“We had our weekly interview this afternoon,” Rebecca nodded and took a large forkful of stew. “He’s a good kid. I think I get more out of our weekly time together than he does.”
“He’s something else.” Granny shook her head. “It’ll be interesting to see what he ends up doing in life. People call him the young mayor these days, you know.”
“The young mayor,” Rebecca mulled. “Suits him.”
She eyed Granny.I’m probably making too much of it.He did giveher his address readily.
Granny eyed her back. “You’re troubled.”
Rebecca shook her head. “I’m sure it’s nothing. It’s—well, Devon had a big bruise on his wrist today. When I asked him about it, he kind of panicked. Wouldn’t let me see, said something about hurting it on his locker at school.”
Granny looked thoughtful. “Maybe he was embarrassed.”
“Maybe.”
“But you think it was more?”
Rebecca pursed her lips. “I don’t know, Granny. This sounds dumb, but it made me wonder if there’s trouble going on. Like, at home or something. Or if he’s being bullied. People don’t usually have bruises here.” She pointed to the underside of her wrist. “A week or so ago, he had some nasty bruising on his torso, too. Said he fell off his bike, but…”
She sighed, couldn’t bring herself to say the words.
“I’d hate to think he’s having trouble.” Granny thought a moment. “Why don’t I take a look at school tomorrow, see for myself.”
Relief washed over her. “Thanks. I’m probably just making a big deal out of it, but …”
“But just in case.”
“Exactly.”
They finished their meal in silence, then Rebecca leaned back, sipped her tea and surveyed the land beyond. Dusk had turned to twilight, and the twangy staccato of katydids began to fill the air.
“Six more weeks,” Granny said.
“Huh?”
“When you start to hear the katydids again, that means six weeks till the first cold snap.”
“But it’s a hundred degrees outside.”
Granny laughed. “This town can turn on a dime. It’ll be in thehundreds one week, then we’ll get a week of rain and boom: the next week we’re in the eighties, then the seventies, then you wake up and it’s fall.”
Rebecca raised her eyebrows. “I always thought it was more subtle. In New York, seasons ease one into the next.”
A flash of last fall, walking with Peter in Central Park on a rare no-work afternoon, came suddenly, and sadness flooded. Not for him, necessarily, but for all she’d once been, all she’d lost. She realized now if she did go back, it would be a different Rebecca who’d walk those streets. One who looked a little deeper at the people she passed, one who cared a little more.
“I forgot you’d not been here for fall before. You always came in the summers. Wait till you see Christmas.”
They grew silent, the evening air settling around them like a shawl. If things didn’t turn around at the paper, Rebecca might not even be here at Christmas. It was hard to imagine.
“You look like you have the world on your shoulders, Becca.” Granny’s tone was light, but Rebecca couldn’t see her expression in the semi-darkness.
“I was wondering if I’d even see Christmas in Dahlia.” She wasn’t even sure why that bothered her. Not that she planned to stay here long-term. But for Granny’s sake, not to mention her own, she wanted to say she’d been able to turn theDahlia Weeklyaround and get it going in the right direction before she moved on to a bigger area.
“Oh, sweet girl. Surely the paper’s doing better. You said so yourself earlier this week, that things were picking up. Small growth is growth, after all.”
“The numbers are still dismal. And now that advertiser, Erik Wennerman, has me worried. He’s been coming by, being all charming, asking me out—” She held up a hand as Granny started to speak. “No, I have no intention of dating him, or anyone, butnow I’m wondering whether he’s more interested in luring me and the paper to his family business.”
“A retirement home?”
