The next one, then. It’s a dragonfly done true to scale, and this one I went all out and painted, so the body is iridescent blue, with a bulbous thorax which goes thin and narrow behind the wings, with delicate veins in the wings. It’s my best piece to date.

“It looks like it could take off any moment.”

“Spent several days on that one. Usually, I can do a carving in an afternoon. But that one? The wings took forever.”

“I bet. They’re so detailed.”

Third is not an animal at all but a representation of the episcopal church in town, a picturesque small-town place, white clapboards and a red roof, a spire with a bell.

“Why a church?” she asks.

“Um. Well, that’s the church that’s in town here. St. Paul’s. It just looks like the kind of church you’d see in a movie about a small town.”

I don’t tell her that Lisa was obsessed with little churches like that, that she would plan entire vacations around which churches she wanted to visit, or that we’d been married in one just like it, that her funeral had been in the same church we’d gotten married in.

Maybe there’s something in the carving, but she handles it somewhat more reverently than the others. Doesn’t say anything else, just stares down at it for a while, and then sets it down to lift up the last one I brought over. It’s a dollhouse-sized rocking chair, a couple inches tall. I’d carved a tiny cat curled up on the seat of the rocking chair.

“Story behind that one,” I say. “Came out onto my porch with my coffee a few mornings ago, and there was a cat sleepin’ on it. Never seen it before. I looked at it, it looked at me, and then it just sorta hopped down and walked off around the lake, and I haven’t seen it since.”

“The amount of detail you get into such small things is remarkable.”

“Well, it takes patience, is all. And a steady hand, I guess. Carving or whittling or whatever you want to call it, it’s kinda meditative for me.”

She nods. “I can see how it would be.”

“You do anything like that?”

She shrugs. “No, not really. I used to be into watercolors, but I sort of…lost the habit of doing it. What with life and all, you know how it is.”

“Well. No better place to try it again, right?” I gesture at the lake. “Lots to paint out here, I’d say.”

“You’re right about that. Maybe I will.”

I refill her coffee, and then there’s an awkward silence.

“I, um.” I clear my throat again. “It was nice having coffee with you, Nadia. Nice to meet you.”