Souvenirs of Starling Falls

“I’ve got a few ideas,” he said.

“Tom, listen…” I lowered my voice. It was a still, crisp, late-September day. The kind of day when voices carried. I looked over toward the McGhees’ house and saw a second-floor curtain swiftly fall into place.

“Hmmm?” He was rummaging through a duffle bag in the backseat, looking for something.

“What happened last night… Nothing like that can ever happen again.”

“You’re right. I’m sorry. I lost it.”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

“I’m just stressed out.”

“You really scared me.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“I don’t want to feel like that again. I don’t want us to be that kind of couple.”

“I know. Me either.” He stopped looking through the bag and gave me a hug.

“Let’s have fun on this trip,” I said. “Let’s really make the most of it.”

“We will,” he said.

“Which way are we headed?”

“Let’s just start driving, like we used to. Before,” he said.

“Okay. Let’s,” I said.

And we did. We drove to Yellowstone and on to Glacier National Park. For ten perfect days, we were us. We had a magical time. A perfect road trip. Open windows and all the songs we loved to sing along to playing for hours on end. It felt like we were the couple we used to be back in Seattle. Back when we had crazy adventures that became funny stories we told our jealous friends. Back when Hawthorne Avenue, Starling Falls was just some place we’d never heard of.

Chapter 8

In those ten days we were gone, we missed quite a lot of Starling Falls news. There had been a grease fire at the Tall Oaks Diner—no one was harmed; they’d rebuild—and one of the teachers at the grade school had been severely injured in a car accident and was now in a coma. Another gift shop had opened on Main Street, but the gallery on Seventh was closing. Rumors had begun to swirl that we might be getting a new restaurant in town, though no one could agree if it was going to be pizza or Mexican food.

Big news upon big news upon big news in little Starling Falls. Of course, when you’re away, you realize how little you care. But when you return, within twenty-four hours, it all becomes bitterly important again.

The biggest news of all, at least for those of us on Hawthorne Avenue, was that the house across from ours had sold. In that short amount of time, our new neighbors Laurel and Ben Bradford had managed to settle themselves in with efficiency and grace. Pots of mums adorned their porch steps and every window in their house was decked out in wooden blinds. Hay bales, pumpkins, and guards were piled around the Little Free Library they’d installed in their front yard.

“They must be in their forties or fifties,” Tom guessed.

It turned out, though, that they were both twenty-seven.

It went without saying, the McGhees were delighted.

So, that was the big change that could be seen. But there was another change, as well. A change in our house. Hard to describe. An energy change, I guess you could call it.

I understood for the first time that we wouldn’t be staying in Starling Falls for the rest of our lives. I realized by our very first night back that if we knew what was good for us, we’d need to find a way to get out.