Sheltering Hearts Read Free

right in,” Dory said to them. And then she walked over to her neighbor’s yard.
    He turned off the hose, smiled at her and said, “Hey, Dory. How’s it going?”
    “You don’t have to cut my grass,” she said. “I have a lawn mower. I can get it done.”
    “It’s no trouble,” he said. “Glad to help.”
    “I wish you wouldn’t.”
    He frowned at her. “I said I didn’t mind. Why don’t you want my help, anyway?”
    She thought for a second. She didn’t want to get reeled in, that’s why. But she said, “Listen, I’m just too busy to be repaying grass-cutting favors.”
    “Yeah, I got that—busy. Look, that’s perfectly fine. I didn’t have any kind of repayment in mind.”
    “But it’s a pretty big yard!”
    “Dory, it’s a riding lawn mower,” he said, throwing an arm wide toward it. “It’s kinda fun, to tell the truth.” Then, for no reason she could immediately figure out, he crouched. “Hey, what’s your name?”
    Austin had followed Dory and now stood right behind her. He just stared at Clay for a second until Dory said, “It’s okay.”
    “Austin,” he said shyly.
    “Well, Austin—want a ride on my new lawn mower?”
    “We need to get dinner…” Dory said.
    “A very short ride?” Clay asked. Then he stood and looked into her eyes.
    “Please, Mom? Just a short ride? Please?” Austin pleaded excitedly.
    She sighed. “Please be careful,” she said to Clay.
    “I’m very careful,” he said. “Come here, Austin. I’ll drive you over to your front door.”
    Austin scrambled excitedly onto Clay’s lap and Clay revved up the lawn mower, lifted the blades off the ground and let Austin put his hands on the steering wheel. Then they started off toward Dory’s house, taking very wide S-turns getting there, making the ride longer. By the time he delivered Austin to the front porch, sweet Sophie was standing there, a very envious light in her eyes. “Well, I bet you’d like a short ride, too. Ask your mom,” Clay said.
    Swell, she thought. She’d pretty much shut down the come-on, so was he planning on winning her over by charming her kids first? Sophie was just watching her with large, imploring eyes. “Mr. Kennedy, this is Sophie. Very quick ride, please. We have to get going,” Dory said reluctantly.
    “Very quick,” he said. Austin scrambled off, Sophie scrambled on and Dory stood right in front of her little house, watching andwaiting. He made some more of his wide S-turns, stretching out the ride a bit, and she could hear Sophie’s laughter and squees right till they pulled back up in front of the house, and he lifted her down.
    “Thanks, Mr. Kennedy,” she said.
    “If it’s all right with your mother, I’d like to be called Clay. We’re neighbors,” he said. Then he made a wide turn on his lawn mower, raised a hand and yelled, “Adios!”
    And Dory thought, Oh, man, I have issues. Perfectly nice, helpful man treats me and my kids well and I have problems with it.
     
    C ORSICA R IOS WAS a social worker who had been a single mother to a young son, whom she had raised into a fine man. It went without saying that she was sensitive to the many needs of single moms. Corsica moderated their support group and was the person who had originally recruited Dory to help her and a couple of her friends grow one small community effort into a nonprofit agency with many volunteers.
    Dory had learned so much from Corsica in just a few years, including fundraising, writing grants and networking, all so that single moms who found them got what they needed. Being part of such an effort filled a need in Dory, because it hadn’t been very long ago that Dory had found herself suddenly alone in Oklahoma with two little kids, behind in rent, no job, no money. Back then it was an angel named Rhonda, a single mother and founder of the Zoë Institute in Oklahoma, who had helped Dory get back on her feet. A year later Dory’s uncle Joe had died and left her the little house on