Love's Healing Touch. Jane Myers Perrine

you are going to have to stop taking care of your family and find a life of your own.”

      A life of her own? An interesting concept. Taking care of her family was, well, habit—one she’d never tried to break until she realized how dependent her father was getting on her. That, and the short drive from her little efficiency to the hospital were the reasons she’d moved. Not one to make changes easily, she felt this one was enough for now.

      “You want a date?” Raúl said. “I could fix you up with some guys.”

      “Thank you,” Ana said politely, but she’d never take him up on that. Although she was only twenty-eight, all his friends were years younger than she in both age and maturity.

      “Don’t ever go out with any of his friends,” Robbie said. “None of them are serious about anything.”

      “Why don’t you come to church with us?” Martita said. “There’s a big singles’ group there.”

      Ana smiled but didn’t answer. Other than weddings and funerals, she’d seldom been to church, although Martita had often invited her to the community chapel her family attended. Ana’d never consider going to church only to find a date. It didn’t seem quite right to her.

      After dinner, they gathered in the family room to sing “Adelita” and “De colores” and other family favorites. Raúl and Quique sat on the bench by the fireplace and strummed their guitars. Her father leaned back in his blue recliner while Martita held her kids on the other recliner, the one Ana’s mother had always sat in. Everyone else relaxed on the sofa while Tonito played with his trucks on the floor.

      As she watched, Ana was filled with love and with a terrible feeling that this was to be her life: to watch while her brothers and sister married and had babies and the babies grew up and married. And through those years, she’d worry about them, every one of them, exactly as Raúl and Robbie said she would. Forever. She knew that about herself, too.

      Sometimes, like now, she wanted more. Now that she’d reached her professional goal, she needed to look ahead. What she wanted now was a family of her own.

      Odd—she hadn’t thought about marriage for a long time, not since high school when Tommy Schmidt had wanted to marry her after graduation. Her drive to be a doctor had broken up their relationship. There hadn’t been anything serious since. Oh, she’d dated, but she’d been so wrapped up in her family, in her push to finish medical school and her need to learn everything she could, to be the best doctor possible, to finish the residency, that she’d never found time for a relationship. Hadn’t really wanted one.

      Now that she was almost there, what would she do?

      Was it too late for her to have a life and family of her own? If she did, she was going to have to leave the warm, comfortable circle of her family and enter the world of dating. The whole idea bothered her. She wasn’t good at flirtation or chatter, and her intensity frightened men.

      Then the image of Mike Fuller’s unsmiling face danced in her brain. As much as she tried to force his image away, she couldn’t. As far as she could tell, she didn’t intimidate him.

      She could not, would not even consider him. How many times did she need to remind herself he was too young for her? No, that was an excuse. How old was he? Twenty-two, twenty-three? Six or seven years wasn’t that much of an age difference.

      But there were other reasons. To her, he seemed unmotivated and that bothered her, a lot. And he was so guarded, so wary and uncommunicative.

      No, Fuller wasn’t the man for her, but, well, other than Raul’s friends he was the only unmarried man under fifty she knew.