Even before the market was officially open, a few people were waiting at our booth. Other vendors had flowers, too, but Julia’s were different—rare and surprising and impossibly beautiful. I remembered Nick, on my first night at the farm, telling me that Julia was famous for them. I could see what he meant. While Liz and Billy rang up the first shoppers, I kept busy, replacing the purchased arrangements with new ones from the buckets behind the tables. I helped customers set strawberry cartons into their bags, place tomatoes in baskets. The time passed quickly with so much work to do, and throughout it all, I watched Billy and Liz as they worked. They made quick and friendly conversation, advising against storing flowers with fruit, explaining how to make the bouquets last through the week. They offered tips on cooking eggplant and commented on the weather—how warm and clear August had been this year. “Say hi to Julia and Terry,” so many people said. “Will do,” Liz said. “You got it,” said Billy.

A couple hours in, when the line was still steady but no extra arrangements remained in buckets, Billy beckoned me over. “Ready to weigh?” he asked. I was. And it felt good—to think quickly that way, to take money and count change, to smile at the next stranger and say hello.

___

Once the market closed, we broke down the tables and folded the canvas. Liz and Billy traded our leftover produce for honey and wine and gray salt to bring back to the farm. Billy counted out our hourly wages from the cashbox and placed the bills in our palms. I hadn’t even known to expect payment and felt a giddy freedom exploring the downtown with money in my pocket: the bookshop and the chocolate shop, the cafés and the toy store. I bought a novel—Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier. It was thick and moody and something in the description made me think of myself. And I also bought two tins of watercolors, two brushes, and two little notebooks of watercolor paper. One set for myself and one set for Lee. There were plenty of art supplies at the farm, but I wanted something of my own. Something new, something that was only ever mine. And I thought Lee might want that, too.

“Dinner?” Billy asked, and Liz and I agreed. I followed them a couple blocks to a pub where the vendors from another farm were eating. We waved when we saw them, and they made space for us at their big table. They were just a little older than we were, and I could tell Billy and Liz had hung out with them before. We ate onion rings and burgers—the kind of food Terry never cooked—and I listened to them talk about people I didn’t know.