Chapter 2:

“I love your hair, River,” Katie, Kaylee’s fourteen-year-old cousin said as she ran a horsehair brush through the long brown locks. “It’s so pretty.”

“It’s just fabric,” River said to Joanne, Kaylee’s sixteen-year-old cousin, ignoring Katie and her observation all together. “It should be soft.”

“Well, we’re gonna stuff it with somethin’,” Joanne said, taking the doll River had stitched together away from the girl. It wasn’t very complicated, the body was made out of the scraps from an old apron, it was red with little white flowers on it and very, very soft from years of wear. A flour bag made up the bonnet and the baby’s hands. Zoë’s baby, Joanne was positive, would absolutely adore it.

River had never sewn a doll before. She’d never sewn anything before. She didn’t know why, but this activity, Joanne had insisted, would be the most rewarding of all the many things they could do that day. Joanne had said that Jack wouldn’t want to be around ‘them girls’ if they were sewing. River didn’t know why anyone wouldn’t want Jack around, but she didn’t feel nearly confident enough to say so. It had turned out all right though, after much protesting from Joanne, Katie and Miriam (Kaylee’s nine-year-old cousin), and an intervention by their mother where River was forced to make her opinions of the situation known: Jack was allowed to stay as long as he didn’t get in the way. Much to Joanne’s displeasure, he’d spent the entire afternoon totally out of the way, sitting in the windowsill whittling and observing as Joanne patiently showed River how to cut and pin and stitch.

“Not sand,” River said. “Sand is little, little rocks. ‘If your son asks for a loaf of bread, will you give him a stone’?”

“Oh-kay,” Joanne said, glancing at Katie significantly. From across the room, Jack glared spitefully at his sisters. “What else we got?”

“Sawdust,” River said, petting her little doll. “Heart and soul of wood. Living, breathing, growing.”

“Good idea, River,” Jack said before his sisters could throw each other more si