“Dad said you repair boats.”
“Electrical systems mostly.”
“My husband has a sailboat that has tried to kill him through wiring twice.”
“Then your husband has tried to kill himself through wiring.”
A man at the table raised one hand.
“That seems unfair.”
“Do you use wire nuts aboard?” I asked.
His hand lowered.
Everyone in the yard laughed.
The attention eased.
Elias introduced people in a sequence I could not hope to retain.
Celia and her husband, Mark.
Their son Theo, who had carved the small boat.
Miriam’s sister June.
A neighbor named Grace who arrived at every family meal despite living three towns away.
Two teenage girls who were apparently cousins and best friends and communicated mostly through facial expressions.
A broad man called Sam, whom Elias introduced as “ours, though not by paperwork.”
Sam rolled his eyes.
“He found me sleeping behind a bus station when I was seventeen and told me I looked underfed.”
“You were.”
“He brought me home for dinner and forgot to send me away.”
Miriam touched his shoulder as she passed.
“We did not forget.”
The casual words brought a tightness to my throat.
Reid noticed.
His fingers found mine.
We sat near the end of one table where I could see the house, the car, and the open space beyond the garden.
Not trapped.
Reid always chose places like that now without announcing why.
Theo approached carrying a wooden tray.
