Page 1 of A Pack of Pumpkins
Clara
Movingistheworst.
It’s the one-billionth time I’ve thought that as I pack up a limp cardboard box pilfered from the Evergreen Café’s storeroom. The café where I waitress. The café I live above. Well, live above for now.
Inside the box is a haphazard mix of knickknacks, baubles, whats-its, and general junk. But it’s my junk, and it basically makes up everything I own in the world.
I meet the beady eyes of a sloth-shaped cheese grater. Because, why have a regular cheese grater when you can have a sloth-shaped one? I drop it into the box. .
I glance around the apartment. I love this place, but the Evergreen Café owners want to turn the upstairs into a merch area. Honestly, I don’t blame them. With a luxury hotel opening in town by Christmas, Lakeside Point is about to boom. They need the space.
Plus, Bax, my cousin and one of the owners, has been letting me live here for way below market rent for three years. Moving to this apartment was supposed to be temporary, but three years later… here we are. It’s time I found something of my own.
Knock knock.
A face pokes through the door. She has dark brown skin, a scatter of freckles, and two curly pompoms perched on her head.
“Hey,” Winnie says, grabbing one of the half-dozen boxes on the floor.
That’s all my life fits in. My new place is furnished, and I don’t need much else. The furniture here belongs to Bax and will stay behind.
“Are you sad to be moving out?” Winnie asks.
I glance around again. My heart squeezes tight. I feel like I’m being slowly suffocated, but I smile and shake my head. “No. This is going to be great!” I lie brightly.
“At least your new place will be perfect for your annual Halloween party.”
That does make me feel better. I love hosting the yearly Halloween party, and my new place will be perfect, so long as my new roommates are okay with it.
“Are you ready for the leaf peepers?” I ask, changing the subject.
Winnie cringes. “I hate that term. It sounds like the tourists are a bunch of nature perverts.”
“They kind of are,” I laugh.
Leaf peepers flood the area during peak color season. It’s too cold to swim, but they love looking at the leaves when the colors are bright. Route 22 is stunning this time of year, especially the tunnel of trees near Petoskey. And with all the shops and restaurants stretching up the Peninsula and through Traverse City, it makes sense people want to visit.
“But yes,” Winnie says, “I’m ready. We’ve already stocked up on Halloween and fall-themed souvenirs. And the store is already decked out in Halloween gear.”
Winnie ownsDandy Stuff, the best gift shop on the Peninsula.
As we reach my junker of a car, she sets the boxes in the trunk. Then she heads to her own car, parked nearby, and returns with a wide, thin package roughly the size of my head.
“For your new place,” she says.
“Winnie! You didn’t have to get me anything. You’re already helping me move.”
She just shrugs as I open it. “You need something to decorate with. You love Halloween.”
I gasp. What I hold in my hands is stained-glass perfection. A swirl of autumn leaves and jack-o’-lanterns surrounding a glowing full moon in brilliant, fiery colors.
I squeal in delight. “Thank you so much! I haven’t even seen my room yet, but I hope it has a window where I can hang this.”
She glares at me seriously. “If there isn’t a window, then that’s a closet, and you will call me, and I will move your stuff in with me.”
I chuckle. Winnie’s cottage in the woods is cozy, but fits exactly one person. Still, I appreciate the offer more than she knows.
“I’m sure I’ll be okay,” I say with all the confidence I can fake, even though I’m renting the place sight unseen.
