15
ELSIE
The week foldsin on itself.
I spend most of it upstairs, holed up in my room with Elspeth’s letters scattered around me. I’ve only read two. The rest sit in their bundle, neat and accusing, as if waiting for me to gather the courage to unfold them. I keep telling myself I’m saving them for when I’m ready. The truth is, I’m not sure I ever will be.
Still, they’ve become my company. My excuse to linger behind a closed door, to avoid conversations I don’t know how to start and emotions I don’t want Wells to see.
The one sealed letter with his name on it lives at the bottom of the bundle. I pretend it isn’t there, pretend I don’t feel its weight every time I shift the stack. I tell myself I’ll hand it over when the time is right, though I have no idea whatrightlooks like.
The house, I think, is trying to coax me out. One morning, my favorite song—“Silver Springs” by Fleetwood Mac—drifts faintly up from the parlor, notes curling through the stairwell like smoke. Another day,Anne of Green Gables, Volume IIstumbles from a shelf on the landing, the spine already split at my favorite chapter.
Small nudges. Soft hints. But I ignore them. I tell myself I’m working, that the county needs documentation, that Wells has plenty to do without me underfoot. He doesn’t need or want my help anyway.
I only catch glimpses of him while I’m hiding upstairs. His boots by the back door. A muffled laugh with Jack on the porch. The smell of sawdust and smoke drifting up from the shed. We pass once in the hall, moving in opposite directions. He says “evening” without stopping.
I nod and keep walking.
That cavern between us grows wider by the day, and I let it. I feel it in a way that settles behind my ribs, low and constant, like a draft you can’t quite find the source of. I wonder if he does, too.
Hemingway betrays me by curling up on Wells’ lap in the lounge one night, tail flicking like he’s staking a claim. What a smug little tyrant. God, I want that to be me.
Not sitting on Wells’ lap, being petted and adored. Jesus Christ, no. I just mean I want to be out there with him, warm and content, instead of marinating in my own restlessness. Instead of hiding.
But I don’t go in. Not because I don’t want to—I do, more than I can explain—but because I’m scared of what might happen if I do.
What if he’s cold? What if I ruin whatever fragile truce we’ve managed to hold together with too many words? Worse, what if he isn’t cold at all, and I start to hope for something I can’t let myself want?
I keep thinking about the letters upstairs. The ones I’ve read and the one I haven’t. I don’t know what they mean or why she wrote to him, and as long as they’re hidden, I don’t have to find out.
It’s easier, in a way, to keep the distance between us. Easier than risking connection just to break it. Easier than saying the wrong thing again.
By Thursday, the walls start pressing in, and I’m going stir-mad. I need to gather more statements for Alma, but I also need to breathe somewhere that isn’t lined with ghosts. So, I bundle up, notebook in hand, and set out for Mirabelle Orchard.
I haven’t been out there in at least a dozen years. I hardly remember the layout—where the fence used to break, how many rows to the edge of the pond—but I do remember how it felt.
The shimmer of early spring blossoms like fairy dust on the breeze. The thrill of climbing trees I was explicitly told not to. The heavy sweetness of ripe fruit in the air, and Isla’s laughter somewhere nearby.
There was a time I thought the orchard had its own heartbeat. That if you were quiet enough, it might speak back.
Now, the snow is hard-crusted, silvered at the edges where the sun hit and froze again. Rows of bare trees flank me as I walk, their branches stiff, clawing at the gray sky. Ahead, Isla’s cottage smokes gently, the scent of woodfire and citrus drifting faintly even before I reach the door.
She answers in a wool sweater, cheeks pink from tending the stove, shiny black hair twisted into a topknot. For a heartbeat, she looks at me, and I wonder if she’ll turn me away. Then her smile cracks open.
“Elsie, oh my God. Hi!” she says, pulling the door wider. “Get in here before you freeze your ass off.”
The warmth hits first, then the smell—spiced plums and woodsmoke. The cottage is cluttered, cozy: books stacked on every surface, herbs hanging to dry by the rafters, a kettle hissing faintly on the stove.
I step inside, tugging off my gloves. “How are you?”
She snorts. “Busy. Cold. Perpetually two invoices behind. Same as always. You?”
I want to tell her how weird I feel. How tragically unmoored, but the words stick somewhere between my throat and my pride. So, instead, I do what I’ve always done—tuck it away and smooth the edges.
“I’m okay,” I say instead. “I was actually hoping you’d help me with a statement. For the committee. Alma’s orders.”
Isla waves me toward the little table by the window. “Of course. Tea?”
