Chapter 2
Chapter Two
F inn raked his fingers through his hair as he left his bedroom.
He shuffled barefoot into his tiny, outdated kitchen.
One streetlight lit up the small space through the window over the sink.
All else was dark. He glanced at the oven clock.
Three-thirty. Only four hours since he’d left his shift at the hospital and crashed on the rectangle he called a bed.
He pulled the pot out from the coffeemaker. At least a cup’s worth of yesterday’s sludge sat at the bottom. He tilted the pot toward the streetlight. Nothing floating. He grabbed a mug from the cabinet. Ninety seconds later, he removed a steaming mug from the microwave.
Finn took the few steps from the kitchen into the area that management called a family room in their floor plans.
The space barely housed the green loveseat he’d taken from his parents’ house and the darker green recliner he’d purchased when he’d moved in.
A twist of his fingers clicked a crooked twenty-dollar floor lamp on. He should have left it off.
Cardboard boxes filled the space in front of him, stacked two and three high. All were from the attic of his childhood home, most of them his mother’s. He pressed one hand to the back of his neck as he drank from the steaming mug.
Three months ago, his pa decided to move into a retirement community.
His reasons were smart ones. He’d struggled back home in Evers Hollow after a broken hip didn’t heal right.
Finn lived an hour away and was in the middle of his medical residency.
The neighbors had helped, but it hadn’t been enough.
Beau from Pa’s old bowling team had been the one to pitch the idea. Great food, no home repairs, and no cleaning. The kicker—he could play cards all day, Pa’s favorite pastime.
More recently, Pa brought up the idea of selling the old house. He asked Finn to handle it.
“I’ve got it all worked out. You can take care of everything.”
Lucky Finn. As if he had free time.
Ridding the house of its remaining contents to get it ready to put on the market took what little he had.
Finn was an only child. He’d spent days off driving to Evers Hollow to empty and sort what was left in the old place.
Multiple runs to local charities had rid him of his pa’s car magazines, paperbacks, and old clothing.
He found an awards shop that recycled shelves of dust-ridden bowling trophies.
The attic, though, was full of his mother’s things.
His last trip, he’d brought back a load of her boxes here to his small apartment.
Each box waited its turn.
“ It’s up to you to decide,” Pa had said when Finn asked him about her things. “I’m too old to revisit the past.”
Pa was only fifty-eight. His attitude was probably how the boxes ended up in the attic. Pa was an emotional sort—his grief still too painful to deal with in the years since his Clara had passed.
The faded black of his mom’s handwriting beckoned in the lamplight. His hand returned to his neck, as if the pressure would somehow lessen the list of things he needed to deal with. So many boxes.
Bed beckoned. The streets outside were quiet. They’d remain so for a few more hours. Instead, he sipped murky liquid until only the dregs remained, foul and gum-like on his teeth.
Finn brewed a fresh pot and poured himself a new cup.
It didn’t taste much better. He turned a second lamp on before setting the mug on the old wooden trunk centered in the room, another relic from the old house.
He grabbed his pocketknife off the top and directed the blade through the tape on the closest box.
Nursing books. He took them all out, then put them back in to be sure. He labeled it and put the box by the door. The next one held his soccer trophies and his old soccer jerseys. He left it open, moved it to an empty corner of the room.
He opened another. A single piece of newspaper lay on top.
Beneath it sat a stack of photos, a red ribbon tied in a knot around them.
Caught by the top image of himself as a baby in his mom’s arms, he lifted the bundle out.
His fingers slid the ribbon off as he moved to his recliner.
A smile lit up her features, her strawberry blonde hair secured by a knotted headband.
Even in a photo, her brown eyes sparkled.
Her smile, her love, and pride rang clear in every line of her face.
She’d carried a subtle beauty that drew people to her, especially in her work as a pediatric nurse at Hollow’s Hospital. Everyone who’d met her loved her. He trailed a fingertip around the edges of her face. Fourteen years since they’d lost her to stage IV breast cancer. It still twisted his heart.
Finn shuffled through the next prints, came across one of him and his pa beside an old Chevy truck, his motorized blue baby. He’d spent hours working on that truck. Finn and his mom took turns bringing him glasses of sun tea and handing him tools on long ago weekends.
The last photo was a family one, taken before she got sick. Finn carried a worn copy of this one in his wallet and kept it as his screensaver on his laptop. They’d been a happy family of three.
He tied the ribbon to secure the photos and reached for the next item in the box.
Another bundle of photos, also tied in red. His fingers froze when he saw the top one. He sank farther back into his seat as a different sort of ache squeezed his heart. The image of his own gangly, mop-headed self next to a dark-haired little girl with two long braids.
His best friend.
In the picture, his own freckled face faced the camera. The girl looked sideways at him. She often had.
Emotions assaulted him—the good, the bad, and the part of him he still considered broken. He hadn’t figured out how to put himself back together. Had she?
He took a long sip of coffee.
Six years old. They’d become friends at his first Memorial Day barbecue at Briar House.
Finn and his folks had just moved to Evers Hollow. Locals told them the barbecue was tradition to honor the soldiers who’d fought in the wars of long ago. He’d looked for boys to play with among all the pine, cedar, and oak trees. He’d only found Rose.
Friends with a girl—as a six-year-old—the idea had been disgusting. Dressed in a frilly pink dress and shiny black shoes, Rose sat on the top stair of her grandmother’s porch and stared at him. Her two braids framed her face as she propped her elbows on her knees.
He’d looked everywhere but at her until she’d marched down those steps, grabbed his hand, and shook it like a cooked noodle. It felt like fireworks inside his arm. He wasn’t sure he liked it, but she held on tight.
Her older frilly sisters sat in chairs, also in pink, with sour frowns. He could still hear the oldest one’s voice in that tone that said she was better than everyone else. “Rose, you promised not to get dirty.”
Rose had flipped her braids around and glared up at them. “You promised I wouldn’t get dirty. I said no such thing.”
Then she’d pulled him with her away from the house.
“Come on,” she said. “We have to hide from the soldiers.”
“Soldiers. What soldiers?” Finn looked around, seeing no one in uniform.
“The Redcoats are coming.” She tugged on him as she crouched down.
Girls didn’t play Revolutionary War, but…
“I got shot in my leg.” He limped a bit. “I can’t crouch down.”
“Criminy, we’ll have to find another hiding place.”
Finn looked around; she still held his hand. “What about that big tree over there?”
Rose popped up like a jack-in-the-box. She nudged him, offered a toothless grin, and whispered, “Great choice, quick, let’s run for it.”
“I can’t run; you go ahead. I’ll catch up.” Maybe he could still find some boys to play with.
“I won’t leave you behind. Here, lean on me.” Rose wrapped her arm around his waist.
He tried to back away; his clothes were covered with dirt. “I’ll get your dress dirty.” He didn’t like girls, but he didn’t want her getting in trouble.
“There’s no time to argue. Our lives depend on it.” She put his arm across her shoulders. “Let’s go.”
Once behind the tree, she let go of him, and they sagged against the foot-wide trunk, breathing hard.
“I’m Rose Everson Finch.” Her voice was soft, cheerful as she looked him up and down. “This is my grandmother’s house. What’s your name?”
“Finn. Finn Murphy.” He peeked around the tree. His parents were talking with other folks. His mom was holding a baby.
“I never heard that name before.” Her face scrunched up like a dried prune.
His face felt hot. “My pa picked it. It’s Irish.”
“My mom gave me my name. She’s not here anymore.”
“Oh.” He knew that from Mr. Hal, but he didn’t know what to say, so he looked at his shoes. Streaks of mud ran across the tops, caked the sides. “How do you know about Redcoats?” He tilted his head and studied her. Her face looked different, like her tummy hurt.
“My dad told me stories—he was a history teacher. He’s gone too.”
“Mr. Hal told me about your folks. It’s a sad thing.” It’s what his pa would say.
“Thanks.” Rose gave him a gentle smile. “You know Mr. Hal?”
“I do. Met him last week.” He hoped he sounded important.
Rose sat down against the tree, folded her legs like a pretzel. He did the same.
“Mr. Hal’s a vet. He takes care of Grandmother’s horses. Want to meet them? Lady is beautiful. You have to see her.”
Finn met the horses that day. He and Rose ate homemade strawberry ice cream and hot dogs. Then they’d caught frogs in the creek that ran through the woods.
Rose’s grandmother had been angry about the mud on her dress. Ms. Magnolia’s words and tone rang clear in his ears even after all this time: “Young ladies do not play with frogs.”
The mud on Rose’s dress proved otherwise, but a warning look from his mom kept him from talking back.
Finn moved to the next photo, another of the two of them, a little older. The porch swing at Briar House on a rainy day, Rose with her floral rain boots and her two braids. She’d always worn floral rain boots. His were dark blue.
He shuffled through the rest of the stack. Their entire friendship sat in his hands as a stack of two-dimensional photos. He reached into the box again to discover a second identical set with a note tucked beneath the ribbon.
For Rose.
Clearly, his mother intended to give these to her.
Mom was sweet like that every day of her life. She treated Rose as if she were one of her own. Called the two of them inseparable adorables, a name she’d coined that he found a bit embarrassing and difficult to say.
Finn picked up the duplicate stack, set it away from the other. His mom would want her to have them, even if his last conversation with Rose formed cracks between them. They hadn’t spoken since.
Today was a day off. He’d made plans to visit his pa around lunch and meet with a real estate agent in Evers Hollow around dinnertime. He could find time to drop by Briar House and figure out how to give Rose the photos.
Surely someone knew where she lived. He hadn’t been to the house in years, not since the day after the last Everson New Year’s Eve party he’d attended.
He reached into the box again. His baby book. He’d forgotten about it. His mom had added his school photos and awards to its pages through the years. It would take a while to go through. He set it aside for later.
A couple of leather bound journals lay at the bottom. He flipped through them. Mom’s handwriting filled the pages along with photos stuck in between. He set them on top of his baby book. They would have to wait as well.
If he was going to drive to Evers Hollow today, he needed to get a run in, shower, and get on the road. He’d call Pa to remind him he’d be dropping by Wylder Ridge Community.