"Can we just do this now, please?" he said, rolling his eyes while the laughter continued.

"What time is it, Mama?" Hank jumped up and down in anticipation.

"It's eight after eleven, the exact time you were born.

"You ready, girly?"

"Yep!" Hank turned her face to the sky, the wind slapping her bright orange hair out behind her. "I love you infinity much, Daddy!" she yelled, releasing the first balloon.

They all watched it sail up, up, until it drifted over the trees.

She turned to Charlotte and frowned. "But I don't remember which note is in which balloon!"

Charlotte smiled at her daughter, recalling how the kids had written three notes each addressed to "Daddy in Heaven," and brought them to the party store. The nice lady had inserted the folded-up paper into their balloons before filling them with helium.

"It doesn't really matter, honey. Daddy doesn't mind what order they're in."

Hank nodded seriously, then wiped her nose with the back of her hand. "I'm pretty sure that was the one where I told him I got in the majors this year."

"Stop the presses," Matt said.

"Dweeb," Hank responded.

"Okay, gang." Charlotte put her hand on Mart's shoulder and squeezed. "Let's let Hank have her turn. Go ahead, birthday girl."

Hank raised her right hand and opened her stubby fingers, and the second balloon was off. "That was the one where I told him I missed him infinity much," she said with a nod of certainty.

Hank released the third purple balloon. "And that one said not to forget my ballet recital at two o'clock on June seventh."

Hank turned matter-of-factly toward her brother and offered him a gap-toothed grin. "Your turn, Matt."

Charlotte had to choke back her sob. One of the hardest lessons she'd learned in the last eighteen months was that the kids had their own way of grieving and it wasn't necessarily her way. It seemed these concrete, simple things let them express their loss the way talking never could.

Neither of them had ever wanted to talk much about their dad's death. Charlotte recalled each long hour she'd ever spent in the worn blue wing chair of Reverend Williams's office in the First Baptist Church of Minton, talking about Kurt. About her fears and hopes and emptiness. It had helped.

But the day the reverend came to the house to chat with the kids, they both ran away, crying.

Matt stepped forward then, causing Charlotte's hand to fall from his shoulder. He let the first yellow balloon fly without comment, waited for it to climb, then released the other two in the same silence.

He shoved his hands in his pockets and stood still for a moment, finally turning his head toward his mother. He nodded and said, "Your turn, ladies."

Charlotte was struck by how grown-up he seemed in that moment.

Bonnie stepped up and let her blue balloon take wing. She smiled and said, "Look out for all of us, Kurt."

Then it was Charlotte's turn. Knowing she was under the watchful gaze of her friend and children, she took a steadying breath and raised her hand. A sudden gust of wind snatched the balloon from her grasp, sending it flying before she was ready.

That struck her as somehow appropriate.

"I miss you," was all she could think to say.

When Charlotte turned around, Matt and Hank were already laughing and running toward the playground equipment and their friends.

"Have you tried the Internet?"

Charlotte nearly spit out her coffee.

Bonnie laughed a little and continued, leaning back on the park bench. "You know, I've read that Internet dating is the hottest way to meet people these days, and frankly, it sounds like the best thing to happen to male-female relations since the Pill."

Charlotte felt her eyes widen. It seemed that since she'd decided to confide in Bonnie about her once-in-a-lifetime fling, all her friend wanted to do was talk about men and sex.

She'd obviously opened up a big can of worms.

"Think about it." Bonnie took a sip from her thermos cup as she watched the kids on the monkey bars. 'The Internet lets you meet people anonymously and be totally upfront before appearance has any impact on anything! How freeing! It's got to be better than bars."

Charlotte raised an eyebrow. "I don't go to bars, Bon."

"My point exactly."

"I don't need a man right now," she lied.

Bonnie tilted her head and studied Charlotte carefully, and the scrutiny made her uncomfortable. "What?"

"Maybe you feel that way now, but someday you're going to be ready for a man to come into your life again."

"Maybe."

"Mama! Can we go to the duck pond?"

Charlotte squinted in the sun, seeing a gaggle of kids running toward the old ice-skating pond on the other side of the park. Matt and Hank stayed behind, waiting for her okay. She smiled

"Go for it!" she said.

"Is it the kids, honey? Is that what's holding you back from dating again?"

Charlotte bunched her lips together and wondered exactly how to answer her friend. Her children's welfare had been her primary concern, of course, and she just couldn't picture the awkward moment when she had to introduce Hank and Mattto a boyfriend. She didn't want to do anything that would confuse them or threaten their fragile sense of safety. And okay-she had a few issues herself.

"I'm just not ready" was all she could manage to say.

"All right."

"I'm doing fine on my own."

"If you say so."

As she watched Bonnie's eyes scan her face, full of affection and challenge, Charlotte felt the knot loosen in her chest. Bonnie Preston had lived a lot longer than she had. She'd stayed married to the same man for thirty-five years, raised two boys to adulthood, and was now a grandmother. She was a hard woman to fool.

"Okay, Bon. I do fine most of the time. But it's been kind of rough lately. There. I said it"

Bonnie's hand patted her knee. "Are you ever going to say anything to him?"

"Him who?"

Bonnie tilted back her head and laughed. "I'm referring to Mr. Male Stripper, honey. Juicy Joe Mills. The man you've not been able to stop thinking about for thirteen years." She grinned. "You know. Your new neighbor."

Charlotte blew out a breath and pulled her fleece jacket close to her chest. Springtime in southern Ohio could be as unpredictable as life itself-bright and balmy one day, biting and gray the next.

"Crazy weather," Charlotte said, attempting to change the subject.

Bonnie shook her head, smiling. "What's the worst that could happen?"

Now that made Charlotte laugh. There were just so many bad outcomes from which to choose, and she'd already imagined them all in detail.

"Well, let's see…" She put down her coffee mug and began counting on the fingers of her left hand. "One, he doesn't remember me and I'm completely humiliated, standing there saying things like, "Oh, come on now! Me? Naked? In the weeds? June 1991?'"

"I see what you mean."

"Or two, he does remember me and then tries to avoid me the whole time he lives here because he's always considered what happened between us a huge mistake."

Bonnie frowned. "Honey, I'm not sure any man on the planet would consider what happened between you two a mistake. I think hours of hot, anonymous sex is something men generally approve of."

Charlotte kept right on going. "Or three, and this is the worst, Bonnie, let me tell you. He knows exactly who I am and expects me to do a repeat performance. You know, meet him three times a week for a roll in the pine needles."

Bonnie waggled her eyebrows.

"You know I'm not like that."

"I know, honey."

"I'm not a slut."

"No one ever said you were, Charlotte."

"But maybe I could go over and talk to him."