Free The Way to Yesterday by Sharon Sala

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later. Her step was light, but her heart was lighter as she went upstairs
because her family was, once again, intact.
    Daniel pulled up in front of the school as Hope began scrambling with her
backpack.
    'Have a good day, honey," he said, and hugged her tight when she leaned
over for her goodbye kiss.
    'You, too, Daddy. I'll see you this evening, okay?"
    'Yep. And don't forget Mrs. Barnes is picking you up after school."
    'I know," she said, slamming the door behind her as she hurried up the
front walk toward the building. Daniel watched until he saw her enter the
building with several of her friends, then he drove away. His mind was already
shifting gears toward the preliminary hearing for one of his clients. He was
well prepared and wasn't worried about that outcome, but he was concerned about
Mary Faith. Even though she swore she felt fine and had shown no other symptoms
of being ill, he couldn't get over how startled he'd been when she'd fainted in
his arms. Her confusion afterward had cemented his worries even more. He made a
mental note that as soon as he got to the office, he was going to give their
family doctor a call. He wanted to hear someone else tell him there was nothing
for which he needed to be concerned.
    *
    Howard Lee Martin stepped out from beneath the trees on the south side of
the playground, watching as the last of the children entered the school
building to begin morning classes, then jammed his hands in his pockets and
started walking toward home. His mind was racing, his heart pounding with
anticipation. He'd seen her again. A perfect little angel. As he walked, he
began making a mental list of all the things he needed to purchase before the
adoption. Not for the first time, he wished he'd gotten a chance to talk to her.
He didn't know what kind of ice cream she liked best and he needed to know her
favorite color. They would play dress-up. Little angels like her always liked
to play dress-up. And then they would play house. Just the thought made him
smile. His mother had let him make a fort under the dining room table when he
was small, but little girls liked to play house, not cowboys and Indians. As he
pictured his mother, he grew sad. She'd been gone almost two years now. He
thought of the two little girls he'd recently adopted and sighed. His children
would never know their grandmother and that was too bad. She'd always wanted
him to marry and settle down.
    After she died, he'd tried to make friends, but he didn't know how. He'd
joined a church, but hadn't been able to bring himself to approach any of the
single women who attended. He'd begun hanging out at bowling alleys and coffee
shops, watching the interplay between other couples and trying to figure out
how it was done. Not for the first time, he thought that his mother had
demanded too much of his time. He'd never had the chance to socialize with the
opposite sex. It was only at his job that he'd come in contact with them, and
then he'd been too shy to do more than speak.
    Lately, his shyness had given way to frustration, then frustration to anger.
It wasn't fair. Everyone had someone but him. That's when he'd decided to make
his own family. Lots of single people adopted children. He read about it all
the time. But the process hadn't been as simple as he'd believed. He didn't
make enough money. He didn't have enough education. The excuses were endless,
but they all boiled down to one thing. The authorities were not going to let
him adopt. So he'd taken things into his own hands and done what he had to do.
    A cat dashed across the street in front of him, just ahead of a small, black
dog who was in pursuit. He laughed aloud, wishing the girls had been with him.
They would have enjoyed the sight. It was important for children to interact
with a parent, and he looked forward to the day when the transition from their
old life to the new one was complete. Right now they were shy of him, but he
had to believe the day would come when they would