I sit and peek up to see glittering eyes still watching me around the table.

Brian, our town crier, sets down his cloth napkin and stands, shouting, “To the Lord and Lady of Lute!”

“To the Lord and Lady of Lute!” comes the response, wineglasses raised.

All the way down the table, I see Hugh holding up his full glass, staring at me through the red. His face is blank, but his hand has begun to shake, wine sloshing to one rim and then the other without falling out.

I look away, to Emma, to Charlie, to Jo.

She shoots me an approving wink, then says, “Bit long.”

I make to strangle her, laughing, then realize it might be too threatening a joke for a day like this.

She deposits the children in their chairs flanking mine and goes back to her seat. Sally comes over to fill our bowls, then settles into her own place between Brian and Jenny Pike with a contented sigh.

And so, we eat.

It’s almost normal. Spectacular, if I’m honest. I didn’t expect much from a puréed dinner, but I’ve never tasted soup quite like this, shining against the tongue like liquid gold, intensely delicious. I have dared the salad and had to close my eyes at the aliveness of it, the green crunch, the gift of it, to have grown and given of itself to nourish us. Food is a treasure. All of this is.

As the sunlight softens, I half rise to switch the overhead lights on before remembering that the power is still out, but no matter. There is ample daylight, really, there is conversation, there is me convincing Emma not to throw a strop about the very existence of salad, whispering for Charlie to stop trying to eat the soup with his fingers, for goodness’ sake, and then keenly regretting it—what if that was the last thing they ever heard me say to them?

Down at the end of the table, Hugh hasn’t touched his food. His spoon is clean on his folded napkin. He smiles faintly, sips his wine, breathes so hard I can see the rise and fall of his chest from here.

The mantel clock chimes in the living room.

8:00 P.M.

I feel a strange mix of pride and regret looking around the table at neighbors we haven’t properly socialized with in the past seven years, now mixed up together like a single family. We should have invited them in sooner, it seems to me now. This should have been their shelter all along, not just today. If the grove is the heart of Lute, Alder House is the mind. The house feels vibrant with them in it, purposeful, alive, the ancient oak table, the echoing Tudor hall, the carved medieval archways chatting now too, all of us in conversation.