"Simon."
"Exactly."
"I know Bradley won't hurt him." Zoe massaged the lotion in, working her way down Dana's body. "But the more Simon looks to him for the sort of things a boy looks for from a father, the more of a jolt it'll be if things don't work out. He's had to deal with not having a father. Ever. Not like a divorce or even death, but never having one. However much I've smoothed it for him, however much he knows I love him, and I'm there for him, he's always known there was someone who didn't, who refused to be there. I don't want him to ever feel unwanted again."
"And to keep that from happening, you'd sacrifice. You'd fight," Malory added. "Whatever it took, whatever it cost you, you'd fight. Because of all the choices you've made, Simon is the most important. He's your key."
"Simon?" Zoe repeated as Dana sat up. "Oh, sorry, over on your stomach. My mind's churning."
"Mal's clicked on something." Dana rolled over, but propped her head on her fist. "We're the keys, the three of us. That's been emphasized over and over. But of the three of us, Zoe's the one who has—you could say—re-created herself in a child. Simon's part of Zoe. Zoe's the key, ergo, Simon's the key."
"Kane can't touch him." Fear wanted to leap up and choke her. "Rowena said she'd protected him."
"Count on it." Dana looked over her shoulder. "If he could do anything about Simon, he'd have tried by now."
"I think it might be more than Rowena that protects him," Malory added. "I think whatever can be done from the other side is being done. Someone's children were already harmed. They won't let it happen again. Between all that, and us, nothing touches Simon."
"If I believed otherwise, I'd walk away from this in a heartbeat." Zoe paused as she caught Malory's nod. "Which Kane has to know, so he would have done anything he could to threaten my son. He hasn't, because he can't. Okay." She let out a long breath. "Okay, let's work from there. If Simon's the key, or part of it the way he's part of me, doesn't that take me back to choices I've made regarding him? Having him was a choice, keeping him was a choice—the best ones I ever made. But I've been back there. And though I think going back mattered, I don't have the key."
"You made other choices," Dana pointed out. "Went in other directions."
"Been over some of those, too. It's been a kind of journey, I guess," she continued as she finished slicking the lotion on Dana. "Remembering, seeing it again, thinking about it all. It's been good for me, all in all, because it validated my choices and let me see that the mistakes I made weren't all that big. You want to roll over? I'll get you your robe."
"You came here to the Valley," Dana began. "You got a job, you bought a house. What else?"
Malory held up a hand while Zoe helped Dana into her robe. "I'm not going to say all of that's not important, and maybe going through some of the details is one of the answers. But we could look at this from a different angle. What if some of the answers have to do with Simon's choices?"
"He's a kid," Dana pointed out, rubbing a hand on her forearm to admire Zoe's work. "His biggest choice is which video game to play."
"No." Thoughtfully, Zoe shook her head. "No, children have a lot of choices. Right or wrong. Some of those choices stick with them, and push them in a certain direction. What friends they make. Maybe they read a book about a fighter pilot and they decide they want to fly. Right now, in a hundred different ways, Simon's deciding what kind of a man he'll be."
"Then maybe you need to take a closer look at some of those decisions," Malory suggested.
A decision Simon was particularly pleased with at the moment was his choice of Homer as a name for the pup. It combined some of his favorite things into one—baseball, a cartoon character, and a dog. Outside in the crisp fall air, watching Moe chase a tennis ball and Homer chase Moe, Simon figured life didn't get any cooler.
Plus, the guys were coming over pretty soon to watch the game while his mom and her friends did girl stuff. He could eat potato chips till he puked.
He snatched up the ball Moe dropped at his feet, then did a lot of dancing and fake throwing to make the dogs totally nutso before he hurled it toward the trees.
When he went to school the next day, he'd tell all his pals about Homer. Maybe, if it wasn't too goofy, he could get Brad to take a picture so he could show everybody.
He looked back toward the river while the dogs rolled around together. He really liked it here. He liked his house, too, and the yard and all. And living next to the Hansons. But, boy, he really liked it here, with the woods to explore and the river right there.
If they were going to stay longer, it would be so cool to have his friends over. Man, they would freak over the game room. And they could build a fort in the woods, and maybe go tubing on the river in the summer. If his mom didn't wig out over the idea.
Maybe he still could, even after they went back home. He could ask Brad, and then Brad would help him work on Mom. That was cool, too, having another guy so they could double-team her.
It was sort of like having a father. Not that he cared about that, but it was probably like it. Sort of.
Anyway, it was going to be totally awesome to have Thanksgiving here, with everybody piling into the house, and the guys all arguing about the game, and eating pumpkin pie until they busted their guts.
His mom made really good pumpkin pie, and she always gave him little pieces of the dough to make dough people with.
He wondered if Brad would think that was lame.
He looked over, then ran toward the house as Brad came out. "Hey! You want to throw the ball some? Moe's teaching Homer how to fetch."
"Sure." He snugged the knit cap he'd brought out over Simon's head. "Getting cold."