Halfway to forever by Karen Kingsbury

hair, couldn't picture her silky dark head bald and cut open.
The room was so quiet he could hear his heartbeat, and he wrapped a thick strand of her hair around his
finger and held it that way. He stared at her, studying her, watching her breathe through most of the night.
Terrified that if he fell asleep, jade-the jade he knew and loved and cherished-would disappear from his
life.
Not just for a day or a week or a season.
But forever.
279 ,7) Val 0 even
Grace's absence and jade's illness were the only marks on an otherwise perfect time for the Bronzans.
During the next two weeks, Hannah prayed daily about
both situations.
Grace's curly hair and contagious smile still flashed in
Hannah's mind every morning, and occasionally-although less
often than before-it took several minutes to remember that she
was no longer their daughter, no longer living in the frilly bedroom
down the hall.
They had talked about converting the room into Kody's nursery
but there was a small room across the hall that Hannah had
used for odds and ends that worked just as well. Besides, she and
Matt still believed that somehow, sometime, God would bless
them with another daughter.
Becoming parents to a son, however, was nothing less than an
act of God. A complete surprise that none of them would have
sought out and that had made their home a place of hope and
miracles. Overnight jenny had taken to spending long hours
rocking Kody and cooing at him. They marveled at his glowing
skin and clear bright eyes, at the fact that a runaway teenage girl
had managed to care for her baby so well, and herself so poorly.
Long before Kody awoke each morning, Hannah would find herself restless, missing the weight of him in
her arms and wanting to hold him, feed him, sing over him as she'd done that first time in the hospital
room. More often than not, she would tiptoe into his nursery, sit in the rocking chair next to his crib, and
stare
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it him, awed by God's hand in her life.
had never imagined, something she had even avoided when they
Hannah Bronzan? The mother of a son? It was something she
first entered the world of adoption. All she'd ever known were girls. But now, holding Kody, she could
sense a difference in the strength of his fist around her finger, the lust of his cry. He was a
good-natured baby, yes, but he was all boy A fighter with strong
will and determination that overshadowed anything she'd seen in her girls at this age.
Hannah often sat in the dawning shadows of morning and studied his face through the crib bars, imagining
what great thing God had planned for him. Maybe he'd be a preacher, like poor Milly had prayed. Or the
faithful president of a company, leading his employees by example. Or maybe a teacher, a coach. A
freedom fighter like Matt, or a doctor like Tom.
It didn't matter really Whatever Kody was, he'd always be a miracle first. A boy whom God had
handpicked for their home, their arms. Their family.
That was something else. After Grace was taken from them, Hannah doubted the entire idea of adoption. It