Forever Finley: An Episodic Novel

By Holly Schindler

~ Forever Love in the Town of Finley ~ "True love never dies." So begins the legend of Amos Hargrove, a brave Civil War soldier who survived battle and returned home only to learn his beloved had died before they could marry. His spirit, some say, still pervades the town he founded and named after his long-lost sweetheart, gone far too soon. Today, in the town of Finley, dreams come true, love blossoms, and second chances are unearthed. Is Amos’s spirit truly at work, granting wishes as he continues to search for the girl he never stopped loving? Does his unfulfilled desire continue to have influence on those who call Finley home? What will it take to finally reunite two souls meant to be together? ~ Forever Finley is novel constructed of stand-alone “episodes,” each building toward a final dramatic conclusion, weaving past and present threads into a single tale of loss and perseverance, the strength of the human spirit, and the ability of love to endure...forever.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Holly Schindler
• Release date: May 8, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370938391

Holly Schindler

I'm a critically acclaimed and award winning hybrid author for readers of all ages--both the young in years and the young at heart. My work has received starred reviews from Booklist and Publishers Weekly, appeared on Booklist’s Best First Novels for Youth, PW Picks, School Library Journal’s What’s Hot in YA, and B&N’s 2016 YA Books with Irresistible Concepts and Most Anticipated May 2016 YA Books. My YA work has also won a Silver Medal in ForeWord Reviews Book of the Year and a Gold Medal in the IPPY Awards. My MG work is critically acclaimed as well, having made the master lists for several state readers’ awards, including this year’s Oklahoma Sequoyah Book Award and Missouri’s Mark Twain Readers Award, and has been chosen for inclusion in the Scholastic Book Fair.

Book preview

Come December

Open yourself up to magical possibilities.

Natalie is new to town, and feels invisible and painfully alone...until a mysterious stranger in a cemetery changes everything.

Leaves are a lot like people, Natalie caught herself thinking as she sat, the first car at the intersection, in a long lane of coming-home five o’clock traffic. Leaves were all clustered when they were young and green—they danced happily together, rustling in the wind on the branches of maples or pin oaks. But once they turned colors, showing signs of their age, they pulled free from the tree and they tumbled willy-nilly. They landed detached from the safety they’d always known, wet and cold on gray cement sidewalks. November, Natalie thought as she watched the leaves continue to fall on the opposite side of the intersection, had never looked lonely to her before.

Come on, Natalie, she told herself. Snap out of it. She reached for the knob of her radio. She needed music. Or some call-in show with people who were worse off than she was.

The car behind her honked, startling her away from the dial. Natalie glanced up at the green light and eased her own car forward, chastising herself again for being so woebegone. Nothing tragic had happened; she’d simply moved from her tiny Missouri hometown to a slightly bigger Missouri town—all in order to chase after her lifelong dream, her love of the lens. Videographer for Channel 27 News.

Following one’s dreams had always seemed so triumphant at the movies, accompanied by soaring background music and fist-pumping. Natalie’s own dream-following had not involved a Rocky-esque soundtrack. On her tight budget, it had involved moving into an apartment across the street from a cemetery.

In all fairness, this was no Halloween night cemetery with crooked gray stones, a distant Victorian-era caretaker building, and bats whizzing about in the moonlight. Instead, it had been designated a national cemetery, populated with neat rows of pristine white marble markers and filled with the peace and noble aura of being selected as the final resting place for so many distinguished, courageous soldiers. Still, though—a cemetery. A dead end. A last stop. No hope for anything better. It filled Natalie with an overwhelming sense of sadness that was as gray and heavy as concrete.

Natalie shook her head at the stone walls and the wrought iron gate that enclosed the more-than-a-century-old burial ground as she steered her car into her apartment lot and dragged herself inside.

She tossed her keys onto the table, her throat feeling tight and dry. And it suddenly occurred to her that she had not heard her own voice all day. Natalie’s main task at the station was to make herself as inconspicuous as possible so that the world could forget that she was standing there with a camera, allowing the journalist with the mic and the perfect hair to get a better on-scene interview. Sometimes, she actually caught herself thinking that the real world stretched before her lens, and she was on the opposite side, in some strange foggy area where her own existence was up for debate. What kind of life was this? Getting up and putting in eight hours of invisibility and then coming home to an apartment with chairs enough for six and a need only for one. It was neither triumphant nor fulfilling. She glared at her own framed art photographs, years’ worth of work decorating her apartment walls. Some dream.

Natalie put her dinner in the microwave, but the carousel tray didn’t fit right, and it rubbed as it turned, letting out a wail so close to the sound Natalie’s own heart was making that she slammed her thumb against the Stop button.

She hated her unending funk—her downturned mouth and the way she tucked her chin into her chest to avoid eye contact and shuffled past everyone as quickly as possible. And she hated that her new surroundings were doing everything they could to keep her from crawling out of her blues and into the happiness she’d expected to find—the happiness she was certain she could still find, if she could only figure out how to quit her incessant moping.

She wasn’t hungry. At least, not for food. She threw her long brown hair in a ponytail, her feet in her running shoes, and her phone in the pocket of her sweats, but only for safety—she certainly didn’t expect to be receiving any calls.

Outside, the evening traffic had yet to slack off. She sighed with disappointment; the only place to avoid the throb of engines and the acrid smell of exhaust was the cemetery across the street. The wrought iron gates towered over her as she slipped inside.

Her cathartic run stopped before it had a chance to really get started; someone close by was whistling a vaguely familiar tune. She stood frozen in place, squeezed the phone in her pocket, and waited for the whistler to step into view.

Don’t see too many joggers this time of year, he said. A label on the breast of his coveralls designated him Caretaker.

Natalie stared, startled by the fact that someone had spoken directly to her. She was growing accustomed to her invisibility—a fact that disturbed her, embarrassed her, made her feel like withdrawing even more. Sometimes, a downward spiral could spin as quickly as a tornado, and was just as easy to outrun.

You are jogging, aren’t you? the caretaker asked, shaking messy gray hair from his eyes. Or are you here to decorate? If you are, you need to mark who the arrangement’s for. So much wind lately. Blows the flowers to kingdom come. You write your soldier’s name, I’ll always make sure it gets back to the right spot.

Not—decorating. She had to force the words out, like her throat had started to rust shut.

Well. Be careful in the fog. Tends to show up at twilight this time of year. Gates close at sundown. And he began to whistle again as he shuffled across the cemetery in an arthritic limp.

Natalie jogged, mounds of leaves rattling beneath her feet. She made up military cadences to hear the sound of her own voice. She ran until her legs burned and her lungs burned and the cold November air even made the tip of her nose burn. That caretaker was nice, she tried to tell herself, breathing in the smoky smells of autumn and exhaling in long steamy streams. But it had been an empty conversation with a stranger. And it couldn’t keep her eyes from burning, too. She swiped a tear away and pressed forward.

She had only just passed a large statue decorated with carvings of antique rifles when her sneaker hit a slick spot—a puddle from the afternoon’s brief shower, lined by fallen leaves. Natalie lost her footing; she slipped and threw her arms out as she tried to catch herself. But she just kept staggering, her shin slamming painfully against a white marble slab.

Ooomph, she said, her knees buckling. She closed her eyes, prepared for the pain of slamming into the ground.

And then, out of nowhere, someone caught her.

Thanks, Natalie breathed. And sorry. I didn’t mean to run into you. But she wasn’t sorry at all. She wanted to hang on.

No apologies necessary.

When Natalie pulled herself away, she saw him—the man who had caught her: slender build, a vintage looking olive green woolen coat buttoned up around his throat. Short dark hair, flashing blue eyes, and a smile warm enough to melt the damp November chill.

He offered her his arm. Natalie was shocked to find nothing strange or frightening about sliding her fingers into the crook of a stranger’s elbow.

George, he offered.

Natalie, she said.

And suddenly, just like that, they became friends. In the same way that once, simply asking another girl in pigtails if she wanted to be on the opposite side of the playground teeter-totter could make the two inseparable. Natalie relished their instant, inexplicable connection.

George talked as though they’d known each other for years. Like this was a date, an afternoon they’d planned on all along. When Natalie let go of the shock of their easy way and focused on what George was actually saying, she realized he was telling her about being stuck overseas. About month after month spent in foreign places—lands that looked nothing like home.

He was handsome, Natalie thought as he carried on, his words coming both rapidly and smoothly, but he was attractive in a way that seemed more sophisticated than any of the men Natalie had been close to. He seemed more ironed shirts and neckties. Old-fashioned thank-you cards and dancing a waltz in front of a bandstand. His voice was measured—intelligent and polite, like he was used to calling women ma’am with no sense of sarcasm.

I’ve learned a trick, he confided, lowering his voice in a way that said it was a secret he didn’t want to share with anyone else. A trick for dealing with solitude or homesickness.

Natalie gasped. Her eyes swelled. Did it show? Did she look lonely? Was he taking pity on her?

He placed his hand on her back in a manner that reassured her, insisted he was only talking about himself. You have to pretend that what you’re doing right now, at this moment, is merely practicing a tiny bit of self-inflicted denial, in order for you to increase the pleasure of enjoying something beautiful that will be coming along soon.

When Natalie wrinkled her forehead at him, he continued, Haven’t you ever gone without lunch—or maybe even just nibbled at a few soda crackers—before a big dinner in a fancy restaurant? Sure you have. You sacrifice your midday meal in order to be completely ravenous by the time you get to dinner. And then it tastes all the better for having gone without for a little while.

A sense of utter peace washed over Natalie. He was right. She had done that before.

What am I waiting for, though? she blurted. What’s the big wonderful thing that’s coming? She covered her lips with her fingers. Why was she asking him? What did George know of her life?

As she chewed her lip, a comfortable silence slipped its arms around them. Twilight was quickly giving way to night. The sun would soon pull the horizon over its head like a blanket and settle in for a good long rest. George was steering her toward the exit, where the caretaker was leaning against his car, waiting for them to leave so that he could close the gates for the night. Surely George had other places to be, even if he was far from home. He had things to do, too. Everyone did.

Still, though, she wanted to ask him to forget his plans, to come with her to get coffee or cross the street and share her still mostly frozen microwave dinner.

He seemed to sense what she was thinking. Looking directly into her eyes, he finally answered her question. You’ll know. About your big wonderful thing. Come December.

Come—? Natalie started to ask. But George was leaving her, slipping away into the fog and the darkening night. Natalie shivered, sliding her hands into the pockets of her sweats. Her fingers wrapped around her phone as George paused to glance behind his shoulder and wave. Without thinking, she pulled out her phone and snapped a picture of him. The flash seemed to startle him—he raised one of his arms, elbow out, as though to duck for safety.

She regretted scaring him, but not taking the picture. She wanted proof of the first truly lovely thing that had happened since her arrival.

But her picture was uncharacteristically fuzzy and amateurish and out of focus. Clarity was what had drawn her to lenses in the first place—she’d always loved how sharp and defined an image or footage looked after it had been captured by one of her cameras. But then again, why wouldn’t this picture be blurry? Didn’t it just figure, when so much of her life seemed out of focus? And there she went all over again, falling right back into her sour feelings.

Only, she didn’t fall as deeply. Not this time. Natalie was surprised to find, the next day, that her loneliness didn’t quite fit the same—not when she thought of George. It was no longer the second skin she had grown the moment she’d crossed the city limits, squeezing her tight. It didn’t cover every inch of her.

That night, as Natalie sat in five o’clock coming-home traffic, it seemed to her that the whole world was playing George’s game. Getting ready for the upcoming holidays—rushing out to shop and stock up for enormous family feasts. Scrimping on their regular weekday meals and toiletries in order to buy gifts. Everyone was going without right now, in order to prepare for their big wonderful thing. Just like she was. It made her feel less alone.

She raced straight to the cemetery, past the caretaker’s car and through the gates. George was coming down the path, dressed in the same olive coat. Wearing the same pleased expression.

It continued this way—the two of them walking through the twilight fog after Natalie’s workday. George making confessions about the games he’d played in his mind, the fantasies he’d cooked up to carry him through his loneliest days. Natalie had her own now, too—fantasies of what it would be like to get George beyond the stone barriers, past the gate. How life would be when he stopped sidestepping her invitations and avoiding her questions of what he did during his days. At times, she felt the cemetery was the real world, and the other hours of the day were a sleepwalk she engaged in until she could get back to him, her George.

Come December, he kept assuring her. It’ll all change come December.

What will? she wanted to know.

George only smiled as he drifted off into the evening.

But things had already changed. Natalie had someone—she had her George. And that made her feel so good that she often hummed under her breath as she arrived for work. She bought a corsage of mums on a whim—Just because, she’d told the florist—but really because it was the sort of old-fashioned touch that she imagined George would appreciate. She wore it to work, and got the kind of compliments that said that maybe it wasn’t so bad after all to stand out, maybe she wasn’t supposed to spend the entire day concealing herself behind her lens, staying out of sight.

That led to her daring to shoot events at different angles or pan across the area the moment her ears picked up on any odd sounds. She caught moments of action during a standoff with police at an apartment building, anguished human moments at the scene of an accident when the mother of an injured boy was comforted by her husband. She was doing better work. Reporters at the studio were seeking her out, asking her to come with them on location. Her voice bounced through the control room as she aided in editing her footage.

She was invited to a Thanksgiving dinner being thrown by one of her coworkers—all of the singles were going to have their own feast, a potluck extravaganza.

My big meal! she giggled when she next saw George. Just like you said, the day we met. You should come with me.

George shook his head. It’ll change, he promised her. Come December.

It was beginning to sound like some sort of prediction, a fortune, her fate. Was he telling her he was leaving? He was returning home? She was afraid to ask.

She went to Thanksgiving dinner wearing one of her corsages and carrying homemade cranberry salad, a recipe recited by her mother over the phone. At first, she felt sad thinking about George, wondering what he was doing and wishing he could have joined her. But she drank wine and she listened to her producer’s long story of thawing the turkey and she danced with a man from marketing after the pumpkin pie, and it was wonderful, wonderful.

All because of George. Because of the mind game he’d taught her to play. It had made the world look different. And because it had looked different, she’d acted differently in it. And then the world wasn’t just seeming different, it was different. Lighter and full of more people and dreams that were beautiful and could be chased until they came true.

That evening, she raced through the rows of pristine white stones, the cranberry stain still on her lips. She wanted to tell George how full her belly was with food and how full her ears were with laughter. And how he’d opened her up to these things.

He knew it, the minute he stepped from a wisp of autumn fog and saw the expression on her face. No need for explanation. He was so happy for her that he grabbed her hand and together, they raced to the band pavilion, where they climbed onto the stage—the same stage that hosted Veterans Day and Memorial Day celebrations. And they danced. He twirled her as he hummed the kind of old-fashioned love song that played behind the most romantic scenes of the classic movies Natalie’d watched with her mother.

He stroked her cheek. You look so joyful, he told her. My trick has worked.

My big wonderful thing was you, she blurted. Right? Wasn’t it you, all along?

Instead of answering, George pulled her close. He smelled like chimney smoke and cedar boxes and yellowed love letters as he lowered his face toward hers. His lips brushed her own, almost shyly. The kiss tingled across her face.

Your lips are cold, Natalie whispered, wrapping her arms around George’s waist and pressing her cheek against the scratchy wool of his coat. Come inside with me.

No, George whispered. You have to go.

But when will—

Come December, he promised, and he kissed her cheek softly, sweetly. Sending tingles through her a second time.

Thanksgiving fog swirled, dancing across the path. George slipped away from her—dissolving more than he seemed to walk away.

Natalie returned to the cemetery at the same time the next day, racing through the rows of white stones. But George didn’t show—the first time since she’d started coming to the cemetery that she didn’t see him. It made her feel panicky and off-center. She returned the next two evenings, calling his name. She raced back to the pavilion where they had danced. But he was nowhere.

Excuse me, she called out to the caretaker who was carrying an armload of pine wreaths and whistling a carol. Have you seen that man? The one in the green coat? George.

The caretaker stared back blankly.

The one I’ve been walking with in the evening. You know.

No, he confessed. I haven’t seen anybody but you in here lately. Like I said, nobody jogs too much this time of year. Especially with the shorter days. Gates close so early, you know.

Natalie frowned. But you saw us that first night, before Thanksgiving. The night you were waiting by your car?

He offered a shrug of his wide shoulders. I feel better if I know you haven’t been in here by yourself. Always did wonder why a young girl liked to spend so much time alone in a cemetery. His whistle returned as he took up the task of decorating the iron gate with red outdoor ribbon and small wreaths.

The caretaker was getting on in years, Natalie reasoned. Either his eyes or his memory had begun to fail him.

Come December. George would return then, she told herself. He would be hers.

The first evening of the month, Natalie raced home, and she dressed like a girl getting ready for a date with a man she was falling in love with. Her hands shook as she curled her hair. She fumbled nervously in her attempt to pull the tags from a new suede skirt and tug on her favorite boots. Her mouth ran dry in anticipation as she popped open the fridge, retrieving yet another of the corsages that had become something of a signature look.

She raced across the street. Snow flurries brushed her face and stuck to her eyelashes. The air was so cold, it pinched her lungs and stung her cheeks.

George! she called out. Her voice echoed. Hardy winter sparrows scattered through bare tree limbs. George?

He didn’t answer. Her pounding heart throbbed inside her ears. Where was he?

She took a step backward, yelping as her foot slammed into a headstone. She’d been here before; she recognized the statue with the antique rifles. This was where she’d met George, where he caught her. This headstone—it was the same one she’d tripped over that first day, now marked by a small holiday arrangement of pine cones and an evergreen branch that had been tied together with red ribbon. The stone’s simple inscription read, G.A. Hargrove. US Army. WWI.

She cocked her head to the side, scanning the rest of the cemetery for George’s face.

The wind picked up. Bare tree limbs swayed, clicking together. The caretaker’s holiday decorations rolled through the rows like tumbleweeds.

Natalie squatted, picking up the small pine arrangement that had just fallen on the toe of her boot. It had a label, like the one the caretaker had asked her to place on any decoration: George Hargrove.

A funny sinking feeling overtook her as she quickly replaced the arrangement and dug out her phone. Her thumb flew across the screen while she searched for the photo she’d taken that first night. There he was—her George. But as she stared, George’s faint image grew still hazier, then disappeared completely into the blur.

Natalie began to tremble. George had never talked about the present. Only mentioned that he was far from home. Far from home, but never with a car? Natalie thought, turning toward the parking lot, where she saw only the caretaker’s ancient Ford. Far from home, but always at the cemetery to meet her—even on Thanksgiving?

Or, Natalie thought, staring at the headstone, George had been in a foreign land a long time ago. He was only telling her he understood what it was to be gloomy and heartsick.

Just as quickly as all these thoughts rose, though, another round of questions eclipsed them all: Had Natalie been playing games in her mind in order to stop feeling so terribly lonely? Like a solitary child with imaginary play friends? Had there never been a George? A burgeoning romance? Only a dream—a silly little daydream about a beautiful stranger who could rescue her from sadness? A daydream that she could use to tide herself over until she had made a few real human connections in her new hometown?

It had all seemed so incredibly real, though. Perhaps the lens up there in her head was the strongest of all. Able to turn even the fuzziest of ideas into the sharpest of images.

Come December. Somehow, she’d known all along it was how much time she’d need to make this new home feel comfortable. That was it—wasn’t it?

Natalie touched the cold marble headstone as gently as she’d once imagined George stroking her cheek. Bye, George, she whispered. But it didn’t sound like a sad parting—it sounded more like an expression of her own amazement.

She backed away from the grave, hurried toward the gate. Her breath drew pretty cursive letters through the air as she waved to the caretaker.

Inside her hallway, a young man was struggling to hold a cardboard box and unlock a door at the same time. Natalie rushed to help him. A move she never would have made without the introduction of George and his game. Yes, Natalie thought as she chuckled to herself, without George, she would have simply tucked her head down and darted away from the stranger, wallowing in her isolation.

Now, though, she offered a neighborly, Let me help, sliding the box from his arm. It jingled, like it was full of something fragile, something made of porcelain or glass. Which made her feel even better about coming to his aid.

Thanks, he said, unlocking the door. I’m a little disorganized. I’m just moving in.

He pushed the door open and turned toward her. He had warm blue summer day eyes; the skin around them rippled as he smiled at her. It was a kind smile. A welcoming smile. The sort of smile that maybe Natalie had been dreaming of the day she’d jogged in the cemetery, when she’d first imagined George. Of course she had imagined George. What was the other possibility?

Natalie’s new neighbor took the box from her, placed it gently on the ground. I’m Damien, he said, extending his hand in greeting. And paused. I’m warning you—my last name’s a doozy. You’ll laugh.

Oh, please. How bad could it be?

He sucked in a breath. You’ll never believe me, especially at this time of year.

Try me. She loved that he used that word—believe. Couldn’t she see the world through any lens she wanted? Isn’t that what George had taught her? Didn’t that mean that a girl would be a fool not to believe in pure magic?

It’s December, he confessed. Damien December.

January Thaw

Big dreams, a small town, and friends who know you better than you know yourself.

Annie Ames returns to her small hometown of Finley to celebrate her newfound success as an up-and-coming young NYC artist...only to come face-to-face with Justin O’Dell, who is both her childhood friend and a journalist who recently penned a scathing review of her work. Can an artist and her biggest critic find common ground—or have Justin's words destroyed their friendship for good?

The town square of Finley, Missouri had captured all the quaint charm of a Currier and Ives print, as well as every last drop of the simple sweetness that had graced any of Norman Rockwell’s Saturday Evening Post covers. And if the young adults behind plate glass windows had their way, these would be permanent qualities—longer lasting, even, than the stones that had been holding up city hall for nearly a century and a half. Finley had raised them on buttermilk biscuits, taught them to skip down the sidewalks, then stuffed plenty of just in case money and extra bologna on homemade white bread sandwiches into their coat pockets, kissing them goodbye at the bus station, shooing them off to college or jobs in bigger cities. But nostalgia set in early for those who had been raised in town; they returned quickly—at times even before their thirtieth birthdays—hungry for juicy beauty-salon gossip and flaky pie crusts filled with both apples from the nearby orchard and long-held family traditions. They hung their own business signs in the plate glass windows facing the square, inviting Finley, Come in; I’m back home; I’ve missed you.

Last month’s Christmas bustle—and the evergreen wreaths, so many of them, the entire town square had smelled of pine the moment shoppers pulled themselves from their cars—had been replaced by a dangerous mix of January-in-the-Midwest sleet and rain. Worst storm of the year, a few tight, worried voices called out to each other, repeating what the Channel 27 weather team had predicted. Hurry—get home while you can. Open signs had begun to turn their backs apologetically toward the sidewalks.

One corner of the square refused to let a little rain—and a bitter twenty-nine-degree chill—dampen its spirits. Cuppa, the popular coffee palace, was still proudly open. The banner that stretched across its front window continued to boast, even as it sagged beneath the accumulating freezing rain, Finley Welcomes Back Annie Ames - Charity Auction - Tonight. Several dozen brave residents were scurrying inside, hastily pulling off woolen gloves and unbuttoning jackets, reaching for Cuppa’s still-warm lemon bars and steaming lattes.

But Finley was becoming increasingly dangerous; that much was getting hard to ignore. The click of ice pellets hitting storefronts perfectly mimicked the sound of fingers clicking at a computer keyboard in the nearby newspaper office. The icy clicks were a bit mean-spirited; they’d wrapped cars in frozen cocoons, denying entry, and they’d weighed power lines, threatening to steal the town’s light.

A few weeks ago, before the holidays, the literal tap of fingers on a computer keyboard—Justin O’Dell’s fingers to be exact—had culminated in a slew of words that the habitual Finley Times readers had also interpreted to be mean-spirited. Those words had built a frozen wall between Justin and the very Annie Ames who was standing inside Cuppa, hugging everyone who had braved the weather to attend her art show.

Justin had arrived nearly ten minutes earlier, but hadn’t yet been able to drag himself inside Cuppa and come face-to-face with Annie, whom, word had it, had yet to let go of what he’d written and published for the entirety of her hometown to read. She was angry at him; it wasn’t a surprise. He’d expected as much. Now, though, he was having a hard time squeezing out enough courage to finally deal with it.

When we go in there… a voice called from down the sidewalk.

Justin turned, sighing with relief when he found that the person approaching Cuppa was Damien December—Justin’s childhood best friend and the person who’d promised to help soothe Annie should she turn into an angry cat, arching her back and hissing warnings at Justin, the mongrel dog he was. Damien waved his arms about, clenching his entire body as he attempted, in a pair of slick-soled dress shoes, to stay upright on the thickening ice. You have to promise me you’ll behave yourself.

Behave myself? Justin asked innocently. What do you think I am, one of your kindergarten students?

Come on, Jay, Damien moaned, sliding to a stop. It’s cause to celebrate. Hometown girl makes good.

Yes, Finley’s girl of the moment had definitely made good in the big-bad world of skyscrapers and endless taxi streams and hoity-toity art connoisseurs who usually preferred their geniuses to be East-Coast bred. She had impressed even the snobbiest of highbrows, the sort that still assumed that anyone from Missouri didn’t wear shoes and had to swerve to avoid piles of horse dung in the street. The quirky girl who’d once doodled incessantly on her canvas sneakers, whose fingers were chronically stained from her favorite inks, and whose locker in high school was instantly identifiable (think: papier-mâché bas-relief down the gray metal door) had been in nearly fifty juried shows since she’d begun her studies at NYU. Currently working on her MFA at the Pratt Institute, she’d also, the previous fall, been profiled by Art Trek as one of NYC’s most promising young artists and had subsequently landed her first solo exhibition in Chelsea.

"Her folks are here. Her old teachers are here. She’s not going to be here long. Got to head back out to New York for the spring semester, Damien went on, pausing to gesture toward the plate glass, then blow a quick burst of warm air on his freezing fingers. A silent auction of a bunch of her new paintings, in order to help fund the old art department at our high school. She’s giving back. She hasn’t forgotten her roots. That’s admirable, right?"

She knows, though. About my review of her Chelsea show.

Wasn’t that the point? Isn’t that why you wrote it? So Annie would read it?

Justin grunted.

It took everybody here by surprise. Had to have taken Annie by surprise, too. You fly all the way to New York to see her exhibit— Damien started.

"Not just to see the exhibit. I had to meet with my editor, too," Justin insisted, blinking sleet from his eyelashes.

Oh, sure, you had to meet with your editor. They fly all their midlist authors to New York these days?

They were interested in my second book—

—which you said they were going to offer a whopping twelve thousand dollars for. Just like the last one. Which is why, I believe, you had to keep working at the paper.

Justin sighed.

"You could have handled all that editor stuff through e-mail. You bought your own ticket to New York to see Annie’s exhibit. And then you don’t say a word to her face, you just come home and write the world’s most scathing review for The Finley Times."

She deserved honesty.

You know more about art than any of the critics in New York? They all love her stuff.

I know more about her, though, Justin murmured, staring through the plate glass—but not at Annie. He was staring instead at the tiny table in the back corner. The same table where a teenaged Annie had spent Saturday afternoons curled over her sketchbook, nursing the same cappuccino for hours. Mindlessly sloshing cold coffee onto the white butcher paper Cuppa used as disposable tablecloths, her pencil scratching feverishly against her pages.

Back then, Justin had often joined her, sliding his own scribbled-on notebook under her nose to share his latest piece of flash fiction—which usually involved aliens and ray guns. And Annie had laughed, loving them (or so she’d said) because they played out like comic books in her mind. Because she could see them. She had even drawn his main characters in her own sketchbook, slipping finished illustrations through the slots in his locker door or tucking them underneath the windshield wipers of his Pontiac.

She had drawn him, too, Justin remembered. Always with a crooked smile and a crooked slant to his shoulders and overly exaggerated, large eyes.

What is this, manga-me? he’d written above one of her drawings before shoving it into her locker.

Big eyes, because you see everything and put it all in your stories, she’d written back. Those aliens aren’t so alien after all, are they?

Just do the polite thing, Damien insisted. "Tell