Free Tessa (From Fear to Faith) by Melissa Wiltrout Page A

on the way home.”
    I shrugged. “Nothing new. Just Gary acting like a moron again.” I paused and poured spaghetti sauce over my meatballs. “I guess there’s some kind of special event tomorrow.”
    “Oh? What’s happening?”
    “I’m not quite sure.” I could feel a tickling sensation as the mouse burrowed around in my pocket. What if she crawled out?
    “They didn’t tell you what it was?”
    I reached down and pushed Genevieve back into my pocket, then plugged the opening with my hand. “Well, they did . . . but I don’t remember. It’s nothing important.”
    Mom studied my face, but she didn’t inquire further. I was glad. I didn’t want her to know there was still a slight fuzziness in my head. Sometimes I had trouble remembering things.
    Later that evening, after she had cleaned up the dishes, Mom stopped by my bedroom. I was sitting on the floor in front of the open closet door, putting the finishing touches on a tiny box I’d made from a margarine carton. A faint odor of sour milk hung in the air.
    “How’s the critter?” Mom asked.
    “She’s sleeping.”
    “You need to get started on your homework.”
    I shrugged. Opening one end of the box, I began filling it with fine shreds of tissue.
    “You can’t take the mouse to school with you tomorrow,” Mom said.
    “Yes I can. I’m gonna put her in this box so she can’t escape. Nobody will know.”
    “You’re not taking it,” she repeated. “I will personally see to that.”
    I twisted around to face her. “But, Mom! I can’t leave her here. She’ll die.”
    “I guess you’ll have to find her a babysitter, then.” A slight smile played across her lips. Was she making me some kind of offer?
    I hesitated. “Well . . . you gotta be awfully careful with her, you know. She’s so little, and…”
    “Stop your worrying. I’ve raised three babies; I guess I can babysit a fourth.”
    “You mean you really would? You’d feed her and everything?” I couldn’t contain my delight.
    Mom laughed. “I don’t think I have any choice, do I? Now you get after that homework; and when you’re done, we’ll see what we can do with the little critter.”
    ***
    I worked on homework at the kitchen table until almost nine o’clock. By then, the mouse had set up a persistent squeaking inside my pocket. Mom unglued herself from the TV, warmed a cupful of milk in the microwave, and brought it over to the table.
    “Before you feed her, you should check the temperature of the milk on your wrist, like this,” she said. “This feels just about right.”
    Following her example, I dipped a finger in the milk and sprinkled my wrist. I couldn’t even feel the drops. “I didn’t think about heating it,” I said.
    “It’s a good idea. It’ll keep her from getting chilled and make it easier to digest too.”
    I dipped a bottle cap into the milk and tried once more to feed the mouse, with the usual results. Mom watched, her face thoughtful.
    “I have an idea,” she said. She disappeared down the hall toward the bathroom, returning a moment later with a cotton swab. “Here. Dip this in the milk and let her suck it.”
    After one or two false starts, the mouse began sucking vigorously on the swab. Mom helped me add drops of milk one by one.
    “This works pretty good,” I said after a while. “Where’d you learn all this?”
    “Oh, it’s just mothers’ instinct. But I think she’s had enough for now. If you overfeed her, she’ll get sick.” Mom stood up and stretched. “Wipe her all over, especially on the bottom. I’ll get a bed ready for her.”
    I watched as Mom laid an old dishrag in the bottom of a shoebox and built a nest of torn tissues in the corner. Then she set the box on my dresser, bending the gooseneck lamp down close to the nest.
    “That should do it,” she said. “She’ll move away from the light if it gets too hot. Now you better hurry and get to bed, because you’ve got about four hours, if that, before she’s gonna