Until the Sun Falls

Chapter 6

Jackie

I walked up to the church yard where mom was waiting for me with a large zucchini in one hand and a squash in the other. She greeted me with an approving glance at my outfit and the umbrella I held over my head so that no inch of skin was touched by the sun.

"Hi, mom." I said cheerily, trying to pretend that I didn't have a strong urge to approach a stranger that was standing at the mouth of the alley nearby.

"Hi, sweetheart. What was that all about?" She motioned with the zucchini in her hand to the alley.

"Nothing really," I lied, "I thought I saw someone I knew."

"I see..." She said distractedly, having already turned her attention to a customer that approached with a small basket of strawberries.

It took every ounce of willpower in my body to not turn and look to the alley again, though I knew I wouldn't be able to see him from here anyway. Instead I looked along the edge of my umbrella to the blue sky. It was a beautiful day by anyone's standards, yet I felt very claustrophobic hiding underneath my umbrella while the rest of the world was free to just...be.

"I could really use some help checking out my customers, Jackie." Mom said quietly and I went to help her out. After entering the shade of the large tent I closed my umbrella, careful to avoid the sun-lit edge as I made my way to the cash box..

The Friday farmer's market in Port William was also a small social event for the ladies of the church. Mom got to talk and gossip with her friends and customers, as well as make some money from her constant gardening. Her fruits and vegetables were held in high esteem. So much so in fact that the other ladies, who had started off selling the fruits of their gardening labors at the market ended up selling baked goods, jams, and fabric creations instead. There was no competing with mom.

I never minded helping out with her stand. I actually enjoyed the small town aspect of it. I loved listening in on her conversations with the other ladies, who would trade recipes like they were state secrets and spin gossip like spider webs, though today my mind was very much elsewhere.

I flowed through the customers, weighing the produce, breaking change, and smiling my way through cheek pinches from older ladies and complaints about mom's prices from a few women, as if they really cared that mom charged ten cents more per pound than the "Wally-world" thirty minutes away.

I was distracted today, though, and I barely heard a word that anyone said around me. In every face before me I saw shadows and dark hair. I became so lost in my thoughts that I didn't notice that the very stranger that had taken over my thoughts was approaching the table with a basket of blackberries in his hands.

"Good afternoon."

My insides jolted with surprise at the sound of his voice, and my eyes focused through the haze of my daydreams to the young man I found standing before me. The well known description of "tall, dark, and handsome" applied to him in every way aside from his height. Though he was only a few inches taller than me, the air about him made him seem taller than anyone I had ever met before. He exuded calm and coolness. Immediately my eyes were drawn to his gold hoop nose ring, and then up to his ice-blue eyes that were staring intently into mine.

My mouth was unable to move to form words, so I smiled in what I hoped would be a friendly way and prayed that my face wouldn't flush.

"I'm sorry, it appears I have disrupted your thoughts," he said silkily, "It seemed like it was something nice."

I opened my mouth and was grateful to find that what came out wasn't a strangled garble, "I was actually wondering why anyone would wear a leather jacket in the August heat."