The crisp air bit at the back of Paul’s neck and swirled around his cheeks. He breathed it in deeply, until his lungs felt washed clean. He’d come to Celia’s house the back way, through the trees, just for a change of scenery. He hoped to convince her and Abe to come back to his house to watch a movie.
He and Malcolm had expanded their business into the fall—they planned to rake yards on Sunday mornings. The summer heat had lingered this year, but this weekend seemed to mark the official start of fall. Leaves were falling and they’d had four customers today, and he hadn’t been able to resist stopping at a yard sale on the walk to the first job. He stood at the card table piled high with movies, and realized he didn’t know what kind of movies Celia liked. He grabbed a variety of genres, and figured he’d let her pick.
He smiled as he thought about her picking a horror movie, and sitting through it without so much as a shiver, just to prove she wasn’t scared. Up ahead, Celia’s back yard came into view through the colorful trees. The leaves were thinning, making everything easier to see. He paused at the edge of the lawn, seeing that Celia’s mom sat in one of the folding chairs by the cold fire pit.
“No need to be skittish, come on over,” she said to him, her voice scratchy and dim.
He stepped toward her. “Good afternoon, Mrs. Y.”
“It’s a little chilly, but it’s really pretty back here.” She gestured to the trees.
He looked at Mrs. Young’s face. Her eyes were puffy and pink, the crying evident on her face the same way it appeared on Celia’s. “I could start a fire for you.”
“No, but thank you. I’m enjoying it, actually. Summer’s too hot for me and I always welcome fall. I need to stack up that pile of firewood over there. That’s what I came out here for, but I got distracted by the beautiful trees.”
She stood up and walked to the pile of freshly chopped firewood. She slipped on a pair of men’s work gloves that had been resting on the pile.
“I’ll help,” he said, and joined her by the wood pile. Gloves on, she lifted a piece of wood and handed it to him, and he stacked it neatly on the grate by the house.
They worked quietly for a while, and he noticed that her soft grunts of effort and some of her movements were just like Celia’s. He smiled at her as she handed him the next log, and she smiled back, looking a little surprised.
“We don’t even have a fireplace,” she offered, chuckling. “We had a dying poplar tree in the woods, just a few feet in, and Todd cut it down this morning. This is just one of the branches. That was all he managed to drag out. We’ll use this wood for the fire pit—probably next spring. It needs to dry.”
Paul nodded. “That’s a big job, cutting down a tree.”
“Todd enjoys that sort of thing. He just fired up the chainsaw, and I steered clear. Abe wanted to watch, but I didn’t let him. I told Todd he couldn’t because he had to help me clean the oven, but really I was terrified the tree would fall on him. Todd thinks he knows what he’s doing, when half the time he’s just winging it.” She sighed. “Well, I suppose you’re here for Celia.”
“I have some movies at my house, and I thought she and Abe might like to come over and watch one. I have popcorn and hot cocoa.”
“Sounds cozy.” She smiled, but it didn’t displace the sadness that had crept into her eyes.
“Do you want in on this movie and hot cocoa action? I could bring one over and we could hang out here instead of at my place.”
“Oh, you don’t want to watch a movie here, Paul.”
He took another log from her. “Sure I do. Why not?”
She lifted her chin and squinted a little bit. “I can think of a few reasons why not, can’t you? By the way, how’s your mother doing these days? I hear she got a new job.”
It was his turn to lift his chin. But when he met her eyes, he only saw compassion there. He looked up at the back door, and then into the kitchen window, searching for any sign of Celia. “Yeah, she got a new job. It seems to be going well so far.” The first few months of a new job were usually fine.
Mrs. Young tugged off the gloves and slapped them together to beat out the dirt. “Thank you for your help with the wood, Paul, that was very kind of you. Celia and Abe aren’t here, though. They went to Bakerstown with Fay and Olive to do a little shopping.”
He watched as she made her way over to the back door and pulled it open. “I think I’m going to make hot chocolate now. You got me thinking of it, and I won’t be able to get anything else done until I have some. I know it’s not what you came here after, but you’re welcome to join me.”
Paul smiled and wiped his hands on his pants and was about to say yes, when Mr. Young’s face appeared in the doorway. “I’m heading over to Roger’s house.”
“We talked about this already, Todd,” Donna said through gritted teeth.
“You talked.” His voice was sharp as a blade.
“And I thought you were listening.”
At that, Todd’s shoulders slumped and he hung his head. When he spoke, his words had a smoother edge. “He just needs some help changing the brake pads. That’s all.”
Donna’s arms flew up. “How many things can be wrong with one vehicle?”
“I’m going, Donna. Don’t give me any trouble about it,” he growled.
Paul saw the moment Mr. Young spotted him. His eyebrows knitted up in a glare. An intruder to this private moment, Paul turned and walked around the side of the house, reminding himself that it was normal for people to argue. That everybody had bad days, and that Fay and her mom hadn’t whisked Celia and Abe away in order to give them respite from household tension, but because it was a normal thing to do.
A few hours later, after killing time playing some video games and eating through most of the snacks in the pantry, Paul went back to Celia’s. On the walk there, he decided two things. He was going to figure out how to save up for a truck so he could be the one to take her places when she needed to get away, and he wasn’t going to leave her house until he saw her.
Thankfully, she was the one who answered the door when he knocked. She bit her lip to contain her smile, and he couldn’t keep his hands from grabbing her hips and pulling her flush against him. She murmured a noise of satisfaction in his ear, and he whispered fiercely in hers, “Where can we go?”
She tugged him into the living room and closed the door behind them. “This never happens, but I’m home alone.” Her fingers twined around his, and her eyes danced as she gazed up at him.
“Where is everyone?”
“We went shopping, and when we got back, Aunt Olive invited us over for dinner. I said I wasn’t hungry, so Mom and Abe went without me.”
“And your dad?”
“He was gone when we got home.”
“What if he gets home and I’m here?”
“I’ll just push you out my window.” She smiled. “It’s fine. Now quit worrying, and follow me.” She led him down the hallway and into her room, where she shut and locked the door.
His heart thumped in his chest. They stood across the room from each other, the air between them getting thicker by the second. He needed to get himself under control. He went to the window and looked out. “I’m glad you have a one-story house.”
She laughed lightly, and he turned back around. “Are you okay, Celia? I came by earlier, and things seemed tense with your parents.”
Her face revealed nothing. “Everything’s good. Mom said you wanted to watch a movie.”
He wanted to think more about what was happening with her mom and dad, but it would have to be later—he wasn’t capable of it at the moment. He leveled a fevered look at her. “I don’t have a movie on my mind right now.”
Her chest rose and fell rapidly, her breathing loud in the silent house.
He swallowed thickly. “And last night? Was what happened with us…okay?”
She nodded, and her lips parted. “Paul.” Her voice was barely a whisper, halfway to being a plea. He crossed the room in two steps and crashed his mouth down on hers. They fell backwards onto the bed, her body beneath his, her lips beneath his, her pounding heart beneath his pounding heart. He pressed his tongue into her mouth, and she groaned as she wrapped her arms around his neck, her legs around his waist.
After some time, when the frenzy had abated slightly, he lifted his head to check on her. He studied her eyes, and she was present—right there with him. She didn’t look away like he feared she might. Instead, she reached up and touched his cheek with her fingertips, letting them wander all over his face, down his neck, and to his chest. Satisfied that she was okay, he pulled her closer and fastened their lips together again.
A scant hour later, the creak of the screen door and the thud of heavy footfalls in the kitchen sent Paul right out Celia’s window, and he flew all the way home.