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I shook my head, swallowing down the emotions that had suddenly surged without warning. I hadn’t been prepared to hear that name. “Nothing,” I told her. “That was my brother’s name.” I shoved the emotions down. I was well practiced at that.

Tenleigh bit her lip and looked up at me, a sympathetic look on her face before we both started walking again. She must have known my brother had been at the mine that day. “Yes, I think I remember that.” She smiled. “Maybe your mama read the book and the name stuck with her.”

“My mama didn’t…doesn’t know how to read.”

“Oh.” She glanced at me and then was silent for a minute. “I know it happened years ago, but…” She touched my arm and when my eyes darted to her hand, she pulled it away. “I’m really sorry about your loss, Kyland.”

“Thanks, I appreciate that,” I said, clearing my throat.

We walked in a sort of awkward silence for a few minutes, passing by my dark house. “So what about this Silas Marner?”

“Um…well, he lives in a slum in England and, ah, he’s falsely accused of stealing, by his best friend. He’s convicted and the woman he’s engaged to leaves him and marries his best friend.”

“Jesus, sounds like a real feel-good sort of tale. I’m glad you’ve found a way to escape the harshness of Dennville.”

Tenleigh’s sweet-sounding laughter made my heart jump in my chest. Somehow making this girl laugh filled me with some sort of pride. Not good. Very, very bad.

We arrived in front of Tenleigh’s trailer and she leaned back against a tree next to the road. “Well, he leaves the town and settles in a small village near Raveloe. He sort of becomes a hermit, feeling as if he’s hidden—even from God.” I unconsciously leaned in so I wouldn’t miss a word. She tilted her head, looking off into the distance. “But one winter’s night, his whole life changes when—”

“Tenleigh!” someone called from the trailer, an older woman with long brown hair the same color as Tenleigh’s. “It’s cold out there. Come inside.”

“Okay, Mama,” Tenleigh called before looking back at me, a worried expression on her face. I didn’t remember seeing Tenleigh’s mama much. She must not have left the trailer very often. “I gotta go. I’ll see you around, Kyland.” And with that, she turned and left me where I was standing. She ran inside so quickly, her sudden absence jarred me and made me feel lost somehow. I stood staring at her trailer for several moments before I turned and headed for home, the wind cold at my back.

CHAPTER FOUR

Tenleigh

The unfortunate thing about being fired from Rusty’s—other than the obvious issues of lost income, humiliation, and possible starvation—was that it was the only place to buy groceries in Dennville. Normally, I’d make the six-mile walk to Evansly just on principle alone, but today it was raining cats and dogs and I just wasn’t up for it. So I sucked up my pride and entered the convenience store. Rusty was a dick, but he wasn’t going to turn down my money. Thankfully though, his sister, Dusty, was standing at the counter. Yes, Rusty’s sister’s name was Dusty—the gene pool in that family was clearly something special.

Dusty had an In Touch magazine plastered to her face and didn’t even look up when I entered. I let out a sigh of relief before moving through the store and throwing things in my basket. Rusty didn’t carry any fruits or vegetables, not even the canned variety. Marlo and I had a small garden planted on the far side of our trailer—tomatoes, green beans, watermelon, and potatoes—and in the summertime we sometimes ate from it exclusively for weeks at a time. Several of the families living on the mountain had at least a small garden, and sometimes we traded one homegrown item for another. It was a good way to save money…and a good way to avoid the scurvy you were likely to get if you ate food solely from Rusty’s.

In the winter months, I’d usually make it a point to walk through the snow to Evansly at least once a week to stock up on canned fruits and veggies. When we were heating our trailer, we couldn’t afford the fresh variety, so for three or four months we made do with canned. And then when the spring came, Marlo and I watched the ground with something close to glee as the first shoots unfurled.

You had to appreciate the small things in life when the big things made you want to curl up in the corner in the fetal position and give up.

“Hey, Dusty,” I said by way of greeting when I was ready to check out.

She didn’t acknowledge me and still didn’t look up, blindly grabbing at my items until she felt something, glanced at it, and typed the price into the cash register.