Page 95 of This Memory
Gavin gave me a look. “I wouldn’t get too excited, Bry.”
Frowning, I asked, “What do you mean? Why not?”
The corners of his mouth twitched with a hidden smile. “You’ll see. Come on.”
He gently tugged me to follow him, and it wasn’t long before I was practically blinded by a bright neon-green wreath with giant red bows and…
“Whatisthat on the wreath?” I asked in a lowered voice.
Gavin cleared his throat. “I think…Ithink…it’s a skull.”
“What kind of skull?”
“Deer.”
I stopped and spun to face him. “What?”
He gently took my arm. “She’s looking this way. Smile.”
Forcing a smile, I let Gavin take my hand in his and we started toward Evelyn’s booth.
“Hi, guys!” she said, standing up and making her way around the table. She hugged me, and then did the same to Gavin.
Turning, she motioned toward the booth with a wave of her hands. “What do you think?”
I wasn’t sure what I was looking at. There were wreaths, and also some kind of ceramic items painted by what looked like a five-year-old.
“Wow!” Gavin and I said in unison.
“I know!” Evelyn cried with a wide grin on her face. “Who would have thought I’d be selling crafts at the winter festival?”
“Not me,” Gavin replied as he surveyed the table. “What is this?”
Evelyn picked up the ceramic piece. “It’s a reindeer, silly!”
Gavin stared at it for a beat too long before I elbowed him in the side. “Oh, right! A reindeer. I see it now.”
Setting it down, Evelyn turned to Denny, who was doing everything he could to hide in the corner. “See? Itoldyou it looked like a reindeer.”
Denny and Gavin exchanged knowing looks.
I glanced down at the wreath and noticed, for the first time, that it was made with bright neon-green duct tape.
Forcing myself to smile naturally, I said, “You used duct tape on the wreath…how clever of you!”
Evelyn beamed with pride. Poor thing.
“Yep! I used pool noodles and duct-taped them together. Green tape for the bows and then red touches added to them. It makes it look Christmasy!”
I nodded. “And the…um…the deer skull?”
“I wanted something woodsy, and I remembered there was one on the back of our property, so I looked up how to clean it, and I was lucky enough to find its antlers as well!”
“Yeah, we lucked out on that one,” Denny deadpanned.
Gavin pretended to cough to hide his laugh.
“Here’s another that a lot of people have been looking at. I think I might have them priced too high because I’m getting tons of people stopping to look, but no one’s buying.”
