Years have gone by since the death of Noah his special needs son, and Wiley Cantrell realizes it’s time to move on. He and his husband Jackson try to adopt little Tony Gorzola, a deaf boy with HIV who is emotionally traumatized.<br><br>Difficulties quickly set in. Tony is a sweet boy but very damaged by abuse and neglect. And Tony’s mother, in prison, is unwilling to relinquish her parental rights. No sooner do they get the go ahead to foster Tony when another child they had considered becomes available -- the daughter Jackson always wanted.<br><br>With two children on their hands, life is complicated -- wonderfully so. But just as things begin to settle down, Tony, his immune system compromised, falls ill with pneumonia ... and Wiley and Jackson find their little family faced with crisis once again.

Go Tell It on the Mountains

I’d seen photos of the scar tissue in his file, but now, looking at it with my own eyes, I felt something in my heart seize up. This kid would have a long, long row to hoe, and it would not at all be easy or pain free.


Tony saw me looking at the tissue and turned away from me, as though embarrassed. His back looked worse than his front, the scar tissue marching up to his shoulders and down to his knees, all of it a dark, angry red, not smooth and soft the way a child’s skin should be but leathery and tough.


He shook his head very slowly, very solemnly.


It’s not so bad,I said, trying to reassure him.


I held out a bath towel, helped him dry off.


Afterward, dressed in fresh pajamas, he lay on the bed.


I spread a quilt over him, tucked in the edges, lay down next to him.


Chapter 16