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Tomorrow evening, this place will be full of people. Last weekend, that thought would have terrified me on Locke’s behalf. Now I look at him standing openly in the middle of town, one hand touching me because he wants to, his work towering behind us where everyone will see it, and the fear is still there. It just isn’t the only thing there anymore.

My phone buzzes inside my purse.

The old reflex wins before I can talk myself out of it. I pull it out. DO NOT ANSWER. The square keeps moving around me. Shannon is arguing with Tom about whether the bear is two inches too far to the right. Laura and Janet are gathering the loose willow. Blair is examining the festival map posted beside the fountain. Locke is beside me.

I put the phone on the edge of the platform and pick up my cup. It buzzes again. I leave it there.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Locke

By Friday evening, the bear has stopped belonging to us.

People stand in front of it with their phones raised, and children pose beneath one enormous paw while their parents take pictures. A man I’ve never met circles the platform twice before stopping beside Shannon to ask how long it took to build.

Shannon points at me, and the man looks surprised, an expression I’m becoming very familiar with.

“He built it?”

“With some help from Tom,” Shannon says. “But yes.”

Tom is standing beside the platform and points toward me. “Mostly him.”

The man looks back at the bear, then at me. “Hell of a job.”

“Thank you.”

He starts to walk away, then stops and turns around. “You make anything smaller?”

“I can.”

The man nods, thoughtful. “What kind of things?”

I think about the things I have made in Rachel’s workshop: the basket that leaned because I did not understand what happened when wet willow dried, the stool that did not lean because I understood better by then, and the small bird I made yesterday while waiting for Tom to arrive.

“What do you want?”

The man smiles. “That’s a good answer.” He pauses, then, “My wife loves owls. Could you make one of those?”

I think about the small bird I made yesterday. “Yes. I can make an owl.”

By the time he leaves, I have his name written on a piece of paper that Shannon insists I put in my pocket. I can’t read it yet, but that doesn’t make it useless.

“First commission,” Tom says.

“Commission?”

“When somebody asks you to make a specific thing for them and pays you for it.”

“Oh.”

Tom tips his chin toward the piece of paper in my hand. “Looks like you’re in business.”

The man disappears into the crowd.

The paper feels important in my hand. “I think I like that.”

The square is much fuller than it was yesterday. Strings of lights hang above the vendor booths, music carries from the temporary stage near the courthouse, and every few minutes I smell something new cooking from somewhere I can’t see. Rachel told me Friday night is the smaller part of the festival, but I’m beginning to suspect Hollis Springs has a different definition of small than I do.