sther’s old truck was waiting on the side of the road whenE I came outside, its wood framed bed filled to overflowing. Buckets of greenburst sunflowers and peach melba gladiolas filled every square inch of the back, their blooms heavy and drooping over the rails.
Esther’s hand was resting at the top of the steering wheel when I made it to the passenger side window, her eyes appraising as I climbed inside.
“Well, you haven’t killed each other,” she said. “Guess that’s something.”
I looked to the moving pillar of smoke already drifting over the tobacco fields. I’d been asleep by the time Eamon came in last night, but the moment Annie’s cries sounded in the dark, the sound of his footsteps crossed the sitting room on the other side of the wall. Each night it pulled me from sleep before the house went silent again. I didn’t like knowing those rhythms.
He’d already been in the fields when I came into the kitchen that morning, which meant that he’d gotten no more than a few hours of sleep. He was working almost around the clock and for the most part, it looked like he’d managed to keep the color change at bay. But the blight was still there, waiting for
its chance to take the field. It was only a matter of time before it did. Eamon just had to make it to harvest first.
Esther took her foot off the brake, guiding the truck back onto the road. “How are you holding up?”
I looked at her, unable to muster anything that resembled an answer. “Why didn’t you tell me the sheriff wanted to talk to me about the minister’s murder?”
She arched an eyebrow in response to my tone. “Honestly, I didn’t think you’d be here long enough for it to matter. It’s just some nonsense between him and Eamon.”
“What kind of nonsense?”
“The kind that men always seem to find themselves in.”
She said it with a weariness she hadn’t had the last time I saw her. When I’d gone to the farm, she’d been controlled and direct, almost cold. Now, I could see an undercurrent of worry in her.
“This isn’t a good idea.” I said, my pulse quickening as we turned onto the river road.
“People are starting to wonder why you haven’t shown your face. Even the hands at the farm are starting to talk. The longer you’re out of sight, the more cause they have to start creating their own explanations. You’ll smile at a few people, give a few waves, and then we’ll be on our way.”
“And if people talk to me? Ask me questions?”
“Stick to the story, and we’ll be fine.”
We. The subtle reminder that this bore a weight on all of them wasn’t lost on me. She had herself, a family, and a farm to look after, but no one was looking after me. I’d come all this way to learn the truth about Susanna, and I’d discovered only that I was more alone than ever. But on this side of the
door, June had knit herself into the fabric of a whole life only to leave it behind. I needed to know why.
Eamon seemed genuinely concerned about what the town would do if they thought we knew anything about what happened to Nathaniel. What he hadn’t said was exactly what that might be.
Esther fell quiet, her carefully constructed answers lingering between us. The first time I’d seen her, I’d been overwhelmed with relief. Like she and the flower farm were a safe place that would catch me. But I was beginning to think there was more Esther wasn’t saying than what she was. Just like Eamon.
Her silver-streaked hair lifted into the air as we picked up speed and the wind poured into the truck. I wanted to press her, to make her tell me what was really going on here, but this woman wasn’t the one who’d raised me. I studied her from the corner of my gaze, looking for some reflection of the woman Gran had become, but I couldn’t find it. She and Esther were different in more ways than one.
We made it around the next turn, and the view opened up to the wide vista of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Soft, dusty blue peaks rolled like waves in both directions, a thread of clouds coloring the morning sky. In a few hours, when the sun reached its zenith, that vista would turn a vibrant green, and then several shades of purple as the sunset loomed.
My hand gripped tighter on the lip of the open window as downtown Jasper appeared in the distance. The buildings that stretched ahead were like perfect copies of the ones I knew.
The reflection of a reflection in a mirror.
The shop fronts looked almost the same, but some of the doors were different, the old parking meters on the street not yet installed. There were things that still had the shine of being new, like a sign over the hardware store that had apparently been an appliance repair shop. Or the chrome-framed stools
that glinted behind the windows of the Jasper Diner, which was, in my time, Edison’s Cafe. There was a small produce shop front in what was now…I couldn’t remember. I could see the windows of the little building wedged between Dr.
Jennings’s office and the grocery in my mind, but what was it?
There was no streetlight at the crossroad that led over the river bridge, and the courthouse doors were propped open, along with the windows that faced the street. Across the intersection, a painted sign for the Midsummer Faire was strung up over an iron archway that framed the bridge. A six- pointed white tent had been erected behind it.
“This is…” My voice trailed off. I wasn’t sure what word to use. It was strange and unsettling. The sight made my skin crawl.
“Yeah” was all Esther said, as if she actually knew what I meant.
If she was already experiencing the side effects of crossing time, then she’d walked through that door, like me and Susanna. She’d said almost nothing about it, and I had to imagine that was on purpose. My fate had been sealed when my mother brought me through that door. When had Esther opened it?
The truck came to a stop as two women crossed the street, and the man on the sidewalk beside us stopped in his tracks, eyes squinting as they focused on me. Esther pulled to the side of the road and set the parking brake, letting the engine cut off.
“Now, you just let me talk.” She waited for me to give her a small nod before she got out.
I sat unmoving for several seconds before I finally followed.
The truck rocked as she let the tailgate swing open, and as soon as I was standing on the sidewalk, several pairs of eyes from the courthouse to the river bridge had found me.
“Ignore them,” Esther murmured, pulling the first of the full buckets toward her. She hauled it up into her arms, the stalks of flowers towering over her head.
I did the same, following her across the brick-paved street to where the large white canvas tent had been raised. This was exactly how we still did it, tenting the bridge and filling it with lights so that the Faire felt like it was suspended over the river.
Every farmer and business owner in town made a contribution, and the flowers were Esther’s. I’d grown up doing the same delivery with Gran each year, and our blooms hung in garlands from the corners of the tent, adorned tables, and decorated booths from one end of the bridge to the other.
The pound of a hammer rang out, the busy street loud at our backs. Esther hoisted the bucket higher in her arms, leading us to the mouth of the bridge, where a man with a clipboard had spotted us.
“Morning!” He looked up from his pen, eyes skipping to me.
Esther gave him a nod. “Morning, Robert.”
“June.” A woman unpacking a crate of jam jars said my name in greeting as we passed and I smiled, keeping myself half-hidden behind the flowers.
“Beatrice Covington,” Esther whispered beside me. “Her husband used to work on your farm before Eamon had to let him go.”
Had to. I wanted to ask what she meant by that, but she was already motioning toward someone else.
She gave a wave to a black man crouched at the corner of the tent with a hammer in hand. He was wearing suspenders, his hat tipped back to reveal a wrinkled forehead.
When he saw me, he grinned widely, giving me a nod.
“Mighty good to see you, June.”
I smiled in return.
“That’s Percy Lyle. He owns the pig farm down the road from you.”
Lyle. That family was still living in Jasper in my time.
“Claire White,” Esther said under her breath as a woman waved us toward a line of tables. “Should probably watch out for that one.”
“I’m never going to remember all of this,” I muttered.
“You won’t have to.”
Esther set the bucket of flowers down beside the stage and I did the same, keeping my hands busy with untangling the stalks. There was an assembly line started, where three women were wiring together branches of willow. They were already whispering, eyes shooting in my direction every few seconds.
“Heard you were back.”
The voice at the end of the table belonged to the woman Esther had called Claire. She had a spindly branch in one hand, a small pocketknife in the other.
I gave her a placid smile. “Hi, Claire.”
Esther’s eyes met mine in another silent warning before she picked up her bucket, heading to the other side of the stage.
Claire snapped the branch, working it into the garland. Her thin, pale pink lips were crowned by a perfect cupid’s bow.
“Was startin’ to think Sam was lyin’ about seein’ you.
Thought maybe you’d come by to say hello, but it seems you’ve been very busy since you got home.”
She didn’t look up at me, as if to demonstrate that she was clearly in control of the moment. There was more to what she
wasn’t saying than what she was.
“You know, we’ve been prayin’ hard for you. Thank God your mama is better.” Her gaze finally flickered up.
“Thank you.”
The words were flatter than I wanted them to sound, but I wasn’t a stranger to this kind of arms-length inquiry. The morbid, superior curiosity of people who pretended to be good Christian folk was something still alive and well in Jasper.
“We took a few suppers over to the house; poor Eamon was practically starvin’ to death.” She gave a hollow laugh. “And you know the town has tried to do what they can to help out at the farm. A real shame to see it fall into such a bad state. It just breaks my heart.” She frowned.
I could feel a fire burning in my chest, her words like gasoline, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on why. Eamon wasn’t mine. He didn’t belong to me. Still, I couldn’t stand that look on her face when she said his name.
“Hello, Claire.” Esther was suddenly beside me again, her hand tightening on my arm before I could speak.
Claire gave her a wooden smile. “I was just tellin’ June how much she was missed while she was away.”
“Yes, well, that’s very kind of you.” Esther’s tone was placating at best.
“None more than Annie, surely.” Claire locked eyes with me.
Again, the words singed. Whatever the reason, I had left Annie, and I still couldn’t even begin to wrap my head around that. The shame of it was growing heavier by the day, and Claire didn’t seem the slightest bit concerned about offending me. I recognized that cool judgment in her tone. The
sweetness-laced insult. I’d known a lot of women like that in my life.
“June, honey, would you mind popping into the diner and getting a pie for supper?” Esther pressed a couple of bills into my hand, and I fought to unclench my fingers.
“Sure.” But I didn’t move. Esther had to turn me toward the opening of the tent and give me a nudge before I started walking.
I could feel Claire’s scrutinizing eyes follow me as I stepped out of the shade of the tent and into the sunny street. Once I was out of sight, that same attention found me from three women gathered on the sidewalk.
I ignored them, pinning my eyes on the diner, where the words COFFEE, SANDWICHES, and PIE were painted on the windows that overlooked the river bridge. Behind the glass, almost every table was filled.
Other than the paint color, it didn’t look that different from Edison’s Cafe. My reflection moved over the windows as I came up the walk, and I reflexively tucked my hair behind my ear, trying to look relaxed. Like everyone wasn’t already staring at me.
The string of copper bells tied to the knob jingled as I pulled open the door, and more than one head turned in my direction.
The haze from the kitchen griddle filled the air, along with the smell of thick-cut bacon. I could feel the eyes instantly. Not sympathetic glances or concerned appraisals, but a sifting kind of gaze.
I headed toward the stool-lined counter, where orders were hung like little waving flags in the window to the kitchen. For the most part, everyone returned their attention to their plates when I found a place to stand in front of the cash register. But as soon as my eyes settled on the wall beside me, I almost recoiled.
A simple wooden frame was hung above the counter, holding a portrait of Nathaniel Rutherford. He was wearing a jacket and tie, a stoic expression on his face. It looked like the kind of photograph that might have been taken for the Presbyterian Regional Assembly directory, or an official picture that would hang in the church.
In 2023 there was another photo that hung there. A different one, with a different frame. Maybe it had become some kind of tradition that Rhett Miller followed when he bought the place. I’d seen the picture at Edison’s many times, but there was something that struck me differently about this one.
Nathaniel’s eyes bored into mine, the black pupils almost seeming to widen and stretch. I could feel myself falling into them, my stomach dropping with the sensation.
Those shoulders and even the shape of his ears made me think of that man I’d seen in the church window as I stood before Gran’s grave. The same figure had been on the porch that night. There’d been a cigarette in his hand, the glow of it illuminating in the dark. Was it possible that it had been him?
“June?”
The man pouring coffee on the other side of the counter stopped before me, steaming pot in hand.
“I’m sorry.” I blinked. “What?”
“I said what can I get for you?”
“Oh.” I glanced again at the portrait almost involuntarily before I turned my back to it altogether. “A pie, please.” I squeezed the bills in my palm.
He put down the coffeepot and went to a shelf on the wall where six pie plates were set in a row, waiting to be cut.
“Cherry or blueberry?”
“Blueberry,” I answered automatically, an emptiness materializing between my ribs. All I could think about was the
blueberry pie on the kitchen table between me and Mason.
That night felt like years ago.
I handed over the money, and the man hit the stiff keys of the register before the drawer popped open. I glanced at his name tag as he dropped the change in my hand.
“Thanks, David.”
He gave me a nod, and I picked up the pie, winding back through the tables to the door. By the time I was outside, Esther had unloaded the last crate of flowers. I didn’t meet anyone’s gaze as I climbed into the truck, setting the pie in my lap. I could feel the sweat beading at my brow, my pulse still elevated from what Claire had said. I hadn’t been the one to marry Eamon or have his child or choose to leave, but the nagging feeling of being responsible for it all was impossible to ignore.
The truck door opened, jolting me from the thought, and I gasped, the pie almost toppling from my lap.
“You alright?” Esther climbed in, fitting the keys into the ignition.
“I’m fine.”
She started the truck, and I pressed my back into the seat, still keenly aware of the eyes on us. The air poured through the open window as she hit the gas, and I felt myself relax a little as the buildings disappeared in the side mirror. I was suddenly desperate to be as far away from all of it as possible. The urge to be home, at the farmhouse, was all-consuming.
Home.
I caught hold of the thought the moment it floated into my mind. I had only fragments of memories there, but somehow, it did feel like the farmhouse was a home. To a part of myself, anyway. Right now any place felt safer than this.
“You have any trouble in the diner?” Esther asked, shooting a glance in my direction.
I turned the question over in my head. There’d been no trouble, but that portrait of Nathaniel had shaken something loose in me. Instead of tugging on the feeling and bringing it into the light, I pushed it away. I wanted the memories, I wanted to know what happened, but that felt different, somehow. When I’d seen him at the church and on my porch, it had almost felt like he was watching me. Were those memories, too?
“No,” I answered.
“Good.” She looked relieved. “That’s good.”
The farther we went into the hills, the more I felt like I could breathe. The oppressive weight of Nathaniel’s empty gaze and Claire’s cutting words was like a tightly wound vine loosening its grip. Again, that thought of home resurfaced, my eyes finding a fixed spot in the distance, where I was waiting to see the turn onto Hayward Gap Road.
Beside me, Esther was quiet.
“What will you tell them when I’m gone again?” I asked.
Her eyes cut to me, revealing that it wasn’t the first time she’d thought about it. In fact, she and Eamon had likely already discussed the subject.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we get there.”
The ominous tone in her answer made me wonder if they’d tell people I’d died. When Susanna had put me back through that door, leaving me in 1989, they’d let people believe she’d lost a daughter. They’d even erected a headstone with my name on it. Esther and Eamon could tell the town anything they wanted: that I’d run off and left my family for good, or maybe even that I’d thrown myself from the falls like one of the other lost souls of Jasper. Was that what they’d tell Annie,
too, when she was old enough to ask why she didn’t have a mother?
Whether the town would really believe it was another thing.
Eamon’s concern wasn’t unfounded. The line between suspicion and fear was a thin one. Jasper was like the still, serene surface that was visible on the deepest parts of the river.
It was the undertow you had to worry about.
“You said Eamon had to let his help go. Why?”
Esther looked at me. “Same reason anyone would have to.
He couldn’t pay them.”
“What’s going to happen to his farm?”
She didn’t answer right away. “I can’t see into the future, June. If you’re asking what I think will happen, I suppose it’s only a matter of time until he loses it. Maybe not for another couple of harvests, but I’m not sure there’s a way to recover his losses.”
“What happened?”
“Well, you left. Things were already tight, but the two of you were making it work, turning out enough crop to keep you afloat. We helped where we could, but there was only so much we could do since that was our busiest time at the flower farm.
He lost a large portion of the harvest, couldn’t keep the help on, so he planted significantly less this year to tend it himself.”
I stared into the dashboard, that vision of him disappearing into the tall tobacco projected across my mind. The flash of his white T-shirt as the leaves swallowed him up, the last sight of him gone.
“I suppose if you really want to know, you can find out when you go back,” she said.
I looked at her, resisting that slow churn in the pit of my stomach. She was right. How hard could it be to retrace
Eamon Stone’s steps and find out what became of him, where he went, when I returned to my time? But the idea of going back meant something different now. It wasn’t just returning to the place I knew; it was also letting go of everything I’d learned since I’d been here. I didn’t know how to just pick up my life again and go on like my entire world hadn’t changed. I didn’t know how to move on from this.
“Dammit.” Esther’s eyes went to the rearview mirror, her hands tightening on the steering wheel.
I turned around, peering through the dusty back window.
Behind us, a police car had appeared, the single red light on its roof flashing. I exhaled unevenly before I faced forward, watching the car in the side mirror.
“Dammit,” she said again, reaching toward the glove compartment. It fell open, nearly hitting my knees, and she reached inside.
She moved so fast that I barely saw what she had hold of before she dropped it into the pocket of her door. It was a handgun.
My heart broke into a sprint. “What the hell are you…?”
“Listen to me.” She cut me off, eyes still on the mirror.
The police car was getting closer.
“June!” Esther’s voice rose.
When I finally looked at her, the truck was beginning to slow.
“You were home all night,” she said, one of her hands reaching out to take hold of my sleeve.
“What?”
“That night, you were home. With Eamon and Annie. Just the three of you.”
I searched her face, the panic in her eyes now flooding into my own veins. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Just say it!” Her hoarse whisper made me tremble. “Repeat what I just told you.”
“I was home,” I stammered, trying to remember. “All night.”
She let me go, and I leaned away from her, pressing myself to the passenger door as she guided the truck over onto the shoulder.
My mouth went dry when the police car followed. We came to a stop, and Esther shifted the gear into park. There was a calm on her face now, a forced steadiness as she drew in a long breath. As soon as she had herself composed, her hand silently drifted to that pocket in the door and stayed there.
It was a few seconds before the police officer got out, and when I saw his face, my teeth clenched painfully. It was Caleb, the man who’d knocked on Eamon’s door. He took measured, easy steps toward the truck, one hand at his belt, where his gun was clipped into a holster.
“Esther,” I whispered.
She ignored me, leaning out the window just a little. “That you, Caleb?” Her tone had completely shifted to match her relaxed expression.
When he reached the window, he pulled the hat from his head. “Esther.”
Then his dark eyes fixed squarely on me. His mouth pulled in a half smile. I mimicked it, but it felt all wrong. I could tell by his expression that it looked wrong, too.
“Good to finally see you, June.”
There was a knowing undertone to the words, as if he were referring to the fact that he hadn’t actually laid eyes on me
when he came by the house yesterday. But he’d known I was there.
“Just got in a few days ago.” Esther spoke before I had to.
“I heard. You didn’t say she was headed back to Jasper.” He was still watching me. “How’s your mother?”
“Better.” My voice was tight in my throat.
“That’s good to hear,” he said. “People ’round here sure will be glad to see you. Been a long time.”
My eyes cut to Esther, looking for any clue as to what was about to unfold here, but she was unreadable.
“I’m sure Eamon’s told you I’ve been looking forward to sitting down and talking. I thought now would be a good time.”
I couldn’t tell if my breath sounded as loud in the truck as it did in my ears. Had he followed us? Had he been watching us in town?
“Talk?” I echoed.
“You have some time to come down to the station?”
Esther laughed nervously. “Now?”
“As good a time as any.” He smirked.
“Can this wait? We’re just headed back to the farm.”
“You’re not the only one who’s been waiting for June to come home, Esther.” He set a heavy hand on the lip of the door, a seemingly innocent gesture, but something about it felt distinctly threatening. “We’ll make it quick. I’ll tell you what, I’ll even have her home before supper.”
Esther’s gaze moved to me. She was scared, her hand still half-hidden in the pocket of the door. She was considering.
Weighing her options. But if she pulled out that gun, I had no idea what would happen. Would she really shoot him? Just
threaten him? What would he do when he saw it? Turn his own gun on us?
“Sure.” I smiled, hands still clutched around the pie in my lap.
Esther’s eyes bored into me.
Caleb’s smile widened. “Great.”
He waited, and when I didn’t move, he gave a nod toward my door. My hand was unsteady as I reached for the handle and opened it. I left the pie on the seat, locking eyes with Esther one more time as I got out.
I came around the truck, catching another glimpse of the gun at his hip as he fell into step beside me. He opened the door to the police car, and his hand clamped down on the top of the window as he waited. My eyes fell to the badge on his chest.
MERRILL COUNTY was engraved in an arc over the word SHERIFF. Beneath it was a name.
RUTHERFORD
My pulse skipped. He was still smiling, but he had the look of someone who’d gotten what they wanted, confirming that there was something very, very wrong about what was happening here.
If his name was Rutherford, then he had to be related to Nathaniel. Too young to be a brother, too old to be a grandson.
A nephew, maybe.
I pulled up my skirt, sliding onto the bench seat in the back of the car, and the door closed a little too hard behind me.
Then he was rounding the car, climbing into the driver’s seat.
He turned the ignition, hand reaching for the switch on the two-way radio that was fixed to the dash.
Esther sat completely still in the truck in front of us, but I could feel her eyes in that rearview mirror. The car turned around, and I swallowed hard before I looked back, one hand clutching to the hot leather of the seatback as I watched her through the dusty rear window. A few seconds later, she was erased from view, disappearing behind the hill.
