Daisy Dulac's Arc

Chapter 3 of 3

Ava's basket stayed in Daisy's mind for a week. One chicken breast. One potato. One woman who fed the whole ridge and ate alone. Cole had taught Daisy the method. You ask. So she drove to the general store, hoping to catch Ava again. She meant to ask her the same plain question she had asked Cole. Ava stood on the store porch, clipboard against her hip. A lean tabby cat sat at her feet. She tore small strips from a chicken breast and set them on the boards. The cat ate fast, ribs showing under striped fur. "You feed him too," Daisy said. Ava didn't look up. "He shows up. So do I." She checked a box on her clipboard, as if a stray cat were one more event to run. Daisy sat on the step. "I came to ask you something. The way you taught me to ask Cole." She picked her words slow. "You plan everyone's happiness. Who plans yours?" The pen stopped. Ava's shoulders went stiff. "That's not my job." "It could be someone's." Ava set the clipboard down on the rail. For the first time it left her hands. "I planned a wedding once. Mine." She watched the cat lick the boards clean. "He left two weeks before. I still had the flowers ordered. The seating chart done." She almost smiled. "So now I plan for other people. It works out for them." Daisy said nothing. She only listened, the way Cole had shown her. "I keep the clipboard so I always have something in my hands," Ava said. "So no one asks me to sit still." She looked at Daisy. "You want to fix me. Match me off. I saw it the day we met." "I did," Daisy admitted. "That was wrong. You're not a mailbox to guess at." She rested her hands in her lap. "I don't want to match you today. I just wanted to know why you hide behind that thing." Ava let out a breath. The stiffness went out of her. "Nobody's asked me that in three years." The cat finished and pressed against Ava's shin. She reached down and scratched its ears. She did not pick the clipboard back up. "Come inside," Ava said. "I'll buy you coffee. Not dinner for one, for once." They went in together. The screen door slapped shut behind them. Ava left the clipboard on the porch rail. Daisy understood now. Ava wasn't lonely by accident. She had built the walls on purpose, brick by planned brick, after a groom who left. Knowing that changed everything. Daisy could not simply pair her with a name. First someone had to convince Ava to set the clipboard down for good. And Daisy did not yet know who on her route could do that.