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Now, it seems, I’m a ghost, and somehow it is 2025, which seems absolutely fantastical to me. I’ll tell you my story—at least some of it, for now—though it seems wildly unbelievable. But if there’s anything I love, it’s something extraordinary. Too much of life (and death? Is this something I should know more about?) is just dull and everyday and terribly boring, like an endless afternoon in the parlor when you must pretend to be interested in the droning conversations and stilted card games and too-tiny glasses of weak sherry. So to find out that I am, after all, a ghost seems the most wonderful revelation. A ghost!

I’m still trying to work out my situation—even in ghostdom, it seems there are rules, rules, rules!—but I find I can flit about unseen, within range of my cookbook (more on that later, I promise). I can’t move heavy things, although I feel myself getting stronger all the time, and the other night I was able to knock over a cup of coffee, which I felt bad about, but I was so frustrated, you see. Anyway, the way I recall it, one minute I was stretched out in my wood-postered bed at Merriweather House, the home of my husband’s family, with old gray-bearded Dr. Addington shaking his head and people hovering above me, their whispers all around—“the fever won’t break,” “poor thing, so young”—and all I wanted to do was scream, to tell them my biggest secret, but my voice was just a croak.

And the next thing, I woke up in the strangest place I had ever been. It was dark, with no people around, and there were boxes and tables, all filled with the oddest assortment of objects. Piles of what looked like clothing, though it was nothing like anything I was known to wear, and strange metal things with strings attached to them. I peered out a window, and there were lights, everywhere, as if it was daytime. I could make out a paved road and trees, but I couldn’t tell where I was. Inside, my eyes settled on a stack of books, and I instantly felt comforted—at last, something familiar!—but even those seemed odd, too brightly colored with covers that were so shiny that they looked wet. And a pile of magazines gave me the same strange impression. These were nothing like the copies of Life or McCall’s that my parents had subscribed to when I was a girl. Their covers showed real-looking photographs, such dazzling things that I could barely comprehend them. I was most intrigued by one called Cosmopolitan—was it about sophisticates and their city living?—but as I read the cover, I was instantly distracted by the date: 2025.

I tried to pick it up, but my hand went right through it, as if the pages were made of water. And suddenly, I knew exactly what was happening to me. I spun around and darted across the room to a window where I would have ordinarily seen my reflection. I passed in front of it but saw nothing. I screamed, and there was no sound. And that’s when I realized I was invisible. I was a ghost. And in that moment, I was as happy as I could remember being, save one or two nights. (Yes, perhaps I’ll tell you about them later, too, though they now cause me even greater sadness.) It is 2025, and I have somehow been given another chance. I can set things right—at least some things.

I just need to find someone to help me.

CHAPTER FIVE

Cam steered her rental car around the bend that led into the town of Silver Cove. Everything moved a little slower in Silver Cove, even the cars. Of course, Birdie gleefully ignored the 25 mph speed limit, and everyone in town knew to steer clear when they saw her old Volvo coming. But Cam preferred to play by the rules and slowed to the speed limit.

It was a few days before Thanksgiving, and Cam had decided to come a little early to help Birdie get started on the repairs to her house. She would find a contractor, eat some turkey, and head back to Brooklyn with enough peace of mind to deal with Izzy Jones.

Things in Silver Cove’s small downtown looked the same as they always had: wide streets lined by older homes with a small stretch of storefronts and a little green square with a gazebo perched in the center. The five-and-dime had closed long ago; now it was an art gallery. The old movie house was still there, and it showed slightly older releases on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights. Cam noted that many of the houses still had their fall decorations up—gourds and pumpkins—while others had already moved on to Christmas, which seemed a little early, but then again, Silver Cove did love the holidays. Cam wondered if the topic of when it was appropriate to break out Christmas decorations had arisen in a town meeting. She wouldn’t be surprised if a raging debate had ensued and half the town wasn’t speaking to the other half.

The town wasn’t exactly a tourist hot spot, though the sign welcoming visitors to town did boast of being the cradle of a popular children’s book about a boy and his horse, written back in the 1920s, which kept a trickle of young fans and their parents coming in every year: “Home of Marshall Merriweather and Stormy of Silver Cove.” Many of the businesses capitalized on the connection. A bookstore called Horse Tales featured a display of the classic tome, and there was even a gift shop that specialized in plushie toys and other “Stormy” tchotchkes.

Cam pulled into a parking spot in front of the bakery, planning her mission carefully. She’d dash in, order the box of cinnamon twists that Birdie loved, and get out. If she kept her head low, her hat and scarf on, and her eyes in front of her, she would maybe, just maybe, escape without anyone noticing her. A run-in with any number of Silver Cove denizens would likely result in a half-hour grilling in which she would be asked all about her career—a topic she definitely didn’t want to dwell on—and possibly her (nonexistent) love life, which she wanted to talk about even less.

“This will just take a second, Parsley,” she told her passenger, who was busy leaving snout marks on the side window. “Be a good boy.”

She breathed in, bracing for the surgical strike, and swung the door open. She was about three seconds into Operation Pastry—in fact, she hadn’t even reached the door to the bakery—when her plan was disrupted. A voice inside her head was practically screaming: Abort mission, abort mission! But it was too late. She had already made eye contact with none other than Roxy Shipman, the owner of Roxy’s Glam and Casual boutique, who also happened to be town mayor and a notorious long-talker.

“Cam Parker, you’re an answer to all my problems,” Roxy said, as if the two of them were picking up in the middle of an extended conversation, and not seeing each other for the first time in well over two years. “As I was just saying at the meeting of the Main Street Business Association, we need a caterer, and lo and behold, there you are.”

“A caterer?” Cam began. “I’m not a—”

“You went to cooking school, I know. Top honors, of course, which Birdie told everyone who would listen. And you cooked at that French restaurant in New York. Everyone was talking about it after Birdie and Marcus went up for that visit. They both said it was exquisite. Yes, I remember that was the exact word Marcus used, ‘exquisite’! So really it’s perfect. What do they call that when things just work out perfectly? What’s the word? Kismet? That’s it! It’s kismet.”

“Mrs. Shipman, I’m sorry, but I’m not a caterer. In fact, I have to run. I promised Birdie I would pick her up cinnamon twists, and I’ve got my dog waiting in the car.” She motioned to Parsley, who was now sitting in the driver’s seat, watching the scene as if it were a highly entertaining movie.

“Someone has to make the food for the holiday fete,” Roxy said in a tone that suggested this was somehow Cam’s problem, which Cam was entirely certain it was not. “Martina from the cafe always does the food, but she had to leave for Florida this morning to go stay with her daughter, who just had a baby. Three weeks premature, mind you. A rude child, if you ask me, arriving so early—and when this year’s fete was going to be the best ever—because I’m chairing the committee, of course, and after last year’s debacle when Shirley was in charge?” Roxy paused to sniff as if a foul smell were wafting down Main Street. “Well, we just have to uphold standards again.”

“I won’t even be here that long,” Cam said, looking around for an escape route. “Not even a week. I’m leaving right after Thanksgiving.”

“I was thinking about cheese puffs,” Roxy continued as if she hadn’t heard Cam. “What do they call them in France? Gougères, that’s it! They served gougères at a wedding I went to in Richmond. A very classy affair, let me tell you…”

Cam couldn’t help the first thing that popped into her head, which was that gougères were a terrible idea for the fete. They had to be served hot, and if you didn’t eat them right out of the oven, they go lifeless and flat. Now, cheese straws, on the other hand, would be much better—sharp cheddar with just a pinch of cayenne. Those you could make ahead of time and serve at room temperature. She immediately reined herself in. Not your problem, she reminded herself.

“I’m so sorry. I have to go,” Cam said, interrupting Roxy midsentence and turning back to the safety of her car. “I’m late. Good luck finding someone. Happy holidays!”

“But what about Birdie’s cinnamon twists?” Roxy shouted.

Later, over mugs of hot tea in Birdie’s homey kitchen, Cam relayed the scene to her grandmother, who broke out in one of her signature cackles. Cam had always loved Birdie’s laugh. It wasn’t elegant or melodious. It was a series of high-decibel staccato “ha’s” usually punctuated with a slap of the table or her knee or any available surface. Miss Manners might not have approved, but Cam did, and so did Birdie’s many friends. You couldn’t hear that laugh without joining in. Even Cam chuckled.

“So you escaped the clutches of Roxy Shipman. Well done, you,” she said, raising her mug in a toast.

Birdie looked good, Cam thought. She was a little thinner maybe, with a few more lines in her cheeks. But she looked like herself. Cam had been worried because Birdie was the one to suggest that Cam come visit to help her sort out the house repairs. Not just suggest—she actually asked, which wasn’t like independent Birdie at all.

The house, on the other hand, was a mess. The cedar tree that had fallen onto the front porch had twisted the structure’s black metal roof into a snarl and ripped off a section of the front wall. Splinters of wood and old painted porch spindles littered the front lawn, reminding Cam of a game of Pick Up Sticks she had played as a kid. Several shutters had been knocked off the facade, giving the front a wonky look. Cam could picture it as she had known it her whole life—a simple, colonial-style home with a steep roof and dormer windows and real wood shutters that her grandmother closed tight when big storms whipped in from Chesapeake Bay. A deep porch that offered shade on humid summer afternoons when she and Avery would sprawl on the cool floorboards and play endless games of Go Fish.

Now, boards had been roughly drilled into place along the entire front of the house that blocked out all the light that once streamed into the living room, the room where Birdie used to spend most of her day. It was cold and drafty and gloomy, which was the exact opposite of how that room had always felt to Cam. The stiff breeze reached all the way back to the kitchen, where Birdie had set up a space heater by the weathered oak table.

This is no way for a seventy-four-year-old to live, Cam thought. She could break a hip or set the house on fire—what was left of it.

At least the kitchen looked the way Cam had always remembered it. The solid wooden cabinets were painted a cheery green and checkered curtains hung in the windows. Mismatched chairs huddled around the table, and last year’s Christmas cards from Birdie’s many friends and former students were still pinned to a colorful red string above the counter. The room was well loved and welcoming—just like her grandmother.