Night after night, his daughter had cried herself to sleep, only to awaken in the wee hours, screaming with nightmares. Nothing he’d tried had comforted her, and he’d never felt more helpless, more useless in his life. “It just didn’t work.”
“That doesn’t mean it won’t now,” she said. “Maybe Kitty was too young then or the counselor’s personality didn’t click with hers. If she needs help—”
Finding it difficult not to leap to his feet and pace, Jack interrupted. “She doesn’t. All she needs is more time.”
“It’s been two years since her mother’s death. If Kitty was going to recover on her own, don’t you think she would have shown more progress by now?”
“It takes as long as it takes. There’s no set timetable for grieving.” God knows, it had taken him a long time even to begin to accept Gina’s death. It wasn’t any surprise to him that it would take Kitty longer.
Ms. Walsh inhaled deeply, and Jack suspected she was counting to ten. Seeing her rein in her emotions certainly was a switch, as was the calm, well-modulated tone she used next. Had someone been coaching her? Perhaps Ms. Walsh had gone to irritation-management classes.
“Of course, there isn’t,” she said, “but sometimes people need a little help with this kind of an adjustment. The social worker here does wonderful work with grieving children. I could get Kitty in to see her early next week.”
“No.”
She blinked, then shot him a startled glance as if she couldn’t believe he wasn’t going to add a sentence of justification she could refute. Too bad. Creating and tolerating uncomfortable silences was part of his job.
“That won’t do, Mr. Granger.” Her voice gained volume with every word. “It won’t do at all. Whatever is going on with Kitty, it’s draining the sparkle and life right out of her, and it’s taking a serious toll on her schoolwork.”
Jack smiled inwardly. Whoever got angry first always lost the argument. “I’m beginning to think that maybe you don’t know as much about children as you think you do, Ms. Walsh. I’ve done everything you’ve suggested—”
She cut him off with an impatient chop of one hand. “I know you’ve tried, but it’s simply not enough. As it stands now, I can’t promote Kitty to second grade unless she develops some concentration and catches up. She’s too far behind the other children.”
“What?” Dammit, even he had a limit to the amount of aggravation he could take at one sitting. Pushing back his chair, he stood again, straightening to his full height. “You’ve never said that before and the school year’s almost over. Why did you wait so long?”
Ms. Walsh rose and tipped her head way back to meet his gaze. The top of her head didn’t even reach his shoulder, but if his height advantage bothered her, he couldn’t detect it.
“Like you, I’ve been hoping Kitty would come around,” she said. “She’s an extremely bright little girl, but she spends most of the day staring off into space and refusing to participate in class activities with the other children. She’s not retaining what she does manage to learn from one day to the next, and she needs to stay on task until she finishes her assignments.”
“You are not going to hold her back,” Jack insisted. “I’ll go to the principal, the superintendent of public instruction, or the president of the school board if I have to, but you will not hold her back.”
The look she gave him could have melted granite. “Go right ahead,” she said, mimicking his posture and his soft, deadly tone. “They’ll tell you that first grade is absolutely vital to her future academic success.”
“Give me a break. She’s only six years old.” He propped his hands on his hips. “What’s so important about the first grade that it can ruin the rest of her school career?”
“Oh, nothing much. First grade is only where they learn to read. And do simple arithmetic and a whole lot of other things that Kitty isn’t getting.”
Ms. Walsh waved one hand in front of her body as if to encompass the entire room. “It may not seem like much to you, but for the next eleven years everything she studies will build on what she’s supposed to learn here. If she doesn’t conquer the basics now, she’ll struggle through every class she ever takes. Is that what you want for her?”
For a long, excruciating moment, he remained silent, feeling ashamed of himself for taking a cheap shot at a woman who, even though she annoyed the devil out of him, obviously cared a great deal about his daughter. “Of course I don’t want that.”
Jack felt a knot of fire in the center of his chest. He stepped away from the visitor’s chair, wanting to leave and regroup before he said something he’d regret. “I’ll have to take this under advisement.” He pushed back his cuff and glanced at his watch. “I need to be home in fifteen minutes. I’ll let you know what I decide.”
“Hold it right there!” She scrambled out from behind her desk as if she had some notion of blocking his path. “We’re not finished. I need a better answer than that.”
“I said,” he said through gritted teeth, “I’ll get back to you.”
She narrowed her eyes and stuck out her chin. “When?”
“Will next week be soon enough for you?” He turned and started for the doorway.
“No, it will not.” She hurried after him. “None of this is for me, Mr. Granger. It’s for Kitty. Can’t you see that your child is suffering? And you’re just letting it go on and on. She deserves better from you than you’re giving her.”
Literally seeing red at her accusations, he came to an abrupt halt and turned back around to face her. “Do you have any children, Ms. Walsh?”
She paled, and for the first time, her gaze failed to meet his. “No, I don’t.”
He laughed, but it wasn’t a pleasant sound, even to his own ears. “Why am I not surprised? It’s always easy to criticize what you don’t understand, isn’t it.”
“I didn’t mean to insult you.” She reached out, as if she would touch his arm. He stepped back out of range and waited until she lowered her hand to her side.
“Well, you did. And let me tell you, being a parent is a lot harder than it looks to people who’ve never tried it. Before you start throwing around remarks like that, maybe you should get married and try having a kid of your own.”
Ignoring her horrified expression, he strode out of the room and down the hallway, and slammed through the school’s front doors. He desperately wanted to get in his car and drive as fast and as far away from this school, Ms. Walsh and all of Spokane, Washington, as possible, and never come back. But he couldn’t give up and run away.
Though he might be a miserable failure as a father, he was all Kitty had. And he was going to do right by her—whatever that meant.
Shading her eyes against the bright sunshine during recess the next morning, Abby Walsh watched Kitty Granger and felt an immediate, all-too-familiar tug at her heart. The little girl sat on the concrete step with her back against the school building, her skinny legs hugged tightly to her chest, her chin resting on her knees, lost in some lonely world only she could see.
Turning to her best friend, Erin Johnson, Abby asked, “Is it just me, or is that kid in serious trouble?”
Erin snorted, then stared at Abby in obvious disbelief. “Well, duh. That’s hardly normal behavior for a six-year-old.”
Abby allowed herself to relax a smidgeon. A child psychologist with a thriving practice, Erin always called things exactly the way she saw them. If Erin saw a problem, there must be one. Still, Abby couldn’t stop herself from asking for more reassurance. “You’re positive it’s not just me?”
“Your instincts are usually right on target when it comes