“You haven’t for the last three days.”
“Neither have you,” he replied.
“Are you on vacation, too?”
“Is this your vacation?”
She bit her lip and studied the buildings and storefronts as they walked by.
“Sort of.”
She wasn’t going to explain. She wasn’t sure she could. The drudgery of constant practice and rehearsals, the limited social outlets, the pressure from her parents to achieve more and more had finally reached the point where she wasn’t sure about anything any more.
Music had once enchanted her. Now it was a chore. Her escape was an attempt to find the joy in music again. Try something else. Find herself. She couldn’t envision herself playing the violin to the exclusion of everything else for the next fifty years.
Should she try another instrument? Think about another career? She was too burned out to do any of that.
The town consisted of two main streets, intersected by cross streets for five blocks. The predominant vehicles parked at the curb were dusty pickup trucks. Except for a couple of men talking in front of the bank, and a woman farther down the block gazing into one of the windows, the place seemed deserted. She really had arrived at another world.
“Where are all the people?” she asked.
“Mostly at work, I expect.”
She glanced at him again.
“What do you do for a living?”
“Construction. A little whittling. Whatever comes along. Library’s right here.”
He held open one of the double doors leading into a single story frame building. The sign hanging from the overhanging roof simply said Library.
It was blessedly cool inside. Angelica’s spirits rose.
A round woman with a merry smile looked up from the front desk.
“Good morning,” she sang out.
Angelica smiled involuntarily. The woman’s happiness was almost contagious.
“Mary Margaret, I’d like you to meet Angelica Cannon. She’s staying at Webb Francis’s while he’s in hospital. She plays the fiddle and wants to study some of the music played around here.”
“Welcome to Smoky Hollow. How’s Webb Francis doing?” she asked, looking first at Angelica and then Kirk.
“Mending. Angelica’s from New York. Plays some.”
“I heard you have tapes of some of the music gatherings here. I’d like to listen to them some time,” Angelica expanded.
“We’ve got a fine media room, with a DVD player and CD players. Plus a VCR for old recordings. And a subscription to streaming events. Or you can check them out and take the CDs home with you. I know Webb Francis has a player.”
“I’m just visiting.”
“Well, with Webb Francis and Kirk vouching for you, I reckon you can get a temporary library card. Want to look now?”
“We’ll stop back by on the way home. Pick her out a couple if you would, Mary Margaret. She wants to hear mountain music.”
Mary Margaret laughed. “Well, she came to the right place for that. Come on in any time. I’m here most days.”
Angelica agreed and turned to follow Kirk when he headed out.
