Grams links her arm in mine as we walk into the square. The Sunflower Festival happens every Fourth of July. It’s exactly what the name implies—a festival with lots of sunflowers. All kinds of sunflowers. Cardboard sunflowers, real sunflowers, kids made up to look like sunflowers . . . Just a lot of sunflowers all around. All the women in town have to wear these hideous homemade yellow dresses (me included, sadly), the men in dapper trousers and yellow ties and jackets. This is what happens when you live in a town that can barely fill one side of a football stadium—you get to play dress up and pretend you’re still in the ’50s.
But I can’t say I don’t love this part . . . just a little.
Over my yellow soda-fountain dress I’m wearing a cardigan with yellow duckies all over it, being a rebel the only way I know how. Grams wears the same dress she’s worn for the last twenty years. It’s bright-ass yellow with patches of sunflowers painstakingly sewed into it.
Miss Loraine at the apple-dunking booth applauds her dress. “It’s not a festival without Eula’s sunflower dress!” she says, and laughs at us. “Come over and bob for apples, Eulie!”
“Maybe later, dearie!” Grams shouts back, and then ducks her head close to me to whisper, “I hate that nickname. She knows it, too. Hasn’t forgiven me for stealing her man twenty-three years ago.”
“You didn’t, did you?”
“Heavens no! Your grandfather was enough for me to handle. I didn’t want her fuddy-duddy of a man.”
“Then why don’t you just clear things up?”
“Because life’s no fun if you never stir the pot.”
We pass the main gazebo, where Heather and her posse sit. You can’t mistake them. Flowery dresses, large-brim hats, a boy on each of their arms. They overtake the gazebo like dandelions. I don’t see Micah until we’re closer, and suddenly all I want to do is lead Grams the other way, but she already has her sights set on a stand selling sunflower seeds on the other side of the square. I wouldn’t mind, except it means we have to go through the greens around the gazebo to get there, and that’s one place I don’t want to go.
You’re getting over him. You’re over him, I keep repeating, hoping its true.
Micah catches my eye for a moment—not even that, really—before he looks away. Back to Heather. And smiles at her.
My heart falls like lead into my stomach. I’m not over him. He’s still mad about what I said the other night—and I can’t apologize for something I meant. Did that make me a bad person? I love the gang, but I also love Grams—and having to choose between two things you loved was my worst nightmare. But I don’t regret choosing Grams. I don’t regret distancing myself from school and the gang and everything else to take care of Grams. Grams would do the same for me.
“Oh, Micah sure looks dashing tonight,” Grams says to me, nodding to Micah. He hasn’t looked over again. “Why didn’t you tell me he’s dating Mayor Woodard’s daughter?”
I shrug.
“I always knew he fancied her.”
“What?” My eyebrows quirk up. “How?”
“When you get older, you can tell this sort of thing,” Grams chides. We make our way to the booth, where LD is helping her parents.
Mr. Darling gives Grams a big hug. “Mrs. North! I’m glad to see you out and about. And that dress! Always a pleasure.”
“I’m making sure none of you forget me!” she jokes, wagging a finger. “Goodness knows I will!”
“Grams . . . ,” I mutter.
“It’s no use treating me like a leper, darling,” Grams chides. “We all know what’s happening to me—and tonight, that sunflower pie is happening to me.” She points to one of the pies on the table, wrapped in cellophane. “Lorelei, sweetie, would you?” She looks up at LD.
LD smiles at her. No one has called her Lorelei in years. Not since her girl moved away and hearing her own name became too painful. “Sure thing, Mrs. North. It’s great to see you out tonight. Looking beautiful as usual.”
“Not as beautiful as you tonight,” Grams replies. “I love that hair! How’d you think an old lady would look with it?”
“I could come over and we could find out,” LD replies.
“Grams? Would you really want blue hair?” I ask. “Is it really you?”
She scoffs. “Sweetie, if I’ve learned anything, it’s that none of us have time to be anyone else.”
“It’s a date then, Mrs. North,” LD replies, and hands Grams a plastic bag with her sunflower pie. As Grams wanders away to another booth with sunflower cooking aprons, LD leans in to me and whispers, “She’s having a good night.”
“Yeah, kinda freaky. I’m just waiting for . . .”
“Don’t jinx it!” she warns. “So, I get off in about half an hour. Wanna be my partner for the hoedown later?”
“You will never catch me dancing.”
“It’s a date then!”
I say good-bye to her parents and hurry to catch up with Grams. She crooks her elbow and I intertwine my arm with hers again. We browse some of the quilts at the mayor’s wife’s booth, but we don’t buy anything even though Grams keeps eyeing a beautiful night-sky quilt for a long, long time.
“Wouldn’t that look lovely on the back of our couch? It almost matches the throw pillows,” she says, nodding like she already made up her mind. “Mrs. Woodard, how do you have time to quilt all these?”
Heather’s mother gives a modest laugh. “I’ve had so much more time for hobbies ever since Heather started taking on more secretarial work at the town office. You know Ralph works his bumpkins off. It’s nice to see Heather taking initiative.”
“It’s nice to see some jobs stay in the family,” Grams replies a little tongue in cheek.
Mrs. Woodard begins to object when Heather passes back into the booth and takes her purse out from the back, beginning to rummage around for something. “Mom, did you remember the charger? My phone’s dying again and I can’t find . . .” Heather pauses, suddenly noticing me and Gran. Her face hardens. “Oh, Ingrid.”
“Heather! You’ve grown up so much,” Grams greets her before I can say anything. “You just graduated too, didn’t you?”
“Yes ma’am,” Heather replies, turning her eyes back down to her purse.
“Going to any colleges? I hear Billie’s been accepted to Iowa! And my daughter here . . .” She hesitates, and my blood turns cold. Oh no, not now. Her eyebrows furrow and she corrects, “My granddaughter got accepted to NYU. Isn’t that right, Ingrid?”
“You did?” Heather echoes.
My mouth goes dry. “I—um—I never—”
“That’s wonderful!” Mrs. Woodard clasps her hands together happily. “But who’s going to take care of you, Eula?”
Grams scoffs. “Stop worrying about me. Heather, do you have any college plans?”
But Heather’s still staring at me like a deer in headlines. Probably wondering how NYU could accept someone like me. Well, jokes on me, isn’t it? Because I’m not going—and Grams will forget that I ever got accepted soon enough.
Finally, Heather turns away again and pulls out the charger she found in her purse. “No, ma’am. I’m staying close to home.”
“It’s not like you’ll lose your way home if you leave!” Grams says, and laughs. “You should go out, find yourself, make some mistakes.”
“Heather and everyone she loves is in Steadfast,” her mother replies, growing a little rigid around the shoulders. “Why go anywhere else?”
“Why not go anywhere else?” Grams rebukes, and then turns to Heather. “Get lost. Find new places. And when you’re done wandering, love is like the North Star. It will always guide you home.” Then, smiling, she points at the quit with the stars. “I’ll take this one. Darling? What do you think?”
I think by the way Mrs. Woodard is turning three shades of red, I think we should get out of here. I quickly pay for the quilt and guide Grams away. Behind us, I hear Mrs. Woodard scold Heather about not talking about the career opportunities the community of Steadfast offers. Which are plentiful, for sure, but there are only so many job positions open to the young people of Steadfast that don’t involve being a sweet assistant at Sweetey’s.
We wander the festival for a few more minutes until the mayor shoos Heather and her posse out of the gazebo so the band can start setting up.
It’s a beautiful night. Perfect for a festival. There isn’t a cloud in the sky, so all of the stars shine down like laser beams of light, the tops of the houses in the square bathed in silver moonlight. And above us all, hanging like theNorth Star, is the blinking red radio tower. Home. I stare up at it, wondering what Steadfast looks like from way up there. Maybe just a toy town, more yellow than usual. Or maybe we all look like little ants running around. Maybe we don’t look like people at all.
Or maybe, from up there, Billie’s right. You can see the whole picture, how small everything is, how inconsequential. From up there, I’m sure you can see Steadfast, but also the abandoned maze beyond, and beyond that the red doors of the Barn, and beyond that the reservoir, as the land stretches farther and farther into the darkness. From up there, I’m sure everything looks like nothing.