I’d grown desperate for company since the discovery of the dead woman in town. A pit weighed in my stomach every time I thought of the gruesome news flash from a few days earlier, the lifeless young woman lying at the edge of the public beach only a few miles from where I stood. I’d been glued to the local news ever since. It wasn’t a drowning as one might have expected, but strangulation. The poor girl, who they guessed to be all of twenty-five, remained unidentified. No suspects had been named, although I supposed the authorities held that kind of information close to the vest.
My fingers opened and a clump of weeds fell to the dirt. I peeled off my rubber gardening gloves and dropped those too, my weary eyes following the truck. My new tenant drove a candy-apple red pickup truck across my field, a miniature log cabin trailing behind her. I squinted past the branches of the oak tree that wavered above Charlie’s ashes. It was probably foolish to rent her the land. My ad in the Petoskey News had been for the apartment above my garage, not for an overgrown field.
My throat dry, I stepped away from the weed-filled flower bed and made my way toward the field, placing each foot deliberately so as not to twist an ankle.
I smoothed down my jacket and refocused on the truck crawling toward me. A fresh-faced woman leaned forward, clutching the steering wheel with both hands. She concentrated on her task but slowed as she neared to offer a wave through the driver’s window. The truck was the heavy-duty type I’d normally expect to be driven by a burly man or a construction worker. It eased to a stop, the engine cutting.
I trod closer, the ground becoming more rutted and my balance less reliable. My pulse quickened as I approached, the sticker on the truck’s rear window coming into focus. Not all those who wander are lost. I’d seen the same sticker the other day affixed to the back of a beat-up Volkswagen outside the IGA. The words shot a pang of longing through my chest, reminding me of something my son, Ethan, would say.
The woman got out and stretched her elbows back. Her eyes darted across the landscape as she waited for me. “Hi. I’m Elizabeth Ramsay.” She extended a slender hand. “You can call me Beth.” The wind whipped a band of dark hair across her face, her skin as smooth as tulip petals. A tangle of wooden beads hung around her neck. She wore tight-fitting jeans and a navy windbreaker that said Patagonia in the corner. She couldn’t have been more than thirty.
“Nice to meet you. I’m Gloria,” I said.
She grasped my weathered hand, bulging veins and all, in a firm shake, then motioned toward her trailer. “Is this a good spot?”
“You found the right field.” I offered a smile, although my insides jittered. I’d spoken to her on the phone two days earlier, but it had been a while since I’d had a face-to-face conversation with a real person. “How was your trip?”
Beth shrugged and motioned toward her vehicle. “Good, I guess. I mean, considering the load. I drove up from downstate.”
“You were smart to wait until after Memorial Day.” I inched closer to her vehicle. A number of insects stuck to the windshield and a scrape marred the back bumper. “That’s quite a truck you have.”
Her smile faded. “It’s a gas guzzler.” Beth crossed her arms and glanced away. “There’s no other option for hauling my house, though.”
“I suppose you’re right.” I swallowed against the dust gathering in my throat. I hadn’t meant to bring up a sore subject.
In truth, I chose the field to the north of my farmhouse for Beth’s truck because I feared a strange trailer would interfere with my view of the oak tree from the front porch. The few months of the year when the weather was warm, I enjoyed sitting in the rocker at dusk, sipping my Scotch, and marveling at the fireflies as they floated above the tall grass like tiny lanterns. The bats would appear around the same time, and that was a whole different show. Oh, how Charlie and I used to marvel at the bats! They’d flit this way and that, guided only by their personal sonar systems. It was a wonder they never crashed into each other.
Ten acres of land was plenty of room to spread out, and Beth seemed nice enough, but there was no need for her trailer to taint the landscape.
“This looks like a good spot.” She meandered along the perimeter of the field, pausing every so often to adjust to her new surroundings. “You have a beautiful piece of land.”
Her head tipped back, the sunlight casting shadows across her face. She was thin and twisty like a sapling, but there was nothing frail about her. She seemed to put down roots with every step she took. Her skin glowed with youth, but her dark eyes were hard and determined. I’d expected her to be somewhat of a drifter, but—just as her bumper sticker proclaimed—she didn’t seem the least bit lost. If anyone could handle that leviathan truck, it was her. I stopped myself from staring and trained my eyes on the trees.
“You’re here at the right time of year, that’s for sure. The winters can be long.” I’d unknowingly wrapped my arms around myself at the thought of last winter. Northern Michigan had seen three weeks straight of record lows, the frigid air seeping through my unsealed windows and keeping me homebound and alone. I’d been down to my last can of beans when the thermometer finally broke zero.
“I’m sure,” Beth nodded. She tipped her head toward the garage. “Have you rented out your apartment yet?”
“No. Not yet.” A rock turned over in my gut. I wouldn’t tell her, but I hadn’t received a single call about the apartment. And, of course, I wouldn’t mention how I’d found the metal handle of the apartment’s front door banging against the siding of the garage, the darkened doorway gaping open when I’d been so sure I’d turned the deadbolt. The discovery felt as if someone had scooped out my insides with a melon baller and sent a cold wind blowing through me. I’d almost dialed 911 thinking I’d found a clue, that the unlocked door was evidence of an intruder. I wondered if the person who’d forced open the apartment door was the same person who’d killed the young woman in town. But then I laughed at myself. I was a hermit who’d grown afraid of her own shadow. The discovery of the lifeless woman on the beach had made me jumpy, freezing up at every creak of a floorboard and rattle of a windowpane. We’d never had a problem with break-ins, or any crime for that matter. It was probably nothing more than a loose screw. That latch had always been a little wobbly. My repair list had been lengthening since Charlie passed away two years earlier.
“I would have rented your apartment if I didn’t have the house already.” Beth nodded toward the trailer. “Should I back it into place? You can direct me.”
“Yes. Of course.” Stretching out the kink in my back, I reminded myself to think positive thoughts about the apartment. Thoughts become reality. That’s what I’d read in my latest self-help book, The Thirty-Day Life Coach.
Beth climbed into her truck and started the engine while I directed.
“A little to the left,” I yelled.
She glanced at me through the lowered window and turned the wheel before reversing a few more feet. The metal hitch groaned with the weight of the load.
“That’s good. Right there.” I held up my hand, signaling for her to stop.
Beth cut the engine again and hopped out. “Thanks for your help, Gloria.” She stood next to me as we admired the positioning of the trailer. “I’m still getting used to hauling it.”
“It’s a very nice trailer.”
“Not a trailer.” Beth faced me, eyes straining against the late-May sun. “A tiny house.” Her voice was sharp, and I sensed that I’d offended her.
“Yes. Sorry.” I leaned back on my heels. She’d mentioned some nonsense about a tiny house when we’d spoken over the phone, but I had no clue what she was talking about. Beth had explained she was a writer who used to work for a newspaper but now wrote freelance pieces on resorts around the world. This summer she’d been commissioned by a major magazine to profile destinations in northern Michigan—Petoskey, Harbor Springs, Charlevoix, and Traverse City. Maybe even Mackinac Island. She needed to park her house somewhere in the vicinity while she researched. I happened to be in the perfect location, close enough to the towns but several miles inland from Grand Traverse Bay where the land was cheaper and the tourists fewer.
I’d rented out the garage apartment a couple of times over the past two years but had never let anyone park a trailer on my land, not even temporarily. My pocketbook was light though, and it would be a relief to have another person nearby. The Thirty-Day Life Coach recommended I take at least one action a week that was ‘outside of my comfort zone.’ Being two weeks behind already, I’d agreed to let Beth park in the field.
“I’m afraid you’ll have to explain the difference between a trailer and a tiny house to me,” I said, feeling my age.
Beth blinked her round eyes at me as if I’d dropped out of the sky. “A tiny house is a lot nicer than a trailer, for one.” Her head swiveled toward the tiny house, and I could see she was right. The structure resembled a miniature ski resort on wheels, complete with a front porch. Half of the roof was constructed of metal, the same shade as the dark green evergreens in the distance, and half was covered in solar panels. A white door rose up at the edge of the porch, and three windows lined the long side of the rectangular box. Above the first row of windows was another smaller row of hexagon-shaped windows.
“Also, tiny houses are super-efficient. Everything inside is built with multiple functions: storage inside of chairs, walls that fold out into tables, a lofted space for sleeping. Things like that.”
I picked at my fingernail and smiled, still not having a clue why a vibrant young lady like Beth would choose to live by herself in a trailer, even a glorified one.
She continued as if answering my question. “And living tiny lets me focus less on things and more on experiences. I only have what I need, nothing more. Leave a small footprint, and all that. It’s kind of a movement right now.”
“Well, that’s admirable.” I thought of my son, Ethan, again—a thirty-six-year-old free spirit who lived in San Francisco. We’d hit a rough stretch over the last several years, but I imagined he and Beth would get along well.
“It’s nice to live off the grid, too.” Beth tucked a few strands of her windblown hair behind her ear.
“Off the grid?”
“You know, no bills.” She pointed at the roof. “I get my electricity from the solar panels, my water from your well, and I have a portable Wi-Fi booster for my internet connection.” She rested her hands on her hips. Her eyes reflected something familiar as if I’d glimpsed myself in a puddle after a spring rain.
I stared at her, lost for words. It was a brilliant arrangement, although something about it seemed borderline illegal. I’d never heard of anything so freeing and terrifying all at the same time. This fearless young woman was taking on the world all by herself, just the shirt on her back, not tied to anything or anyone. She hadn’t told me that, exactly, but I noticed she wore no rings on her left hand. I could see now that the garage apartment wouldn’t have been a good fit for her at all.
Pressing my lips together, I turned away from Beth, hoping she hadn’t noticed how different we were. How I’d hitched my own trailer to the past, content to watch film clips from my younger days play out in my head—five-year-old Ethan popping his head out of the chlorinated water of the Grand Rapids YMCA swimming pool, his eyes finding me and Charlie from behind his too-tight goggles as he passed his first swim test; or sixth grade Ethan arriving home from school, smiling wide as he told me how he’d won the ‘Student of the Week’ award. It was the small moments I treasured most. Those were happier times from a life already lived. Unlike Beth’s adventurous spirit, I’d anchored myself to this land for the remainder of my days, this ten-acre parcel of rolling fields and meadows encircled by a safe barrier of forest. The decision had been made the moment I’d buried Charlie’s ashes beneath the oak tree.
Beth wandered to the back of her tiny house and unscrewed the hitch behind her truck.
Her independence fascinated me. She was a rare find for a beleaguered old lady like me; it was as if my rusty garden shovel had accidentally hit a gilded treasure chest. I’d barely scraped away the top layer of soil. She peered at me from behind the tiny house, her bottomless eyes scanning the surroundings and landing on me. My breath snagged like a stuck zipper. I had so many questions, but I clamped down on my tongue, stopping myself from asking any of them.
I tended to talk too much. At least, that’s what the ladies in my Bible study group had told me. Mary Ellen Calloway complained that I talked too much about Charlie and my feelings, and not enough about the written word. Now I made sure to not speak more than necessary, to not share too much, or seem too eager. I didn’t dare go to Bible study anymore. Not after everything that happened. Instead, I read verses to Charlie under the oak tree whenever the mood hit me. On the loneliest days, the unopened book rested on my lap, my eyes fixed on the trunk of the sturdy tree while I harbored visions of reconciling with Ethan, utterly mystified how a book that could provide a lifetime of comfort could also cause so much pain.
I stepped closer to Beth, feeling a lightness in my step that hadn’t been there this morning. Maybe because I’d never had a daughter of my own and Beth was about the right age, I was drawn to her. Or perhaps it was because I’d been without companionship for so long. Regardless, I hoped we could become friends; not just casual acquaintances who go shopping together and chat about the weather, but something more substantial, the sort of friends who keep each other safe and share their deepest secrets.
The storage room in the basement normally gave me the creeps, but today I didn’t care. I shouldered open the door and pulled the string dangling from the light bulb before inching inside. A cobweb brushed the side of my face and I waved it away, trying not to breathe in the dank odor of the room. It was even messier than I remembered. Towers of musty boxes surrounded me. I wondered how Jason and I had accumulated so much stuff in barely two years of marriage. They were his things, mostly, along with some unused wedding presents and containers from his mom’s house that he refused to throw away. If it had been up to me, I would have gotten rid of ninety percent of it. But now I was happy we’d saved everything.
The light bulb flickered, exposing an intricate spiderweb stretching between the rafters. My muscles tensed. I scanned the bare sections of the concrete floor, expecting a mouse to scurry into a crevice, but nothing was there.
My hand drifted to my abdomen, where I let it rest for a second, regaining my courage. These few moments of unpleasantness would be worth it to see the look on Jason’s face when he opened the present. A square of turquoise caught my eye from a high shelf in the corner, and I exhaled. It wasn’t labeled, but it had to be the storage bin from my mother-in-law’s house. I’d helped Jason carry the unusually bright bin out of her attic last year after she’d passed away.
An oversized box blocked my path, so I bent down and pushed, sliding it a few inches to the left. Turning sideways, I squeezed through the space and stood on tiptoes to reach it. I grasped the handles on the sides and pulled it toward the edge of the shelf, causing a cloud of dust to rain on me. My eyes closed, temporarily blinded by the debris. The container was heavier than I remembered, and while I tried to lift it down gently, my arms gave way. The weight of it knocked me off balance as it slammed to the floor. Had Jason been home, he would have come running, but instead, I found myself splayed backward across a large box labeled Good China.
“Shit!” I said under my breath. We hadn’t even used our good china yet, and now I’d probably broken some of it.
I looked over my shoulder, inexplicably worried that someone had witnessed my clumsiness. It was only 4 p.m., though, and Jason wouldn’t be home from work for at least another hour or two. I regained my footing and brushed the dust from my pants. The china—broken or not—could wait for another day. Besides, it might be years before we got around to eating off it.
A long-legged spider skittered across the side of a box just inches from my hand. I jumped back, overwhelmed by a sudden urge to escape the enclosed room. But first I needed to be sure I’d taken the right bin from the shelf. I tried not to think about how many other spiders might be creeping toward me, or the number of mice that might be hiding in the corners, under the old hoses and extension cords, or behind the mountains of cardboard containing Jason’s ratty toys and clothes. I slowed my breathing and focused only on the turquoise bin in front of me. My hand grasped the lid and peeled it open, revealing the treasures inside.
I smiled at the familiar contents—a tattered bunny lay on top with two brown button eyes staring up at me. Peter Rabbit? I think that’s what Jason had told me, although he said he’d called the bunny Floppy. Spots of fur were worn off Floppy’s tummy, one ear was ripped, and the stuffed toy had long ago lost its clothes. Beneath the bunny were a few of Jason’s baby blankets.
My fingers sifted through the crocheted blankets until they hit something hard beneath. I pushed the blankets to the side, finding stacks of picture books. They were Jason’s favorites from when he was a toddler. His mom had saved these things, showing them to me with a proud gleam in her eye one day after we’d gotten engaged. The memory of my mother-in-law, Mary, seemed so fresh that I sometimes forgot she was no longer with us.
“Liz, come over here. Look what I happened upon in the attic,” Mary had said, her watery eyes the same deep blue as Jason’s. She’d acted as if her discovery was just a coincidence when I knew she’d dug out the keepsakes for the sole purpose of showing them to me. I understood that she’d wanted me to see another part of Jason, a part that she knew better than anyone and I barely knew at all. Despite our differences, I’d loved her for that. We’d giggled at the raggedy bunny and laughed even harder when Jason grabbed the toy from the box and called him Floppy. He’d been a good sport about the whole thing, chuckling along with us, but I could tell by the way he hugged the bunny to his chest that it still meant something to him.
“And this was his very favorite book,” Mary had said, holding up a Goodnight Moon board book with worn edges.
“Oh, yeah. I loved that one.” Jason snatched the book and read through the pages, a hint of a smile on his lips.
The bulb flickered again and I froze, terrified of being caught in the dark. I piled everything back into the container and dragged it straight out of the horrible room, turning off the light and pulling the door closed behind me. One step at a time, I heaved the bin up the stairs to the main floor, grinning at my good fortune.
I’d found out I was pregnant less than two days ago while on assignment in Aspen. Although Jason was thirty-two and I was approaching thirty, we hadn’t planned for a baby—not yet, anyway—but we hadn’t been too careful either. I’d written off my morning nausea to too much coffee on an empty stomach, but when the queasiness didn’t go away I’d taken a pregnancy test. Minutes later, two lines had appeared on the stick and it seemed as though an inexplicable magic trick had taken place. Two lines meant positive. I reread the instructions on the back of the box and then retook the test with more sticks. Two lines appeared each time and the realization that we were going to have a baby, that we’d created another human being, slowly set in. My heart had pounded, but whether it was from excitement or fear, I wasn’t sure. Jason would make a terrific dad, no doubt about that. On top of being a great provider, he was patient and loving and goofy. But, me? A mom? It was a role I’d never tried on myself and it was difficult to wrap my head around. Yet, I felt as if I was floating above my body, as if I was witnessing something slightly beyond my comprehension.
I’d called Jason right away, bursting to share the news that would change our lives, but my initial calls had gone to voicemail. My fingers fumbled over themselves, anxious to text him, but then stopped, remembering hearing about all of the fun ways my friends had surprised their husbands with the news of a baby: a onesie with the words I love my daddy written across the front; a plate filled with jars of baby food presented for dinner; a box of diapers wrapped in fancy paper. That’s when I thought of Floppy and the box from my mother-in-law sitting in our storage room, and came up with the plan to dig out Jason’s most treasured items from his childhood. I’d wrap them up and give them to him as a present when he got home from work. It would be the most meaningful way to tell him and to start the next chapter of our lives. His mom had saved those keepsakes for a time just like this and it would be a present he’d never forget.
I dragged the plastic container to the center of the living room, lifting it slightly so as not to scratch our newly refinished hardwood floors. Our 2,500-square-foot house in Royal Oak had been a fixer-upper when we’d bought it a year and a half ago and it was still a work in progress. The main floor was complete though, and now we’d have a good reason to finish the improvements to the two extra bedrooms upstairs. I bit my lip, suppressing the smile that was permanently plastered to my face. We could start the upstairs renovations right away. Jason’s investment business had been booming, the deposits hitting our bank account growing larger and larger by the month. We’d paid off the construction loan and Jason’s student loan, and there was still some money left over.
While the financial windfall was nice, I worried Jason used his long hours at the office as a coping mechanism—a way to deal with his pain since his mom’s sudden heart attack last year. It was obvious that he hadn’t completely dealt with the loss, his moods shifting with the wind and a frequent vacancy glazing over his eyes. Whenever I tried to talk to him about her, he brushed me off and said he was fine. I didn’t believe him, but I didn’t know how hard to push.
My phone buzzed on the table and I hoped it wasn’t my editor, Gwen. I was a journalist for one of Detroit’s major publications, The Observer, where I contributed to a column on vacation destinations and local events. It kept me busy and allowed me to travel for free, but my salary barely paid the bills. Now with a baby on the way, maybe I’d have to make some adjustments. I’d talk to Gwen about it when the time was right. The number on my phone wasn’t familiar. I sent it to voicemail and refocused my attention on the storage container.
I laid the blankets aside and dumped the board books out on the living room rug, singling out Goodnight Moon for Jason’s gift box. The book went into the cardboard box first, followed by his tattered bunny. No note. No other hints. I wanted him to be confused for a minute before he figured it out. I taped the box closed and folded some blue-and-white-striped wrapping paper around it.
My hand wandered across the shag rug searching for the Scotch tape, but something else poked my thumb. Sifting through the long strands of carpet, my fingers uncovered a tiny silver object. I pinched it, inspecting the blue topaz center and hooked backing. It was an earring, but it wasn’t mine. It must have fallen out of the storage bin when I’d dumped the contents across the floor.
My chest heaved, realizing it must have been Mary’s earring. I envisioned it snagging on one of the old blankets or falling into the container when she’d leaned over to pack it for the last time, not knowing she’d soon suffer a heart attack and never see her keepsakes—or her family—again. A wave of heat rose up in me, stinging my eyes. Poor Mary! She’d never get to meet her grandchild. I surveyed the piles of books and blankets and stuffed toys surrounding me and steadied myself, my breath trapped in my throat. The best part of my mother-in-law’s life had been packed away into that turquoise bin. I held the earring between my fingers and gently placed it in my pocket. Jason would want to save this.
The watering can tipped further forward than I intended, dousing the purple-and-white petals. The flowers hung limply over the soil. “Oh!” I sucked in my breath staring at the flattened pansies. Hopefully they’d survive. I probably shouldn’t have splurged on the flowers, but it had been too hard to resist the bright pops of color after such a long, gray winter. It was almost June—safe enough weather to plant some hardy greenery to spruce up Charlie’s final resting place.
Clutching my back, I lowered myself onto the bench underneath the shade of the oak tree. I stretched my neck toward the tiny house that had appeared in my field a few hours earlier. It was difficult to make out much through the foliage and I wondered how Beth was settling in.
“We have a new tenant.” I spoke in a low voice in case Charlie was there with me. “Not for . . .
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