Page 22 of Until the Last Leaf Falls

Niles gaped at the spectacle of Orren crooning to the tiny tree with his other trees rustling encouragement.

It took a few minutes, but eventually Orren withdrew his hand and stood. “We’re not far,” he said. “We’ll leave a light in the window, and when the sun rises, we’ll be here. For now, sleep sheltered by your new family. You’re home.”

Orren’s voice held so much longing, a lump rose in Niles’s throat. Loneliness was universal, it seemed, and even the ages-old, experienced Orren wasn’t immune to it.

The knowledge encouraged him to join Orren and weave their fingers together. “He’s right,” he told the trees. “You’re here and safe, and we’re but on the other side of this wall. Because that’s the nature of humans, to seek shelter behind walls.” He was quoting from one of Orren’s books, he realised, and didn’t hold back the chuckle that bloomed in his throat. He took Orren’s hand and led him the last few steps to his front door, relieved when Orren followed him inside without complaint.

“Now you’re home and safe, too,” he said in a near whisper. “If you want to be.”

Orren slumped against the door, whether in exhaustion or relief Niles couldn’t tell. But when he smiled, his joy lit the space between them. “I would very much like to be home. Here. With you.”

Niles stepped into Orren’s arms, the chance to touch as much a relief as an exhale after holding one’s breath. He had no idea how long they stood there, wrapped around each other, just breathing. But then his stomach growled, and Orren’s followed suit—and the weight of the moment vanished in a flash and a chuckle.

Niles took a step backwards and held out his hand. “Now you’re home… what would you like for dinner?”

Bursting with Life

“You’re in a tearing hurry,” Anne Katrin remarked when Niles handed over the new books and added the returned ones to his basket without making a move to stop for a chat. His book rounds had grown to three a week and making it out and back in the hour before the library opened was now a pipe dream.

“We’re setting up for the party,” he said. “I need to stop on the way to pick up Bob’s present.”

“Ah, yes. And what would that be?”

“That would be telling. You’ll find out at the party—like everyone else.” He hurried down the hill, the book basket full, but not weighing him down. It held far too many birthday cards and small gifts for that.

Bob Gerland, who hadn’t expected to see this spring, was celebrating his eighty-fifth birthday. His doctors didn’t think it would be his last one either. The history project had cheered him, given him a new interest, and his illness had taken note.

Niles loved the implications of community-as-therapy, but he hadn’t forgotten what Bob had told him on that first rainy day. That he would like to be remembered.

The cards and gifts in Niles’s basket proved many people would remember Bob Gerland when he left them. Niles could have been content with that, but he’d wanted to provide more tangible proof.

Orren had given him the idea in the end. “Back in my day,” he’d said over dinner one night, “if you wanted to be remembered you wrote a book.”

Bob Gerland had done that, in a way. He hadn’t hoarded his past. He’d offered his photos and a raft of happy and painful memories from the last eighty-five years to the whole community. All Niles had had to do was collate them, collect comments and reminiscences from people who knew Bob, and in very short order he had created a book of Bob’s life going all the way back to the late Fifties. Then he’d gone and hired Andy Wishaw.

Andy’s studio smelled like his library—of paper and coffee, maybe with a touch more glue.

“Is it ready?” Niles asked, giddy as if he were picking up his own gift and not somebody else’s.

Andy set a box on the counter and lifted the lid. Inside, in a bed of cream velvet lay a book bound in deep green leather tooled in gold: The Memories of Bob Gerland.

“That is utterly stunning,” Niles breathed. “Wait until Orren sees this, you’ll be drowning in work. And don’t ditch the pattern for the binding. I’m sure I’ll be asking for it again.”

“Really?”

“When people see this one, they’ll want their own book of memories, and I’m happy to help them with it. I have a corner in the library where I keep all the town’s history and the history of the local area. They will look fabulous taking up a row.”

“I see you’re looking ahead.”

Niles smiled, mind on the man waiting for him at home. “I certainly am and thank you.”

When he left the shop, the book tucked into his basket, Andy’s comment stayed with him. He was looking ahead, something he’d never really done before. Alongside this thought came another one he’d once voiced to Orren. That loneliness hadn’t just made him feel invisible but had also made him think he was the only person with that problem.

Inviting Bob and his friends into the library had shown him how wrong he’d been, and never had there been a mistaken belief he’d been so happy to ditch. Joy touched people, too, and it was so much easier to spread around.

He hurried down the High Street, calling out hellos and waving greetings, but not stopping until he passed through the carriage arch into his courtyard.

In the two hours he’d been gone, the place had turned into a fairground. Picnic tables took up the space in front of the library, already laden with paper plates and plastic cutlery. In the far corner, a small, mismatched fence ringed a play area, as if all the parents had brought their child gates and hooked them together to keep the little ones out of mischief. And bowls, buckets, and tubs of flowers were everywhere.