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Previous Chapter: A Very Important Person
“Isla, I don’t know if you should . . .” Dave said.
But Isla had already shoved the sign’s spike deep into the ground below the flowers rooted there in the park overlooking the mill pond. Danny had, in his typical style, overbuilt the sign. It read: “In memory of Lacey Abbatescianni, citizen of Scottsville, who watered this garden.”
Dave read the sign and laughed a little. “She dumped her soda here.”
“Yes,” Isla said, “and look how they loved it.” The flowers were, it’s true, flourishing, although that might have been due to Aunt Dot and Austin’s care more than the soda, especially since it had been mostly weeds in Lacey’s day.
“She’d always get the biggest size at Cumbies and then she could never drink it all and complained about how big they were.” Dave shook his head.
“Make sure Clara sees the sign, ok? She was upset when they repainted the bench.”
“I will.” Dave’s face grew absolutely serious. “This is the right place, isn’t it?” he said as he pulled a plastic urn out of his backpack. “I thought about the ocean. She only went there a few times, but she loved it.”
“But this is where she lived, and she loved it, too.”
Dave nodded and began to open the urn. “It’s legal, isn’t it?”
Isla shrugged. Just as he tipped out the contents, the background noise on the park’s new playground suddenly escalated sharply with shouting and cheers, drawing their attention away from the solemnity of the moment. Dave’s head snapped up, brow furrowed, but he put up his hand to quiet her when Isla began to say, “I’m sorry Dave . . .”
The noise and tension continued to rise as a schoolyard game took place, a handful of kids observing as one boy, bigger, stronger, leering, his eyes crazed with the pleasure of bloodlust, wrenched the arms of a smaller boy, who writhed and occasionally yelped with pain. His bravery wasn’t lessened by the brevity of his battle.
“Mercy!” he screamed, the words tearing from his throat, desperate, shrill, and, “Mercy!” again.
The older boy pushed him to the ground as he released him, then put his fisted hands on his hips in a stance of triumph as Dave sprinted towards them. By the time he got there, the older boy and his cronies had moved on, leaving the smaller child sobbing alone on the ground, rubbing his wrist. Isla saw Dave inspect it, ask the boy to open and close his fingers. She moved towards them as Dave settled cross-legged on the grass beside the boy, but something held her back. She just watched as Dave picked three buttercups and held them under his own chin, then passed them to the boy.
The boy smiled as the tears on his cheeks began to dry.
Copyright 2026 Jennie Robertson