“If you want to learn to braise turnips, though, you’re in the right place,” I told him.
Kip shook his head as if our tale of woe had wounded his heart. It turned out he was some sort of media “seeding” guy. Which, if I understood it correctly, had something to do with planting big metal towers on pristine and scenic hills.
We ate until our buttons popped and then some. Before long, it was late enough to start heading to Ham’s for the Cider Toast.
“So, the whole town gets together to drink cider?” Tom asked as we walked toward Main.
I shook my head. “Not just that. It’s a Thanksgiving thing. You’ll see.”
Ham’s doors were flung open, and the front walk was lined with tables. In great kegs, there was apple cider and peach cider and a new thing that year, blueberry. There was sugared cider—very, very sweet—and Granny Smith cider for the folks who preferred theirs sour. There was even spike cider, as they called it, though the grown folk were keeping a close eye on that table, so Travis and I didn’t get a taste.
By the time the crowd finished gathering, it was dark and getting chilly. I wrapped my hands around my paper cup and breathed in the spiced steam as deep as I could.
“Let’s get started!” Handyman Joe called. “There’s a turkey sandwich calling my name.”
“You can’t possibly be hungry!” his wife replied.
“I’ll go first,” said Ham, clearing his throat. He held up his cup. “A toast! To the people of Sass. Neither snows nor floods shall keep us from the completion of our appointed, uh, turkey dinners.”
A few folks groaned, but nearly everyone cheered before they drank.
When I saw Tom toss back his cider in a single throw, I warned him, “Best take that in sips, or you’ll be up peein’ all night.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Ah.”
“A toast!” shouted Dilly Barker. “To Starla MacIntyre Woods. She will be missed.”
“Hear, hear,” came several voices in reply.
“To Gram,” I whispered. “And to Ma.”
Travis heard, and clinked cups with me before he took an especially large swig.
Scree Hopkins waited the span of a whole two breaths before she cried, “A toast! To me and Micky Forks! We just got promised to be engaged!” She held up her hand and waved it wildly. I guess she must have had a ring on, but I couldn’t see it.
An argument promptly started over in the Forkses’ corner of things.
Sheriff Thrasher stepped up. “A toast! To a peaceful night. Right, folks?”
There was some shuffling and some elbow nudging, and the Forkses calmed right down.
“A toast! To our new crop of wish fetchers!” called Missus Fuller. “And to Genuine, who taught ’em!”
“To Genuine,” a voice said softly in my ear. I turned to find Penny Walton standing there.
“Happy Thanksgiving, Miz Walton,” I said. “How are you feeling?”
“Happy. Free.” She took a deep breath of our country air. “Grateful to spend a holiday doing something besides worrying that it might be our last one together.” She nodded in Edie’s direction.
“I’m real glad for you,” I said, and I meant it with all my heart.
She gripped my hand and squeezed it. “I’m sorry about your granny.”
I gave her the brightest smile I could muster, hugged her, and watched as she drifted back to her kin.
Several swigs later, Kip asked me, “So, what’s a wish fetcher?”
I started to tell him it weren’t nothin’ (I had learned my lesson about keeping certain things private, after all), but JoBeth Haines—pretty as a picture in a green and gold party dress—stepped into the circle and said, “A toast!” She pointed her cup in Kip’s direction. “To new friends.” Then she blushed. Furiously.
Kip’s eyes got wide at the sight of the librarian/dispatcher, and I was surprised to see his cheeks flare red, too. A few seconds passed before he managed to smile, lift his cup, and return, “To new friends.”
After that, Kip didn’t care what a wish fetcher was. He and JoBeth floated together like magnetized motes of dust. Next thing I saw, they’d made their way to a nearby bench and—once the toasting was done—there we left them.
My house was empty when I got home. I wasn’t surprised. Still, I left a plate of Miz Tromp’s goodies beside Pa’s bed before I went into Gram’s room and shut the door behind me.
It was time, I’d decided earlier that day, to let some of her things go. There were all sorts of warm clothes in her closet, not to mention a whole chest of quilts that someone could make use of. I’d ask Jura to post them on the SUBA site.
Slowly, carefully, I took everything from its place and set it on the bed. I cried a little as I boxed up Gram’s powders and such. I bawled like a baby when I folded her robe. In the end, I only kept three things. Gram’s wish cup. A stack of letters—most of them from folks who’d contacted my ma for wishes, back when. And a framed photo of Gram and Ma and me, taken when I was nothing more than a bump in Ma’s belly.
I moved back into Gram’s room, my old room, that night.
The place seemed awful empty.
I dreamed of letters and notes, packages and papers. So many of them! Cascading down from the sky, flooding in through the windows. Some of it was my ma’s old mail, but there were other things, too. I picked an envelope off the floor. It was addressed to me.
My eyes snapped open.
A note from Gram! Pa said something about a note from Gram!
In a flash, I was on my feet and tearing the house apart. I moved furniture and flung piles of Pa’s dirty laundry. I spilled out drawers and even checked to see if a letter got stuck somehow to their undersides.
I went through every closet, every chest, every keepsake box. I even looked in the pockets of Gram’s winter coat. Nothing. Heartsick, I flung myself onto the couch.
Something crunched beneath me.
Cushions flew. And there it was, wedged between the pillows! A carefully folded slip of paper with my name on it.
In Gram’s wobbly but beautiful cursive, she had written this:
My Genuine Beauty Sweet,