"I just ate, and the rain's bound to bring people in. They'll want reading material while they wait out the storm in the cafe," I said, gesturing to his book.

"Oh," he said, looking a little crestfallen. "All right. Can I bring you something, then?"

"Just make sure you get home all right, or stay in town if it's not safe."

He left just as another bolt of lightning illuminated the sky. I saw him stop on the front porch, probably in surprise. He stood there, tall and awkward, with a pack on his back and his parcel under his arm. He was staring up at the sky as if he'd never really seen it before, with such an expression of thrilled wonder that perhaps he really hadn't.

In flat country with no skyscrapers, you take the sky for granted. The same's true in the city, since you can't see enough of it to really understand it. But, in that space between times, before you're a resident but after you're a stranger, everything is new and remarkable. I envied him.

***

The next day, I opened the shop at seven with a plate of waffles in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other. I hadn't even finished breakfast before Lucas returned.

"Didn't go home?" I asked, around a mouthful of food.

"Rain never stopped," he said, jerking his thumb at the wet street outside. His hair was wet too, and the shoulders of his coat.

"Hopefully soon. It looks like it's about blown itself out," I observed. "One benefit of living where you work, the commute is easy."

"You could sell books in your pajamas if you wanted to."

"I've often considered it, but it's a little too gentleman-of-leisure. I don't want to be the town eccentric." I washed a bite of food down with some coffee. "You stayed at the hotel last night?"

"I thought it was probably smart. There's so much I don't know about this place, and I've learned to listen when people warn me."

"It's not a battlefield, Lucas!" I laughed.

"No, but..." he spread his hands. "There are rules for survival everywhere. And they change."

"I like to think I've moved past survival, but I see what you mean. You wouldn't have walked around Chicago at midnight wearing a Rolex."

"Not some parts, anyway."

"At least you weren't a cheerful idiot who went home in an electrical storm and got struck by lightning. Though fate protects fools. Charles told me about this one time..." I trailed off, because he'd ducked behind a shelf.

A second later I knew why – there was a creak as Leon pushed the door open and stepped inside. Leon's farm lay two south from Jacob's, and we rarely saw him in town.

"Morning, Leon," I said, turning away from where Lucas was pretending to be absorbed in cookbooks again. "How's things?"

"Muddy," Leon answered sourly. "Can't get a truck through."

"You come in on horseback?"

"Yup. She's stabled in the pastor's garage."

"What can I do for you today?"

"Couple of romance novels for my wife, you know the type," he said, consulting a slip of paper from his pocket. "And...Teen Pulse?"

I lifted an eyebrow. Leon blushed. "It's for Maureen. Can't fathom sixteen-year-olds."

"They're a mystery to us all," I agreed, crossing to the shelf of romance novels and pulling down some of the less lurid ones. Leon's wife liked them, but she always insisted she didn't want the Naughty Ones. Which really translated to the fact that she did want the naughty ones, she just didn't want the covers to proclaim to her whole family that they were naughty. Bookselling is a delicate art.

"Here you are, and one...Teen Pulse," I said, grabbing a magazine featuring the young hot pop star of the moment from the rack. "Got any news I can pass along?"

"Seen Nona recently?" he asked. I shook my head. "She's starting to show the babies." He cupped his hands in front of his stomach to emphasize it. "Little tiny thing to be carrying twins."

"What's Dr. Kirchner say?" I asked.

"Well, he don't say anything to me directly, naturally, but he told Mr. Harrison she oughta be in town if she can when the babies are due."

"Want me to ask around about someone she can stay with?"

"Sure Harrison'd appreciate that."

"Consider it done. That's...sixteen-fifty even for the books."

He paid with a crisp twenty-dollar bill, out of a roll of twenties. "Got to stock up on groceries," he said, when he caught me eyeing the roll. "Snow won't be far behind all this."

"No, I don't suppose it will. You see Nona, tell her I'm looking around," I replied. "Have a nice day, Leon. Stay dry."

"Look after yourself," he replied with a grin, zipped the bag of books into his coat, and doffed his hat as he left.

I pretended to be distracted by tidying the counter until Lucas emerged.

"They're really friendly, you know," I said, when he'd relaxed a little. "Everyone in Low Ferry. We're nice people."