All the walking we’d done over the past few months, aside from the trips to work, seemed to have helped my waistline a little. We crossed the street and trotted down the stone steps to the sand to make our way toward the big crowd in the distance.
The fire wasn’t yet lit, but it would be, in an hour or so when it was dark enough. People greeted us as we walked along, and Thorn responded shyly. He was getting better at letting people in, and he’d made friends, despite himself.
I saw Maury talking to his sister’s boyfriend, Leonard, while Tory and Austin were holding court with a bunch of people. I even spied Trent and Shirley in the crowd. A man about Thorn’s age came bounding over, a big smile on his face. I recognized him as a worker at the daycare center, but I couldn’t remember his na
