Three Little Words Read Online Free PDF Page A

compensate for your shortcomings.”
    “I haven’t had a single drink in three years!”
    “The police tested you, sir.”
    “Sometimes I have a taste, just to be social.”
    “It’s my fault,” Adele said as she wept. “I should have been more protective. I won’t let them go with him ever again.”
    “I have to report this to Florida,” she told Adele and Grandpa.
    “Are you going to send them back?” Adele moaned.
    “The authorities in Florida are still in charge of the case,” the caseworker said. “Personally, I don’t think the children are at risk based on this single incident, but my supervisor is probably not going to want to accept further responsibility.”
    All the commotion caused Adele to cancel my fifth birthday party. She still gave me two dolls: Lilly, a Cabbage Patch doll; and a life-size baby doll I named Katie. I wrote my initials—A. M. R.—on her bottom with permanent black marker.
     

     
    “Christmas is my favorite time of year!” Adele said. She decorated the whole trailer before Thanksgiving. We went to the mall and sat on Santa’s lap, and I wore my angel costume again in a holiday pageant at church.
    There were many phone calls about our placement, and Adele pleaded with the authorities not to move us before the holidays. “We’ll do anything you say,” she promised Ms. Willis, who had stalled our return after Adele and Grandpa had agreed to undergo psychological examinations.
    On Christmas morning I received a pink bicycle with training wheels and Luke got a red tricycle. Grandpa gave me a battery-powered Barbie car that I could drive down our long road, and Adele made me a red dress with a white pinafore that had strawberry appliquÉs and matching outfits for my dolls. After we opened our presents at home, we visited Adele’s relatives and played with her three grandchildren, who were close to my age.
    A few weeks later Adele woke me up early. “We’re going to drive up in the mountains so you can see snow.”
    I slept in the car until Adele nudged me awake. Huge flakes whirled around and the ground looked as if it were coated with shiny pearls. When the car stopped, I ran outside, opened my mouth, and curled my tongue to catch snowflakes. I thought that they would taste like vanilla. Instead, they had a rusty-nail flavor. I wanted to make a snowman, but the thin layer was melting into mud.
    After our trip to the mountains, I asked when it was going to snow at our house so I could build a snowman. “It’s very rare around here,” Adele said, and made me a cup of cocoa with a marshmallow bobbing in the middle.
    “But could it happen?”
    “Only the weatherman knows.”
    From then on, I listened to weather reports for any mention of snow. When I finally heard the word, I kept checking for the predicted snow, but it never came. “That weatherman is a liar!” I said.
    “It’s snowing in Colorado,” Adele said with a laugh.
    “Take me there!” I demanded.
    “Maybe someday,” she replied offhandedly.
     

     
    A few weeks after Christmas my grandpa was arrested again—this time for nonpayment of child support for his youngest son. Adele bailed him out, and in his attempt to deflect the heat from himself, he told the police that Adele’s heart condition made her unfit to care for us.
    “Yes, I had a problem with my heart muscle, but it’s in remission,” Adele explained to Ms. Willis when she came to investigate. “Anyway, caring for the kids isn’t too hard.”
    “You’re judging me because of my past,” Grandpa argued. “People have always been against me. Why should the system take my own flesh and blood?”
    “I went to bat for you,” the caseworker reminded him. “We wouldn’t have a problem if it hadn’t been for these recent arrests.”
    “The last arrest was unfair,” Grandpa scoffed. “Why should I have to pay child support when I gave all my children up for adoption?”
    “If you gave them up, then you are no longer Lorraine’s