Her little car waited in the parking lot.Corinthia climbed in gratefully, letting its worn but familiar interior wrap her in quiet isolation from the strangeness of the Refuge.The hike already felt like a dream, a dream that had happened to someone else entirely, someone she had left behind in the maze.Now she was herself again: well-ordered Corinthia, librarian, indoor person.
The car chugged jauntily out of the parking lot.A turn brought her onto the main road that ran alongside the Refuge.Corinthia found it oddly difficult to believe she had been walking around inside it.It seemed as remote as the surface of the moon.
Another turn and she sailed down the residential street bordering the south edge of the Refuge.The neighborhood had been built in the sixties for retirees from up north, and all of the houses were simple concrete block construction, rather like shoeboxes with pitched lids.
With no homeowner’s association around to make rules, residents had taken it upon themselves to individualize the houses however they saw fit: collections of concrete statuary, year-round Christmas lights, and exterior paint colors that would have had Andy Warhol in raptures.
The original retirees were long gone, replaced by an assortment of residents as colorful as the houses.Young and old, with children or without, of many languages, they had only one thing in common: budgets that stretched just enough to buy a small house, but only in a place as unpretentious as Shadow Ridge.
Corinthia had kept the original paint on her home, mostly because it was too expensive to redo, and as such it remained Kelly green with dark emerald trim; or, as she liked to think of it,Lucky Charmschic, after the leprechaun on the cereal box.
She hurried to the door.Tonight was Halloween, and there was much to do before the trick-or-treaters arrived.
The first word anyone would have used to describe the inside of Corinthia’s house was “small.”The front door swung open directly into the living room.Within three strides you could be in the master bedroom; four strides, in the kitchen; five, in the tiny second bedroom on the other side of the house.It was almost ship-like in its coziness.Corinthia kept it ordered, as well, for she could not abide too much clutter.
There was a couch for lounging, a wing-back chair for reading, and a papasan chair for when Corinthia wanted to feel like she was curled up in a nest.If you looked closely, none of the furniture actually matched, but with enough soft pillows and blankets strewn about, the mix of colors blended together into something quite pleasing, like spilled paint accidentally making art.
There were no side tables, only small bookcases, and on top of the bookcases sat tabletop bookshelves, added later, to hold even more books.
Old coffee mugs sat here and there, occasionally holding a pen or pencil, but mostly holding dozens of various bookmarks.There was a bookshelf in the kitchen, too, and not even for cookbooks.
Books lay here and there like Easter eggs ready to be found: one on the floor, halfway under the sofa; one on the kitchen table; two fighting for space on the coffee table.
This did not take into account the bathroom book rack, the pile on Corinthia’s nightstand, or the half dozen books sitting unbuckled in the back of her car.
Books were just… everywhere.And if you’d asked Corinthia if she should have perhaps had less books, she would have given you a stern look.
She was proud of what she had made of the old place, and had grown to not mind so much that the kitchen cabinets were falling apart.Stevie was her only visitor, and if Stevie didn’t mind, then no one else of worth would mind either.
Sitting in the entryway was a dog with floppy velvet ears, short tricolor coat, and the most soulful eyes ever seen in a hound: Beaufort, a beagle and basset hound mix, who was quite possibly the world’s most amiable canine.
“Beaufort,” Corinthia said, with a formal tone, shutting the door behind her.“And how have you been this fine day?”
Beaufort trotted forward, tail wagging, eyes turned upward to his beloved mistress in an unashamed plea for pats, and preferably treats, too.Once in range he commenced sniffing his owner with such vigor that Corinthia couldn’t take a single step forward for all the snuffling taking place.
Beaufort was the kind of dog who stood on two legs and put his front paws on you, not to wrestle you, but to stand tall enough to look into your eyes with a depth of genuine concern you might only expect from your mother.His eyes asked whether you’d eaten well and slept enough, and if you perhaps needed a hug.For Beaufort was a hugging dog: if you situated yourself on the couch, for example, he would place one front paw on each of your shoulders as if he’d known and loved you for years, even if you were only there to fix a sink.There was no creature on Earth who loved as truly, and with as much faith in humanity, as Beaufort.
Corinthia was unsure how a creature’s eyes could appear to contain all the wisdom of the ages while that very same creature could be a complete and utter noodlehead, but Beaufort managed it.He was both thoughtful and silly, peaceful and playful, full of energy and content to curl up, nose-to-tail, in epic naps that lasted throughout whole afternoons.
“I’ve been on an adventure,” Corinthia said, smoothing back Beaufort’s ears.“But that’s all done now, my friend.Sniff while you can—I won’t be going back in there,” she finished, patting the dog’s smooth, spotted flank.
Beaufort sneezed, as if in disbelief.
Corinthia collared and leashed him for their regular after-work walk.There was something so wonderfully tame about walking through the neighborhood.While Beaufort could sniff and romp on the grass, Corinthia could keep her sneakers firmly on the relatively smooth and steady asphalt.
The sky was accessibly bright and blue, the trees generous with their leafy tambourines, and an assortment of common birds provided musical accompaniment, all without having to venture into any setting too wild, uncouth, or unruly.These were all separate qualities, and Corinthia relished each descriptor with intention, as if she were tasting different percentages of chocolate.
Now that she had seen the birds in the Refuge, she could not stop trying to distinguish the ones on her walk with Beaufort.The birds with the curved beaks, marching in loose formation across the lawn, were ibises.Those were easy.Other common birds she also recognized by sight—blue jay, cardinal, mockingbird, crow—but she had never quite gotten the knack of identifying them by song.
She downloaded the bird identification app Stevie was always going on about and waved her phone through the air like a butterfly net for catching songs.It lit up with one bird after another; some she had known about, but others she had never realized were hiding nearby: chickadees, chimney swifts, wrens, and more.And what was the bird of prey that sounded like it was saying “Uh-oh!”repeatedly from its perch on top of the telephone pole?Even the app didn’t know.
Corinthia glanced at Beaufort.He didn’t seem to pay much attention to avians unless they managed to flap into visual range.“Some help you are,” she said.
Beaufort ambled on, unbothered.
When they returned, she changed into a Halloween sweater and emptied several bags of candy into a large plastic bowl.Although she had no particular like or dislike of children, viewing them simply as small versions of full-sized library patrons, she had strong feelings about what was owed to the community.As such, she felt duty-bound to be prepared with holiday-appropriate attire and a generous supply of individually-wrapped treats.
The sun set in a sky striped with shades of saltwater taffy pink, and a blanket of cool darkness fell over the street.The original builders had not seen fit to install streetlights—another cost-saving measure—but on Halloween night, though perhaps it took away from safety, it added to the atmosphere.
