Next to the blocks was a set of wooden dolls from Africa. The objects seemed to symbolize the two parts of her life: Kansas and the world. From the time she was nine, Mike had spent winters in Kansas with Cait and Coop, who she called Mom and Dad. Summers were with her birth parents, Vera and Papi, in whatever country they were in.

Restrictions were set before the first summer spent away. Vera would have taken Mike with her anywhere, but Cait and Kelly wouldn’t let her go where there was danger. The rules they imposed had put Vera’s back up. She didn’t like agreeing to anyone’s orders.

When Miguel stepped in and said he’d have to spend summers in Kansas with their daughter, Vera gave in. For three months every year, they borrowed a house from one of their many friends, and Michaela stayed with them.

Cait and Kelly felt they’d won a war. It was only after Mike returned from her first summer away that the women realized they’d not stipulated things like indoor toilets, electricity and not teaching Mike how to use native weapons. This was discovered when Michaela was suspended from school for three days for using a broom handle to teach spear tossing. One of her “students” had missed the target so completely he’d hit another child in the stomach. Thankfully, it had only resulted in an ugly bruise, but the principal shouted, “It could have been an eye!” Cait and Coop had hung their heads in agreement.

On the drive home, Mike, in the back seat, said, “Lance Pullman is a jerk. He wouldn’t do what I said. Then he told everybody it was my fault that he missed. He wouldn’t last ten minutes in the bush.”

Coop had started to laugh but the look his wife gave him made him stop. When he caught his daughter’s eyes in the rearview mirror, they knew they agreed.

Mike turned away from the bookcase. She had to get ready to go to what Kelly had named the Homecoming Carnival. It wouldn’t be open to the public until four, but since Mike had done a lot of work to make it happen, she was allowed to get in early and Hayes was meeting her there.

She and Hayes Lancaster had been going together for two years and she knew it was time for them to move forward. Would this carnival weekend be when “it” happened? A ring, maybe? Or some commitment to the future?

She’d teased her dad by saying his clinic was better than any online dating service. It was how she and Hayes met.