The family is really taking shape. A family happens when people commit themselves to each other for the long haul. It doesn't always look like we grew up believing it would look. Maggie and Zelia and Betty and her special daughter are coming together in the ways that work for all of them.

That night I finally finished the last work on the cover for the daybed mattress in Zelia's tiny house library, my first sewing job in a long, long time. I saw the tiny house lights still on, so I wrestled the pillow out of my room and Miss Roxy followed me across the yard to the tiny house, up the short ramp to the door, which was standing open. Zelia saw me struggling with the pillow and came to help me. The great room in front with the walls of windows was finished and painted. Without a word, she closed the door and Miss Roxy settled down in her dog bed by her own window set down low in the wall.

We positioned the pillow on the built-in day bed bench, and it fit perfectly. What a relief. The library in the back still had miles of bookshelves to paint. Let's try this out, Zelia said, and she unbuttoned my jeans and hers at the same time. We stood in the room smelling of sawn pine and kissed each other as we pulled off shirts, stripped to the skin, still standing, kissing. It was so dark that I could barely see her, but every inch of my skin could feel her so near to me.

I had to sit down, lie down, pull her down onto the daybed with me. I felt her smile though I could not see it in the darkness.