Chapter 10

Hank's POV

"I'm home!" I hear Ashley yell from downstairs then rustling in the kitchen followed by the slam of the door to the garage then the blaring of music.

Shaking my head at her entrance then exit I move towards the kitchen knowing that although it would be somewhat clean she still would have made enough of a mess that it would no longer meet my standards. That has got to be the worst thing about being a janitor nothing is ever clean enough for you.

After a week of having Ashley here I have learned to stay out of the garage which we had converted into her studio.

Although Ashley is actually a very neat teenager her art space is an absolute disaster zone. Clay dust on the ground with drops of paint all through it, half finished works here and there. After the first time I tried to clean it she blew a fuse, yelling that it was her space and that she had it that way for a reason and begged me not to move anything again. So I now try to stay out of her studio.

Wiping down the counter my eyes fall upon pictures lining the window sill. A couple of the pictures were of Ashley before the accident with her family but most of them were of after the accident.

I studied the picture of Ashley at her school. I had taken the picture myself, it had been Ashley's very first art show and one of her pieces was on display and getting a lot of attention. She had been grinning at the camera with immense joy despite the fact that her teachers had insisted that she wear a dress that was by no means tom boyish. Muriel had had to fight to get her to go and buy a dress and then the fight had been on to actually put it on. But Muriel had understood that first impressions stick and that she would be better accepted if she at least looked sweet.

Smiling I switched my attention to another photo on the ledge of the three of us taken last year. It was one of my favorite pictures of us. We had been at the grand canyon, Ashley had been racing around trying to get as many sketches and pictures that she could for different projects she could do. Muriel had spent most of her time yelling at Ashley to get away from the ledge and for god sake to stay on this side of the ropes. I had spent my time watching my girls. My girls, that's what they had become slowly but surely they had become my family.

I let my mind wander back to the first day of school all those years ago after the accident.

6 years ago

Hanks pov

Where was she? She's never late for the first day. She likes to drill in the plan of attack with the other teachers before the students arrived but there had been no sign of her.

I looked worriedly at my watch wondering if she was even going to be late.

"Come on Muriel, don't do this" I muttered to myself as I once again tried to pick out her yellow pock-a-dot dress with no luck.

"Ms. Finster! Ms. Finster!" I heard Randall yell behind me making me whip around to see Muriel now standing in the middle of the playground. How does that kid do it? It's almost like he's got radar to track her down.

I slowly began to make my way towards Muriel and Randal to hear what was being said.

"Ms. Finster, I over heard TJ and his pals saying that they were going to wait until Spinelli arrived at school before they went to class no matter how long it takes" Randal declared with joy at the news that his fellow class mates were going to be deliberately late for class.

I waited expectantly for the explosion that I knew was to come but instead of an immediate bellow there was silence. I looked up from where I was pretending to do raking and looked at Muriel.

She was looking at Randal with a considering look. She still had a scowl on her face which I had come to love but it was her eyes that no longer reflected the same scowl. They looked almost sad at what Randal had said.

"Where are they Randal?" He looked at her with a shocked face that I felt and pointed over to Old Rusty. She sighed and told him to head to class and made her way over to the small group of close knit friends.

What was going on? Why was she acting so calm?

Once again I made my way towards Muriel and began to pretend to do work so that I could be close enough to over hear her conversation.

"Ms. Finster" I heard Gus gasp in fear and grinned. My girl sure did have a reputation.

"Calm down Gus, you're not going to get in trouble for being late"

"Ms. Finster we don't want to go to class until Spinelli gets here. None of us have seen her all summer and our parents just told us that she was in a car accident I'm….. we're worried about her" my head came up at TJ's words as finally noticed what was wrong with there group. Spunky little Spinelli wasn't present.

"We always go to the first class together so we can try and get seats together" Gretchen added looking towards the front of the school as if she was expecting at any moment to see a familiar girl in army boots, a red dress and an orange toque.

Muriel sighed heavily and began to speak then stopped to clear her throat.

I looked at her suspiciously was she trying not to cry….. my Muriel didn't cry.

The children around her didn't seem to notice how close this battle ax was to breaking down. For the most part they were looking down at their shoes or towards the front of the school for there friend.

"Spinelli's fine, there is no reason to worry about her Detwiler. She's been moved to another school in New York. If you have any questions I'll…" again her voice cracked as TJ and the others were now staring at her in disbelief.

"Spinelli would never leave without telling me!" TJ yelled

"Like I was saying if you have any questions I'll answer them at recess if I can now run along to class before your late" Muriel said as she began to shoe the children towards the building.

My heart broke at the long faces on the children dragging their feet trying to figure out how they could contact their friend. Once they were in the school I looked towards Muriel about to ask some questions of my own but paused.

Muriel's shoulders were hunched and it looked like she was about a minute away from completely breaking down.

"Muriel?" I whispered as I got closer to her she looked at me with tears in her eyes and I made a decision without breaking a stride I took her in my arms and gave her the support that she so desperately needed.

It was after school when I was finally able to get her to tell me what happened and slowly from there are relationship began to shape.

The first time she went to visit Ashley she had come home near tears babbling that the little girl she knew was dead and all that was left was a doll. The next time she went to see her I insisted that I come along and that we actually go do something so we decided to go on a road trip.

We let Ashley decide were we going to turn and where to stop and basically drove her batty with questions like should I turn here, do you want to stop here, does that look like I nice hotel until she finally yelled that she didn't care. It was the first sign of the old Spinelli that we had seen and we decided that if the way to make her behave the same was to drive her crazy then so be it.

When she got depressed we made her mad, when she was sad we made her laugh (which I must say she truly hated) It wasn't until we got to small town on the Atlantic coast that she finally decided to begin to heal. It was one night that there was an extremely bad storm we had thought Ashley was in her room but when I went to get her for dinner we found the room empty. We ran out into the storm and found her sitting on a rock on the beach watching the ocean waves. She was soaking wet but for the first time during the trip looked at peace.

We ushered her inside while Muriel yelled and she looked at Muriel with surprise then a faint smile. It was almost like the storm had released her pain and allowed her to begin to let go.

Two years later I proposed to Muriel and we became a family. I understood both of them so well. They were both such strong women but at the same time they were more fragile then any other female I had ever known.

Present

"Hey Hank? You okay?" I turn to see Ashley looking at me with worry written all over her face. I guess I had been staring at the pictures for quite awhile now.

"Yeah I'm fine" She looked at me a little puzzled then started upstairs to her room.