Another day in O’Leary, another moment of utter lunacy on my part.

I'd never been endowed with much common sense — my tendency to see deeper meaning in cloud formations, or to believe the universe communicated deep messages through the irrational yelling of a panhandler on the street were quirks that both my grandfather and my husband had rolled their eyes at, and I swear I’d tried to break myself of those habits since Adrian died — but I was clearly a special kind of stupid these days.

Stupid, confused, and weak, as evidenced by the fact that I’d somehow consented to go hiking with Si Sloane, after two fucking weeks of doing everything in my power to avoid him.

Maybe the reason O'Leary was so isolated wasn't due to simple geography, but because it was a black hole, like the Bermuda Triangle. Good judgement went in, but never came out.

I kicked at the packed suitcases still sitting on my floor and threw myself on the guest room bed with a sigh. Daphne, seeing an opportunity to get affection without implying that she needed or wanted affection, jumped from her spot at the end of the bed and curled in the crook of my arm, just where a patch of fall sunlight was streaming in the window.

My stomach was full of pancakes, my head was full of doubt, and my heart was thrumming like a hummingbird’s wings even though I wasn’t capable of fighting or fleeing at the moment if my life depended on it. I threw my forearm over my eyes and groaned.

Anxiety was such a bitch.

Avoiding Silas this long had been no easy feat. He’d been persistent in a way that might have screamed stalker, but instead came off as really sweet. Sweet enough to nearly make me forget why I was avoiding him in the first place, especially since the reasons all tended to sound stupid when I tried to articulate them even to myself.

Fear that I might be attracted to him? Was that really the best I could do? Because honest to God, that ship had sailed so far out of the harbor I couldn't see it from the shore.

It wasn’t just that Si was handsome, though. Simple good looks, I could have ignored. This tiny, backwoods town had a disproportionate number of hot guys, and strangely enough, I’d gotten more flirtatious looks while taking my shift in the hardware store the past few evenings than I’d ever gotten walking down the street in Boston. I had no problem tuning them out.

It wasn’t that Si was friendly, either. Si wasn’t one who carpet-bombed people with friendliness, unlike the rest of the appallingly friendly people in this town. Given that Adrian and I had referred to most of our neighbors by the cars they drove - like, Ms. Silver Mercedes and her husband better clean up after their damn dog - the culture shock of having perfect strangers who’d seen yearbook photos of me greasy-haired and pimple-faced was a very real thing, and I approved of the way Silas stayed a step removed. If I lived here, I’d shy away from town gossip too. People assumed they knew you when they really knew only one part of you… and maybe not even that.

No, the attraction to Silas was because being with him was the closest to human I’d felt in a really long time. I liked his sense of humor and the way his eyes crinkled. I liked the way my stomach got warm when I felt his gaze on me, even from across the bakery in the mornings. I liked the way his lips twitched like he was fighting a smile when he saw me, even when I wasn’t doing anything bright or funny or amusing at all; like maybe just seeing me made him happy.

Si had spoken my name in the diner today and made my spine tingle like he’d uttered a command in a language I couldn’t fully process but instinctively understood. And Silas had defended me. That had been the real nail in the coffin of my resistance right there. I'd known him for, like, a day, before retreating into my shell like a turtle, and I was pretty sure he didn't even get why Hen's comment had been hurtful, and still he'd come down on my side and made Hen apologize.

I didn't want to be attracted to that. I was pretty sure it ran contrary to the whole self-reliant, stand-on-my-own-two-feet thing I'd been so determined to attain after Adrian's death. But there was a difference between requiring something and liking it.

He made me feel special, important, understood. And that, right there, was pretty damn impossible for me to resist.

I’d had a really shitty revelation earlier in the week, while rinsing dinner dishes after a long day of teaching, stocking shelves at the store, and preparing dinner for a man who seemed determined to hate everything I cooked: I wanted someone I could talk to who would really understand me. Just that. And if that someone came attached to a pair of strong arms that could wrap around me, and gorgeous blue eyes, and a mouth with a perfect little scar right beside it that could distract me from all the piddly shit that made me spiral? Well, that would be pretty fucking excellent too.

I’d spent so long just wanting Adrian back that I had no frame of reference for wanting anything else. I couldn’t decide if it was normal that I should want more out of life than memories, or if I was the shittiest lover in the history of love, because I couldn’t remember the way my name had sounded on Adrian’s lips anymore.

How much was too much to let go? How much of myself could I give Si without forgetting Adrian entirely?

I stroked a hand over Daphne’s soft fur and focused on the rhythm of her breathing, letting my own heart rate calm.

Last week, the insurance company had gone out to inspect my Toyota at the repair shop and declared it a total loss, which was pretty much what I’d expected. But the adjuster had sent me pictures of the damage, too, and I’d felt this rush of leftover adrenaline sing in my blood at the reminder that I could have died. The night of the accident, I hadn’t cared very much either way, but now I was pretty damn glad to be alive, and right or wrong, wanting Si, who made me feel very much alive just by watching me from across the floor of the hardware store or texting me some lame joke I wouldn’t reply to, was all caught up in that.

“Everett! Are you nearly ready? Silas will be here soon.”

I rolled my eyes as Grandpa Hen’s voice bellowed down the hall. Since we’d left the diner, he’d been acting like I was a teenager and Si was my prom date. He’d suggested I pack a picnic; he’d asked me what shirt I was wearing. I’d sort of imagined he’d try to warn me away from Si, or any man actually, but instead he was all but pimping me out. Just be nice to the gentleman, Fancy.

“Yeah,” I yelled back, dislodging Daphne, who gave me a disgruntled look. I muttered under my breath, “Ready as I’m gonna be.”

I had no idea how to act, what to wear, what to think. I’d been out of the game longer than I’d ever been in it.

Lucky Silas had no idea what he was in for.

I rolled off the bed and appraised myself in the mirror over the wooden chest of drawers. Same jeans I’d worn at breakfast. Cotton button-down over my t-shirt because I’d read somewhere that layers were good outdoor wear. Either I’d do, or I wouldn’t. I was not going to dress up.

I pulled on my sneakers and grabbed my old backpack, which I’d filled with water bottles and protein bars in lieu of a picnic, then made my way down the hall to the living room, leaving Daphne shut in my room.

Grandpa sat in his recliner and looked me over before nodding once. “You need a haircut, Ev.”

I snorted and patted a hand over my unruly curls. “Grandpa, I’m going hiking to find a missing camper. I don’t think anyone’s gonna be looking at my hair.”

“Hmmph.” He regarded me steadily. “You know, I’ve known Silas Sloane since he was a baby.”

I nodded. He’d known practically everyone in town since they were babies.

“He’s a good man,” Grandpa continued. “Reliable. Smart.”

“Okay.”

“Steady job. Kind heart.”

“Healthy teeth. Strong back. A fine specimen?” I pushed my luck a little, still pissed off at him basically telling me to get a life back at the diner. “If he proposes, I’ll accept. It’s legal now and everything.”

Grandpa flushed a satisfying beet red. “I’m just saying that you could do worse than Silas Sloane, that’s all.”

I frowned down at him. “I don’t get it. Is this a change of heart? Have you decided to accept that I’m gay suddenly?”

“Didn’t realize it was a thing that required my acceptance,” he shot back. He looked supremely uncomfortable. “But since you are, and Silas is, then… He’s a good man to… date.” He cleared his throat. “That’s what I’m saying.”

I shook my head, still baffled, but before I could question him further, the doorbell rang downstairs.

“You sure you’re going to be okay here by yourself?” I demanded. “Need anything before I go?”

“Of course not! I’m capable of…”

“Yes, yes, I know,” I sighed. “You’re capable of taking care of yourself, capable of vaulting the building with the aid of your crutch, capable of taking down an armed intruder without leaving your recliner.” I rolled my eyes. “But when you’re out saving the world, avoid the shop, okay? Theo’s got everything under control and when you’re there, you fluster him.”

Grandpa scowled. “Fluster him? Sort him out, more like. He doesn’t do things right!”

“He doesn’t do things the way you do them,” I corrected. “They’re not wrong.”

“Hmph. Well, I’m watching college football today anyway,” he informed me, which was as close to capitulation as I was likely to get. “If you happen to see Diane on your way out, send her up?”

I blinked. “Am I likely to see Diane? She didn’t say anything about it earlier, and God knows you didn’t say anything at all to her. And for that matter, why does she still come around three times a week when I’m here to take care of you? Doesn’t she have her own things to do?”

“Never you mind, Everett.” He waved a bony hand through the air. “Go on with you. Enjoy the sunshine. Live while you’re still alive.”

I stared at him for a minute, but he was busy tracing the patterned fabric in the arm of the old recliner and wouldn’t look back.

The bell downstairs rang again, and I hefted my backpack higher. “I’ll see you later, then?”

Grandpa nodded. “Off you go,” he commanded.

So, off I went.

Si was standing by the door when I got downstairs, wearing the same outfit he’d been wearing earlier, except now the sleeves of his maroon Henley were pushed up to his elbows to reveal lean, muscled forearms lightly sprinkled with dark hair.

I stopped in my tracks.

Bizarre but true fact: I am a forearm guy. Don’t get me wrong, biceps are great. Thighs, asses, pecs, all wonderful also. But back when I was still drawing regularly, I had notebook after notebook filled with sketches of forearms in all different shapes and sizes. I’d sprung wood for my junior high track coach’s forearms — and lifted weights religiously during that period, since it meant that he would stand behind my head and spot me with those arms on prominent display. I was a forearm connoisseur, and Adrian used to tease me mercilessly about it.

And so of course Silas Sloane’s were the epitome of forearm perfection, and I could barely breathe in that first minute, with the way his pulled-up shirt sleeves highlighted his lean strength.

I didn’t know what the right thing to do about Si was, but I knew what felt good and necessary. I was attracted and I didn’t want to fight that anymore. Maybe for today, that would be enough.

“Hey,” Si said, not realizing that in my mind we’d already dispensed with the greetings (along with the whole damn hike) and I was already feeling his arms around me. Considering we hadn’t exchanged more than two-dozen words in two weeks, I might have been moving a teensy bit fast.

“Hey. How, uh… have you been?”

He grinned, and his blue eyes were as warm as the summer sky when they landed on mine. “You mean, since breakfast?”

I cleared my throat. “I mean, since the last time we talked.” Since I ran away from you and ignored you because you made me want things I shouldn’t want and thought I was strong enough to resist.

He frowned, like he was considering his answer, before finally deciding on, “It’s been a long two weeks.” He grinned again. “Annoyingly productive. I cleaned out the attic over my garage and got caught up on my paperwork.” He opened the passenger door of his truck for me and held out his hand for my backpack, then laid it gently in the backseat. “What about you?”

“Uh…” I waited for him to walk around the hood and climb in before answering. “It’s been good, I guess? Classes started.”

He nodded. “You settling in at the school?”

“Yeah.”

We drove on in silence for a minute but God, there were so many things I’d been thinking about these past couple of weeks, so many silly stories and surprising experiences, that it felt like my brain might overflow if I didn’t share them. My friends in Boston had been great about staying in touch, but they might as well have been on a different planet for all that our lives had in common right now. And I realized that Si was maybe the only person in the world who might understand.

“I thought teaching kids was going to be one of the harder aspects of moving here, but it’s actually been great.”

Si glanced at me and smiled. Warm, comfortable. “I can see that. Sometimes they’re really funny. It’s relaxing to be around them.”

“Exactly! They’re young enough that they say what they mean most of the time. And they make me see things differently.”

“How so?”

“Well, I had them do self-portraits last week. Draw yourself doing something that makes you happy, I told them.”

“Self-portraits?” He whistled low as he started the car and backed out of the parking space. “Just jumping right in the deep end, eh? And next week they’re carving statues out of marble with mini chisels?”

“Shut up.” I slapped his arm lightly. “I’m not expecting mini-Van Goghs here, Silas! It’s mostly just a baseline to see what they already notice about form.”

His expression was dubious. “Form?”

“Like, kindergarteners draw bodies as sticks, you know? Older kids make them two-dimensional; one big rectangle with four smaller rectangles attached.” I waved my arms in illustration. “And then eventually they get that there are fingers attached to hands attached to arms, and hey, we actually exist in three dimensions with shadows and light. That kind of thing.”

Si glanced at me again. “Okay, first of all, I feel very judged right now, Everett. Some thirty-eight-year-olds draw bodies as sticks as a stylistic choice.”

I bit my lip. “I… I’m sorry. Of course, you’re right. Well, Frannie and Sivan Siegel are identical twins, and…” I caught myself and rolled my eyes. “I mean, obviously you know that.”

“I do,” he agreed. “Can’t tell them apart, though. They’re mirror images.”

“Right?” I was usually pretty good at spotting differences, but as an outsider, it seemed these girls were identical down to their expressions. “So I’m expecting, you know, some variation of lines and rectangles. Not that there’s anything wrong with that,” I added, leaning over to pat his arm. “But they’re both actually super talented. And the coolest part was that the way each girl drew herself was completely different.”

Si made an encouraging noise, like he was really interested, and I found myself spilling my guts. We had pulled away from the buildings in town and sped up, flying past acres and acres of open land and pretty little houses. There was something freeing in that, too.

“Frannie drew herself with her sister and parents - one, two, three, four, in a row like stair-steps. And even though she and Sivan are the same height in real life, she drew herself bigger. Her smile was wider, her eyes more open. She’s the bigger personality of the two, the more protective one, and she knows it on a deep level.”

“And did Sivan draw herself smaller?”

“No.” I laughed. “She didn’t draw her family at all. She did this incredibly realistic portrait of herself in the woods petting a deer. The color of the deer’s pelt was spot-on. The bark of the tree was, like, ten different shades of brown, all intricately blended. And then her own face was basically a sphere with brown circle eyes and a red smile. That was the part she cared about.”

He looked over at me, his gaze slipping over my face and catching on my mouth. “And you didn’t mind,” he guessed. “Because you know what it’s like to get caught up in something. Your anthropomorphic… squirrels, was it?”

I nodded. I had no clue how he remembered that, but he did. “I loved that she got passionate about something. Probably means I’m a crap teacher,” I allowed with a chuckle. “But maybe they’ll get someone better next year.”

“She’ll remember you her whole life,” he corrected me. “All it takes is one awesome teacher to inspire an artist.”

Si was somber, just a little bit, and I wondered if he was thinking of the brother he’d lost. I both wanted him to talk to me about it and didn’t. I wasn’t sure how much of myself I wanted to share, or how much of him I was ready to handle.

It didn’t matter, though. A second later, Si slowed the truck to a stop and pointed at three tall, metal structures set side-by-side, high up on a hill.

“What do you think of those?” he asked, pointing with barely suppressed glee.

“What are they?”

The structures were just a bit taller than the two-story house next to them, slightly different in width and height, although that might just have been a matter of perspective. They were all hollow and sort of cylindrical, but topped with pointy ends, like giant watchtowers surveying O’Leary. The one in the center was dark orange, while the ones on either side were blood red and yellow-gold. There appeared to be a fourth one, half-constructed, on the end.

I tilted my head to the left. Maybe crayons?

I tilted my head to the right. Nuclear missiles? Some kind of claws?

“Are they… carrots?” I guessed.

“Carr… Wait, are you kidding?” he demanded. He looked at me with this expression of arrested laughter on his handsome face, like he’d been so sure I was giving him shit. But I wasn’t. Not even a little.

“I have no clue what it’s supposed to be,” I told him honestly. “I’m sorry. Is it a local history thing?”

He stared at me incredulously. “Come on,” he said. “It’s obvious.”

I shook my head. “Oh, pencils?” I guessed.

“They’re… they’re cocks, Ev.” He looked at me pityingly. “Giant cocks.”

I stared at the sculptures again. I mean, they could be cocks, if you only had the most basic understanding of what a penis looked like.

“Huh. Well, that’s interesting. And did the artist say why they did it?”

“No, Ev!” Si laughed again. “No one’s cornered Rena Cobb and asked her why she erected — pardon the pun — three enormous dicks in her front yard. It’s not exactly the kind of conversation folks have around here.”

“So you don’t even really know if they’re meant to be penises?” I surmised. “You all just assumed?”

“No! I mean…” He frowned. “I don’t think so.”

It was my turn to laugh. “Oh, my God. What is wrong with this town? Freud could have set up shop here and never had to leave.”

Si sat up a little straighter and eased his foot off the brake to get us back on the road, but that little pucker between his eyebrows stayed in place. It was hilarious. It was sexy.

“You know,” he said a moment later. “I think you could be really good for this town, Everett Maior.”

I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. My stomach flopped painfully, soaking up the validation like sunshine, and my heart also thrummed with very real fear because… damn, I liked that way too much.

He pulled the truck off the main road onto a rocky dirt path and drove us under a wooden sign that read Pickett’s Campground. His mood changed with the road, becoming quieter, more reserved. Focused on his job. And goddamn it, that was appealing too.

I chuckled, running a hand over my face.

God.

I liked when he focused on me, I liked that he was dedicated to something else. I liked the efficient way he breathed and how he managed to have ten fingers and two eyes. If I found out he had six toes, I’d wax rhapsodic about how six-toed men were so much more compelling than their five-toed brethren.

Essentially, I was deep in lust and everything about the man was appealing.

I laughed again, and Si glanced my way. “Everything okay?”

I waved a hand dismissively. “Yeah! Yeah, totally. This is, uh, the place where the camper was staying?”

“Yep. Frank and Myrna Lucano’s campground. Don’t ask me how it got the name Pickett’s,” he said. “Not sure if anyone remembers anymore, even Frank and Myrna.”

I forced myself to look around at the scenery — trees upon trees upon trees, with peeks of red and gold among the green, and a tiny clearing visible just a little ways ahead. “It’s pretty.”

“Wait till the fall colors really catch,” he said softly. “Frank always closes down at Labor Day, and I’ve told him he’s crazy. If he kept the place open, he could make as much in October as he does in June.”

“But he doesn’t?”

“Nope. Says autumn is a time for him and Myrna to enjoy the place. Sometimes their kids come home for the weekends. And of course, the locals are always parking here for a hike, stopping in to say hi. Faster than driving all the way around Lake Loughton or over to Camden to the nearest public lots.” He made a circular motion with his hand, like he was drawing me a map in the air. “But he and Myrna bought the place because they loved these woods so much, and for a few months a year, he’d rather not share it.”

“That’s really cool,” I said sincerely. Enjoying things while you could sounded like a hell of a philosophy. Maybe one I should adopt.

“Yeah, well.” Si winced. “Not so much anymore.”

Before I could ask what he meant, he pulled to a stop outside an actual, honest-to-God log cabin set in the small, grassy clearing. The house was small but clearly well-tended, its wide front porch set with a pair of white rocking chairs and at least a dozen pots of orange chrysanthemums that were too bright to be anything but plastic. The shutters on the windows had cut-outs shaped like maple leaves, and there was a giant purple-and-orange welcome sign hung on the front door.

“It looks like something out of a fairytale,” I whispered. Si lost a little of his melancholy and grinned.

An older man, bald but for a border of white curls around three sides of his head, appeared immediately at the front door, like he’d been stationed there waiting for our arrival.

“That’s Frank,” Si said. He waved at the man, then climbed out of the truck and I followed.

Frank rattled down the porch stairs and over the path to greet us. “Silas!” he said, clapping Si on the bicep. “Heard you boys were doing an organized search today.” He looked at me while he spoke, though, like my presence was way more exciting news.

“You heard right,” Si said. “And this is Everett Maior, Hen—“

“Henry Lattimer’s boy! Of course!” Frank shook my hand. “Haven’t seen you since you were waist-high, but I heard you and Si were at the bakery together the other week! Myrna will be real excited too… Myrna!” he called. “Myrna? Get out here, honey! Si’s brought Everett with him!”

Si looked down at his hiking boots and scratched the back of his head. He looked so bewildered by Frank’s excitement, I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing, and I couldn’t help but admire the way his arms flexed as he moved them.

The door slammed and a tall, thin woman with gray-blonde hair came striding out of the house, her slippered feet slap, slap, slapping down the porch stairs and her bright-pink blouse floating behind her. She even looked like a Myrna.

“Good morning, Si!” she said. But she, too, looked at me as she said it. “Everett Maior! You sure have grown!”

From waist-high? “Yes, ma’am.” I held out my hand. “Nice to see you.”

Myrna ignored my hand and gathered me up in a two-armed hug. “Nonsense! I knew your mother back when we were girls! You’re like a nephew or something.”

She held on tight, rocking me from side to side, because no one in this town had any sense of personal space.

I hugged her back anyway.

“You boys are here for the search, eh?” She nodded to herself without waiting for a reply. “You’re the first ones to come in this way, but I guess the rest’ll be coming soon. You’re welcome to take a peek at the poor man’s campsite, if you’d like, but I don’t think there’s much to find.”

“Thanks, Myrna,” Si said. “I know Mitch already came out here, but it might help.”

She nodded. “Mitch and Dare, both,” she said. “New eyes are always good though, I guess. He was staying at site ten, the one closest to the river.”

“Told John Carpenter he might as well stay there now, since it wouldn’t be a campsite at all next year,” Frank said gloomily.

I frowned and looked at Si, who scratched his cheek with one long finger before answering. “The State of New York is taking a small part of Frank’s land.”

“Small? Big enough!” Myrna corrected.

“Right,” Si agreed, he shot me a tiny smile, lightning-fast, that managed to convey amusement and sympathy all at once. “I just meant, they’re not taking the part with the house or the majority of the campsites, but a part up back there. They want to build a new, expanded visitor center and parking area.”

“Eminent domain,” Frank spat, shaking his head angrily. “Bastards.”

“They’re paving our paradise,” Myrna sighed, resting her head on Frank’s shoulder.

“Did you fight it?” Looking around the clearing, I was strangely moved. This place was beautiful. I understood the desire to want to keep all of it close, to protect it.

“Oh, sure. Our daughter Regan is a criminal attorney down in the city and she got a friend of hers to look into it,” Myrna said. “No dice.”

“But we’re not gonna let it go quietly! We’ll keep fighting until the trucks move in.” Frank wrapped his arm around Myrna’s waist.

“You two make sure you stay safe,” Si cautioned. “Don’t go looking for reasons why Dare will have to arrest you.”

“Darius Turner,” Frank sneered. “Mighta thought he was on our side, given how long he spent here as a kid.”

“He is on your side, Frank. He works for the state, but he doesn’t set policy,” Si said, folding his arms across his chest. I could tell this was a discussion they’d had more than once. “Dare cares about both of you, and no one’s sorrier than he is.”

“Maybe,” Frank allowed. “But maybe intentions don’t matter as much as actions. Maybe there’s right and wrong, and you need to stand up for things you care about because some things can’t be undone.”

Frank’s words made my stomach jangle, and I frowned. I’d grown up steeped in superstition on my father’s side of the family, and I wondered if this was some warning from the universe to stay away from Silas before it was too late, even as the pull of him throbbed like a toothache – insistent and impossible to ignore.

“Maybe there isn’t one right answer,” Si told Frank gently. “Maybe once you’ve fought the good fight and things didn’t work out, it’s okay to let it go and to be happy with what you still have. You don’t have to stay angry forever.”

Whoa.

The problem with superstition, of course, was that once you allowed it to catch hold of your brain, it was impossible to control. Once you opened yourself up to the possibility that the universe was sending you a warning disguised as two men discussing an eminent domain case, you had to accept that that same conversation could be the universe sending you some sort of tacit approval.

Even when you weren’t sure you wanted it. Even when approval was by far the scarier option.

My cheeks flushed and tears burned the backs of my eyes. I tried to suck in a breath, but my lungs stuttered and I couldn’t quite level out. High-strung, Grandpa Hen used to say. All that Romanian blood. All that artistic temperament.

“Ev? You alright?” Si asked. When he put his hand on my lower back, the warmth of him burned through all my layers and left my skin tingling. “You need anything?”

I needed very badly not to cry in front of strangers, and I was about to. I needed to stop the see-saw of emotions because I couldn’t hold them, and I was drowning. I needed to be kissed, because it had been so damn long. I wanted to figure out how to get Si to make a move, since that seemed beyond my capabilities at this juncture, and I needed to let him know I was interested, since the man seemed to have finally gotten the message and backed off, just as I changed my mind. I wanted to hear him say my name again, just to feel the shiver of it flow through me in a way I’d never felt before, reaffirming for me that there were more things for me to experience and I was alive to experience them.

I wanted to just be.

Si studied me for a second, then nodded like I’d somehow managed to convey with a look, some fraction of what I couldn’t articulate. We said our goodbyes to Frank and Myrna, with Si not seeming to care how strange it was that the high-strung freak of nature at his side was struck mute and on the brink of tears. He simply grabbed my backpack, took my hand, and led me into the woods.