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The argument stops. Not because I suddenly believe this will work. I don’t. Not because I’ve decided a Wicker Man is the answer to thirteen disappointing dates. He isn’t even a man yet, if there is a he at all.

But I’ve spent four years waiting to be certain of what I wanted before doing anything about it. Then I spent weeks trying the reasonable version because reasonable felt safer than ridiculous.

I do know one thing. I want someone in my life again.

I don’t know who. I don’t know what he’ll be like. I don’t know whether the impossible thing I watched happen to Rachel can happen twice.

But I’m done making later the answer every time I’m afraid to choose. And just like that, the argument is over.

“Oh, hell.”

I’m doing this. Now I have to figure out how to make a fire.

Rachel had a bonfire, which is very convenient if you happen to live in a cottage with a yard. I have a two-story condo, granite countertops, a smoke detector with an aggressive personality, and neighbors on both sides.

I start in the living room anyway. There is no fireplace. I know there is no fireplace. I’ve lived here for twelve years and was present when Dave and I bought the place. Some part of me still thinks one might have appeared since this morning.

The small patio off the back is marginally more promising until I remember the grill is gone. Dave and I got rid of it years ago after realizing we liked the idea of grilling considerably more than we liked actually doing it.

I could buy another one. I stand at the patio door contemplating the prospect of driving to a store at this hour and purchasing a grill because I’ve decided to attempt spontaneous life creation.

“No.”

The kitchen sink will have to do. It’s stainless steel, surrounded by stone, and the faucet is right there if this gets out of hand.

I put both hands on the counter and survey my chosen site.

“Very mystical.”

It will have to do. Now I need wicker.

That part, at least, is easy. I go back into the living room and pick up the knitting basket beside the sofa. It’s oval, woven from brown wicker with two handles and a loose bit of trim that has been threatening to come off since the day my mother gave it to me. Inside are four balls of yarn, two knitting needles, and the unfinished scarf I abandoned with the vow that I’d never make another knitting stitch in my life.

“This is insane,” I tell it.

It doesn’t argue. I empty the contents onto the counter. Then I set the basket on the tile beside the sink, far enough from the cabinets that if the impossible actually happens, whatever comes out of it will have somewhere to go.

Planning floor space for a hypothetical Wicker Man should probably concern me more than it does. Rachel’s ring mattered because the marriage attached to it had become something she needed to escape. She gave up something that still had a hold on her long after she wanted out.

My wedding ring isn’t right for this. Dave didn’t bind me, and our marriage isn’t something I need to free myself from. Burning the ring would feel less like letting go and more like pretending twenty-five good years are something I regret.

A random object won’t do either. Whatever happened in Rachel’s yard, it wasn’t powered by tossing something meaningless into a fire and asking the universe for a favor.

I leave the basket where it is and go upstairs. My jewelry box gets me nowhere. Most of what’s in it is either valuable because I like it or sentimental for reasons that have nothing to do with what I’m asking for. I open the closet, reject several equally stupid possibilities, and eventually end up in front of my dresser with the underwear drawer open.

“This is getting undignified.”

I own good underwear. I also own practical underwear because I’m a human woman who occasionally values cotton and full coverage more than seduction.

Near the back is a boring, unassuming cream-colored pair I bought after Dave died. Granny panties, if I’m being accurate. I remember ordering them online, fully convinced no man would ever see me in my underwear again now that I was a forty-four-year-old widow.

They weren’t just practical. They were part of deciding that whole part of my life was over.

I was more certain then than I am now. I pull them from the drawer and carry them downstairs.

The basket is still on the kitchen floor, looking entirely too ordinary for what I’m about to ask of it. I lay the panties in the bottom of the stainless-steel sink and get the long candle lighter from the utility drawer. The basket sits below and slightly to my right, close enough that if proximity matters, I’m giving the universe every reasonable opportunity to cooperate.

If this ends with a pair of scorched granny panties and absolutely nothing else, I can open a bottle of wine afterward and reconsider my life choices. My thumb rests on the lighter.