“I found a job,” Harmony informed her, then told her the story of meeting Jolene at the diner.

Muffin stood on his hind legs with his head pointed straight up at Harmony’s purse. A small whine escaped his throat and interrupted Ginny’s story about that time when Jolene had botched her own baptism as a youngster.

“Sorry,” Harmony said with a sigh. “I promised him a treat to celebrate the new job, and I guess he can smell it waiting for him.” She pulled the rawhide from her purse and removed the shrink-wrap plastic. The thing was practically as big as Muffin himself, but he had no trouble picking it up and trotting off to enjoy it somewhere in peace.

Virginia shrugged into a pretty baby pink jacket. “I need to get back to the church. I just stopped in for a quick lunch break. By the way, you don’t need to leave Muffin cooped up in your room all day. I know him and the other church dogs quite well and don’t mind giving him free rein of the house. Same goes for you. Consider this whole place your home, not just that tiny room upstairs. Okay, I best be off. Bye!”

Harmony said goodbye, then headed to the kitchen to pour herself a glass of water and grab a fork for her omelet. She took everything back up to her room and sat cross-legged on her bed as she ate. While she appreciated Virginia welcoming her into her home, she also found the hospitality to be a bit overwhelming. Harmony had always found it far easier to belong in a small space—her room, her corner, her bed—than to have too much space in which to roam about. More space meant more chances for trouble, more chances for finding yourself in someone else’s space, and that someone else becoming downright angry about it.

That’s how she’d first met Alan. His first words to her had been, “That’s where I sit.” And those words were quickly followed by a sharp elbow to her ribs.

They’d both found themselves in one of those homes that collected foster kids like it collected head lice. What could one more hurt? And so they’d opened their home to Harmony and their wallets to the check from the state that came with her.

At the time there were four others, mostly older boys who could be put to work around the house and yard as needed. Alan was the youngest of them and it seemed he was grateful to finally have someone under him in the pecking order.

He’d been terrible to Harmony, but that had only lasted three weeks before he ticked off their foster mom and was sent packing. She never thought of him again until she randomly bumped into him in Mobile, Alabama a little over a year back. He’d apologized a blue streak, saying he’d been an angry kid but he was a different man now—a better one.

And Harmony believed him, partially because she understood the anger and partially because she had no reason not to. They began to seek each other out more and more until at last Alan had kissed her straight on the lips and declared himself in love.