Chapter 1
Josie
In exactly four weeks, the Porter family reunion will assemble in my parents' backyard. Forty-one relatives. Two casserole tables. And somewhere among them, smiling, single, and recently relocated, the alpha my mother has hand-picked for me this year.
She does it every reunion. She thinks she's subtle. Last year his name was Davis, and he showed me photos of his boat for forty minutes while my entire family watched us like a nature documentary.
This morning, though, the reunion is still a month away and none of it is my problem yet. This morning, my biggest crisis is armed with a paintbrush.
The walk to Little Hollow Preschool takes eleven minutes if I don't stop, which I always do, because the walk goes straight down Main, and nobody gets down Main unbothered. The bakery's putting out trays. The Book Nook's cat is in the window judging everyone.
And at Dottie's Diner, in the second booth from the door, where by all accounts he has sat every morning since theinvention of coffee, Pete raps his knuckles on the glass and points at me like he's hailing a cab.
I wave. He beckons. I point at my wrist where a watch would be if I wore one. He holds up one finger, mouths something elaborate, and I keep walking, because whatever Pete has, and Pete always has something, it'll keep until I have the strength.
Through the diner window, Dottie catches my eye over the coffee pot and rolls hers, which is Dottie forI've been listening to it since six.
This is my town. Eleven minutes of it, every morning, mountains on all sides and everybody in everybody's business, and I love every nosy inch of it.
I didn't grow up here. I grew up forty minutes down the highway in Pine Valley, in a house with a big backyard and a bigger extended family, and I moved to the Hollow five years ago for the teaching job. I stayed for everything else.
By eight forty, I'm on the alphabet rug, losing a negotiation.
“We don't paint Wren,” I tell Bodhi, down at his level. “Wren is a person. People aren't walls.”
“She said I could.”
“I didn’t.” Wren stands very still beside him, a blue handprint drying on her cheek.
“She said it with her eyes,” Bodhi tells me, grave as a tiny defense attorney.
“Eyes don't talk, bud. We use our words, and then we wait for a yes.” I look at Wren. “Did you say yes?”
“No.”
“That settles it.”
I hold my hand out. Bodhi surrenders the brush with a sigh, like I've ended something beautiful, and I send them both to the sink. Halfway there they're holding hands again. The war is already forgotten. That's the magic of being four. No yesterday, no ten minutes ago. Just right now.
Must be nice.
I'm good at this. I'll say it even though you're not supposed to. Twelve kids, half of them with strong opinions, one conducting an opera only he can hear, and I'll have every one of them fed, calm, and roughly horizontal by nap time.
It's the one room in my life that does what I tell it to.
For two more weeks, anyway. Then the term ends, the room empties out for the summer, and I become a woman with twelve weeks of unstructured time and no idea what to do with a single one of them. I try not to think about it. I'm very good at not thinking about it.
I restock the paint cups. I referee a dispute over whether dinosaurs can be firefighters, ruling yes, with conditions. I peel Hazel off the bookshelf she is not allowed to climb and redirect her to the climbing structure she finds insulting. The morning hums along, and I move through it the way I always do, a little smug about how well the machine runs.
“Miss Josie.” A tug at my sleeve. Junie, holding a drawing in both hands like it's made of glass. “It's my family.”
I crouch down. Four stick people and a brown blob. “Walk me through it.”
“That's Mama.” The tall one, triangle dress. “My daddies.” Three more, assorted heights, one with a beard that's mostly scribble. “And Biscuit.” The blob. A dog, I'm choosing to believe. She looks up at me, small and proud, her whole family in crayon. “Where's yours?”
“Where's my what, bug?”
“Your alphas.” She asks it the way she'd ask where I keep the glue sticks. “You can draw them on the back. There's room.”
