At Home on Ladybug Farm - Donna Ball [56]
Derrick gave her a playful one-armed hug as he passed. “We’re not company, Ida Mae. Haven’t you figured that out by now?”
She pretended annoyance as she shrugged way from his embrace and set the casserole down with a clunk on the center island beside a colorful bowl of fruit salad and a basket of muffins. “Ya’ll’re gonna have to serve yourselves from the counter,” she told them.
“You’re right, Paul,” Bridget declared, picking up her plate. “The kitchen table is cheerier. And if there’s one thing this house needs right now it’s a little cheer.”
“It’s funny,” Cici said, “but as much trouble as he is, and impossible as he can be sometimes, I’d really miss that kid if he were gone. I don’t want them to place him somewhere else.”
“I guess you never know how much someone really means to you until you’re faced with losing him,” Lindsay agreed somberly.
Lori took up her own plate. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but I don’t understand what you’re all so upset about. I thought Noah was only supposed to stay here temporarily, anyway. Isn’t that what temporary guardianship means? Maybe he’d be better off with the preacher and his wife.”
Cici gave her a look. “Don’t you take this the wrong way,” she told her daughter, “but go out to the barn and tell Noah to come to breakfast.”
“My eggs will get cold!”
“They will if you don’t hurry.”
With a huffing breath, Lori put down her plate, snatched up a muffin, and left the room.
“Put your coat on!” Cici called after her.
Lindsay absently scooped breakfast casserole onto her bright yellow plate. “Maybe Lori’s right. Maybe he would be better off in a traditional home.”
“He wouldn’t last a day,” Bridget said.
“There’s nothing traditional about him,” Cici said, taking the serving fork from Lindsay’s hand and sliding one of the three servings of casserole Lindsay had taken onto her own plate.
“I think the worst part is being disapproved of.” Lindsay placed a muffin on her plate and topped it, rather forcefully, with a dollop of butter. “It’s not that I care what other people think about me. I just don’t want them thinking I’m not good enough.”
“It’s your own fault,” Ida Mae pointed out gruffly. “Anybody that stays in the bed until ten o’clock in the morning and leaves dirty dishes and empty bottles scattered all over the front room deserves what they get. I never been so scandalized in my life. You ought to be ashamed of yourselves, every single one of you.”
“I, for one, take full responsibility for my actions and am properly chagrined.” Derrick’s tone was reassuring as he took her elbow and guided her toward the table, a full plate in his other hand. “Here you are, dear lady, I fixed this just for you. Sit by me.”
“I got no time to sit down,” Ida Mae objected, her eyes narrowing suspiciously even as she sat and let Derrick unfold a napkin in her lap. “I got things to do.”
Bridget and Cici shared a secret smile with Paul. “Can he come live with us?” whispered Bridget.
“You’ve already got your hands full with one renegade male,” Paul reminded her.
“Speaking of which . . .” Cici looked over her shoulder toward the window. “Where are those kids, anyway?”
Noah was not in the barn, or the studio, or any other likely place, which suited Lori just fine. The morning air was bitter and she was hungry and she could smell hot muffins and sausage even from here. She was hurrying back toward the house to report that the boy could not be found when she actually caught sight of him, crossing the stubbly back field that led toward the woods. She cupped her hands around her mouth to shout for him, and then changed her mind.
For one thing, he was leading Bambi on a rope beside him. For another, he was wearing his backpack and his red stocking cap, which Bridget was always badgering him to put on when he went outside in the winter, and which he never would. It was all very odd. Curiosity momentarily overcame her hunger, and Lori decided to follow him.
She didn’t rush, not that she cared whether he knew she was behind him or not, so that