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“Wow.” I adjust my grip on my suitcase handle. “You know what? Forget it. I have to get to Haven’s Rest. Thank you for this wonderful introduction to Alaska.”

“Ravenslight Creek.” His voice is low, like he isn’t fully in charge of what he’s saying. “You’re in Ravenslight Creek. If you head back to Fairbanks, you’ll find Haven’s Rest about ten minutes from the airport.” He pauses. “They have a shuttle bus.”

“Thank you.” I push as much crispness into the words as I can muster because while that information is useful, it doesn’t get me to Fairbanks or to the mythical shuttle bus. I don’t mention this, vowing to never ask this man for another thing if my life depends on it, and drag my suitcase around him onto the damp grass. The wheel starts screaming as I walk down the pebbled driveway toward the road. I choose to ignore it and keep my head high.

Once I’m over the short plank bridge, I cross the street to the fire station to the side that has an actual sidewalk. The bay door is up, fire truck inside, and one of the firemen leans on the front bumper, sipping from a steaming mug.

In a T-shirt.

Probably only because it makes his biceps look good, and he knows it.

“Morning.” He raises the mug in salute, a sharp white smile of perfect teeth. The men of this town are giving me whiplash.

“Hi?” I plaster on a smile. Bright and charming, like a welcome you’d get at a high-end hotel. I let it fall. I’m so tired of wearing it.

My suitcase wheel locks up, and I nearly trip as it refuses to move. Pretending I don’t hear how it scrapes along the pavement like I’ve tossed it into a meat grinder, I persist all the way to the corner, where it snaps clean off, listing sideways onto the soggy grass.

I tip my face to the sky, which is rolling with heavy, bruised clouds. A fat drop falls onto my nose, and all the duct tape and spite that’s been holding me together since storming out of my parents’ apartment yesterday goes ping.

Leaving my suitcase tilted in the mud, I slump down on the curb, feet in the gutter, and press my gloved hands into my eyes.

I have no idea what I’m doing. I have no idea what I’m doing. I have no idea what I’m doing.

Ashfords don’t cry, Ellery.

I was four when my mother instilled that lesson. I wipe the rain off my face with my sleeve, which is a thing I have never once done in front of her.

This is a minor setback, not a catastrophe. You can, and will, find a solution. My father’s voice this time, and for once, it’s useful. Another icy raindrop slides down my collar.

I sit up straighter, refusing to be defeated by a few drops of water, rise to my feet, and assess the situation. The suitcase comes up by the handle, and I drag it as the rain falls in earnest. My hair is soaked. I slip under the awning outside the newspaper office and look back. The street runs past a few more storefronts, then the lots spread out into houses and vanish altogether. The forest starts and keeps going.

On the other side of the road, Mr. Flannel Shirt shoves his hands into his pockets, watching me as the rain pours down around him.

We lock eyes. He doesn’t move.

He’s been standing there the whole time, an audience to my off-off-Broadway one-woman show.

My anger deepens.

Fuck my parents and fuck him.

I push my wet hair off my face, tip my chin up, and haul the suitcase on its remaining wheels by the handle. It swings against my shin every second step, and I keep walking, because the alternative is standing in the rain while he stares at me.

I’m here, in a town called Ravenslight Creek, and my priority is getting to Fairbanks. Break it down into small tasks. It’s how I got through high school, and college, and the six months of pretending I wanted to work in the family business.

I make my way along the row of businesses, and an old man in a leather apron comes out of the hardware store to stack cute enamel watering cans in olive and navy blue. He watches me lug my suitcase past and doesn’t offer to help, which I appreciate. “Mornin’.”

“Morning.”

Past a salon with flamingo-pink chairs and a secondhand store, both not open at this early hour. A bell dings down the block.

“Catch you later.” A young woman in a fluffy wool hat walks out of a shop, coffee cup in hand, and climbs into a truck parked at the curb.

Warm light spills across the sidewalk, and I drag my luggage toward it.

The Roost is painted on the glass in gold cursive. The woman behind the counter tops up coffees and talks to everyone like she’s known them for years. She probably has, in a town this size. Her fading blond hair is piled in a loose bun, strands falling around her angular face and eyes crinkled with smile lines. She seems like a mom who’d make all your friends brownies after school. So, the absolute opposite of mine. Maybe she’d let me charge my phone?

A help-wanted sign sits in the corner of the window. I’ll need a job soon, but coming out here from Fairbanks won’t be feasible without a car. The wind curls another icy draft under my coat and I pull open the door.