Page 27 of Upstate

I’m about to remind him there is no café, but I haven’t had any coffee yet, either. It wouldn’t kill me to make two cups instead of one. “Sure. I’ll meet you under the oak tree.”

I come outside a few minutes later with two frothy mugs. The morning sun picks out the crow’s-feet beside Wren’s eyes, but otherwise his face is remarkably smooth. Botox, I guess; what else could explain his frozen forehead and plump cheeks?

“Hey, remember how you said Evelyn wrote for a magazine?” I say, setting a mug down on the arm of his chair. “Turns out it was Mademoiselle, not Glamour. I found a stack of them in the bookshop. Her column was called ‘A Woman’s Place.’ I started reading them, they’re great. When I went to the co-op in the village yesterday, I kept thinking about how she bought roofing nails from Burgess Hardware.”

“She wrote about fixing a roof for Mademoiselle?” Wren laughs. “That sounds like Miss Cabot all right, always doing things her own way. Did you ever find those index cards?”

“No, I haven’t. No naughty books, either. The shelves in the back room are pretty bare, actually.”

“I wonder what happened to all that stuff.” Wren frowns. “My mother heard Miss Cabot was losing her memory by the time she closed up shop.”

“That’s a shame,” I say. A doddering octogenarian doesn’t at all fit the charismatic character I’m getting to know from reading her column.

“It makes me feel less guilty about not coming back to visit. I prefer to remember Miss Cabot the way she was when I knew her.” Wren takes another sip and sighs. “Honestly, this latte is life-affirming, Audrey. You really should sell them.”

“I don’t know about that, but I can legally sell books now.”

“You got your tax certificate? Congratulations!”

“Thanks. Oh, and the Schuywich region is now in Phase Two, which allows for in-person retail, so I guess Red Barn Books is officially open for business.”

“There are things in that barn worth selling besides books, you know.”

“What do you mean?”

“Remember that barrister’s bookcase I was looking at? In the city, I’ve seen pieces just like it priced over a thousand dollars. I bet if you poked around, you’d have enough antiques for a side hustle.”

“I’ve already got too much work to do,” I scoff. “I can’t start another business before I even get this one off the ground.”

“I thought you’d say that.” Wren finishes his coffee and leans forward in his chair. “Listen, Audrey, I’ve been turning something over in my mind the past couple of days. I’m out of a job, obviously, and I need something that’ll get me out of the house and put some money in my pocket, too. I was thinking maybe I could work here, with you?”

Never mind that the whole point of buying this place was to keep people at bay. What he’s proposing is impossible. “I’m in debt as it is,” I admit. “I definitely can’t take on anyone else.”

“No, that’s not what I meant. I was thinking more like a partnership. I could polish up some furniture and post pictures of the pieces, maybe even set up a showroom. People are itching to redecorate their houses now that everyone’s stuck at home. You wouldn’t have to give me a cent up front if we split the profits.”

“First you want me to open a café, and now you think I should have a furniture store, too?” Even as I shake my head, my mind is click-clacking like an antiquated adding machine. With the interest on my credit card multiplying like mushrooms after a rain, any income stream would help.

“Like I said, I’ll take care of everything.”

If Wren wants to do all the work, how can I say no? “Listen, I’ve got to go pick out some books in the barn. Why don’t you look around and see what’s here?”

“So you’re open to the idea?”

“I’m not making any promises, but sure, why not?”

Wren sets off to explore the outbuildings while I roll open the barn door. The bookshop’s organization still baffles me, but eventually I find a shelf labeled botany & plants. Dragging my finger along dusty spines, I search for titles that might interest Sandra. I’m drawn to the deep-red cover of Ginseng and Other Medicinal Plants, published in 1908. Evelyn’s pencil scratch on the flyleaf prices it at twenty dollars. Next, I consider The Physick Garden, printed in London in 1934, but decide The Herbalist from that same year may be more useful as it’s from an American publisher. For something relatively more contemporary, I pick Margaret Kreig’s 1964 book Green Medicine, which claims to be “one woman’s dramatic story of the search for plants that heal!” After adding a few titles from the 1970s and ’80s to the growing pile, including a gorgeously illustrated Guide to Medicinal Plants, I carry the books up to the front table. Passing a shelf in the next aisle labeled gardening, I wonder why it isn’t next to the books on plants.

“Hey, hi, are you Miss Beacon?”

There’s a teenager standing just outside the barn door wearing an N95 mask that’s nothing like the little flaps of fabric that cover most kids’ mouths. Above it, her dark eyes are accentuated with a dramatic swoop of mascara. A yellow bandana holds back twists of hair that brush her shoulders. In her wide-leg pants and thick-soled sneakers and black tank top, the girl looks more like a Brooklyn barista than an upstate high schooler.

“I’m Audrey Beacon, yes. Are you Aisha?”

“That’s me.” She frowns. “Don’t you have a mask?”

“Oh, sorry, I forget when I’m here by myself.” I cover my face, then step aside to invite her in.

“I’m just super careful because I’m living with my grandmother,” Aisha says, entering the barn. “Oh, wow, this place is even bigger than I remembered. How many books are in here?”