A Time To Forgive

His hair was disheveled, as though he’d been running his fingers through it. Smudges appeared under his eyes, and he seemed at a loss.

“She’s been like this since I picked her up at the school,” he explained. “Granted I was a little late—”

“Fifteen minutes late,” Jaye interjected.

Connor finished the sentence at the same time. “But it was only fifteen minutes.”

“I was the last one there,” Jaye said unhappily.

Abby rubbed the girl’s shoulder, silently conveying that she understood. She had experience dealing with children of this age. Promptness might not seem like that big of a deal, but every minute counted when a child was waiting to be picked up.

Especially a child whose mother had left her and hadn’t come back. Couldn’t Connor see that?

“I’m sure your uncle didn’t mean to be late, Jaye,” Abby told the girl in a soothing voice.

“He’s late all the time,” Jaye said.

“Some of the time,” Connor clarified.

“And now we’re late for the lesson.” Jaye glanced at the clock, which showed the time at twenty-five minutes before seven. “There’s only ten minutes left.”

“I don’t usually do this.” Abby never did this. “But you’re my last lesson of the day. How about we go until seven-twenty. That way, you won’t miss a minute.”

Jaye’s tears stopped flowing. “Really? You’d do that?”

“I most certainly will. Go over to the sofa and take your instrument out of the case. Will you do that, Jaye?”

“Sure,” she said and headed away from them.

“Thanks,” Connor said. “You’re saving my life.”

He looked so relieved that she nearly let him off the hook but realized she couldn’t. For Jaye’s sake. “This is a one-time thing,” she said quietly. “From now on, you need to get her here on time.”

He swiped a hand over his brow and lowered his own voice. “I don’t have the kind of job where it’s that easy to leave at a prearranged time. Clients call. They’re paying me for my time. I can’t just hang up on them.”

“You’re going to have to figure something out,” she said.

“I know that. I just don’t know what it’s going to be.”

His vulnerability touched a chord deep inside her. “Maybe we can talk about it later. But for now, Jaye’s waiting for her lesson. You can pick her up at about twenty after seven.”

“Would it be okay if I stuck around?” He lifted his portable computer. “I have a couple things I need to check online. Any flat surface will do. Your kitchen table would be great.”

She glanced at the still-sniffling Jaye. She sensed that something more serious than Connor showing up late was bothering her. Jaye would never reveal what it was if she thought her uncle could overhear.

“I find that my students do better without their parents—or in this case, their uncle—in the room.” She nodded toward the door. “Seven-twenty.”

She expected him to argue, but instead he asked, “Any suggestions on a place I could go for forty-five minutes?”

“There’s a public library a half mile down the road. It has lots of cubicles, all with flat surfaces.”

He tipped a nonexistent hat to her, said goodbye to a nonresponsive Jaye and left. Pasting a smile on her face, Abby turned to the girl. “Are you ready for your lesson?”

Jaye nodded, but made no move to pick up her violin from the open case. Abby lifted the delicate instrument, turning it over while she examined it. It was a rental from a popular music store, adequate for a beginner but not of the caliber Abby suggested for her more serious students. For now, though, it would do.

She handed the violin to Jaye. The girl took it but didn’t lift the instrument onto her shoulder the way Abby had taught her in class.

“What’s wrong, Jaye?”

“I already told you. Connor was late picking me up.” Jaye’s lower lip thrust forward, but the way it trembled betrayed that something more serious than her uncle’s tardiness distressed her.

“Okay,” Abby said, sensing that Jaye would clam up if she tried to force a confidence. “If that’s all it is, then let’s start the lesson.”

Jaye nodded, but her violin remained at her side. Staring at a point on the carpet, she said, “Remember when I told you my mother was dead? Well, I said that because I wish she was dead.”

Abby swallowed a cry of dismay and forced herself to speak in gentle, even tones. “You don’t mean that, honey. Whatever your mother’s done, she’s still your mother.”

“I hate her.” Jaye sniffed but didn’t cry. “She left me with Uncle Connor.”

“Your uncle seems okay to me.”

She shrugged. “He is okay. But he doesn’t have time for me. He doesn’t pick me up from school till six o’clock and half the time he’s late.”

“He has to work, Jaye.” Since Abby had taken Connor to task for putting in too much time at the office, she found it surreal that she was sticking up for him. “I imagine he’s doing the best he can. He didn’t plan on you coming to live with him.”

“He doesn’t want me any more than my mom does.”

Although Connor’s life would obviously be easier if his niece hadn’t come to live with him. Abby couldn’t let the girl paint him with such a negative brush stroke. “He’s your uncle, Jaye. I’m sure he loves you.”

“Then why can’t I come home after school and be with him?”

“I told you, Jaye. He has to work. And you’re not old enough to stay home alone.”

“I’m too old to hang out with the babies at day care.”

“Surely there are other children your age there.”

“They don’t want me there. They’re all boys. They barely talk to me. And they won’t let me play with them.”

Abby swallowed a sigh because she well understood how it felt not to be wanted. Jaye’s situation was doubly difficult. Not only had her mother left her, she was meeting with rejection in every direction she turned. “Have you talked to your uncle about how much you dislike the school-based day care?”

She nodded. “He says it’s the best he can do and that I need to stick it out.”

Abby had a sense that she’d regret her next question, but couldn’t keep from asking it. “I can’t promise anything but would you like me to talk to him for you?”

Jaye nodded eagerly, making Abby feel marginally less apprehensive about the offer. “Oh, yes, please, Miss Reed.”

Abby smiled at her. “When we’re not at school, you can call me Abby.”