Read Online Avalanche Dance by Ellen Schwartz - Free Book Online Page A

begged off, using her leg as an excuse. There was no way she could have faced her dad.
    Gwen pushed herself up and limped to the door.
    “Sally!” she said as her neighbor came in, swathed in a rain poncho with a strange hump on her back, the two boys crowding around her legs. She held a large pot in both hands.
    “Gwennie,” Sally panted. She put the pot on the stove, kicked off her rubber boots, and whipped off the poncho to reveal a sleeping Tanya in a baby sling on her back. Turning to Gwen, Sally opened her arms. Tears briefly stung Gwen’s eyes as she felt the warmth of Sally’s chest, the tug of her embrace.
    Paul yanked on the hem of Gwen’s sweatshirt. “Percy here?”
    Gwen nodded. “Upstairs.”
    Paul grabbed his little brother’s arm. “Come on, Jasp!”
    “Percy might not be in the mood –” Sally began, but they were heading to the stairs before she could finish. She grinned at Gwen. Then her smile faded. “Holy, Gwennie, you look awful.”
    Gwen looked down at the shapeless sweatshirt and baggy sweatpants she’d taken to wearing around the house.
    “I don’t mean your clothes,” Sally said, giving Gwen an exasperated look. “I mean
you
. Have you been eating?”
    Before Gwen could answer, her mother came into the kitchen, yawning and rubbing her eyes. “Sally! What’s up?”
    Sally indicated the pot. “Brought you some clam chowder.”
    “Oh, Sal, that’s so kind.”
    “Kind my behind,” Sally said, laughing. When she laughed, her round belly shook and her eyes disappeared as her cheeks bunched up. “Simon took the boys down to the beach so I could have some peace, and they brought back such a haul of clams, I didn’t know what to do with them.”
    Gwen’s mom took the lid off the pot and sniffed. “Mmm … I love your clam chowder.”
    Gwen did too. Sally’s chowder, made according to her grandmother’s Coast Salish recipe, was more stew than soup, loaded with clams, kelp, potatoes, and wild onions.
Too bad
, Gwen thought,
I have no appetite these days
. A couple of pieces of toast, a few cups of tea, the odd pear or banana – that was about all she could manage.
    Tanya stirred in the sling, her tiny booties kicking to either side. She squeaked, growled, then straightened, her fine black hair sticking out every which way. She was screwing up her face to cry when she popped her head over Sally’s shoulder and saw Bridget and Gwen. Then she burst into a smile. “Ga!” she said, raising her arms.
    “I’ll take her,” Gwen said, unzipping the sling and lifting Tanya out.
    “Whew,” Sally said, rolling her shoulders. “That kid takes after her mama.” She laughed again.
    “Here, let me make tea,” Gwen’s mom said, but Sally pushed her into a chair.
    “Sit,” she said. “You look beat.”
    “I am beat,” Bridget said.
    Sally filled the kettle. “So, how’s Andrew?”
    Gwen froze. She started to edge out of the room with the baby. Surely Tanya needed to play on the living room floor, right away.
    Before her mother could answer, though, there was another knock on the kitchen door. Sally, who was closest, answered it. “Robert,” she said, grinning. “Come on in.”
    Her brother-in-law, Simon’s brother and fishing partner, stared at her, shaking the rain off his canvas jacket. “What are you doing here?”
    “Same thing you are,” Sally said, pointing at the parcel in his hands.
    “Oh yeah,” he said, blushing a little. He was the shier of the two brothers, the more serious. Gwen knew where her friend Danny, Robert’s son, got his quietness from. Gwen had fished off the dock or scavenged on the beach with Danny many times when they were younger, and he could go all day without saying more than a few words.
Comforting
, she thought now.
    Robert lay his brown paper–wrapped parcel on the table and opened it to reveal a whole salmon, sliced into inch-thick steaks, seasoned with lemon and herbs.
    “Thought you could use this, what with all the to-ing and