Starting Now (Blossom Street #9)(38)

At least she didn’t need to worry about carrying the current conversation. Casey easily took on that responsibility, bouncing from one subject to the next as if she were playing verbal hopscotch.

When Casey took a short breath, Libby asked Ava a couple of questions and Casey, bless her dear heart, didn’t leap in to answer, allowing Ava to respond.

“I’ve decided I wanted to learn how to knit, too,” Ava announced, focusing her attention on her knitting.

When they’d first met, Casey had been teaching her to crochet. Lydia seemed to think it was Libby’s influence that had shifted Ava’s interest to knitting.

“Knitting really isn’t difficult once you get the hang of it,” Libby assured her.

“That’s what Lydia said. I’m knitting a dishcloth.” Ava laid it on top of the table and smoothed it out for Libby to see. “I’ve made a bunch of mistakes, but no one is going to be wearing it, so that shouldn’t matter, right?”

“Right.” Ava had done a really good job, especially for a beginner. Libby told her so, and the teenager beamed with the praise.

Out of the blue, Casey scooted her chair out and stood. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

Libby wasn’t sure if this was her cue to broach the subject of the pregnancy with Ava, but either way she decided to seize the opportunity.

“If you’ll remember, I was about the same age as you when my mother died,” Libby reminded her while studying Ava’s knitting.

Ava glanced up from her knitting, and her hands went still. “How did your mother die?”

“She had cancer. In fact, I originally learned to knit sitting with my mother when she was in bed. She taught me, but after she died I set it aside and didn’t start again until just recently.”

“Why did you stop?” Ava asked. She returned her attention to the needles and the yarn, her tongue darting in and out of her mouth as she concentrated on creating the stitches.

“After my mother died, I didn’t know anyone else who knit and there wasn’t anyone I could go to for help if I had a question or made a mistake.” Recognizing this as the perfect opportunity to lead into the pregnancy, Libby continued. “I wonder if you feel the same way about some things now that your mother is gone.”

Ava responded with a slight shrug of her shoulders. “My mom worked a lot … she didn’t have time to spend with me or Jackson, knitting or anything else. My dad left us and Mom had two jobs.”

“I’m sorry.” Libby remembered Casey telling her that Ava’s mother had died in a car crash. Apparently she’d fallen asleep at the wheel. A single mom, working two jobs—it’s no wonder the poor woman was so tired.

“I’m not your mother, Ava, but if you have any questions, you can always ask me.”

“About knitting?”

“About anything.”

The tentative smile returned and she held Libby’s gaze for longer than she had before, and then nodded as though to say she would. Seeing her gratitude made Libby realize how incredibly young Ava was. Her heart ached for the girl, having experienced the same loneliness herself.

Libby tried a new angle. “After my mother died, I was alone after school every day.” She remembered how empty the house had felt without her mother. It hadn’t completely hit her that her mother would never return until several weeks after the funeral when she was struggling to find something easy to cook for dinner. Her mother would never be able to tell her how to cut down a recipe. She wouldn’t be able to teach her how to hem her pants, or shop for a special dress with her.

“Jackson and I are alone a lot, too, because Grandma works so many hours.”

“Sometimes I did things I knew would get me in trouble if my father knew about them.” Libby had given a lot of thought to how she should broach the subject and hoped to lead into it naturally.

Ava’s fingers slowed. “Like what?”

“I phoned my grandmother in Colorado. Long-distance calls cost money. She said I could talk to her anytime I wanted, but the minute my father saw the phone bill he blew up and put me on restrictions.”

“Grandma gets upset about money, too. I know she misses my mom because she doesn’t like me to talk about her. It makes her sad; it … it makes me sad, too.”

Libby still had her mother’s picture on her desk. For years she’d kept it on her nightstand for fear she would forget what her mother looked like. “Do you have a special boyfriend?” Libby asked, unwilling to get sidetracked.

“Not really.”

“Is there a boy you like more than anyone else?” she tried again.

Once more Ava shrugged. “My brother is friends with Peter. He lives next door, but he can’t come over because my grandma doesn’t like us to have anyone in the house when she isn’t there. She’s afraid someone might take something. Peter wouldn’t but she said we couldn’t break the rules for him.”

“So you don’t see Peter much.”

“Not so much,” she said, and looked away.

“Is he cute?”

Ava grinned. “I guess.”

Libby felt completely inept at this. She’d hoped the conversation would lead naturally into boyfriends, and that she could transition into the topic with a lot more ease and finesse than this.