Jordan's Arc

Chapter 1 of 1

Jordan spread the tin box open on her workbench and counted forty-three small parts she could not name owners for. A brass gear. A blue button. A spring shaped like a question mark. Each one had come from a fix she'd made for a neighbor in the village of Sassafras, and each one she'd quietly slipped into her pocket instead of back into the machine. She had told herself it was habit. This morning she admitted it was theft. She wanted to give them all back. That was the plan she'd woken up with, the plan that made her heart beat faster than the kettle. Walk door to door. Return every piece. Apologize. But the tin held no labels. No notes. Forty-three orphans and no map home. She tried to sort by memory first. The copper washer felt like the baker's mixer. The tiny hinge felt like the weaver's loom. She wrote guesses on paper scraps and pinned them to each piece. Halfway through, she stopped. Guessing meant knocking on the wrong door with the wrong treasure. It meant a neighbor opening a palm and saying, that isn't mine. It meant proving she'd been careless with things people loved. She pushed the tin away and put her head down on the bench. A scratching sound came from the cart outside. Jordan lifted her head. She went to the door. A red squirrel sat on the driver's bench, plush tail curled over its back, ears perked. It had one of her paper scraps in its paws. As she watched, it hopped to the tin box, sniffed the brass gear, and chittered. Then it hopped to the blue button and chittered differently. A short sound. A long sound. Two different songs. Jordan crouched. "You know these?" The squirrel didn't answer, of course. But it had been in every yard in the village. It had watched her work through every kitchen window. It had probably seen every piece go into her pocket. She couldn't read its chittering. She didn't need to. She only needed a witness who had been there. Jordan carried the tin outside and set it on the cart bench. She lifted the brass gear. "Show me," she said. "Lead. I'll follow." The squirrel leapt from the bench to the fence rail, ran three posts down, and stopped. It looked back at her. Jordan grabbed her coat. The tools on the patched canvas jingled. The cart chimed softly as she pulled it behind her. She had a guide now. She still didn't know whose door came first, or what she would say when it opened. But the tin was moving. The pieces were moving. For the first time in years, she was walking toward the neighbors instead of away. The squirrel jumped to the next post and waited.