The Red Gloves Collection

by Karen Kingsbury

  Remorse tapped at the door of Megan’s conscience. “Oh.” She wanted to let excitement grow within her again, but it all seemed so sad. “I’m sorry.” How could a man with that type of loss be any kind of positive influence on Jordan? She kicked her doubts back into the closet and pinched the bridge of her nose. “What else? Tell me about him.”

  The woman gave as thorough an overview as possible. The man’s name was Casey Cummins. He was thirty-four and ran his own café in Midtown. He was interested in basketball, football, baseball, and anything outdoors, and, because of his job, his hours were flexible.

  “He jogs three miles a day and has a master’s in business administration. He’d be happy to help with homework.”

  Megan glanced at the murder files on her desk and felt the door to her closet of doubts creak back open. “What about the screening process?”

  “We went over that at the interview.”

  Megan crossed her arms and pressed her fist into the hollow near her lower rib cage. “I know that, but tell me anyway. I’m a district attorney, remember?” She paused and forced a more polite tone. “Specifically … how did this Casey check out?”

  “No record of any criminal behavior with either the FBI or the local police. He’s never served time, never been arrested, no history of drug abuse. Never even had a speeding ticket, as far as we can see. He pays his bills on time and has an apartment about twenty blocks from his café. We spent several hours interviewing him here at the office, and of course we had a licensed social worker check out his residence.”

  “And … ” Megan hated her suspicions, but after a week of waiting, the whole setup sounded too good to be true.

  “We give our volunteers a rating, Ms. Wright. It’s not something we usually share with the child’s parent, but in this case—given your job—I think it might be okay to tell you. Mr. Cummins earned the highest possible marks in all categories. He’s the kind of volunteer we’re desperate for.”

  Megan exhaled and felt herself relax. “So, then. When do they meet?”

  “Today’s Monday. … The woman’s voice drifted off, and Megan heard her flipping pages. “Fridays are good for him, so let’s try for this Friday, November 14, say three o’clock?”

  She shot a look at her own calendar. A hearing would take up most of the afternoon, and normally Megan would use early Friday evening to go over her notes from the past week. Still, maybe there was a way to make it work. “I have to be there, right?”

  “Yes.” Megan could feel the woman’s disapproval. “Of course. You’ll come in with Jordan, and the two of you will spend an hour or so getting to know his special friend. Then, if you’re all comfortable with the idea, Mr. Cummins can spend another hour or so with your son either at the club or across the street at the park.”

  “Right.” Megan pictured Jordan, the way his eyes would light up when he heard the news. He deserved this; she believed that with all her heart. Work would simply have to wait. “Okay, that’ll be fine.” She killed a heavy sigh before it could escape. “Three o’clock Friday.”

  As she hung up, Megan realized something. Already she was looking forward to Friday, to meeting this Casey man and watching the way he might interact with her son. It was a wonderful idea, one that didn’t rely on her dating and coaxing someone into being a surrogate father for Jordan. Healing Hearts was a program based on honesty and need, where expectations and guidelines were spelled out from the beginning.

  Jordan and Casey would get together once or twice a week and possibly speak on the phone. All of them would meet with the counselors at the Children’s Organization every month to discuss how the relationship was progressing, and to give each of them a chance to ask questions or air concerns.

  Of course it was a good thing, and it was worth every minute of work she might have to forfeit to see that the setup was successful. Megan had planned to wait until after work to tell Jordan about the phone call, but suddenly she couldn’t think of anything else. She picked up the receiver again and dialed her home number. Jordan answered after only a few seconds.

  “Hello?”

  His young voice filled her heart, and her eyes felt watery. “Hi, honey. It’s Mom.”

  “Hi! When’re you coming home?”

  “Soon.” She gazed out her window and tried to picture his face. “Jordan, I got a call from the Children’s Organization today. You know… the ones trying to find you a special friend?”

  Jordan sucked in a loud breath, and his words were louder and faster than before. “You mean … they found him?”

  “Yes … yes, they found him.” A sound that was part laugh, part sob slipped from Megan’s throat, and for a few seconds she covered her mouth with her fingertips. “In fact, I think they found someone just right for you, buddy.”

  The phone was ringing as Casey slipped through his apartment door and tossed his jacket on the chair. Work had been busy, but the wind gusts were worse than usual. At least once for each of the last ten blocks he’d thought about giving up and grabbing a taxi. But he’d pressed on, and now he was glad. He felt alive and awake, the same way he’d felt since doing the interview with the people at the Children’s Organization.

  He hadn’t even been assigned a child yet, and already Healing Hearts was living up to its name.

  He darted around the back of his old, worn sofa into the kitchen, and picked up the phone just as the answering machine clicked on. “Hello?” He cradled the receiver between his cheekbone and shoulder and tore the gloves from his hands. The moment his fingers were free, he punched the Off button on the answering machine. “Hello?”

  “Yes, hi, this is Mrs. Eccles at the Manhattan Children’s Organization. We’ve matched you up with an eight-year-old boy, and we were wondering if you were available to meet him this Friday?”

  The room began to spin. Casey felt behind him for one of the kitchen chairs. He positioned it and sank to the seat. “This Friday?” His words were little more than a whisper, and he repeated them again. “This Friday, the fourteenth?”

  “Yes.” The woman gave a happy laugh. “If that works for you.”

  Mrs. Eccles had said it could take six weeks to make a match between volunteers and children, but Billy-G had disagreed. “Two weeks tops.” He had given a wave of his favorite spatula. “I have a feelin’. Two weeks, Casey.”

  Indeed.

  Casey switched the receiver to the other hand and leaned back in the chair. “Friday would be perfect. Tell me … tell me about the boy.”

  “Okay.” Mrs. Eccles drew a quick breath. “Well, he’s a darling little guy, eight years old and midway through second grade. He likes a lot of the things you like, and he lives with his mother and grandmother on the Upper East Side.”

  “His father?” Casey almost hated to ask because the answer was obvious. The boy wouldn’t be in the program if his father were alive.

  “The man was in his fifties, a bond trader who died of a massive heart attack a few years ago at work. Since then the boy’s mother and teachers have noticed a change in his behavior, enough that he’s had counseling and other help. He’s responded lately to spending more time with his mother.” Mrs. Eccles hesitated. “Unfortunately, his mother is a district attorney, and she can’t be home with the boy as often as she’d like.”

  The picture was as clear as air. The boy’s mother loved him enough to sign him up for the program. But on her own, she simply couldn’t make up for all the boy had lost when his father died. Casey stood and poured a glass of water. He wasn’t dizzy anymore, but a certain kind of giddiness had come over him.

  A child needed him!

  He was about to get involved in the life of an eight-year-old boy, something he was certain Amy would’ve wanted him to do.

  Mrs. Eccles was going over some of the details, and Casey tried to focus on what she was saying. Something about coming at three o’clock and expecting an hour-long meeting with the boy’s mother, and possibly having another few hours with the boy after that.
Then, if the first meeting went well, he’d be given the boy’s phone number and address.

  “If Friday’s a success, you can take the boy out for pizza. Something to break the ice.”

  Casey wrote “pizza” across the top of a pad of paper.

  The woman was about to hang up when Casey remembered something. “You didn’t tell me his name.”

  “Oh … sorry.” He could hear a smile in the woman’s voice. “His name’s Jordan.”

  It was all Casey could do to finish the phone call. The boy’s name was Jordan? How was that possible? He hung up the phone and walked across his apartment to the bedroom he’d shared with Amy. Her journal still lay in the nightstand beside their bed, and now he opened the drawer and pulled it out.

  The book was worn and flimsy, with a light tan leather binding. Amy had saved favorite sermon notes and Bible verses on pieces of paper that still stuck out every twenty pages or so. Casey held it carefully, as though any sudden movement might break it in half. Inside the front cover, Amy’s name was barely visible, scrawled in blue ink across the center of the page.

  It was the same journal she’d had with her in Haiti, the year Casey had first met her.

  He ran his fingers across the letters of her name and flipped past the accounts of how the two of them had met and the detailed feelings she’d had for him even back then, past the entries she’d made when they were dating, past every other passage, all of which she’d shared with him many times.

  Then, at the back of the journal, he found it.

  A list of baby names, names Amy and he had discussed and agreed on for their first child. He already knew what he’d find on the list, but he had to look anyway, and as his eyes scanned the names he saw he’d been right.

  Amy had thought she was having a boy, but they’d come up with names for both a boy and a girl—just in case. The list held ten names, five for a girl, and five for a boy. And next to the name they liked best, Amy had doodled a happy face.

  Her favorites were written over several times and stood out in bold on the finely pressed piece of paper. Kaley for a girl, and for a boy they’d chosen the name they’d most easily agreed upon.

  Jordan Matthew.

  Casey stared at the name and imagined the odds that Mrs. Eccles would pair him up with a boy named Jordan. Seconds passed, and chill bumps rose on Casey’s arms and across the back of his neck. What was it Amy liked to say? Something about Christmas miracles. Yes, that was it. She used to tell him that Christmas miracles happened to those who believed.

  He would tease her and tell her she was wrong. With her in his life, miracles happened every day of the year. But she had been adamant, insisting that something special happened to people at Christmastime, and that Christmas miracles were there if only people looked for them.

  Casey shifted his gaze to the picture of Amy that hung on the wall nearby. Were you right? All this time … ?

  If Christmas miracles really were a special kind of something that happened once a year for those who believed, then Casey was certain that wherever Amy was at that very moment, she was smiling down at him, glowing with that special something that had won him over so easily the first day he met her.

  Because here and now, six weeks before Christmas, Casey was suddenly convinced that a miracle was in the works, and that somehow it involved an eight-year-old boy named Jordan.

  Even if the two of them wouldn’t meet until that Friday afternoon.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  God had finally read his letter.

  That was the only way Jordan could explain the things that were happening to him. He and his mother had spent more time together the past month than all the months before as far back as Jordan could remember. And then she’d found out about the special program. Healy Hearts. At least that’s what Jordan thought it was called, not that it mattered, really.

  The important thing was, God had found him a daddy.

  Well, not a daddy really, but a pretend daddy. Someone who would play with him every week and take him to the park and help him with his pluses and minuses the way Keith’s daddy helped him.

  Jordan was so excited about the whole thing, he could barely sleep. He’d lie in bed and stare at the blue-and-white-striped wallpaper and the little row of baseball gloves and bats that went around the top of his room, and picture God getting his letter and opening it and knowing that the program, the Healy Hearts thing, would be the perfect way to give him a daddy.

  He tried not to, but lots of times that week he asked his grandma questions about that coming Friday.

  On Wednesday he found her and tugged on her sleeve. “How many days, Grandma?”

  “Until what?”

  “Until I meet him. How many days?”

  His grandma let out another huffy breath and patted his head. “Two days, Jordan. One less than yesterday. Don’t keep asking.”

  “Do you think he’ll be nice?”

  “Very nice.”

  “Should I tell him my knock-knock joke about the chicken and the bulldog?”

  “Sure, Jordan, tell him the joke.” His grandma turned her attention back to the television. “Most men like jokes.”

  “What if he wants to be my daddy, Grandma. What then?”

  “Jordan … ” His grandma put her hands over her face and sort of stretched out the skin on her forehead until the bunches disappeared. “Your mother already talked to you about that. The man’s name is Casey, and he won’t be your daddy. Just a special friend.”

  “But kind of like a pretend daddy, right, Grandma?”

  “No, Jordan. Not like a pretend daddy. Like a special friend. That’s what he is, a special friend.”

  “Oh.” Jordan thought about that for a minute. “But if he wants to move in with us, can he sleep in my bedroom?”

  Grandma took tight hold of the arms of her chair and her eyes got wide. “He won’t be moving in with us, Jordan. You need to understand that. Not now and not ever.”

  “Okay.” Jordan waited until his grandma turned back to the TV one more time. Then as soft as he could, he did one more tug on her sleeve.

  “My goodness, child.” Grandma’s voice was louder than before, and her eyebrows disappeared into her forehead. “Can’t you leave an old woman in peace?”

  “Just one more question.” Jordan made his voice nice and quiet, the way Grandma liked it. Then he smiled just in case she might say no.

  “Oh, bother.” Grandma slid down a little in her big chair, and her bones got smaller in her shoulders. “Go ahead.”

  “What if … what if he doesn’t like me?”

  Grandma sat up straight again, and her eyes got softer. “Of course he’ll like you.” She reached out one arm and gave him a half hug. “Just don’t ask him a hundred questions.”

  By Friday morning, Jordan was so excited he couldn’t eat breakfast. This time the questions went to his mother. How many hours until they could meet him? What would he look like? Where would they go and what would they do? And most of all, what if Casey didn’t like him? His mommy was starting to breathe hard, and Jordan was sure she was going to get mad at him, when all of a sudden she did something really strange, something she never did when she was getting ready in the morning.

  She laughed.

  Then she messed up his hair and set a glass of orange juice down in front of him. “Jordan, I don’t have all the answers this time. Besides, I should be the one asking how many hours until we meet him.” She planted her hands on her hips. “Because then you’ll finally have all the answers you need.”

  Jordan laughed, too, but after that he tried not to ask any more questions the rest of the morning. His mother was right. She didn’t know all the answers, but God did. And a little while later, on the way to school, Jordan added a P.S. to his letter. A P.S. was when you wrote a letter and remembered one more special thing you forgot to say.

  His mother was reading one of her files, so Jordan looked out the window of the cab and made his P.S. extra quiet. So
only God could hear.

  “P.S., God. Please make Casey like me.”

  Jordan hardly listened to Miss Hanson that day, and twice he had to sit at the back of the room for not paying attention. But that didn’t matter because when the bell rang, his mother picked him up in a taxi, and off they went to the kids’ club, the place where he was going to meet his pretend daddy.

  Except he wasn’t going to tell that to anyone else, just himself. Because other people would call Casey a special friend, and that was his ‘ficial title. But Jordan knew the truth. They walked in, and the same lady they met before took them to a room, and just then his mommy’s pager went off.

  “Phone call,” she said. She smiled at the lady and held up her finger. “Just a minute.”

  When his mommy hung up, she talked to the lady in private for a long time, and Jordan heard only a few of their words. Something about an emergency situation and how it would never happen again and that his mother was very sorry. Then the lady from the club gave Mommy a mean sort of look and did a frowny face for a long time and said just this once maybe.

  Finally, Mommy and the lady came over to him.

  “Sweetheart”—his mother scrunched down so they were the same size—”Mommy has a special meeting at work, and I can’t stay to meet Casey. Not this time.” She looked at the other lady. “But Mrs. Eccles will stay with you after Casey comes, and everything will be fine. I’ll meet him next week, okay?”

  Jordan had a hurt feeling in his heart, but he decided this wouldn’t be a good time to cry. Besides, his mommy had special meetings all the time, and at least he was still going to meet Casey. “Okay.”

  His mom left, and after another minute, Mrs. Eccles came back, and this time she had a man with her. A man who looked tall and strong and happy like Brett Favre of the Green Bay Packers. He walked up and held out his hand and did a kind of smile that made Jordan feel all warm and safe inside. “Hi, Jordan. I’m Casey.”

  “Hi, Casey.” Jordan shook the man’s hand, and right then and there he knew for sure. Casey was a pretend daddy, not a special friend. Because sometimes Jordan dreamed about having a daddy again, and every time the daddy in his dream looked the same way.