Page 77 of The Unmaking of June Farrow

Eamon seemed surprised by my reaction.

“I’m serious. You wouldn’t ever get her baptized, right?” The tone of my voice was almost defensive now, bordering on angry. But I couldn’t account for the anxious feeling that had gripped me when he said it. I suddenly felt like I couldn’t draw a full breath.

“No, we agreed we wouldn’t,” he answered, leaning forward to see my face. Then his hand lifted, his knuckles pressing to my cheek likehe was checking for a fever. “June, you look like you’re going to be sick. What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” I tried to breathe. “I’m fine.”

I looked at my reflection in the side mirror, realizing that Eamon was right. The color had completely drained from my face.

“What else?” I said, dropping it. The knot in my chest was slowly unwinding.

“What else do you want to know?”

“How do we…” I tried to think of how to ask it. “Act?”

“Act?”

“Like, do we hold hands? Do we touch?”

Eamon was struggling now, the tension radiating from him. “Yeah.”

“How?”

“What do you want me to say?” He shifted in his seat, irritated. “If you’re asking if we acted like we loved each other, then yes. We did.”

I fell quiet when Annie looked up between us, her brown eyes trying to read the dissonance that had settled in the truck. Eamon gave her a reassuring smile, taking her small hand in his and raising it to his mouth. He kissed it, giving her fingers a squeeze before he let her go.

It was such a natural, intuitive movement, a reflex to seeing that subtle distress on her face. And it worked. Annie let her head fall against his arm, her eyes glittering as the lights of downtown Jasper came into view.

The road was the busiest I’d seen it. Even in 2023, the Midsummer Faire was something that no one in Jasper missed. But in 1951, it wasn’t just an annual event, it was the one-year anniversary of Nathaniel Rutherford’s murder.

Three police cars were parked in front of the diner when we neared the white tent, and I clenched my fingers into a fist. Over Annie’s head, I could feel Eamon give me an appraising look. The whole town was probably talking about seeing me in the back of CalebRutherford’s police car, and they’d have their own theories about why. It seemed like Caleb had kept his suspicion of Eamon quiet.

The tent erected over the bridge looked like the portal to another world, a blush-hued glow spilling from beneath its roof. Strands of glowing string lights stretched across the street outside, taking on the appearance of fireflies.

As soon as Eamon turned off the engine, I could hear the music—bluegrass. It was a timeless sound I could feel at home in. For a split second, the divide between the Jasper I knew and the one I’d fallen into felt almost nonexistent.

“You sure about this?” Eamon still had his hand on the keys, ready to start the truck back up and turn around.

“No,” I answered.

I got out anyway, waiting for Annie to hop out behind me before I shut the door. Eamon was at her side a moment later, and she stepped into the street, sticking close to him. His hand floated into the air between us, and I drew in a deep breath before I took it, goosebumps racing over my entire body when his fingers folded between mine.

I swallowed hard when his grip tightened, pressing the wedding ring I’d put on between our fingers. He went still, lifting our hands between us, and then he turned mine over until he saw it. The small gold band gleamed in the soft light. He stared at it, a gentle summer breeze catching the collar of his shirt.

I hoped he wasn’t hurt, but he didn’t betray whatever it was he was thinking. A second later, he was walking again, his hand still in mine.

The light from the tent framed the mouth of the river bridge, and we walked toward it, our three shadows moving side by side. Across the water, the white glow of the church sat nestled in the trees. It was nearly dark, but it all looked the same. The small parking lot that was half gravel and half grass. The crude fences of the churchyard, though they were narrower. They hadn’t moved them to expand the cemetery yet, and I found myself searching the distant green hill for the white headstones of the Farrows.

I forced myself to smile as we ducked inside, swallowed up by the sound of voices and the quick-step melody of a song. The flowers we’d brought from the farm were woven into long garlands that were draped from each corner of the tent to the next, a cascade of golds and pinks that cast a rose-colored haze around us. Beneath them, the stage propped up a four-piece band consisting of a fiddle, mandolin, banjo, and steel guitar.

I ignored the feeling of eyes on us as Eamon pulled me through the crowd.

“Hey, June!” A woman about my age with copper-red hair squeezed my shoulder as I passed, giving me what appeared to be a genuine smile.

“Hey!” The response was automatic as I tried to place her face. Hers was one I definitely knew, painted in the background of some memory that hadn’t unfurled yet.

She waved, chasing a little boy toward the stage, and then she was gone, replaced by a dozen other faces.