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She’d forgotten how much she loved this porch, this view, this feeling of being exactly where she belonged. There was nothing but the sounds of song birds and the occasional scurry of a squirrel. Maeve took a deep breath and savored the aroma of the coffee mixed with the smell of the smoke coming from the chimney. I woke up at sunrise and couldn’t go back to sleep.”Ītlanta with all his brick and glass and asphalt seemed a million miles away. It was wonderful to be here, in these mountains that were her home, with her granny. “Never known you to get up this early without a bucket of cold water dumped over your head.” It opened with a creak and her grandmother came out onto the porch.

Maeve heard the shuffle of her feet coming across the hardwood floors the screened door. “Where you at?” Her granny’s voice called from inside the cabin. Already some of the trees were turning into the brilliant golds and oranges of autumn. Even though it was only late September, up here, nearly five thousand feet above sea level, the air always stayed cool. Maeve was wrapped in a tattered cotton quilt that smelled like it had just come off the clothesline. This early, the mountains were hidden in the blue mist that gave them their name. Beyond that there was nothing but the Blue Ridge Mountains. Only twenty feet from the edge of the porch, there was a huge drop-off, easily two or three hundred feet. Maeve McMahan took a sip of her coffee and looked out across the yard. The people in this town were much scarier than wild animals and much meaner. I worried more about the people in town than I ever worried about wild animals. The bears were generally quiet this time of year and they usually kept to themselves anyway. After all, I grew up in these mountains and sometimes I felt as old they were. I walked as slowly as I could, keeping to the shadows beside the road. I prayed that a wind wouldn’t blow my candles out. The moon was barely a sliver and gave very little light. I’d latched the door of the cabin and walked down the road. The metal was cold and heavy in my hand and a shiver ran up my spine. It was the only fine thing she’d brought with her and I treasured it. Mama was a Charleston lady before she met Daddy, and he brought her here to these mountains. I had a few candles left and I stuck them in the candelabra Mama had brought from Charleston. My husband was already dead and the love of my life was about to be. After today, I wouldn’t have any use for it anyway. I’d wanted to look pretty, so I fixed my hair the way he liked it, piled on top of my head with just a few curls around my face, and I used the last of the lipstick I had. I wore the dress the last time I went to see him. The garment hid the worst part of me and brought attention to the best part of me.

The best part of the dress was that it had sleeves that flared out like a bell at the end and if you didn’t look very closely, you’d never notice that my hand looked more like a claw than a hand. He always made me believe I was the most beautiful woman in the world, even with my hand the way it was. The way he looked at me made me feel as shiny and brilliant as a diamond.

“Why, that dress is very color of your eyes, every bit as blue, but not nearly as pretty.” He said it was the color of Delphiniums, the flower my mother named me for because she saw them through the wavy glass of the cabin window on the day I was born. To me, the dress was the color of the sky in November when the air is as crisp as an apple. Jenks had bought in it Asheville with some of the money he’d made selling White Oak baskets. If I’d known what was going to happen, I wouldn’t have worn my best dress.