Chapter One

t was a still, Sunday morning, save for a sparrow. The panicked bird fitfully flapped its wings, tip-tapping its beak against a cloudy window from inside the small garden center.

The bird’s spastic attempt at freedom distracted Rochelle.

Poor bird. Rochelle forced herself to concentrate so she wouldn’t forget the list of items she’d memorized.

Towels. The bird appeared to be exhausting itself trying to escape. There’s an open door right below. You flew in through that same door!

Rochelle had problems of her own. She wrestled with a creaking metal shopping cart, as she jockeyed it through unkempt aisles, resenting its errant front wheel.

It was hard enough keeping her thoughts in line…towels…never mind trying to steer an erratic buggy with a wandering front end. On top of that, she could still hear the desperate bird. Flutter-flutter, tip-tap.

Rochelle grabbed a small stack of white terry towels and placed them in the cart.

Lye. A regular at her local garden center, everyone there knew her by her first name. Which was why she chose this particular store, secluded in the country, many towns away from her own.

There it is! Lifting the plastic bag of lye from the shelf, she read the words caustic and food grade and wondered how a thing could be both. She placed the package into the cart. Uhm…shovel.

The malodorous scent of mulch hung in the air as Rochelle forced her cart to make the turn at the end of one aisle into the next, causing its stubborn wheel to lock and sprag along the floor, leaving a black skid mark on the concrete. Flutter-flutter, tip-tap. She spied the shovels and made her way toward them. She eyed the jumbled lot, their handles leaning against each other like drunken cowboys.

-Dinner With The Hawthornes