The pub crowd pressed in on Colleen as she stripped off her raincoat. It was nine at night and the place was packed to the walls. During the day she’d walked around the town, napped for hours and wrote her first impressions of the town. She found a place for fish and chips and gobbled as though she hadn’t eaten in weeks. Now she stood near the entranceway taking it all in, cataloging it as she would any place she’d be writing about. The hoppy aroma of beer mixed with the scents of rain and warm bodies. The wooden bar was dark and formed an L shape at the end of the room. Men and women were bellied up, placing orders in their thick accents and slapping one another on the back. It seemed everyone knew everyone else and Colleen wondered if this was how a stranger might feel entering the Lark. The room looked and felt as she’d thought, but also deeper and richer, just as though she’d imagined it in three dimensions and found instead four.

The dark wood-paneled walls were nearly covered with framed photos of men in uniform, men in groups, women at the bar or the bay, families and parties, priests and bartenders. And just as in Watersend, there were posters for bands and musicians.

With her raincoat draped over her arm, Colleen moved through the room, not looking at those around her but at the photos. Was her dad here? Her mom? As she wiggled and wound her way to the back of the room, she saw it—a photo of her dad as a much younger man, exactly as he’d appeared in the photo back in Watersend, the one where he was sitting on a stone wall, dressed in a suit with a flower pinned to his lapel. Here, though, there was a woman at his side. She wore a simple white dress with lace sleeves and a short lace veil pinned to her wild curly hair, both of which seemed alive in the wind. She clung to Gavin, both her arms looped through one of his as she leaned against his shoulder. He gazed at her and she at him, and it was clear they were both laughing. All was right with the world for this couple—they had no idea what was coming. Does anyone ever?

Colleen backed up and bumped into an older man. His shock of white hair sprouted in all directions and his Guinness was half-empty. He smiled kindly and stepped out of the way.

“I’m sorry. Did I make you move from your spot at the bar?”

“Aye, no, you didn’t. But I’m afraid if I stay here I’ll be falling in love with you.” He bowed his head and laughed, then ambled off to join another white-haired gentleman at the far end.