Maybe Lynn put it up? Is she back? I haven’t seen another car in the driveway or heard anyone downstairs.
She’s the only other person who would have keys, who would be able to get in.
Unless . . .
I remember the other night, when I left the door unlocked, when I thought I heard footsteps, movement. But who would sneak into my stairway in the middle of the night to hang a plant?
No one, that’s who.
I shrug it off, like a damp animal shaking the wet from its fur.
I walk out to a perfect day. Early September weather is pure magic.
I resist the urge to take out my phone. I want to drink in this morning. I want to enjoy a leisurely stroll in this charming town. I want to reprogram myself. In the city, everyone is rushing toward the past, trying to get to where they needed to be ten minutes ago.
Things are so different here. The sidewalk is wide and the grass on either side is beautifully green. The trees provide generous shade; the leaves hum above me. I’m able to take a good look at the houses. They’re set back from the road so they’re hard to see while driving. They’re all the same style, Victorian farmhouses. They have porches and shutters and identical landscaping.
There’s a man on one of the porches reading and drinking coffee.
“Morning!” he says. He’s older, his white hair down to his shoulders. He’s got a deep, dusty grandpa voice.
“Morning!” I reply.
It feels nice to be acknowledged. To walk down the street and not be completely invisible.
There are more people on the stretch of Main Street with all of the shops. It’s much busier now than on weekdays. There are people out and about holding coffee cups and pastries and loaves of bread and bouquets of flowers and multiple dog leashes attached to multiple dogs trotting ahead or lagging behind. Some people have grocery bags overflowing with greens. As I walk by, they turn to me, smile and say, “Good morning,” or “Hello.” Every single person.
And every time it happens, it’s like a sip of hot tea. It’s macaroni and cheese; it’s cozy slippers; it’s cashmere. It’s comfort.
I come across a sign stuck into the grass that reads Farmers Market, with an arrow pointing down a narrow path.
I follow the path, a stream of pale dirt between two rows of tall trees. If I were young, I’d want to climb them. They have those low, sturdy branches. I spot some particularly adorable squirrels scurrying around, all furry and fat cheeked. Eyes big and black and glassy.
Only animals have eyes like that. Innocent voids. I’ve held a baby before; as soon as we’re born, our eyes are filled with want.
The sun reintroduces itself at the end of the path, the shade disappearing at the part of the trees. There’s a large field with rows of white tents with peaks like meringue. There’s a circle of children playing duck, duck, goose on the grass. There are two teenage boys hovering over open guitar cases, playing a song I’ve never heard. They’re the kind of boys I would have had crushes on in high school, angsty musicians in waffle knits with good bone structure and poor hygiene. Except these boys are actually talented. All the guitar players I ever liked were terrible. I taught myself how to play when I was fourteen, thinking it would impress them. I picked it up fast and was, surprisingly, pretty good. But that ended up being a bad thing. None of those guys wanted to date a girl who was better than them at guitar.
It never bothered Sam. He liked when I played.
I drop a dollar into each of their cases.
Sophie said she would be here, but she didn’t say when or where to meet her. She mentioned coffee, so I set off to find coffee.
I walk through an aisle between tents and find vendors selling fresh eggs and milk, selling fish, selling apples and apple cider and apple turnovers, selling jams. I pause in front of the jams. There’s apricot. Sam’s mom used to make cookies with apricot preserves in the middle. They were my favorite.
“Hello,” says a very thin woman with a blunt white-blond bob. She wears giant black sunglasses, the kind that would make anyone else look like an insect, but they make her look chic. She lifts them up to look at me. She wears clumps and clumps of mascara. I’d guess she’s in her sixties.
“Hi,” I say. “Morning.”
“Here, sweetheart. For you,” she says, depositing a sample-sized jar of jam in my hand.
“It’s raspberry,” she says. “Do you like raspberry? You look like a raspberry girl.”
“I like raspberry,” I say.
“Just a little tart,” she says. “Like me.”