In the middle of each table there are two crystal bowls. One is filled with honeyed nuts, and the other with those pastel chocolate-mint lentils that they sell at The Candy Counter on Jackson Street. There are yellow roses on the sideboard, and cinnamon sticks simmering in cider on the stove, to add a sweet cozy smell to the house. Still, it feels sterile to her somehow, a bit like the set for a play about a party.
The doorbell rings its familiar melody. She has heard that melody, like the clock on Old Main, seven times in the past twenty minutes. Dan gets the door, and she hears him saying hello to Jackie and Steve, and as she hears the beginnings of a conversation about holiday plans, she quietly slips out the back door. She hadn’t planned to…
Joanna isn’t dressed appropriately for the weather, but the cold is energizing. She goes through her carefully manicured back yard, and the Heller’s rock garden, to the street. She sees little Bobby’s blue stingray leaning on its kickstand in the Singer’s driveway, and she decides to find out where it can take her. She will have it back before they know it is gone. She wishes she had taken some of the nuts with her. She smiles and pedals down Sycamore Lane.