Free Pictures of Emily by Theresa Weir Page A

he’d chopped enough wood to last him several winters.
    Arms crossed at his chest, Sonny pushed himself away from the wall. “I won’t be far,” he muttered, silently cursing Martin and his X-ray vision.
    * * *
    Emily heard the front door close.
    Instead of putting the stethoscope to her chest, Martin got up, strode to the window and looked out. “There he goes. Straight for the woodpile.” He turned back to Emily. “How are you two getting along?”
    Her hand hovered near the buttons of her blouse. How does someone get along with Sonny, she wondered. “He’s a very private person,” she said.
    “No kidding. I first met him six years ago, when he donated money to add a children’s wing to the hospital. I consider him a friend, but I really don’t know him any better today than I did when we first met. But you’ve done something to break through that shell of his.”
    She shook her head. “I’m sure I don’t know him nearly as well as you do.”
    Martin shook his head. “You’ve gotten to him somehow. This place is sacred. It’s his sanctuary. Nobody, I mean nobody comes here. Before you arrived on the scene, I’d never gotten past the porch. And now I’m only here because you’re here.”
    He sat next to her on the edge of the bed, adjusting his stethoscope. She was hardly aware of the examination, caught up as she was in what he’d just told her about being allowed here—Sonny’s secret place.
    “Sounds good,” Martin said, removing the stethoscope. “I’ll talk to Sonny about bringing you to the hospital the day after tomorrow. We’ll take some X-rays and if they look okay, we’ll send you home. How does that sound?”
    Suddenly she wasn’t sure how it sounded. It would mean saying goodbye to Sonny.
    * * *
    The next day Sonny felt kind of silly, like someone reciting lines from a corny movie, but he asked Emily if she’d like to go for a walk.
    She smiled up at him, and his heart thudded in his chest. “I’d love to.”
    He’d never wanted anybody to see his place. Now, suddenly, he couldn’t wait for Emily to see his favorite spots.
    They walked around the spring-fed pond where he sometimes fished. Spring was Sonny’s favorite time of year. Maybe because everything was new. The grass was at its greenest, the air its cleanest. But he didn’t share those thoughts with Emily. He could only give away so much.
    “There are a hundred acres here,” he told her as they walked over the new grass. He wasn’t trying to impress her with the amount of land he owned—one hundred acres wouldn’t begin to keep a farmer in business. He simply used it to gauge the distance and space between himself and the rest of the world.
    Emily laughed and asked if he was like Owl in Winnie the Pooh .
    He didn’t get it.
    She must have noticed his puzzlement, because she said, “Owl lived in the hundred-acre wood, remember?”
    “Sure.” But he didn’t remember. He’d never read any kid’s stories. Whenever people made reference to a storybook character, he felt like a visitor from another planet.
    He took her to his favorite place: Spring Hollow. It couldn’t even be seen until you were right on it—a huge opening in the ground filled with moss-covered boulders bigger than houses. Water poured from the side of one rocky crevice, cascading over delicate ferns and moss.
    “It’s beautiful,” Emily said, her voice full of awe.
    She meant it. He could tell. And he was glad that she liked it here. This was new to him, sharing the beauty of nature with someone. He felt a brief moment of panic, afraid for himself.
    “I can feel the coolness from here,” she said, stepping closer to the side.
    Sonny grabbed her arm, afraid for her.
    “The hollow creates a cave effect,” he explained, gently urging her back. “It’s cool in the winter, warm in the summer. The Indians used to store food in some of those small caves.”
    He would have liked to take her down to the bottom, where the waterfall tumbled