Beneath the Apple Leaves(45)

“Got enough sandwiches in here to feed an army!” Lily exclaimed.

“Men work up an appetite when they fish. Don’t we?” Andrew winked at the boys, who puffed with pride.

“Ma says we’re growing outta our shoes faster than she can buy ’em,” shared Will. “Says we’ll be eating the bark off the trees if she don’t keep us fed.”

“Well, certainly don’t want that,” agreed Lily. “Sheep already nibbled this place raw.” She laughed and picked up the picnic basket weighted with food. “I’ll make sure I bring a batch of cookies next time I come over.”

“Oatmeal raisin?”

“If you like.”

Together, Lily, Andrew and the boys followed the curve of the creek as it meandered through the property and spilled out to a large pond surrounded by weeping willows. Andrew stopped then and put a finger to his lips for quiet, bent down on one knee and tilted his head in the direction of the reeds. A blue heron, majestic and slender, stepped lightly upon the shallow marsh, the long neck straightening and then curving nearly to an S. In a blink of an eye, the yellow beak seized the water and gripped a shiner, swallowed the body whole.

“Whoa!” shouted the boys. “Did you see that?”

Andrew chuckled, glanced at Lily, who was resting on her haunches, holding her knees. The light brown hair spun to gold under the sun, framed her face in silk. The collar of the pale pink dress reflected the hue to her cheeks and brightened the smiling lips. And the figure blended into the grass, competed with the beauty of the day and won without a fight. Her eyes met his and they held the light in one saturated moment.

“I caught one!” Will cried. “I got—”

The giant bullfrog hopped out of his slimy hands and plopped near Edgar’s foot. “I got him!” Edgar shouted. “I got him!” The frog bounced from the boy’s staggered chasing until leaping into the stream just as Edgar slipped, belly first, in the mud.

Andrew plucked his cousin up by the waistband, the boy wet and dripping in pond sludge. “Yuck!” Edgar shook his hair and hands, splaying dirt and scum into the air.

“We’re supposed to be catching fish, not the other way around,” Andrew joked.

Under the willow, Lily helped pull the hooks from the wad of fishing line and salvage which pieces were long enough to use. Andrew and the boys collected worms from under the soft moss.

Andrew picked a leaf from the cluster of jewelweed growing on the bank. “Will. Edgar. I want to show you something.” He took the leaf to the water’s edge, submerged it and tilted the green that morphed to silver no different from metal. “Magic, see?”

The boys’ jaws dropped; they pulled up the leaf that turned green again before submerging it again and turning it silver for themselves. “It’s the only leaf that does that. Far as I know anyway,” Andrew said.

While the boys marveled at the plant’s alchemy, Andrew picked up a round, flat stone and flicked it across the water, sending it skipping four times before sinking.

“How’d you do that?” Edgar asked, dropping the jewelweed into the current.

“Have to find the thinnest ones you can.” Andrew took a stone and placed it in Edgar’s fingers, stood behind him and showed him the back-and-forth motion for launch. Edgar released and the stone skipped once and sank. “Like that?” The little boy’s eyes grew wide and brown as a cow’s.

“Just like that.” Andrew stacked a small pyramid of stones. “Keep practicing and you’ll get it six times across, I bet.”

A heat shimmered from below the willow, vibrated down his skin, and he knew Lily watched him. He plopped down beside her and brushed the dust off his thigh. “You hungry?” he asked.

She shook her head, smiled as Edgar squatted and readied his stone, his nose scrunching in concentration. “You’re really good with them,” she said.

“They’re good boys.” Andrew unwrapped one of the ham sandwiches. “After the accident, they practically lived in my room playing marbles and Old Maid. Always with a million questions, those two,” he said affectionately. Andrew rested his elbow on his knee and stared at the bread in his hand. “But it was good having them there. Kept me distracted. Kept me from thinking about the pain.” He took a small bite of the sandwich and chewed easily.

“Does it still hurt?”

“Yeah. Sometimes.”

The light reflected off the water in ripples, lazy white lines that sparkled at the tips. Edgar flung his stone and it bounced three times.

“Nice one!” Andrew hollered, and the boy beamed. Will followed suit and picked up a stone, watched his little brother’s technique carefully before attempting his own.

“You’re very lucky.” Lily’s voice hummed wistful and longing. “I’d give anything to have a family like this.”

Andrew swallowed his food, watched his cousins, scanned the meandering creek and followed it to its source at the Kiser homestead. Family. Until then he hadn’t thought of the Kisers in that way, and the realization prickled his skin with gratitude.

Lily leaned on one arm, tucked a section of hair behind her ear. “All I ever wanted was to have a family. Piles of kids. My own house. My own animals. A garden so big that I would get winded going from one end to the other.” She picked up a small stick and traced a shape in the dirt. “Want to know something? Before you moved here, I used to come up to your farm every day. Pretended it was mine.” Her head turned to scan the view. “Even when I was little, I’d see the Andersons out here with their sheep, thinking this land belonged to me and not them. Silly, isn’t it?”