Then he turned and loped into the darkness.

As she swung around, she took a long last look at the house. She came seeking answers only to leave with more questions. A slender, ghost-like figure waved from an upstairs window, haloed in lamplight.

Come back soon, the wave seemed to say.

I’m not sure how…or why. But I will.

****

Thunder bellows, and lightning splits the clouds. Carrying an empty bucket, I cross the bridge behind Jonas Rishel’s farm. Far below, the creek rages.

I am alone, but I suspect I am meant to meet someone. I think it is my grandmother. The sky is dark, and I slip on wet wooden slats. My yellow rain slicker sticks to my skin. The clouds detonate, and I wince. I am afraid the lightning will strike me. I run my tongue over braces on my teeth.

I emerge from a path at the edge of a vast field. A gazebo stands in the middle. I stumble across crumpled cornstalks, and my sneakers squelch. I shield the bucket with my body as best I can.

A man stands in the gazebo. His back is to me. I call, but he does not turn. I want to join him, but the gazebo is surrounded by a moat. I circle the gazebo, but no matter where I go, I can’t see the man’s face. The rain stings now. It pelts my cheeks like slivery shards of hail.

“I’m here,” I call again. “I need to stay the night.”

Neon blue lightning splinters the sky, and the man is now a deer. He leaps over the moat and runs off into the woods.

Tessa opened her eyes so quickly they made a sound like a doorknob turning or a book opening to a middle page.

A gazebo?

Thunder rumbled over distant ridges. The upholstered foam mattress was hard against her shoulder. Wind rushed through the half-moon screen, cooling sweat from her neck and cheeks. Her dream faded fast.

What else? She had a bucket, and there was a deer, maybe?

The canvas sides of the pop-top’s upper story puckered with the change in pressure.

A gazebo.

She flipped onto her back and stared at the velveteen ceiling. A gazebo.

And she knew just the carpenter to build it.

****

“Will you build me a gazebo?” A round of applause for that beautiful bit of awkwardness. No “Hello.” No “Hey, good to see you again. Thanks for the firefly show the other night.” Nope. The following Wednesday, Tessa strode up to Rishels’ Farm Stand, looked Jonas in the eye, and lobbed her request like a cherry bomb into the whoopie pies.

So eloquent.