Miracle in the Mist Read Free Page B

womb, enfolding her in its warmth and love. Though her memory was still tantalizingly beyond her reach, she had no trouble recognizing a house decked out in all its splendor to celebrate Christmas.
    A huge blue spruce spread its abundant branches and took up the entire bay window. Glittering strings of tinsel; rainbow-colored lights; garlands of fluffy, white popcorn; and an abundance of all sizes and shapes of shiny ornaments graced every limb. Beneath the tree lay colorfully wrapped packages tied up with bows and just waiting for the recipients to discover what was concealed inside. Over the blazing fireplace, a swag of fragrant pine adorned the mantel, permeating the house with its rich aroma. The coffee table held a cut-glass bowl overflowing with pinecones interspersed with gold and silver balls. The blazing fireplace's reflection danced brightly in the bowl's prisms. Candles burned on every surface, spreading a homey warmth throughout the room that no electric lamp could attain.
    Carrie could feel in her bones that love, laughter, and happiness resided within these walls and that the people who lived here were special. Yet all the wonderfully calming emotions she sensed here felt so very foreign to her. Why?
    Meghan deposited a tray laden with four mugs topped with snowy whipped cream on the coffee table. She handed Carrie one of the steaming mugs. The aroma of rich chocolate drifted up with the steam and made Carrie's taste buds water. She had no idea when she'd last eaten, but from the hollowness inside her, she had to assume it had been some time ago.
    "Faith insisted I give you hot chocolate because she just knew you were very cold and would catch your death if I didn't." Meghan laughed. "I think she may follow in her father's footsteps and be a doctor someday."
    Carrie looked around to thank the child.
    "She's gone to bed," Meghan explained. "She has a big day ahead of her tomorrow. We're going to the city to help feed the homeless, and then she'll be staying with her grandmother for Christmas Eve."
    When Carrie frowned at the idea of the child being anywhere but at home with her parents on Christmas Eve, Meghan smiled. "It's a tradition. She and her grandmother make popcorn balls and decorate Irma's tree, then bright and early on Christmas Day, they show up here to open presents and have a big family breakfast. My mother only lives a mile or so down the road from here."
    Irma and Steve came in from the kitchen, and each picked up a cup of hot chocolate from the tray. The peaks of whipped cream that had poked up above the rim of each mug had begun to melt. Irma seated herself beside Carrie, and Steve flopped into the big recliner, pushed on the arms until the footrest popped up, and then crossed his ankles and rested the cup of hot chocolate on his flat stomach.
    Carrie sipped at her cup, licked the sweet whipped cream from her upper lip, and waited for their inevitable questions, the questions she wouldn't be able to answer.
    Steve dropped the footrest and leaned forward, his elbows resting on his thighs, the mug cradled in his hands. "So, tell me, Carrie, what exactly do you remember?"
    She set her mug aside and folded her hands in her lap. The warm, cozy feeling the house had produced in her dissipated and was replaced by the cold, empty hopelessness she'd experienced before.
    "Nothing before I found myself standing on the street, I'm afraid." She looked from one to the other, and the desolation lying in the pit of her stomach grew. "You said you could help me remember," she reminded them.
    "No, we said we could help you ," Meghan said softly.
    "But doesn't that mean… "
    Irma laid a hand on her arm. "It means we'll help you find yourself. Your true self."
    Carrie shook her head. The throbbing in her temples had begun again. "I don't understand."
    Meghan smiled. "What if we told you that there was a place where you could go and not only learn who you are, but what you are? A place where miracles happen and