Page 17 of Something About September

“The very image of her,” Mrs. McGill agreed. “Your mother spent a lot of time at the library, Rebecca. Like you, she was an avid reader as a child. I remember as a youngster she just loved the Baby-Sitters Club series. She waited outside the door in the morning, the day she knew the latest copies would be arriving. We both agreed that our town needed its own bookstore and not just a library.” She continued lifting books from the box, while Rebecca considered this piece of information, filed it away where she kept the little things she learned about her mother.

“I like hearing things about my mother,” she finally said. “Thank you for telling me that.”

Ms. Abrams’s eyes lit up. “She loved music, too, as I recall. Your mother used to wait for me on the side porch, so excited for the CDs she had ordered to arrive. The smile on her face when I had what she was waiting for would brighten my entire day—as would the cookies she would slip me to enjoy on my mail route.”

Now Mr. Patel chimed in. “She sure did love music, didn’t she? Not that I’d ever heard of any of the bands she liked—the Smashed Pumpkins? What kind of a band name is that?” Rebecca suppressed a smile. “But her enthusiasm was beautiful. She had such passion. She really was special.”

Rebecca’s heart felt warm as she listened to stories about her mother, then her grandmother and the diner, and passed almost an hour drinking tea and happily assisting with the shelving of the books.

“She takes a leave from her job as a professor in the city, only to come to her hometown and be forced to shelve books,” Mr. Patel finally said. “We shouldn’t be putting you to work!”

“I really don’t mind,” Rebecca said, and found she meant it. “I feel like I could do this all day.”

Nasreen had come over to inspect their work. “People, this is amazing. It looks like an actual bookstore display. Rebecca, you should be a book merchandiser.” Then she frowned. “I mean, obviously you’re a professor, but in another life, you’d have been great at it. This town doesn’t even have a bookstore.”

“Which is a true shame,” Mrs. McGill said. “Rebecca and I were just discussing this. Perhaps you can talk to that husband of yours, Nasreen, about trying to attract a book merchant to Bramley Hollow.”

“I’ll add it to the list,” Nasreen said. “We all know how much Crispin loves the idea of perking up Main Street.” She turned to Rebecca. “Although really, your building is the only vacant one right now. You never know what the new owners will want it to be, I guess. Maybe even a bookstore.” The bell at the cash register dinged then, indicating someone was waiting to check out with their pile of thrifted items, so Nasreen headed back the way she had come.

Rebecca turned back to Mr. Patel, Mrs. McGill, and Ms. Abrams and found they were all looking at her expectantly.

Finally, Mr. Patel spoke. “So, you really are selling the place, dear.”

“We did assume, but we didn’t know for sure,” said Mrs. McGill. Ms. Abrams just smiled, but sadly.

“That’s the plan,” Rebecca said. “I wish it could be different. That building has been in my family a long time.”

“Right! Of course. And we shouldn’t be making the young lady feel sad about it, should we?” said Mr. Patel, his tone overbright. Just then, the trilling of the shop’s cuckoo clock rang out, reminding Rebecca she was due at the orchard soon. “I should go. I told Sabrina I’d help with the hay maze,” she explained.

“You won’t believe it when you see it this year,” said Ms. Abrams. “She’s outdone herself, and that’s saying something. We’ll see you soon, dear. Welcome home.”

These words stayed in Rebecca’s mind as she walked outside and drove toward the diner to drop off her car. Then she walked down roads so familiar it felt like there was a map of them on her heart. Home. And yet, she couldn’t stay, and she knew it. Whatever her heart was trying to tell her right now would grow quiet once she was back in the city.

Chapter 13

The hay maze construction was already well underway when Rebecca arrived at Calloway’s Orchard. It was a far cry from the way it had been done in their childhood, when volunteers and friends would get together and help out with the construction of a basic maze most people could easily find their way through. Now a team of employees were hard at work, the field beside the rows of apple trees a hive of activity.

“Excuse me, do you know where Sabrina is?” Rebecca asked a tall twentysomething man holding a clipboard and wearing a headset.

He turned, and his eyes behind his thick-rimmed glasses lit up. “You must be Rebecca! I’m Byron. I’ve heard all about you.”

“Same thing goes for you,” Rebecca said. “Good things, of course. I’m glad she has someone to help her.”

“And I’m glad to be the one hired to do it. She’s amazing. Her vision can be hard to keep up with at times, but always worth it in the end. I’m learning so much from her.”

Rebecca laughed. “Seems like you really get Sabrina. Always a few steps ahead, always worth running to catch up.”

“Absolutely. Can I get you a hot coffee, warm cider, anything? It’s probably a good idea to bring something with you into the maze,” he advised. “It’s a bit of a long haul, and I’m afraid I still find myself getting lost sometimes.”

She accepted a cider and followed him toward the maze—but stopped in front of it and gazed around in wonder. “This is more than just a hay maze, isn’t it? This is true hay infrastructure.”

“Impressive, right?” He flipped a few pages of the clipboard until he came to a complex-looking map. Then he checked his phone. “Okay, she’s right in the middle. We just need to follow this map, and we’ll find her. But don’t worry, we also have walkie-talkies.” He tapped his headset. “Impossible to get truly lost.”

But it wasn’t exactly impossible. Byron took at least three wrong turns before Rebecca politely asked if she could look at the map. He breathed a sigh of relief.

“Please don’t tell Sabrina I admitted this, but I am very bad with maps,” he said.

“Nothing to be ashamed of, Byron,” she said. “Our phones tell us which direction we need to go in these days. We don’t usually need to follow a map. Unless we’re in a hay maze.”