She opened her eyes, lips tingling, and grabbed the basket of eggs off its hook. The eggs clattered against each other but didn’t break.
Instead of turning toward the barn, she retraced her steps back to the house, keeping her head down to avoid the two ant beds that always magically reappeared, always in the same place, the morning after she’d poured vinegar and boiling water over them. It was amazing—they had the most industrious animals, even insects, on their property. Ants that did nothing but work, just as they were supposed to. Cows overflowing with maternal milk. Hens that offered eggs each morning without fail, their bodies giving forth life as they should. Even Etta had once offered them a litter of kittens, much to their surprise. It seemed every body on the farm consistently obeyed God’s natural order of things, producing and giving life, working and contributing as they should.
Betsy sidestepped the ant mounds, and when she looked up, the first thing she saw was the swing, moving slowly in the breeze. The swing hung from the lowest branch of the sweeping oak tree in the backyard. The tree was like something from Grimms’ fairy tales—it sat in the middle of an otherwise treeless yard, its limbs extending twenty, thirty feet from the trunk, arms of Spanish moss swaying in the breeze, fingers of ivy trailing up and across the limbs. The shade underneath was thick and dark, always at least fifteen degrees cooler than the heat-saturated yard.
It was the kind of tree Betsy and her sister, Jenna, would’ve loved to have had in their backyard growing up—a backdrop to their adventures, even if most of their adventures were only in their minds.
Under the swing was a dirt patch where broods of kids—including Ty—had swung, their feet trailing in the dirt and stomping out the grass. That swing was the first thing Ty had showed Betsy when he brought her to the farm their senior year of college. They’d been together for about a year, but it wasn’t until she saw this place that she understood who he really was and what a life with him would look like. When he had pointed out the swing, she was confused at first.
“The swing?” she asked him. “You want to take over your grandfather’s farm because of a wooden swing?”
“No, not the swing. The farm will be profitable. I can make a few changes and get this place running smoother than lake water. It’s gonna be great.” Then he put his hands on her shoulders and turned her so she faced the swing directly. “Tell me what you see there.”
“Wood. Dirt. A tree.”
“I see children,” he said. “I hear laughter. I see a childhood spent outside in the heat and air and light. I see our future.”
Staring at that swing now, Betsy took a deep breath and squeezed her eyes closed, then opened them again. The swing swayed back and forth on an invisible breeze. With her free hand, she brushed back a lock of hair that had escaped her clip and started for the house. On her way past the swing, she raised her leg and gave it a swift, hard kick.
two
Jenna
The babysitter was late, Addie and Walsh were flying around the house in superhero capes yelling the Batman theme song—“Da-na-na-na-na-na-na-na Batman!”—and Jenna had just poured a mug of coffee when Walsh bumped into her from behind, spilling hot liquid down the front of her black Full Cup Coffee T-shirt.
“Walsh, please!” She set the coffee mug down and pulled her damp shirt away from her skin.
“Sorry, Mommy.” Walsh’s brown eyes were wide. She crept backward, then turned to run but stopped to grab a dish towel off the kitchen table first. “Here.” She dabbed at Jenna’s shirt with the towel, itself too damp to do the job.
Jenna took the towel from Walsh and kissed her cheek. “Thank you,” she whispered. Walsh grinned and took off, her cape flying behind her.
After wiping her shirt as well as she could—she’d be wearing an apron over it anyway—Jenna leaned against the counter and took a long swallow. She still didn’t understand how she could make coffee all day long, then drink the stuff at home. But at least she believed in what she was selling. Full Cup did make a good cup of coffee.
She sighed. Where was Kendal? Her head hurt and she had ten minutes to get to the coffee shop, a drive that usually took twenty with traffic. She thanked her lucky stars she wasn’t opening today—as manager, she had the ability to pencil someone else into those early-morning slots—but it meant getting home later.
As Addie and Walsh zoomed through the kitchen and wound around her legs like cats, part of her wanted to call in sick and stay home with the girls all day, but another part of her wanted to get in the car and drive away. Maybe not come back for a while.
She squeezed her eyes closed and raked her hands through her hair. Then the doorbell rang and there was Kendal, her stand-in babysitter for the next two weeks until summer daycare began for the girls. With red, puffy eyes and a trembling voice, Kendal explained that she and her boyfriend had broken up the night before.
“But don’t worry, Miss Sawyer, I’m fine. I brought my craft box for the girls. We’ll have a blast.” With one more messy sniff and a swipe at her eyes, she dropped her bag in the foyer and attempted a smile.
Jenna sighed and pushed the door closed. With her long blonde hair and killer legs, Kendal was Jenna a decade ago, except Jenna never would have allowed herself to wallow in misery over a boy. If anything, it had been the boys miserable over her. Back then, she always left before they did.
But no sense thinking about those old days—Kendal was here and she was a mess. Jenna wasn’t super comfortable leaving Addie and
