Page 43 of Charlotte

Then Delly cleared her throat. Lottie turned.

Her sister was watching them over the ledger with the grave expression of a woman observing dangerous weather develop over a town where she owned property.

“We are working,” Lottie said.

“I said nothing.”

“You nearly said several things.”

“They remained unsaid. I deserve credit.”

Peterson’s mouth twitched.

Delly noticed that too, of course. Delly noticed everything.

Cornelia came to the rescue by handing Peterson the brackets and asking whether the screws were sufficient. He answered her with more words than Lottie had yet heard him spend in one stretch, explaining why the shelf ought not sit directly against the damp wall and why a small gap would preserve both wood and books.

He did not sound uncertain. He sounded capable. Patient. Precise.

When Cornelia asked whether the upper shelf should be higher, he shook his head.

“Children need reaching room. Women too.”

The words came out plain and practical. Then his ears colored as if he had remembered Lottie was both a woman and shorter than the proposed shelf.

Delly dipped her head over the ledger. Lottie loved her fiercely for not smiling.

“I appreciate reaching room,” Lottie said.

Peterson took up the hammer. “Most folks do.”

The shelf took the better part of an hour.

It should not have been romantic. It involved nails, planks, sawdust, and a great deal of Delly insisting the shelf ought to be level enough that a book did not slide gradually into ruin. Cornelia held one end of the measuring string. Lottie fetched screws, handed tools, and tried not to watch Peterson’s hands too closely.

She failed several times.

His right hand was not useless.

That was the first thing she noticed once he stopped hiding every bit of it. It was stiff, yes. Scarred. Two fingers shortened. The skin across the back pulled pale and tight in places, and his grip had to adjust around what was missing. He used his left hand for strength and the right for balance, pressure, the brief work of holding something in place.

He knew exactly what the hand could do and exactly what it could not. What hurt Lottie was not the damage. It was the apology built into every movement, as if he expected the room to be offended by what winter had left him.

When he reached for a nail and found the tin had been moved, she slid it closer before he could search.

“Thank you,” he said without looking up.

“You are welcome.”

A simple exchange.

A nail tin and two ordinary words.

Her heart behaved as if he had recited poetry.

By the time the shelf was fixed to the wall, half the town seemed to have developed reasons to pass the meeting hall door. Mrs. Beck stopped in twice. Mrs. Hanford declared the shelf plain but respectable. Mr. Prentiss looked disappointed to find no disaster requiring his opinion. A boy carrying a parcel stood long enough to ask whether books about horses would be allowed.

“All books are allowed,” Lottie said.