Those words were a dart, and they hit the bull’s-eye. To my horror, my eyes started to sting. “Excuse me?” I blinked hard. I was not going to let this asshole see he’d made me cry.

But he noticed. “I mean . . .” He had the grace to look a little ashamed and started to backpedal. “You’re not staying, right? I thought you were only here short term to help out your sister.”

“Well, I hadn’t thought about it yet. I’m . . .” I put up a hand, stopping the thought. Stopping him from saying anything else. “You know what? My future isn’t any of your business. What is your business is I represent fifty percent of your wenches, and Faire starts in two weeks. Do you really not want me here?”

Simon’s mouth compressed into a thin line, and instead of backing down I held his stare. We looked at each other for a good solid minute, which doesn’t sound like long until you’re in a staring contest with someone and you don’t want to lose.

Finally he sighed. “You’re right.”

“And?” It was nice to have won, but I still didn’t know what exactly I was right about.

“And we only have two wenches this year, so we can’t afford to lose you. I . . .” He looked over his shoulder one more time. To see if he had stalled long enough, and his drug contact had skedaddled by now? When he turned back to me, something in his face had changed. “Sorry,” he said, and I almost fell over backward to hear him apologize. “This time of year is hard. And this year is . . .” That was all he said, but I watched his face. He looked tired, maybe a little sad. Why did he do Faire every year if it made him look like this?

But I didn’t ask. Because that was the kind of thing a friend would do, and we weren’t friends. I was starting to regret that.

“Anyway.” I half turned away from him, pointing up the lane. “This way back to the front, right?” I knew it was, but something in me wanted to defer to him this little bit. Like a peace offering.

“Yeah.” His voice had gone all rusty again. He cleared his throat. “That way, and it curves around to the left.” He pointed halfheartedly, and I made a little show of watching where he indicated, like he was being helpful.

“Thanks.” I started down the lane, but before the curve I ducked down a side lane. I peered around a tree and watched Simon walk the same main lane as me, heading up to that curve to the left, and as soon as he had disappeared I doubled back the way I’d come. I was better at figuring out these woods than I thought, and it didn’t take long to find the clearing where he and I had been talking. I followed the side lane where Simon had appeared. There was something down here he didn’t want me to see, so naturally I had to find it.

I followed the lane until I came across another intersection. Nothing. There was nothing here. No key to why Simon was the way he was. I stepped onto the lane, the one that was paved, when a flash on the ground caught my eye. It was sunlight, glinting off metal. Off silver.

It was the flask. The one Simon had been playing with during the morning briefing. Now it lay under a tree. He must have dropped it, and I bent to pick it up, but my hand stopped. The flask hadn’t been dropped, it had been deliberately laid down; it stood on its end, leaning against something.

Simon hadn’t been back here for a drug deal. He’d been back here for a tree. A very specific tree.

I crouched in the dirt on the side of the path, and my fingers reached out to the raised plaque resting at the base of the young tree. My fingertips grazed over the largest two words on the plaque: SEAN GRAHAM. Beneath the name was a set of dates, and my breath whooshed out of my body.

Sean Graham. Simon’s older brother, the founder of the Faire. People talked about him in the past tense, but the stories were always fond, and everyone had a smile on their face when they spoke about him. I’d convinced myself Sean had left town, maybe gotten married or something, and simply wasn’t part of Faire anymore. It hadn’t even crossed my mind that he was dead. Simon had lost his brother. I looked at the dates again and did the math in my head. Sean had died three summers ago, at the age of twenty-seven. No one should die that young.

Beneath the dates was one final line. Bring me that horizon . . . My lips quirked up. I’d seen the Pirates of the Caribbean movies more than once. I recognized the line, spoken by Captain Jack Sparrow at the end of the first film before embarking on an unknown voyage. It was a fitting farewell to someone who had spent his summers creating and running a Renaissance faire. Simon’s flask leaned against the plaque, and if I had to guess I’d have said there was rum inside.

This time of year is hard, Simon had said. Well, of course it was. This was obviously a ritual he had followed these past few years, saying hi to his brother on the first day the cast came here for the season. This whole morning snapped into clearer focus, and I burned with shame, remembering the assumptions I’d made. His thunderous face during the meeting this morning, his red-rimmed eyes, his clear discomfort and insistence that I not know what he was doing back here. Of course he didn’t want me to know. Like I said, we weren’t friends. I hadn’t wanted to confide in him. Why would he want to confide in me?

Now I understood the past few months more than I ever had. Every disparaging thing I had said about Faire, every flippant comment I had made about my character or my costume, and every stiff response from Simon, down to his disapproval of how I’d filled out the audition form. Simon was carrying on his brother’s legacy; of course he’d be protective of it. Of course he wanted everything to be just right.

“I’m sorry,” I said to the plaque, to the tree dedicated to the memory of Sean Graham. “I’m sorry I didn’t know you, it sounds like you were a pretty cool guy. But I promise, despite what your brother thinks, I do take this seriously. I’m gonna be the best damn wench he’s ever seen.”

I turned and headed back up the side lane, back to the main one that curved to the left. Stacey was waiting at the front with a paintbrush for me. I had work to do.

Six

When the Fourth of July rolled around, April had no interest in the festivities, so I dragged Caitlin with me to the town center to see how Willow Creek celebrated. The downtown area was practically awash in bunting, the perfect backdrop for the parade strolling through the main street. We kept running into people we knew from Faire, making me feel even more welcome in this small town. The whole day was like something out of an old movie: high school marching band, Boy Scouts riding on red fire trucks waving little American flags, a hot dog–eating contest (that Mitch won, to no one’s surprise), and a modest but delightful fireworks display after dark.

In mid-July, I turned another year older. My birthday was the Thursday before Faire opened, and I woke up to a reminder to pick up Caitlin’s costume from the dry cleaner’s after I dropped April off at her physical therapy appointment. I didn’t expect anyone to acknowledge my birthday, so I wasn’t disappointed when no one did. April had never been one for something so demonstrative; birthday greetings usually came from our mother. But even those weren’t forthcoming. Mom didn’t call all day, and there wasn’t a card from her when I checked the mail. Which was . . . weird.

So after dropping off April, finally returning Marjorie’s casserole dish (and fending off her politely probing questions about April’s recovery), and picking up the dry cleaning, I headed for Read It & Weep. I deserved a book for my birthday, at the very least. Not to mention Caitlin and I had finished Twelfth Night a week or two before. We’d had a lot of fun reading it out loud together, pausing every so often if she needed something explained. I wanted to keep the momentum going with a copy of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. If she was picking up my Shakespeare nerd gene I wanted to encourage that as much as possible.

I strolled the stacks for a little while before Chris realized I was there, and by the time she waved me over to make me a coffee I’d picked out three new books I couldn’t live without. Screw it, you only turned twenty-five once, right? I headed for the back of the shop, where she had coffee waiting for me, with half-and-half the way I liked it, as well as one for herself. I reached for my wallet to pay, but she waved it off.

“My treat,” she said. “Books too. Happy birthday.”

My jaw dropped. “How did you . . .”

“It was on the audition form, remember?”

I didn’t, but she did. A few months ago I might have muttered something about “goddamn small towns,” but now I thanked her with a grateful smile and shoved the books into my messenger bag.

“How’s April?” She pushed my coffee cup toward me as she picked up her own.

“Good. She’s good.” I took a tentative sip; it was still hot. “The doctors all seem to be impressed with her progress, and with how fast she’s healing. But they don’t know her. She’s pretty determined.” I tried not to wince, both from the hot drink and from my own mouth. Was I talking too much? Giving away too much of April’s private information?

“So what does that mean for you?”

“For me?” I tilted my head.

“Well, sure. You’ve been her caretaker for, what, about four months now? If she’s mobile again, what does that mean for you? Are you heading home?”