The Healing Quilt Read Online Free PDF Page A

really hustled, they could still make it, though why Teza couldn't take herself to her appointment was beyond Kits comprehension. Teza got herself to everything else.
    She needed clean pants. Mud from kneeling to weed the iris bed caked her jeans. She stopped with that and grabbed the phone to dial Teza's number. Four rings and the answering machine clicked in. Phone clamped to her shoulder, Kit waited through the message and slipped her feet into a pair of sandals. “Teza, Fm on my way. In case you've forgotten, your mammogram is today. Please be ready and we can still make it.”
    Kit grabbed a blue shirt off a hanger and stuffed her arms in, buttoning it as she descended the stairs. She paused long enough at the mirror to pull her hair back into a club at the base of her neck, smoothing errant strands several times before digging a coated rubber band out of her pocket and wrapping it three times around the club, pulling her hair carefully through each time. She'd apply lipstick as she drove, normal modus operandi. She loved the sound of words like modus operandi, and while she usually saw it in the murder mysteries she read, it certainly applied today.
    She wheeled into the pink hawthorn-lined lane to the Bit of Heaven Farm. The lane ran past the house and yard on the left and back to the red hip-roofed barn that now housed the fruit stand. The sight of Teza still out in the strawberry patch made Kit beep the horn.

    Stubborn didn't begin to describe Aunt Teza.
    Kit sucked in a deep breath, counted to ten, and reminded her fingernails that they weren't to be doing imprint surgery on her palms. Keeping a smile of sorts on a mouth that wanted to scream, she started again and counted to twenty, nodded, and deliberately released each finger. When her last pinkie hung limp, she started again.
    “But I made that appointment for you today since you said that was the only time you had.”
    “I'm sorry, dear, but something came up.”
    “Something came up—like weeds or too many ripe strawberries?”
    “Oh no. Vinnie Lambert needed to go visit her mother in the hospital, and her car wouldn't start.” Aunt Teza looked up from the row of strawberries that were indeed in need of picking. The patch spread around their feet in dense rows of deep green leaves hiding their fruit from those who would snatch them away, be they birds or humans. The sweet fragrance of strawberries and rich dirt warmed by a welcome June sun rose as palpable as the frustration coloring Kit's rejoinder.
    She leaned over and began picking, knowing she and Teza always were able to talk more freely when their hands were busy. “And?”
    “And so I took her in. Her mother doesn't have long to live, you know.” Teza sat back on her heels, the knees of her jeans wearing traces of the mulch she spread between the rows. “It about breaks your heart, watching someone you love die bit by bit like that, even though you know that one day you will be back together again.” She shook her head and returned to picking. Teza's fingers had a will of their own, sorting through the dark green leaves in search of succulent fruit while she glanced up from under the wide brim of her straw hat. “You'd have done the same.”
    Kit knew she'd been nailed again. There was really no sense arguing. She never won. “Don't you ever listen to your messages?”
    “I haven't been back up to the house.” Berries continued to fill Teza's crate at a speed to be revered by most other berry pickers.
    “That's why I called to remind you last night, too. You know you are supposed to have a mammogram every year.” Kit plopped a handful of berries in Teza's narrow wooden box, built to fit between the rows. A sturdy wooden handle enabled Teza to move it along easily. The fragrance of sun-warmed strawberries reminded her she was inhaling summer.
    “I know that, but my year isn't over—yet.” Teza moved the box forward and continued brushing the leaves from side to side to find the ripe