Read Three Little Words for Free Online Page B

daycare center.
    On my birthday the school bus dropped me off at Perfect Angels. Ms. Jamison was waiting with a big box from Aunt Leanne. I ran to claim my gifts. The box contained a new doll with matching clothes and a Chutes and Ladders board game. “Where are Lilly and Katie?” I asked.
    “Who?”
    “My favorite dolls!”
    “These are new presents, honey.” The caseworker stroked my red curls and turned to Mrs. Pace. “How’s she settling in at school?”
    “She’s a very good student—way ahead, even though she missed the first nine weeks.” She indicated Luke with her chin. “He’s finally stopped wandering around the house at night.”
    “When am I going home?” I whined.
    “Honey, you just go play and enjoy your birthday,” Mrs. Pace said. “Why don’t you show the other kids what you got?”
    I repacked the gifts in the box and vowed I would not let anyone else near them because the other kids destroyed everything they touched.
     

     
    Adele received her South Carolina foster care license on my sixth birthday, but she was told it would take several more months before the interstate paperwork would allow us to travel. She begged the officials to return us in time for Christmas. When it looked like that was not possible, she promised to send us some warm clothes and my dolls.
    Then, to everyone’s surprise, the documents were ready in early December, and we shuttled back to South Carolina.
    “Look, I lost a tooth!” I crowed when Adele met us at the airport.
    Grandpa was no longer there, which made life easier since there were no more raised voices or slammed doors. I felt comfortable in Adele’s loving embrace. On Christmas, I received a pink Barbie radio and a Precious Moments sleeping bag. I liked the way we did everything the same as we had the previous year, including opening one gift on Christmas Eve and the rest before breakfast the next morning. Then we had crisp bacon and biscuits before going to open more presents and have lunch with Adele’s grandchildren.
    “I want to do this next year too!” I said to Adele when she tucked us in that night.
    “Of course you will,” she assured me. “How else will Santa know where to find you?”
    “But what if they come to take me away again?” I asked.
    “They tricked me last time, but I’ll never let you go again.”
    “Promise?”
    She kissed my forehead. “You are here to stay.”
    By the time spring came, I had lost both front teeth. Adele made her granddaughters and me Easter outfits in pastel colors, and we celebrated with an Easter egg hunt and picnic in a park.
    Fresh flowers popped out of the grass every day like all the new lessons I learned in school. I couldn’t wait to see my teacher’s welcoming smile, open to the next page in a book, or start marking a clean work sheet with a sharpened pencil. I tried to keep these thoughts in mind as I made the scary walk down the long, rutted dirt road all by myself each morning. If it had rained, I had to try to balance on the high part to keep my shoes clean. If it had been dry for a spell, dust swirled around, and I had to breathe through my nose to keep from eating grit. Adele was always busy with Luke, so mostly, I had to plod along on my own. One morning I waited and waited, but the bus never came. I sat on the grassy shoulder and wrote my name in the dirt with a stick. I saw a rabbit scamper into a hole and wished I could follow him like Alice in Wonderland would have. After several hours the man who ran the mom-and-pop shop in town sauntered up to me. “What are you doing out here?”
    “Waitin’ for the school bus.”
    “Honey, there ain’t no school today. Didn’t Ms. Adele know that?” I shrugged. “Well, it’s a good thing someone told me about a little girl out here. Are you hungry?” I nodded.
    He led me to his store and gave me a Coke and a sandwich. While I was eating, his wife called Adele. When she arrived, Adele was flustered. “I told Ashley that I