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“Come on, Kitty. Time to wake up.”
Susannah tried to remember if her mom always ran into this much trouble rousing Kitty from her afternoon naps.
She touched her sister’s forehead. Didn’t feel hot, but she’d been acting more tired than usual, taking more time to wake up, sleeping longer each afternoon.
Maybe it was the winter.
Or was she depressed? Susannah didn’t even know how to begin guessing if it was something like that. Should she call Dr. Bell? Would the pediatrician be able to help or just refer her to a specialist in Spokane or Wenatchee?
She rolled her sister onto her back and checked her diaper. It wasn’t wet, which was convenient for the moment, but Susannah knew from experience that if Kitty’s bladder didn’t kick in soon, by the time her systems finally caught up with each other she’d leak right through the Depends and all over the mattress.
Well, that’s what the chux pads on the bed were for. Not worth worrying over.
“Wake up, Kitty. It’s time for your snack. And after you eat, you can help me make a Christmas treat. Would you like that?”
Kitty lifted up a single finger.
“Oh, come on,” Susannah prodded. “I thought you’d be way more excited than that.”
Kitty made a fist.
“That’s more like it. If your back’s not too tight, I think we’ll save your massage until later and I’ll get you into your chair.”
Blink.
After helping Kitty manage to drink five ounces of formula without gagging, Susannah pulled ingredients down from the cupboards and chatted with her sister, who watched from her wheelchair.
“All right, so we’ll need flour and sugar, and I’m pretty sure we still have yeast in the fridge, but I better proof it to make sure it’s good.”
When she was alive, Susannah’s mom made homemade bread once or twice a week on top of the cinnamon rolls and other pastries she baked for Sunday school or Bible studies. Susannah should have been a baking expert by now for all the times she’d helped in the kitchen, but she’d never progressed past the very basics.
Oh, well. At least she knew how to follow directions.
She pulled down her mom’s index cards from the cupboard and ran her finger along the little hand-painted flowers. Susannah had made her the recipe holder as a Mother’s Day gift sometime in junior high. As far as she could remember, it was the last time she’d picked up a paintbrush.
After pulling out the rest of the ingredients, Susannah set to work, careful to keep up her one-sided conversation with her sister. She wanted Kitty to feel engaged, and she also wanted to keep her from falling asleep in her chair. Why couldn’t she remember if it was normal for Kitty to be so drowsy in the afternoons? Why hadn’t she paid better attention, asked more questions when her mom was alive?
For the first few minutes, she was afraid she’d have to throw out the yeast, wait for Derek to buy her some more, and start the whole batch over in a few days when it would be too late for Christmas morning, but thankfully the bubbles finally started to form, filling the kitchen with a familiar yeasty smell.
The smell of love. The smell of a peaceful family life. The smell of Mom.
Kitty grunted with pleasure.
“I know,” Susannah told her, “it’s going to be delicious.”
She didn’t stop to think how wasteful it was to make a whole batch of Amish friendship bread for Christmas breakfast when she was the only one who would be able to enjoy any. It was the entire experience. Susannah couldn’t remember a single Christmas when she didn’t wake up to the smell of Mom’s baking. Kitty might not be able to eat anything Susannah prepared, but at least it would remind her — remind them both really — of happier times.
Times when Mom was alive, when the future was bright and promising, when Susannah could joyfully ease through her day without those relentless reminders that all her hopes and dreams and plans had come crashing down around her.