Arden had yearned to be part of Baz’s clique, but she had not expected in the slightest to end up picking through old midden dumps. But Fern was right. Arden found a couple of pretty, flowered saucers with gold rims and just a couple of chips and cracks, and a teacup that matched with a small chip out of the rim. A couple of other items from the same set were too shattered to save, but Arden gathered the pieces and put them in a cracked clay pot that she had also found; perhaps they could be used as part of an art project.
“There’s probably enough broken crockery in this town to make a really beautiful tiled walkway,” she remarked as she and Fern picked through the weeds behind another of the houses. Fern found a nice metal coffeepot that didn’t seem to have anything wrong with it, and would look very nice on a kitchen shelf once it was cleaned up.
“Oh, that’s a lovely idea,” Fern said. “I can keep any pieces I find for you if you’re collecting them.”
Arden flushed. “I’m really not going to be here long enough for it to matter.”
“Are you sure about that?” Fern tilted her head to the side, birdlike. “I saw the way you and Baz keep looking at each other.”
Arden felt her flush deepen. “It’s not like that. We’ve only just me.”
“Not all men are like the one who hurt you,” Fern said quietly.
She said it so matter-of-factly that it took a moment for the words to sink in, and when they did, Arden sprang to her feet. “What do you know about me?” she demanded. Her heart was racing like a rabbit’s.
“Nothing!” Fern cried. She scrambled up, too. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you think I’d been prying. I can just tell it’s something like that, isn’t it? No, don’t look at me like that. Sometimes I speak out of line. I’m sorry, I’m really sorry. Forget I said anything.”
“It’s okay.” Arden pressed her hand to her chest. For a minute, she’d felt like she was having a heart attack.I have to stop being so jumpy about this.“I don’t want to talk about my past, that’s all.”
Fern mimed zipping her lips. “Then I won’t. I think you should start fresh the moment you walk into town. Nothing before matters. That’s a nice thought, don’t you think?”
It was a nice thought. But as Arden walked back to her cabin after waving goodbye, carrying as much broken crockery as she could hold, she wished it could be that simple.
Nothing is ever really left behind.
Still, once she had finished putting her new acquisitions in prominent places, it did make the place look a little more homy. The dishes, washed in the creek, glistened on a shelf. The flowers filled the cabin with their fresh, summer scent.
Now that she no longer had to hide, Arden left the door open to let in the sun and the sound of a radio playing and cheerful voices calling to each other. She still wasn’t quite one of them. But stretched out on top of her sleeping bag, with a book in her hands that she was only halfway paying attention to, she felt much less alone.
BAZ
Baz wokein his sleeping bag on the floor of the general store, feeling an odd tugging sensation, as if the rolled-up jacket he was using for a pillow was moving out from under his head.
He opened his eyes and found himself face to face with a goat, its mouth full of jacket sleeve.
Baz sat bolt upright. The goat took a step back, but, being a goat, didn’t seem bothered other than that. It reached down to delicately nibble on his jacket-pillow again.
Not entirely sure that he wasn’t dreaming, Baz told it, “Stop that.”
The goat ignored him. He put a hand firmly on its nose and pushed it back. He had heard that goats would eat anything, but he couldn’t really think of a reason why it would chew on his jacket, unless maybe it was the salty taste of sweat; he’d been wearing that jacket while clearing brush around the store yesterday.
This led his half-awake brain to wonder where exactly the goat had come from and how it got in. Following on this thought was the realization that it wasn’t alone. There was another goat standing up with its hooves on the counter, investigating the cans and bottles he had placed there the other day.
“Hey!” Baz said. “Go away!”
The goat, startled, bounced straight up and landed on the counter, almost effortlessly, except for knocking over a couple of bottles. Now, from its new vantage point, it resumed its investigations.
Baz looked around hastily to find out how many other goats had manifested in the night.
Early morning sunlight was streaming through the door. He had been leaving it slightly ajar so he could hear in case anyone had trouble in the night. Now the door stood all the way open, and in the street outside, he could see more goats.
Right, he thought, rubbing at his temples as if it might help wake up his brain. Uncle Axl had mentioned this. There was a farmer who lived down the hill and brought her goats up to trim the grass and keep the underbrush from consuming the town. One of the items on his mental to-do list was going down and talking to her, but it had been pushed aside by everything else.
Evidently, if you don’t go to the goats, the goats come to you.
He had crawled into the sleeping bag in a T-shirt and boxers. Baz stood up and looked around for his jeans, only to find that they had disappeared.
Was it possible that the goats had eaten them? At this point, he wouldn’t be surprised.
