So Claire took a box from the storeroom and she and Bay gathered the apples the tree had thrown at the back door.

“Why did it do this?” Bay asked as they walked to the garden gate in the bright, wavy morning light.

“That tree has a hard time minding its own business,” Claire said as she unlocked the gate. “We were all together last night, and it wanted to be a part of it.”

The tree fluffed itself up when they entered the garden.

“It must be kind of lonely.”

Claire shook her head and went to the shed for a shovel. “It’s cranky and selfish, Bay. Don’t forget that. It wants to tell people things they shouldn’t know.”

She dug a hole by the fence while Bay stood under the tree and laughed as it shed little green leaves all around her. “Look, Claire. It’s raining!”

Claire had never seen the tree so affectionate. Bay was just innocent enough to be able to overlook the pall it cast. “It’s a good thing you don’t like apples.”

“I hate them,” Bay said. “But I like the tree.”

As soon as Claire finished, she and Bay went back to the house.

“So,” Claire said, as casually as possible as they walked. “Does Tyler have a night class tonight, like last night?”

“No. Monday and Wednesday are his night classes. Why?”

“Just wondering. You know what we’re going to do today? We’re going to go through some old photos!” Claire said enthusiastically. “I want to show you what your great-grandmother looked like. She was a wonderful lady.”

“Do you have any photos of your and Mommy’s mother?”

“No, I’m afraid not.” Claire thought about what Sydney had said some time ago, about leaving the photos of their mother behind. Did she leave them in Seattle? She had seemed so panicked at the time, when she remembered that she had left them.

Claire made a mental note to ask Sydney about it.

Was a dress too much? Claire looked at herself in her bedroom mirror. Did it look like she was trying too hard? She’d never tried at all before, so she had no idea. The white dress she was wearing was the same dress she’d worn the night she met Tyler, the one Evanelle said made her look like Sophia Loren. She put a hand to her bare neck. Her hair had been longer then.

Was this stupid? She was thirty-four years old. It wasn’t as if she was sixteen, but she certainly felt that way. Probably for the first time in her life.