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  Rose let out a long, unsteady breath. She’d been holding it in and didn’t even realize it.

  Her new laptop was still powered on, screen glowing brightly, waiting. The Internet was still open to her Facebook profile and “Rockin’ Rose” Murray stared up at Rose.

  She sat down slowly and pulled her chair up to the desk and computer. Her heartbeat increased as she contemplated her next move. She thought back to the conversation she’d had with the ladies the night before…

  Rose and her two favorite co-workers, Sara and Melinda—her gals as she called them—had just finished the offices on the 3rd floor of the building they were cleaning that night. It was one of the smaller buildings on Congress that they serviced. It was a nice area, almost midway between Capitol Square and the Colorado River.

  They’d done this building many times, the three of them, and they were fast. They moved swiftly between rooms, cleaning and polishing, sometimes silent, but mostly chatty. Their talk was frequently accentuated by gales of laughter. They were easy to identify by building security or people working late; each wore their company shirt with the logo emblazoned across the back: Cleaner is Better: Better is Cleaner!

  The business’s logo was a play off the name of their boss, James “Teeny” Better. In direct contradiction to his nickname, he was a very large man, muscular, not flabby. His heart, however, was his largest attribute; he was known for giving women with troubled pasts a second chance, for giving them the opportunity to make an honest living when the rest of society lifted their noses and turned their backs on them.

  Of course, Sara, Melinda, and Rose were more than co-workers these days; their three-way relationship had morphed into a close friendship. Teeny called them The Three Amigas, and he made sure they worked together 99% of the time, or else they’d let him know about it.

  They had just pushed and hauled their cleaning supplies into the elevator when Sara’s phone chirped. She looked at the screen as the elevator doors closed and started laughing. “I can’t believe what my daughter just did,” she told them. “Look at what my husband posted on Facebook.” Sara held her phone up for Melinda and Rose. On it: a picture of Sara’s toddler, covered in spaghetti noodles. They all laughed.

  “That’s so funny,” Rose told her, thinking about it. “It’s pretty easy to stay in touch with your family on that, isn’t it?”

  “Oh, yeah! Facebook is so easy, girl. If I didn’t make myself stop, I’d be on it all day with people. People all over the place, like my sister in Chicago. It’s almost like she’s right here with me sometimes.”

  “Me, too,” Melinda chimed in. “All my family’s back in Virginia. I see every birthday, and I know how my momma’s doin’, any time of day.”

  “Is it easy to find people?” Rose asked.

  Sara looked at her thoughtfully for a moment, realization dawning in her 35-year-old blue eyes—eyes that looked ten years older than they were. Sara had been a wild child. “Are you thinking about your daughter?”

  Rose nodded, looking between Melinda and Sara. They remained respectfully quiet. They had shared their secrets over the years. They knew that Rose hadn’t spoken to her daughter for years and years. She had tried once to contact her daughter, once, but Mary Beth had rejected her, slamming down the phone after a fiery spray of words. Rose accepted it as a deserved response for abandoning her daughter in childhood, in pursuit of her addictions: booze, drugs, and rock and roll.

  “You can probably find her,” Melinda said. “Everybody’s on Facebook. It won’t hurt to try.”

  “You could just lay low, check it out, figure out what you want to do if you find her. You can’t tell who looks at your stuff on there,” Sara added. “She’d never know if you looked and then changed your mind.”

  That conversation had Rose staring at her ceiling the entire night, when she should have been sleeping. Sara and Melinda had given her all the information they could on finding people using Facebook, Google, and other tools on the Internet. It was more than she could digest, but she didn’t stop them: they were trying to be helpful.

  All she could think about was her daughter, and Facebook, and the regrets that she had pushed out of her mind. She was at a crossroads in her life and she thought that if she didn’t do something now, she never would. She might succumb to a permanent feeling of loss. She’d become an old spinster.

  She had bought the laptop the next day.

  And here she was. She stared at her own image for a moment, then shifted her eyes to the little white search window.

  It said: “Search for people, places and things.”

  She moved her hands over her keyboard, then hesitated. They were shaking a little bit. Finally, she typed Mary Beth Murray into the window, said a quick prayer, and clicked on the little magnifying glass.

  Chapter 5

  The Donahue Family

  Susan was late. Again.

  Being a single mom wasn’t easy. Not at all. She was routinely late, or just barely on time. Being a nurse meant shift work, which was cumbersome and tiring even in the best of situations, and only made a tough situation a downright pain in the…

  But, she was a good mother, and always had been. When Danny needed help with his homework, Susan helped him. Rides to baseball practice? No problem. She made sure he had clean jeans to get dirty—made sure he brushed his teeth in the morning and at night.

  She didn’t mind doing it—sort of enjoyed it—it was all part of being a mom.

  Of course, there were the unpleasant things. Just last night, they’d had a mom-and-son sit-down to discuss the dip his grades had taken recently. It hurt her heart to talk to him about it, because he was a good kid and this wasn’t natural for him. It was just another side effect of the situation.

  It was all so frustrating. It wasn’t misfortune, bad decision-making, or a tragic accident that left her without a husband. It wasn’t another woman. If it were any of those things, life would be easier because she would just move on.

  But it wasn’t like that.

  It was the United States Marine Corps. Those damned Devil Dogs, she thought, how I love them and how I hate them.

  Jason was deployed, again, for the second time in four years, the fourth time in eight years. But it was the last two deployments that really made her bitter. One of the reasons Jason had switched over to the reserves was to give their lives the stability it lacked while he was active duty.

  That was laughable. His new unit kept the same tempo that his old unit did, if not worse. They were supposed to be part-timers—weekend warriors—yet they found themselves answering their nation’s call as much as their active duty counterparts.

  What sense does it all make? She wondered.

  Of course, she had pleaded with him to get out, but he was too patriotic for that. Jason bled red, white, and blue—he could never, would never, give it up completely.

  Ironically, Jason’s passion, his love for his country, was what initially attracted her to him when they met eleven years earlier…

  It was at the USO in the Atlanta airport.

  Susan had found herself emotionally overwhelmed, as a college student, by the tragedy of 9/11. She had considered joining the military herself, but she didn’t think she’d ever go back to college if she did, and disappointing her parents wasn’t an option. Her family was poor, but hard working, and the importance of education was like a Gregorian chant that she heard daily growing up.

  Education is the most important thing, Susan.

  You’ll be the first in our family to graduate college, Susan.

  She couldn’t remember a time when the fabled, sought-after college degree wasn’t her primary goal in life.

  But she wanted to do her part, give back—do something—even if it was just a supporting role. She would never forget the feelings she’d had when she watched those planes hit the towers on the news. Sadness and confusion at first. Followed by fear, but only briefly, only until she had time to really sort it out. Anger at the injus
tices, at the loss of life, was the last emotion that affected her, and that anger fueled the intense desire to help that was inside of her, the desire to make things right.

  She decided to volunteer at the USO in her spare time. She could do it around her college schedule and still feel like she was helping.

  Parked behind the counter, she was handing out orange juice, snacks, and refreshments when Jason walked into the room. It was a made-for-television, cliché moment. She was blonde and blue-eyed; he was tall, dark, and handsome in his own way. She knew right away from the skin-close shave that traversed his head all the way to the little patch of hair up top, that he was in the Marines. It was a unique look, easy to identify, and ruggedly appealing.

  “Hey, there,” he said, smiling. He seemed friendly, though underneath the surface, she sensed something stony and hard, different from the boys she had known in high school or her time in college. Those eyes were intense; they locked onto her when they spoke.

  “Hi,” she greeted him. “Would you like something to drink? Orange juice?”

  “Hmm. OJ would be great.”

  “Croissant?” she asked.

  “Sure, thanks.” He watched her from the counter with that steady gaze, but it didn’t feel uncomfortable. No, quite the opposite: it felt right somehow, his eyes connecting with her.

  “So, are you going or coming back?”

  “Coming back.”

  “Afghanistan?”

  “Yeah.”

  “It’s pretty tough, yeah?” she asked.

  “Well,” he said, smiling a little bit, “I don’t know. I don’t know if tough is the word I would use to describe it. Not everything goes your way over there, so that’s tough. Missions can be hard and it isn’t always fun. Sometimes it’s the opposite.”

  “Yeah…”

  “Yeah, but sometimes, you know, it can be a little fun.”

  “Really?”

  “Ha … well, sort of. The friendships you form with people in an environment like that, the trust you develop, it’s the kind of thing that takes years, if ever, to cultivate when you’re just living a normal life in the United States. Over there, you rely on your teammates to get you through. Little jokes between friends can shape your entire day when you’re in a situation like that.”

  Susan was struck by his words. By how well spoken he was. Impressed with his honesty and his manner of speaking. The face that couldn’t lie.

  Through some strange twist of fate, Jason’s connecting flight got cancelled, and they spent almost the entire night getting to know each other over coffee at one of the trendy, local hangouts her college friends frequented. She was pretty sure that she fell in love with him that night…

  But, now it keeps us apart, she thought and sighed. And, I’m late again…

  She sped along 290, lost in thought, and almost missed the exit for Johnny Morris Road. With a squeal of brakes and tires, she jumped into the right lane. Honks from the car she cut off chased her down the exit. Minutes later, she pulled into the nearly empty pick-up point at Overton Elementary School.

  Danny was sitting on the back of a black bench, underneath the overhang at the school’s main entrance, legs swinging idly, hugging his backpack. He reacted slowly when he saw her. Jumped down from his perch. There weren’t any other kids—no faculty—she was very late.

  Susan dropped the passenger window and called to him, “Sorry, Danny!”

  He trudged up to the car, tossed his backpack in the rear seat, and got in next to her, all without a word. He didn’t look in her direction—kept his attention focused on something outside the passenger window. The front of the school perhaps, or a bird, or the long white water drainage pipes that stretched from the roof down thin, square pylons, and finally to the pavement below. Anything but his mom.

  “Buddy, I’m sorry,” she apologized again, and leaned over to hug him and kiss the top of his head. She rubbed her hand though his hair—he didn’t stop her.

  He sighed, hesitated, and then finally yielded with a reserved smile. “It’s okay, Mom,” he told her, but he didn’t really sound okay. He couldn’t disguise the sadness in his voice and it wasn’t something that could fly beneath her maternal radar.

  She continued to hug him, gave him a tight squeeze. She could feel his hesitation slipping away. Finally, he leaned into her and hugged her back.

  “I love you, Mom.”

  “I love you, too—you’re my dude—my buddy!”

  “Yep, I’m your dude, and I’m your buddy,” he replied, allowing the corners of his mouth to lift in a small smile.

  That smile is medicine for my soul, Susan thought. “Okay. Let’s get home … Dad left me a message on Facebook last night. He’s going to be waking up early to Skype with us before work, if he can.”

  “Awesome!” Danny replied. He immediately looked so much better than he had just three minutes before. His eyes sparkled; he was excited about the prospect of talking to his dad.

  Susan looked at her watch. It was 4:30 p.m. in Austin, which meant that it was 3:00 a.m. in Afghanistan. She always wondered why the time difference wasn’t even-on-the-hour like everywhere else in the world; it was offset by half an hour.

  They had thirty minutes to get home and they’d need every minute of it with rush hour traffic kicking in soon. She hit the accelerator and the car jumped into action, kicking gravel up as they left the school.

  Their apartment complex came into view with only seconds to spare and Susan whipped the car into their parking spot. Jason had been offered a job that sent them cruising halfway across the country, from Camp Pendleton, California, all the way to Austin. It was an opportunity they couldn’t pass up, and the apartment was supposed to be temporary, just until they found a house.

  Right. Temporary was eighteen months and counting.

  The good news: she found a great job. Right away. They were financially ready to make the big move and buy a house. Their new careers, however, were time-consuming and they had repeatedly put finding a home on the back burner.

  Before he left, Jason had told her, “You should look at some houses while I’m gone. Keep your mind off things, apply your energies to something positive.”

  “That’s probably a good idea,” she had agreed.

  And it had sounded like a good idea at the time, but she didn’t realize just how busy life would be without Jason, in a city that was still very much new to her, without the support of the military community, family, or old friends.

  As she cut the engine, and they jumped out and sprinted to the door, Susan thought briefly about the Internet search she’d done a few nights before. She had found an interesting blog called The Square Foot that was written by one of the local realty agents, of which she thought there might be thousands. The blog was informative, and the realtor in the profile picture looked approachable, so she figured she would call him sometime soon when she had more than sixty seconds to spare.

  “Mom! I can hear the computer ringing inside! Hurry!”

  “Okay, Okay!” she said, scrambling to get the keys into the lock. They dropped to the ground and Danny snatched them up quickly, sank the key home, and had them inside in seconds. Little kid reflexes, she figured, as they simultaneously dropped all of their things in a puddle on the floor and raced to the computer.

  Danny signed on and in less than 60 seconds they were looking at Danny’s dad on the giant monitor.

  “Danny, buddy!” Jason’s voice called through the speakers.

  “Hey, Dad! I love ya!”

  “I love you, too, man! Hey, Suze!”

  “Hey, honey,” she answered. She squeezed in against Danny as he gushed to his father about school, how he did in the Science Fair that week, and all of the other things that nine-year-old kids think about. She relaxed and let all of her cares slip away. All the little hardships and rough spots disappeared while her son connected with his two-dimensional dad. He was so happy just to be talking to his father. And while she wished that they could live
a normal life, that most Americans lived, where fathers didn’t go away for 7-month vacations to war zones, she could also see how much Danny looked up to his father.

  She felt her eyes fill up, but she didn’t care, not today, not now. She smiled broadly at her husband and son and allowed herself to be swept away in the moment.

  Chapter 6

  Greg, Claire, Candy, and Nancy

  “Dad, I saw a cat on Font Claire earlier.”

  “Does Mom know?” Greg asked. From the cast-iron fruit and vegetable basket he retrieved a couple of mushrooms and an onion. He placed them on the counter and took up his regular position next to Nancy at the kitchen island. Homemade pizza was a Thomas family tradition, forged and perfected from more than a decade of pizza-making. Nancy was just a toddler when they started. Greg smiled to himself at the memory of a four-year-old Nancy, the screech of the dining room chair on linoleum as she pushed it across the kitchen, so that she could help cook.

  “She hasn’t seen it yet. She is not going to be happy though,” Nancy concluded, tilting her head, and lifting her shoulders in a shrug.

  “You’re right,” he replied, slicing the mushrooms into paper-thin pieces for the pie. They all three liked them thin. “The mushrooms are super-thin!” he proclaimed with a triumphant smile.

  “Awesome, Daddy,” she chirped, putting an arm around him and giving him a quick squeeze. “Any idea when Mom’s going to be home?” He started slicing the onion, also thin, while Nancy began spooning tomato sauce onto the dough.

  “I don’t know. She and Jennie went to some new place downtown.” Jennie was Claire’s best friend; they were teachers at the same school. “It’s like an antique store that’s inside a warehouse or something. They’re looking at those big barrels—”