The Girl with Bare Feet - L. Avery Brown (fiction book recommendations TXT) 📗

probably take some therapy but… therapy… I can handle therapy. How am I going to explain this to Wade?” Janelle stood up and felt almost giddy about the not so ominous discovery.

 

She made her way across the room and stepped out into the hall where she was greeted by Dumbo. He sniffed at her feet and licked the top of them. “Geez, Dumbo. That’s so disgusting. Let me guess, that’s you’re not so subtle way of saying ‘take me out.’ right?” Dumbo tilted his head to the side and woofed.

 

“Well, you’re going to have to wait. I have got to do some work today. Besides you went out a little while ago. There’s no way your bladder is that full.” Janelle made her way to the sunroom and sat at her desk. Janelle was able to focus on sketching out a couple of fairies and a dragon fly for a book called ‘The Dragon Fly Rodeo’.

 

Janelle grabbed some of her colored pencils and started filling in the sketch with some light color accents. “Hopefully, this is what Gillingham wants.”

 

She looked down at Dumbo. He was stretched out in a broad beam of sunshine. “Hey, you. What do you think?” Janelle held up the sketch and Dumbo paid little to no attention. “Fine. Be that way.” When she finished adding a few extra splashes of color, Janelle grabbed her phone and took some quick photos to send to Clarissa Gillingham hoping she’d be pleased with what she’d come up with.

 

Dumbo waddled over to her and licked her feet again. Glancing out the large windows of the sunroom, Janelle’s eyes focused on the ridge of hills beyond the water. The lake glistened and the trees just below the Blue Ridge horizon soaked up the sunlight. Dumbo licked her foot again then pawed her leg. “Alright boy. I hear you. Well, I feel your gross slobber. Let me check on the little humans then we’ll see about going on a walk.”

 

Janelle made her way upstairs and checked in on Liza and Peter. They were still both sound asleep. She turned on the monitor in the hallway and then put the receiver in her jacket pocket. She made her way down the stairs and grabbed Dumbo’s lead. Once they were outside, Janelle was taken away with the beauty of the quiet place. It was close to five o’clock. The sun was starting to cast a soft rosy hue across the ridge of mountains.

 

The lake stretched out so far, Janelle wondered how long it would probably take someone to actually row a boat out to the other side. She glanced back at the house and thought of how happy Wade’s family must have been to come here when Allison was alive. She felt a wave of melancholy overcome her as she thought about how hard it must have been for Lucas to spend so many hours out here building and building as he pondered what had happened to his daughter.

 

With Dumbo by her side, Janelle contemplated Lucas’s reluctance to visit the house now that it had been renovated. His vision of what the cabin could be was magnificent but Wade told her that once the last bit of work was done, Lucas decided he never wanted to come back. “Maybe the longer we’re here he’ll start to feel better and want to come out here. That way he can make new memories. Happy memories.” She sat on the lake’s shore and watched ripples float across the surface whenever a bug would alight or when a fish would jump up.

 

Her cell phone rang causing her to yelp with surprise. The Caller ID read ‘In-Laws’. She answered the phone. “Hi. Were your ears burning?”

 

Doris replied. “What?”

 

“Nothing. I was just sitting outside thinking about you and Lucas.”

 

“Oh, well, that’s sweet. No. I was calling to see if you wanted to come over for supper tonight.”

 

“Huh?”

 

“It’s Wednesday, Janelle. Wednesday services are tonight. I was wondering if you all were going to come by for dinner. You mentioned it last week. Don’t you remember?”

 

 “Oh, yeah. Sorry, I totally forgot. It’s been a long day. I didn’t sleep well last night.”

 

“I’m sorry, dear. Anything the matter?”

 

“No. I mentioned yesterday that Wade was out of town. And I had a rough night sleeping. I actually overslept this morning. When I got up it was almost so late. So, I decided the three of us would just make a day of it. I guess I missed Liza more than I imagined I would when she went to school the other day. And with Wade gone, I think I just needed to feel needed.”

 

“Well that is just downright precious.”

 

“I guess it is.” Janelle felt her phone vibrate in her hand. “Oh, sorry. I’ve got to go. My author is calling in to discuss some images I sent her.”

 

“No problem, Dear. So, can we expect you this evening?”

 

“I’ll have to call you back.” Janelle ended the call more abruptly than she wanted but speaking to Clarissa was more important than discussing dinner. “Hi. Did you get the images? … Good. How do they look? … That’s great. I’m glad. I was worried you were going to say they were blurry. I took some pictures the other day and I thought maybe I’d gotten moisture beneath the lens or something. So, you want me to keep with that feel? … Excellent. I’ll get to work on them straight away. So glad I was able to capture what you were hoping for. … Alright. Bye.”

 

She rubbed Dumbo’s ears. “It’s a yay moment, Dumbo. Aren’t you going to say yay? Or bark or do something? Well, fine. See how excited I get the next time you catch your tennis ball.”

 

Dumbo barked and wagged his tail. “Nope, it doesn’t count now.” She stood up and sighed. The sky was such a brilliant blue with just a hint of rose on the edge, the lake so glassy, and the backdrop of hills with trees already starting to show signs of the changing season inspired Janelle to do something she hated doing; taking a selfie. It was one thing to take pics of her with her family around herself with her family around but it just seemed sort of egotistical to take what she called self-admiring photos. But nonetheless, she wanted to capture the moment because it was truly picture perfect.

 

She stood right at the edge of the water by one of the big rocks, knelt down, and leaned in close to Dumbo. Then, with her arm extended and smiling broadly, Janelle looked at her image on the screen and positioned her thumb above the red button. But in the snippet of time it took for her thumb to make contact, Janelle saw the face of the girl she’d dreamed of so often pop up behind her.

 

Dumbo howled, Janelle stumbled backwards, and her cellphone fell out of her hand landing in about a quarter-inch of water. “Shit! Shit! Shit! ” Janelle grabbed it and immediately started drying it while turning around to make sure no one was there. She was alone.

 

Her hound yanked at the lead and barked like mad. “Dumbo, quiet! Stop!” Janelle’s mind raced trying to process what she’d seen or if she’d even seen anything at all.

 

Praying her phone was still functional, Janelle pressed the HOME button. The screen lit up. It was still on camera-mode. She touched DONE then GALLERY and took a deep breath to prepare herself for what either was or was not on the screen. Her finger shaking, Janelle triple tapped the last image; enlarging it while Dumbo kept up his frenzied barking and tugging on the lead.

 

“Damn it, Dumbo, I said stop!” Her heart started to pound when she looked at the screen. “It’s her.” Zooming in on the image, just over her left shoulder confirmed to Janelle it was the face of the girl from her nightmare. But not the battered, sunken face, with the dead eyes. Rather it was the sweet face she could never quite remember.

 

Then her phone rang again and she nearly dropped it back into the water but she was able to save it from falling. “Yes?”

 

“Hey, babe. It’s me.”

 

“Oh, it’s you.”

 

“You say that like it’s a bad thing. What were you expecting someone else to call you? A secret lover or something?”

 

Janelle tried to sound calm. “Please. Don’t even. I thought you were your mom. She called a little while ago to ask if we were coming over for dinner tonight after the service. I was kind of short with her because I got another call.”

 

“Don’t worry about it. It’s my mom. She’s kind of chill about things like that. She knows we’re fast-paced people. Besides, it’s getting kind of late. I already called Larry and asked him if he could fill in for me. I’m just so worn out after yesterday. And…”

 

“And?”

 

“And, I feel a little like maybe we should do some laundry.”

 

“Laundry? Oh, wait, yes… do laundry.” Janelle smile in spite of herself.

 

“You alright? You sound preoccupied.”

 

“No, I’m just being fast paced, I’m standing outside by the lake. Yep. That’s me. Fast paced like a turtle.”

 

Wade laughed. “You crack me up. Well, I don’t want to disturb you in the middle of what is obviously a deep, spiritual moment.”

 

“You didn’t. I was just… nothing. So are you close to home?”

 

“I’d say about forty-five minutes. Maybe. I think I should be home before the sun goes too far down. Maybe we can do a load of laundry when I get home, before dinner. How’s that sound.”

 

“It sounds like you are totally horny.”

 

“I am.”

 

“Well, laundry or not I’ll be glad when you’re home.” Janelle cleared her throat. “Before we do any laundry or any sort of lathering, we might need to talk with Liza.”

 

“What? Why?”

 

Janelle laughed. “Oh, it’s nothing bad. It’s kind of stupid to be honest. Apparently Liza came across some of your fetish porn, I guess that’s what you’d call it.”

 

“My what?”

 

“You know what I’m talking about. She said you’ve got this thing about shoes and…”

 

“She did? Shoes?” Wade cleared his throat. “And what else did she say?”

 

“She said you had some pictures in your office and so, I, being paranoid went snooping.”

 

There was an audible, heavy cough on Wade’s side. “You did.”

 

“Geez, Wade, it’s fine. I found your little stash of porn magazines by the loveseat in your office. I’ll admit was a little weirded out about seeing the magazines along with your fishing and hiking magazines. And then I realized most all the pictures had women in these seriously dangerous looking shoes and I was like, oh, shoes. I tell you, in retrospect, it was kind of funny. I just hope she didn’t inadvertently see you doing, you know, anything while you were looking at them. Because I have a feeling she might have, maybe.”

 

There was a bit of nervous laughter from Wade. “I doubt it. I don’t ever remember being intruded upon. And even so, I probably would’ve been alert enough to notice her. I’m just surprised she found them.”

 

“You know, she’s a kid. Kids explore. She probably didn’t know what they were other than that they were pictures of naked women.

 

“Well, now you know my dirty little secret. Does it make you think any less of me?”

 

“No. Although, I’m beginning to wonder if I need to go out and get some eight mile high stilettos or something.”

 

Wade sighed. “No. You’re perfect the way you are. Slightly high heels and all.”

 

“Hey. I have some high heels.”

 

“Yeah. But not eight mile high.”

 

“Ha. Well, you drive carefully. I’ll see you when you get home.”

 

“I will.” There was a pause. “Hey, Janelle, I love you.”

 

“I know. Bye.” Janelle pressed END and let out a long breath. She’d been wondering how she was going to approach Wade with the ‘Liza found something she probably shouldn’t have found’ conversation. All in all, it went pretty well. And even though she couldn’t see Wade, Janelle could almost hear him blushing. “Men.”

 

Janelle laughed and decided to head back to