Free Somewhere Between Luck and Trust by Emilie Richards Page B

hunted for candles and flashlights, since losing power seemed like a good possibility. She had found both, plus an oil lantern filled and ready in case of emergencies. A larger problem was what to do with herself.
    Even with electricity the day had inched along like molasses in January. Yesterday she had inventoried the cupboards and refrigerator. Samantha had made sure she knew all the food was to be eaten, and there were a variety of canned and packaged foods as well as fresh vegetables and fruits, frozen hamburger and chicken.
    Samantha had left cash, as well. While living and working in Berle, Cristy had saved what she could, but every bit of it was gone now, spent for necessities at the prison canteen, along with the extravagant forty cents a day she had earned working in the kitchen. She didn’t want to use Samantha’s money, but she knew she would have to dip into it until she found some way of earning her own. If nothing else, she had to have gas to make trips to see Michael.
    Thinking about Michael had the same effect on her spirits as the storm.
    She could have gone to see the baby yesterday, as planned. Her son was already four months old, older than Harmony’s Lottie. Berdine had sent photos while she was in prison, but Cristy had only glanced at them, not willing to look closely. What hair he had seemed to be an indeterminate color. His face wasn’t shaped like hers, and his eyes were brown, like the Reverend Roger Haviland’s.
    And Jackson’s.
    If she waited too long to visit, Michael might be frightened to let her hold him. She knew babies often developed something called stranger anxiety. She had paid attention in Samantha’s class, although being there hadn’t been her choice. But she was used to listening, used to paying attention to everything that was said to her and around her. She remembered almost everything she heard, and most of the time she could recite whole conversations verbatim.
    Not that having that talent had done her much good on written exams.
    She was out of prison now. She had paid her so-called debt to the citizens of the great state of North Carolina, but she was still the loser she had always been, only this time, she was a loser with a baby she was afraid to see.
    This morning she had cleaned the house from top to bottom, although there had been little to sweep or wipe away. Then after lunch she’d tried to watch a DVD, but she hadn’t been able to concentrate. Now she tried to nap to soft music from the CD player, but when she found she couldn’t, she leafed through a couple of fashion magazines from a neat pile on an end table. The clothes looked as if they belonged to women from a different planet. After prison’s blues and pale greens, the variety, the colors, were overwhelming, and she was sure the prices were, as well.
    In a cabinet in the living room she found a stack of jigsaw puzzles and pulled out what looked like the hardest. She wondered if all the pieces were in the box, then wondered why she cared.
    She hoped tomorrow would be sunny. She might not feel comfortable outdoors by herself, but she had to learn to be. She would make herself take a walk, make herself take her car from the barn and park it below the house.
    She had to get out. She had to try. But for whom? For what?
    Right now a real life seemed as unattainable as a pardon. She had no high school diploma, no skills except floral design, no money except what a kind young woman had given her. She would scour the immediate area for a job, but even if such a thing existed, she was still an ex-con, a felon who had tried to steal a diamond ring. What business would feel confident allowing her to operate a cash register or work on a sales floor?
    And so many jobs were beyond her skills, anyway.
    She dumped the puzzle on a small table by the living room window and began to turn over the pieces so she could see what she had. Outside the wind howled and the sky grew darker, until lightning briefly illuminated the