AN: Here you go, another little chapter.

The muse has been stuck here. It's not that I don't know where I want to go, rather it's simply been finding the urge to go there. I'm trying to get back to this one some, though, and start things rolling here again.

For now, I hope you enjoy this chapter! Let me know what you think!

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Sophia came into the dining room from where she'd been in her room reading one of the books that she'd selected off of Carol's bookshelf. She found Carol sitting at the table, white envelopes spread out in front of her and a good deal of what appeared to be cloth patches laid out to the side.

Sophia cleared her throat as she approached so that she wouldn't run the risk of startling the woman who had so kindly made her breakfast and given her access to her bookshelf to make a selection.

When she made the noise, Carol looked up from where she was writing on a notepad. For a second she seemed to be focusing on Sophia and then she smiled.

"Hi sweetheart," she offered softly. "Can I get you something? Are you ready for lunch?"

Sophia shook her head and croaked out a "no ma'am" before Carol reached across the table and tapped the surface with her hand directly in front of a chair. Sophia took that as her invitation to sit and she went and arranged herself in the chair.

"What are you doing?" Sophia asked.

Carol smiled.

"I'm thinking about some dresses that I plan to make," Carol said. "Some of my clients come to me already knowing what they want, but some of them are a little more adventurous. So I make dresses that no one's ordering in my size. I make some for my sister in law for our expectant mothers. Then, when they come and see us wearing them, sometimes it does something to sort of push them into deciding that they might want them."

Sophia smiled.

"That sounds smart," Sophia said. "Do they even know you're doing it?"

Carol shook her head.

"I don't think so," she said. "I didn't even know it was happening at first. I just liked the different dresses and I liked…I don't know…the challenge of sewing the new ones. Then I noticed that whatever I would wear, some would order."

Sophia looked at some of the envelopes spread out on the table showing different styles of dresses. Some were even illustrations of women wearing pants. Sophia pointed to one of them, and got Carol's attention.

"That's not very proper," Sophia said.

Carol smiled.

"Aren't they great?" She asked. "I'm going to make some of those too."

"And Daryl's going to let you wear them?" Sophia asked, wrinkling her brow.

Carol laughed lightly and nodded with some enthusiasm.

"Daryl doesn't notice things like that," Carol said. "And he doesn't stop me from wearing whatever I want to wear. Would you like some dresses? He's gone today to see about getting you in school and I thought that I could make you a few dresses to wear. You could choose your pattern and your cloth. Anything you want and I'll make it for you."

Sophia felt a little overwhelmed by the concept and the amount of choices available to her. It was dizzying since most of their clothes at her old home had always come in bulk deliveries, all the same, and were handed out according to size, each person receiving the size just up from what they wore so that they had "room to grow".

"Anything?" Sophia asked.

Carol nodded.

"Anything you like," Carol said. "I can make any of them. And I have some more too, if you don't see anything here that you like."

Sophia shook her head.

"No…there's plenty here," she said, not wanting the woman to get the idea that she was simply so demanding that she couldn't even find anything in the pile of options that she was being given. "It's just that really there's too many. What do you like? What's a nice dress? I don't want to choose something that's too complicated."

Carol smiled and looked through the patterns.

"The complicated ones are the nicest," Carol said. "They're always my favorite ones."

She offered Sophia an envelope.

"This one, for a girl your age? This is probably my favorite one," Carol said.

Sophia examined the dress. It was a very pretty dress. It was one that she couldn't imagine having for her own at all, less likely having as a dress that she might wear on a regular basis.

"It's too nice," Sophia insisted, shaking her head.

"No!" Carol declared. "Not for you…I could make you three of them if you wanted them. Just tell me what colors you like and I'll make them. And I can make you new underclothes too. Anything you want…anything at all…and I can make it."

Sophia looked through some of the cloth pieces that Carol had and chose one of the pieces of fabric that she liked the most. It was a rich purple, almost blue, and Carol smiled at it.

"I love that one too," Carol said. "I have three dresses made out of that one…Daryl hasn't noticed that they're different and he calls them all my purple dress."

Sophia laughed at that.

"Are you sure it's not too much?" Sophia asked.

"It's not too much at all, Sophia," Carol said. "It's not nearly enough, so it's certainly not too much."

The smile faded somewhat from Carol's face as she pinned the cloth to the pattern.

"I'll need your measurements," Carol said. "I can have this done in a few days…it won't take too long."

"Thank you…Mama," Sophia offered, seeing the change in the woman's countenance all of a sudden.

Carol looked at her as though she'd been spooked, her head jerking toward her quickly. Her expression was an odd one that Sophia had no idea how to read, so she immediately worried that she'd overstepped her boundaries and that Carol hadn't been sincere about telling her that she could call her that if she wanted to use the word.

"Is that alright?" Sophia asked softly.

Carol stared at her a second longer and then she nodded.

"It's just fine," Carol said. "I told you. You can call me whatever you're comfortable with."

Sophia smiled.

"With all due respect," Sophia started, remembering what Miss Margaret had always told them about being polite and respectful, "I'm not comfortable with calling you anything yet, but I thought that if I were going to get comfortable with something, then it's just as reasonable to get used to calling you that as it is to get used to calling you something else only to want to change it later."

Carol offered Sophia a soft smile that wasn't entirely sincere and she nodded.

"You're a very smart girl, Sophia," Carol said.

"Thank you," Sophia said.

She'd been told she was smart more than once, but she'd also been told that she was "too smart" and that could be abrasive at times. In fact, it had often lead her to never be sure if it was a compliment or a curse when someone said it to her.

"Can I ask you something?" Carol asked.

Sophia considered pointing out that Carol was allowed to ask or demand anything of her that she was inclined to ask, but she didn't say anything. She figured that Carol's need to ask that was more of a formality than anything else. She simply nodded instead of making any comment to her new mother.

"Who taught you to say 'with all due respect'?" Carol asked.

"Miss Margaret," Sophia responded. "She said that people don't appreciate some of the things that I say and that they aren't the kind of comments that show the respect that I owe them…so I should say that to let them know that if I haven't made a good decision in saying what I chose that I didn't mean to be offensive. Rather, it would let them know that I meant respect but I wasn't good at thinking through the things that I should say."

Carol shook her head and reached across the table, tapping Sophia's arm with her finger.

"You don't have to say it here, not anymore," Carol said. "I expect you to be polite…and I expect you to be respectful…but I don't think that you would be anything else. You're free to say what you want within reason, and you're smart enough to know what's reasonable or not."

Sophia nodded.

"Thank you," she said. "Mama," she added, testing to see if the second use of the word was more smoothly received than her first pronouncement of it. Carol's expression didn't change as drastically that time, so Sophia assumed that it was simply a case of her having to get used to hearing the name, just the same as Sophia had to get used to saying it. "What should I call Daryl?" Sophia asked after another moment.

"What do you want to call him?" Carol asked.

Sophia shrugged.

"Is he a Daddy or is he more of a Father?" Sophia asked.

Carol laughed to herself.

"I think Daryl is more of a Daddy," Carol said. "He's not really a Father type. I think he'd find that odd."

Sophia smiled and nodded, turning the new names over for herself.

Carol swallowed audibly.

"You'll meet the rest of your family soon," Carol said. "You'll meet everyone. We thought you might like a few days to settle in with just us, but when you're ready, we'll have everyone over for you to meet. You'll meet your Aunt Alice, Aunt Melodye, Aunt Andrea, your Uncle Merle, and all your cousins."

"Can I ask you something?" Sophia asked after a moment.

Carol nodded.

"Why don't you have any more children?" Sophia asked. "I mean, really, why didn't you?"

Carol shrugged and shook her head.

"Sophia," she said, "Daryl and I have wanted to have a baby for…years. And we've tried everything, we really have. Do you really want to know this?"

Carol paused and Sophia nodded.

"Yes ma'am," Sophia said. "I'm not in the practice of asking questions that I don't want to be answered."

Carol nodded.

"Sophia we really wanted a baby," Carol said. "And doctors have said that we could have one, but there's just been no baby for us. And…I think…I've spent years angry…with God or with myself or with…I don't even know who…"

Carol stopped, sucked in a breath and shook her head slightly, obviously getting the composure that she was starting to let slip.

"I thought that it wasn't fair that I couldn't have a baby. I thought we'd be wonderful parents. I thought I'd be this incredible mother," Carol continued. "But now? I don't think we have any children because I haven't really deserved it."

Sophia eyed her oddly.

"Why do you say that?" Sophia asked.

"Sophia," Carol said, "I'm so sorry and I'll do anything I can to make it up to you, but I've been your mother for fourteen years and I haven't been a good one at all."

Sophia barely knew Carol, admittedly, but already she couldn't stand to see the expression on her face. She didn't want the woman to suffer, and she certainly didn't want her to suffer for something that Sophia felt like she couldn't entirely understand.

Sophia wasn't angry with Carol and she wasn't angry with Daryl. The whole situation still seemed like something she'd read in one of her books, almost a fairy tale instead of reality, and she didn't feel like she would have been angry if she'd come and found that the situation was the same except that they'd had other children.

After all, she hadn't known about them, and they hadn't known about her. She'd lived her life for fourteen years, and she couldn't expect anything different from them.

"Have I been a bad daughter?" Sophia asked.

Carol looked at her oddly.

"Of course not," Carol responded, her voice changing octaves.

Sophia shrugged.

"I've been your daughter for fourteen years," Sophia said. "So if I haven't been a bad daughter, you haven't been a bad mother."

Carol smiled and shook her head.

"I wish it was that simple," Carol said.

"Maybe it is?" Sophia asked.

Carol got up from the table definitively.

"I'm going to make us some lunch, OK?" Carol asked. "Is there anything I can get you or anything I can do for you first?"

She turned toward Sophia expectantly and Sophia wished she had requests for the woman because they seemed to be so important to her. She didn't really have anything that she wanted at the moment, though, and she already thought that the dresses offered her were more than she had expected.

Sophia stood up from the table.

"No ma'am," she said.

"Sophia," Carol started, "I really mean it. I want you to let me know anything that you want. Anything that you've ever wanted and never got. I want you to have those things. Please, don't be scared to ask me for them, OK?"

Sophia searched her mind for a request, feeling that it might do Carol some good if she were to make one. Finally she nodded at Carol and outstretched her arms.

"Could I have a hug?" Sophia asked. "I never had many of those…"

Carol smiled and came over, wrapping her arms strongly around Sophia and pulling their bodies together in a warm embrace. Sophia sunk into the hard hug and enjoyed everything about it. She nuzzled her face into Carol's chest without even thinking about it. She might not have a lot of requests for the woman, and maybe she'd have more in the future, but for the moment she was pleased with this, and she suspected that Carol might be pleased as well.