,” Grandpa said. “Somebody will need to hold her in their lap.”
Grandpa drove with Grandma in the front seat, Diana and me in the back, and Clover on Diana’s lap on a towel. Diana kept her arms wrapped around her. Clover struggled occasionally, but her injured leg prevented her from moving too much.
Twenty minutes later we pulled into the gravel parking lot of the emergency veterinary clinic, which was a double-wide trailer. Kirsten was already there, with Star still in the dog carrier in her truck. She came up to our car window, and leaned in.
“There’s a new vet here today that I’ve never worked with before, but he seems very good. He said to bring the fawn right in. Want me to carry her?”
“Since I found her, can I?” I asked.
“Sure.”
I ran around the side of the car and wrapped my arms around Clover’s little body, hugging her close the way I’d seen Kirsten do with Star.
“Maa!” As I held her in the waiting room, I could feel her heart beating next to mine. She struggled a little. Her ears, twitching back and forth, tickled my chin.
The vet, with graying dark hair and kind eyes behind glasses, hurried out, wearing blue scrubs. “Hey, I’m Dr. Miller. Come on back and let’s take a look.”
We all went into the exam room, and Dr. Miller directed me to place Clover on the metal exam table. I put her down, and her little hooves slid on the slippery metal. With gentle hands, Dr. Miller examined Clover, who winced and kicked when he touched the swollen area on her leg. “It feels like it might be a break. We’ll need to get some x-rays to find out for sure.” He suggested we take a seat out in the waiting room for a few minutes.
When he called us back into the exam room a few minutes later, Dr. Miller pointed to the x-rays hanging up on a light screen. “It’s definitely broken.” Dr. Miller traced the ghostly image of Clover’s bone with his pen. “Can you see the fracture there? It’ll have to be set. What I’d like to do is start an IV and get the fawn stabilized, and then I’ll do surgery later today or tomorrow.” He adjusted his glasses, looking at Kirsten.
“That would be great,” Kirsten said, with a shy smile. “Thank you so much. Not many vets would be willing to work on a fawn.”
“Well, a broken bone is a broken bone, and I enjoy orthopedic surgery,” said Dr. Miller. “And then you can come pick her up in a couple of days, if she’s doing well.”
“Perfect,” Kirsten said, her smile broadening.
“Our staff will love having a fawn here,” Dr. Miller said. “That doesn’t happen too often. This little girl is lucky you kids found her. Good work!”
Diana poked me in the arm, and I felt myself blush.
The technician came to take Clover.
“Wait. Will we see her again?” I asked. We had only had her for a little while. How could I have developed such affection in such a short time?
Kirsten shook her head. “No, so sorry. I’ll pick her up once the surgery is done and take her to rehabilitate her at my place. Remember, you’re not allowed to visit. I can call you with updates.”
So, once again, Diana and I said our good-byes.
“Bye, little girl,” Diana said, stroking her head. “They’re going to make you all well.” We each gave Clover a kiss on the top of the head. Then the technician took Clover from us.
“Maa!” she bleated, as she was carried out of the room.
The four of us were quiet part of the way home.
“Star and Clover will be taken care of and eventually be reintroduced to the wild,” Grandma said.
“When can we call to check on them?” Diana asked.
“Maybe tomorrow afternoon?” Grandpa said.
Once we arrived back at Grandma and Grandpa’s cottage, Mama’s ring tone started up on my phone again. Diana gave me a pointed look.
“You should answer it.”
I tightened my lips and nodded. A prickly feeling ran up my spine. I walked through the grassy back yard and down to the dock so I could have privacy.
“Hi, Mama.”
Shadows stretched over the graying planks and the dock rocked up and down. While the father goose swam in alert semi-circles around the dock, the mother goose rearranged herself in the nest, touching her bill to each of the fluffy goslings as they quietly cheeped around her.
“Hi, sugar. How are you doing? I’ve been thinking about you all day.”
“Really?” I caught my breath, then closed my eyes and shook my head. I wasn’t going to let myself be taken in.
“Did everything go all right with you and Matt last night?”
I considered what to tell her. I started to say everything had been fine, but then I changed my mind. “I need to talk to you about that.”
“Oh, well, okay, we can talk when I get home, sugar. Barry and I had such a lovely time. I got here in time to go to a place where we did some dancing. It meant a lot to him for me to come, I think.”
My heart beat hard a few times. I remembered Diana telling me to forgive Mama. “Well, that’s good. I’m glad.”
“Thanks for understanding, sugar.”
“Sure. No problem.” I looked out over the surface of the water, where the sunlight seemed to glitter. The baby geese cheeped.
“So, I’ll be home later tonight. Will you still be at the house when I get back?”
“No, Daddy and Lynn are going to pick me up this afternoon.”
Mama hesitated. “Well, all right. I understand. I’ll miss seeing you tonight!”
“Me, too. And we have to talk … next week when I see you.”
I hung up. I watched the baby geese, thinking about how hard they’d had to work to crack out of those shells.