Page 21 of Puppy Christmas

“Can you braid my hair like yours?” Emily asked suddenly. “Like a royal crown?”

More pleased than she cared to admit that Emily noticed her concession to the princess persona, Lila jumped at the chance. “Of course.” She dropped the two fingers of her right hand over two fingers of her left—the ASL sign forsit—and patted the space between her legs. She wasn’t very well-educated in sign language, but considering how much Emily lit up to see her make the attempt, she resolved to improve her studies.

Emily obliged with the request, settling onto her knees and holding herself perfectly still in front of Lila. Turning around, she said, “Daddy makes me sit like this. No wriggles. No talking. Else he messes up.”

“Can your dad braid?” Lila asked, impressed. Her own father could barely manage a ponytail holder without snapping his fingers off. With three daughters and a wife who excelled at hair duties, there’d never been any need for him to learn.

“Not like you,” Emily confessed as she turned back around. Whatever uneasiness had been left between them fled in that moment. Lila had no idea if it was the mention of Ford that had done it, or if the mere act of running her fingers through the girl’s corn-silk hair was the cause, but Emily’s guard dropped. “Ms. Helen and Ms. Maddie taught him how. Ms. Helen only gots boys, but Ms. Maddie has a little girl like me.”

“Oh?” Lila murmured. She doubted Emily could hear her, seated as they were, so she didn’t press the issue.

As it turned out, there was no need. Emily pressed it for her. “Her name is June. She knows all about bugs and how to jump off swings so you get super high. She doesn’t want to be my friend.”

Lila had no idea what to make of this, so she focused on the intricate twists of Emily’s hair instead. Her cochlear implants made some of the side bits a little tricky, but Lila had done her sisters’ hair so many times that she was something of an expert.

“Byron and Neil don’t want to be my friend, either. Nobody does.”

This time, Lila was moved enough to voice a protest, but she stopped herself short. Ford might have found her company so unstimulating that he fell asleep rather than explain Emily’s outburst, but the little girl seemed to have no such qualms. She was explaining plenty.

“They have to play with me a’cos their moms make them, but it’s not the same as having a real friend.” For the first time, Emily showed a tendency to squirm, twisting until she was looking up at Lila. “Do you have real friends?”

Lila was startled enough by the question that she grabbed a rubber band and twisted it around Emily’s hair to hold her place. Emily didn’t seem to mind that it took Lila so long to gather her thoughts. She sat patiently with Jeeves in her lap, an expectant look in her eyes.

“Well, I have two sisters,” Lila eventually confessed.

“And the evil prince brother?”

“Er, yes,” she fibbed, remembering her cover story. “Him too. But my sisters aren’t evil. They’re very nice, actually.”

“Like you?”

That startled her even more. “Much nicer,” she said. “We work on training puppies together, so we spend a lot of time in one another’s company. But as for friends,realfriends, the kind of friends I’m not related to, no. I don’t have many.”

Emily sighed wistfully. “Don’t you want some?”

That was the most startling question of all. It had never occurred to Lila to question the number of friends she had in her life. She had acquaintances aplenty—work colleagues and old college study buddies, as well as the rare handful of ex-boyfriends shewasn’tashamed to own up to. What they didn’t provide in terms of social stimulation, her sisters did. Rarely a day went by without the three of them sharing dinner or drinks or, as was more often the case, a barrage of invasive questions and general lack of privacy.

For some reason, Lila felt that didn’t count. She loved Sophie and Dawn so much it hurt sometimes, her whole world wrapped up in everything they said and did. But if they’d met as strangers, she doubted either of them would have wanted anything to do with her. They were both so much fun, so alive, so unafraid to put themselves out there.

So unlike me.

“I do want some, actually,” Lila admitted. “How about you?”

Emily nodded solemnly.

“Is that why you don’t want to teach Jeeves about the door? Because no one comes by to play?”

Emily nodded again, her lower lip quivering. Lila had never seen anything so tragic. What was the matter with the kids on this street that they’d reduce this poor, lonely creature to tears? She had half a mind to storm over to Helen’s house and chuck those coffee cups at the door, demanding answers. But although that might be something Dawn would do—in fact, she was pretty sure her sister had thrown a tire iron at a man’s house—Lila was a model of decorum. She always had been.

She was not, however, heartless.

“I know that you and I haven’t known each other long, but maybe I could be your friend?” she offered. “I’m not very fun, and I don’t know any jokes, but—”

“Daddy!” Emily sprang to her feet before Lila could finish her tentative offer. From the way Ford leaned against the doorframe, his legs casually crossed at the ankle and an unreadable expression on his face, she had a feeling he’d been there a while. “Princess Lila is doing my hair in a crown like hers.”

“I see that. It’s very fetching on you both.”

“And she’s going to be my friend. Myrealfriend.”