A Valentine’s Day Miracle Page 2

  “Do something happy,” he says. “Then she’ll come down from her castle in the sky and try to stomp out all the fun.” He reaches over and takes a business card from a stack. “Or you can call her secretary tomorrow.”

  I take the card and tuck it into my pocket. “Thank you,” I say.

  He nods. “Any time.”

  We turn to walk away.

  “I did my good deed today,” the doorman calls out. People love to tell the Reeds about their good deeds, since it matters to them all.

  Paul turns back, smiling. “Oh yeah?” he asks. “What did you do?”

  “I took food to the girl who lives in the stairwell,” he says. “Miracle.”

  “You know her?”

  He shakes his head. “Never met her, myself. But she’s sort of a super-hero in this area. Everyone on this block takes turns making sure she has blankets and food. I just did my part.”

  “You should come by and sign up for a light on the Valentine heart,” Paul says. “All it takes is a good deed.”

  He shrugs. “All my wishes have been fulfilled.” He lifts a small framed photo that shows his lovely little family. I smile at his photo, and at his genuine delight in showing it to us. “I don’t need any wishes.”

  “So did you see Miracle when you went to take her food?”

  He shakes his head. “No one sees Miracle unless she wants to be seen. She comes and goes like the wind.”

  “We’re going to go by and check on her on the way home.”

  “She won’t be there. Not this time of night.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She’ll be out walking the streets, looking for her mother.”

  “She has a mother?” Paul asks.

  He frowns. “Not anymore. She hasn’t come home in weeks. Nobody has seen her. Not anywhere. Miracle used to sleep at night with her mother in the basement of that abandoned building. That’s why she stays there so much. She’s waiting for her mother to come home.”

  My heart lurches in my chest. “Do you know how old she is?”

  “If I had to guess, I’d say she’s about sixteen. Maybe less. It’s hard to tell.” He gives another shrug. “She’s stubborn as hell,” he says. “People all over town have offered her a warm place to stay, but she always refuses. And if they force her to leave, she goes with them kicking and scratching all the way, until they turn their backs and she gets away. She always goes back to the same place.”

  “What do you think happened to her mother?”

  He heaves a sigh. “She loved that little girl, and she’d never stay gone this long unless something was wrong. Honestly? I think she’s probably dead. Otherwise, she would have come back for her already.”

  We leave there with my heart feeling heavier than it has in a long time. Paul takes my hand in his and holds it, our gloves no barrier against the warmth of mutual love between us. “You okay?” he asks.

  I nod, but I say nothing. We do swing by the abandoned building, but no one is there. The basement is a hollowed-out shell, and it’s cold. Really cold. We see a pile of blankets neatly stacked in the corner, and a small pile of canned goods next to them. Nothing else. No furniture. No people. Nothing.

  “Where do you think she is?” Paul asks.

  “She’s probably out looking for her mother,” I reply. And my heart breaks all over again for a child I don’t even know.

  Matt

  I stomp snow from my boots and growl under my breath. I can’t figure out how the hell I ended up with this errand.

  “Do you see anything?” Sky asks. She squints her eyes because the snow is blowing so hard that we can only see two feet in front of us.

  “I can barely see you,” I say over the wind, “much less anything else.”

  Paul called two hours ago and asked me to pay a visit to the basement apartment on Fifth Street to see if a little girl named Miracle was there. Of course, as soon as Sky heard about a little girl living in a cold basement in the middle of winter, she insisted on coming with me. Since our oldest son, Seth, was at home, we were able to go out. Seth is in college and isn’t home that often.

  It’s rare for the two of us to be alone together, and I find myself with the almost insatiable urge to jump her bones every time I look at her. We have six kids and another on the way. We haven’t even told anyone about the pregnancy, because this one was definitely not planned. Then again, none of our kids were planned. Sky certainly didn’t plan to get custody of our oldest three kids when her half sister died, our twins were the result of a condom breaking in a broom closet at a wedding, and our youngest just sort of happened. Sky had said “no more” but then…well…that didn’t happen.

  “We need to get you back inside,” I say. “She’s not here.”

  “Let’s at least go inside the building,” Sky says. “If it was one of our daughters…” She lets her voice trail off and shakes the thought from her head. “I’m going to check.”

  She starts down the steps, which have thankfully been protected from the weather. Mostly. They’re a little icy, but not dangerous. At the bottom, she turns back to see if I’m following. I am. I’d follow her just about anywhere and she knows it. “I’m right here,” I say from behind her. I’ll always be right here, behind her, no matter what.

  I turn the knob on the door and shove it open with my shoulder. I walk into the space, using the flashlight on my phone to light the way. I stop short when something moves on my left. I shove Sky behind me and focus my light on the pile of blankets in the corner.

  “Who’s there?” I ask.

  Two hands emerge from the pile of blankets. Then I notice more piles of blankets moving around and more people sitting up, clutching their covers to their chests, squinting their eyes at my light.

  “Who are you?” a voice asks.

  I shine the light toward the sound and see a man with a ginger beard. He has a stocking cap pulled down over his hair.

  “I’m Matthew Reed,” I explain, suddenly feeling like I’m intruding somewhere I shouldn’t be. “Who are you?”

  He shoves his covers down and lumbers to his feet. He shuffles toward me and I see that his feet are clad in thick stockings. A pair of boots with no laces lie next to his pile of blankets. He steps closer to me, and I keep Sky behind me. The man extends his hand. “My name is Andy,” he says. “It’s nice to meet you.”

  “Do you all live here?” Sky asks from behind me. She gooses me in the side until I move over, and then she steps up beside me.

  He chuckles. “No, we don’t live here. This is Miracle’s place. Miracle and her mama claimed it a long time ago.”

  “Then why are you here?” I ask.

  “It’s cold outside, Mr. Reed,” he says quietly. “Miracle keeps getting blankets delivered, and food. And she told us all to come over to get out of the weather, and to get a bite to eat.” He yanks his stocking cap from his head and holds it in his hand. “We were only planning to stay the night. It’s cold out.” He wraps his arms around himself. “Miracle, she’s a godsend, Mr. Reed. Tonight’s supposed to be the coldest night of the year. We’d die out there if not for her sharing her space. And her food. And her blankets.”

  My gut reacts, and suddenly every hair on my body stands up. “How many of you are here?” I ask.

  He glances around as I shine the light into the corners of the large area. “I’d say about thirty.” He dances from one foot to another. “Like I said, we’ll be gone once the sun comes up. We’ll clean up behind ourselves.” He points toward the corner. “We just had to get the babies out of the cold.”

  Sky inhales audibly as I shine my light toward that corner. On blankets lie eight children, from toddlers to school-aged children. They’re sleeping in a pile, just like our children do when they visit their cousins. One of the smallest children sleeps on his knees with his butt in the air. Another has a thumb stuck in his mouth. When Andy sees that most of their covers have been kicked off, he goes and replaces them.

  Sky g
rabs my arm and jerks it so I look at her. “There are children here, Matt,” she whispers fiercely.

  I wrap my arm around her waist. “I see that.” I don’t know what else to say.

  “Whose children are they?” Sky asks Andy.

  “Two of them are mine, and the rest belong to my friends here.” His friends stare warily at us from their piles of blankets. “Like I said,” he states again, “we’ll be out of here once the sun comes up. And we’ll be sure to clean up our mess, just like Miracle told us to.”

  “Do you know where I can find Miracle?” I ask.

  “Why do you want her?” he counters, his brow furrowing as his eyes narrow with suspicion.

  I hold up my hands like I’m surrendering to the cops. “I just want to help her.”

  A laugh bursts from his throat. “Miracle is the last person who needs help. That girl can do anything.” He runs a hand through his red hair. “You don’t have to worry about her.”

  I say nothing, because I couldn’t collect my thoughts right now if I had a bucket to carry them in.

  “You leave Miss Miracle alone, you hear?” he says quietly. His voice is little more than a growl now.

  I nod. “I just wanted to help her.”

  “Everybody wants to help her. But she doesn’t want help. She doesn’t need help. She needs to be left alone to wait for her mama to come back.”

  “Do you think she’ll come back?” Sky asks.

  His mouth opens and closes a couple of times. “I certainly hope so, for Miracle’s sake.”

  “Where is Miracle now?” I ask.

  “She took a pile of blankets and went to go pass them out to the homeless people who refused to come here. She’ll be back shortly.”

  “She’s giving away her blankets?”

  “Miracle gives away everything she doesn’t need. Shoes. Clothes. Food. Medicine. If Miracle has it and you need it, you get it. That’s what she does. Her mama always did the same thing. Until she left, that is.”

  The door behind us opens with a cold gust of wind. A woman and a man step into the room, each of whom holds a small child.

  “Miracle send you?” Andy asks them.

  The woman nods. Andy goes and gets a pile of blankets for them and leads them toward an empty spot. He gives them cans of food and offers them an open box of pizza, but they refuse.

  Finally, Andy walks back toward us. “Is there anything else I can do to help you?” he asks.

  I shake my head. “Is there anything we can do for you?”

  He smiles at us. “You do enough already, Mr. Reed.”

  “Matt,” I correct. “Just Matt will do. And I haven’t done anything for you. Not yet.”

  He laughs. “Those blankets and the food came to Miracle because of your work with the wish project. So I’d say you have.”

  Our wish project did all that?

  “And tomorrow, when we all go to the food bank for lunch, that’ll be because someone donated the money they would have spent for their Valentine’s dinner on food for us.”

  “What do you need? Is there anything specific I can do for you?”

  “A hand up,” he says. “Not a handout.”

  That statement hits me like a ton of bricks falling from the sky. “Can we come back tomorrow to discuss it?” I ask.

  “We have everything we need for today, Matt. But thank you.”

  “Okay,” I say softly. I shake hands with him again and lead Sky toward the door.

  Sky turns back. “It was nice to meet you, Andy,” she says.

  He nods and smiles at her but says nothing more.

  Sky

  Matt is quiet as we go home. The snow and harsh wind make it difficult to talk anyway, but I’m pretty sure that Matt’s being quiet because he’s trying to figure out his next step. He will want to help those people. But he’ll also want to figure out how to help them while maintaining their pride. I could tell that Andy was a prideful man—a prideful man who was cold or he never would have been where he was.

  We stamp the snow from our boots outside and go up to our apartment, but Matt pushes the button for Paul’s floor instead. “I want to go talk to him,” he says quietly. “You want to go with me?”

  I say nothing, and just lean my hip against the wall of the elevator and regard the man I married. His long blond hair is pulled back in a low ponytail that gathers at the nape of his neck. Blue eyes meet mine, and I see them flick away quickly, proof that he’s worried about something.

  We remove our snow gear outside Paul and Friday’s door and Matt knocks softly. He doesn’t wait for a response. He opens the door. Most of the brothers still do that. They don’t usually knock. It never seems to bother Paul or Friday. In fact, I think Paul likes that his brothers come and go freely.

  We find them on the couch. Paul is sitting on one end and he has Friday’s feet in his lap as they watch TV. Paul reaches for the remote to pause his show. “You guys are out late,” he says.

  That’s how you can tell how old you’ve become. It’s barely ten o’clock and we all feel like it’s late.

  “We went by that basement to look for the girl you told us about.”

  Friday lifts her feet from Paul’s lap so she can sit up and we have room to sit down. “What did you find?”

  Matt chuckles. “A whole bunch of people who weren’t her.”

  “There were other people there?” Friday asks.

  “About twenty, not including the children, and people were still coming in as we left. Apparently, Miracle is inviting people to share her space to get out of the weather. She even shares blankets and food. It’s really pretty amazing.”

  “But she wasn’t there?” Paul asks.

  Matt shakes his head. “They said she was out giving blankets to homeless people.”

  “Wow,” Paul says.

  I clap my hands together, getting everyone’s attention. “So what are we going to do?”

  Paul scrubs a hand across his forehead. “I have no idea. I promised Hayley I’d look for the girl who lives in the stairwell.”

  “Why does she live in the stairwell?” Matt asks. We never really got the full story.

  “Apparently, she lives in the basement of that abandoned building. Her mother used to live with her, but her mother disappeared a few weeks ago. The locals think the mother must be dead. No one is sure. Not even Miracle.”

  “And the name is fitting,” I say. “The homeless people think of her like she’s a super hero. They are loyal to a fault. For good reason, considering all she does.”

  “But while she’s taking care of everyone else, who takes care of her?” Friday asks.

  Matt shakes his head. “No one, apparently.”

  “Can we at least get some heat in that building?” I blurt out. They had blankets, but it was so cold. “Depends on who owns it, I guess.”

  “Lady Humbug owns it,” Paul says.

  My heart plummets. There’s no way that Lady Humbug would let us do anything nice for the homeless in the area. “Could we turn the heat on without her knowing?”

  Matt grins at me. “I guess you’ll find out tomorrow.”

  “Can we just buy it? Maybe we could turn it into apartments for the homeless in transition.” Surely there’s something we can do.

  Paul shakes his head. “I can’t see any of us convincing her to do that. Not even Logan is charming enough to thaw that frozen heart.” He gives a mock shiver.

  Matt stands up. “So we went and checked. She wasn’t there. We found more problems, and we’ll see what we can do for the homeless in that building tomorrow. Did you need anything else, Your Highness?”

  Paul grins. “That will be all.” He indicates Matt’s dismissal, making a shooing motion with his hand.

  “Wait,” Friday calls out. “Where are all your children? I can’t remember the last time I saw the two of you alone.”

  “Seth came by for a visit,” I explain.

  “So you gave him all the kids.” Paul chuckles. “You wo
n’t see him again for months.”

  Matt shrugs. “The challenge of being the oldest child. I’m sure you understand.”

  Paul raised his brothers, so he understands all too well.

  Matt takes my hand and pulls me toward the door. He picks up our snow gear and carries it with us.

  We walk past a storage door on our way to the elevator. Matt jerks his head toward the area and grins playfully at me. “Want to take a five-minute break before we go back?”

  I nod and he pulls me into the tiny room and pushes me back against the door. “This is how I got pregnant with the twins,” I whisper.

  “I’m not too worried.” His lips touch my neck, right in that spot I like, and it’s twenty minutes—not five—later when we get back to our apartment.

  Seth is on the couch watching TV, and the kids are nowhere to be found. He gets up when we walk in the door. But he doesn’t get ready to leave. He goes to the kitchen. “So how’s it going?” he asks.

  There comes a time in a child’s life when they become someone new. They will always be your child, but they also become an adult, and Seth is heading in that direction.

  I fight off a yawn and sit down at the kitchen table with him and Matt, and I listen as he talks about school, his friends, his part-time job, and the girl he went out with the night before.

  It’s almost midnight when Seth leaves. He stops in the doorway of the room that Mellie and Joey still share, and then he goes to Hoppy and Matty’s room. Then he drops by Gracie’s bed and I would swear he’s counting her breaths.

  “I love you, Aunt Sky,” he whispers to me as he hugs me goodbye.

  “I love you too,” I say, and I kiss his cheek.

  Matt makes plans to attend Seth’s wrestling meet later in the week, but I know he was going anyway. It’s on the calendar.

  With his hand at the small of my back, Matt leads me to the bedroom, where I change into one of his shirts and climb into bed.

  “Do you think we could get power down there for space heaters?” I ask.

  He kisses the tip of my nose and pulls me to lie on his chest. “We’ll figure it out tomorrow.”