by Erica Boyce
“Yup. Yes.” It means no number fifteen, an almost-was. It means no one will remember me during any of those future meetings. It means I’m no longer welcome at the place I met Claire. It means no more circles.
But tonight, they’re all waiting for me, the five of them sitting on the porch steps, Charlie and Zach leaning against the railing behind them. I’ve brought all four of my pressers with me. Eli helps me lean them against the side of the porch.
Charlie nods a greeting. Zach says, “If it’s all right with you, we’d love to help.”
My eyes are caught on Nessa, who’s got a smile spread across her face.
“You came!” she cries and flings herself past me.
I turn in time to see her grinning up at a big, blocky man around our age. My hands shove themselves into my pockets. A very small woman in a droopy T-shirt steps out from behind him.
“Melissa wanted to help, too,” he says.
Nessa shrinks back a step, like this new woman is a wolf. Melissa closes the gap and wraps Nessa in a hug.
“I am so, so sorry for what’s happening to your family,” Melissa says.
Nessa’s eyes are wide, startled, as she looks up at the man, but he doesn’t notice. He’s smiling down at his wife, one hand at the small of her back.
Melissa lets go, and Nessa backs away.
“I’m Shawn,” the man says, holding his hand out. “Old friend of Nessa’s. She’s told me all about you.” He smiles slowly, and I try not to hate him.
“I hope it’s okay I came.” Melissa pokes her head around him. “We all just love these guys, and we’re desperate to chip in.”
The spotlights of her eyes leave me no choice. “Um, sure,” I say. She squeals and claps her hands while I sigh. I turn to the rest of the group, watching me. “Let’s grab those boards and head out into the field, then.”
They scramble to their feet and move toward the markings.
Nessa trails behind them, and I slow down to join her. Her face is tipped back toward the sky, but she walks in a perfect straight line, one exact arm’s length away from me. “Beautiful night,” she says.
I peel my eyes off her and look at the stars. “Yeah, a full moon is perfect. It really helps to see the paint.” She turns to me, a funny smile on her face, and I know that’s not what she meant.
We’ve reached the rest of the group. All eight of them stand at the edge of the circle.
“All right,” I say. “Here’s how it works.” I take the longest presser from Ben’s hands, find a cluster of marked stalks, and place my board against their bases, one end in the center of the cluster with the rope held taut between my hands. I step on the board slowly, and the stalks ease their heavy heads toward the ground until they snap crisply at their bases and a blanket of green lies glowing in the moonlight. Every time, it’s the same, and every time, the blood rushes through my veins.
A few small gasps escape from the crowd, and I hold back a smile. I split them up into pairs: Allison and Ben, Maggie and Eli, Charlie and Zach, Shawn and Melissa, and give each one a presser. Nessa studies me as they all disperse through the field.
“I thought maybe we could keep an eye on the progress up at the road. Since you were so good at it last time and everything,” I say. What I really want to tell her is that there’s awe up there, watching shapes emerge in the field like a photo developing. She turns away.
Standing on the road, she is still and distant. I’m relieved when she speaks.
“It’s really an amazing design,” she says, “all spiraled out like that.” She spreads one hand in the field’s direction, her long fingers glowing and pale. They are butterflies, and I could almost catch them.
I look away and watch the groups of cornstalk tops fall. “It’s a fractal,” I say. “It’s the form I learned at my first circlers meeting, with Claire—” I wince as I say her name, and sure enough, Nessa shifts away just a little bit more.
“I think I screwed up,” I blurt.
Nessa whips around toward me. “What, you mean the design? Is it too late to fix it?” She’s already looking away, trying to spot all the pairs.
“No, I mean—” I inhale deeply to stop the shaking. It doesn’t work. “I mean with this.” I flap my hand uselessly between us. “With us.”
She looks at me the same way she looked at Melissa. I take another gulp of air. I feel like my brain is on a string, floating away, bobbing somewhere above our heads.
“I still miss Claire,” I say, and I force myself to watch her face fold when I say Claire’s name. “Every day. But lately”—I feel the flush rising across my face—“lately, it’s you. You’re the one who’s been making it hard on me.”
She stares at me, looking a little confused, and I hope she doesn’t say anything, because I can’t seem to hear anything over the roaring sound in my head. She takes one careful step closer, then another, and another, until she’s just inches away. She looks up at me and whispers, “Yeah. You did screw up.” But then finally, she smiles, perfect and gleaming.
My hands unfurl and rise to her cheeks. She holds my forearms, her palms warm.
The kiss is different this time, less hungry. My mind is nowhere else but here. We’re not two people, adrift and alone, clinging to each other to float. We might instead be a promise to build on.
When we break away, my heartbeat has slowed. Nessa laughs a little and releases my arms. My hands drop to my sides. We turn back toward the field, the voices still rising and falling from the corn.
She reaches her hand out and slips it into mine. I close my fingers around it.
“My dad wants to give me the farm,” she says.
“Whoa.” I haven’t seen him face-to-face in weeks, and there’s a pang as I remember him then, full face, easy laugh.
“Yup.” She tightens her grip.
“Are you… Do you want it?”
“I don’t know.” Her shoulders slump a little. “My mom will still live there, and I don’t know what Charlie’s going to think. Maybe. Yes.”
“Charlie’s happier out in California, I’m pretty sure,” I say, and as if on cue, his low laughter rumbles up from somewhere to our right, just exactly like Sam’s.
“I just—I can’t imagine this farm without my dad.” Her voice hiccups a bit.
I hold her hand tighter, because there’s nothing else I can do.
“Anyway,” she says after a minute or two, “either way, we’re going to need a couple farmhands to help out. I’m going to ask Eli or Ben after all this is done, I think.”
“Yeah,” I say. It makes perfect sense, with them already familiar with the land and everything.
“Would you—” She falters. “Do you think you’d be interested in staying and helping? I mean, I know it sounds crazy,” she says, picking up steam. “I’m not the easiest person to live with, and we’ve only known each other a few weeks, although you could have your own room after Charlie goes back. And maybe it would make people suspicious about the crop circle, seeing us together. Obviously, I don’t want to mess with that.”
All I can see, one last time, is the life I pictured for myself when I first drove down their driveway. A sunny coffee shop, apron and name tag, regular customers who know my name, only speaking to ask for orders and exact change. Nights in a windowless classroom, losing all my calluses except the ones where I hold my pen, trying to cram something, anything, into my brain. Visiting Claire’s grave with flowers once a week, then once a month, then once a season on birthdays and anniversaries, sometimes running into her parents, smiling sadly, not quite friendly.
I know now that all of it blew away the second Nessa surprised me on that porch that first night.
“Yes,” I say, “I would.”
She grins. “Good. I could’ve hired one of those kids who travel the country looking for farm work, but, you know, I always wonder wh
at they’re really doing here.”
I laugh in spite of myself, loud before I remember to muffle it. “Oh, by the way,” I say, “I got Anne of Green Gables out of the library.”
“I knew you would,” she says and pulls her hand out of mine, takes a running leap down toward the field. She looks back at me, and I follow her.
Chapter Fifty-Four
Molly
Sam is asleep and the house is quiet, but I can’t stop watching him. In my mind, I run my fingers over his face, gently on the thin skin there, and through his hair. A small, wistful part of me wonders if we’ll ever be alone, really alone, again. Charlie will leave soon to go back to work, and Zach will go with him. Maggie will reach the point where she starts making little jokes about getting out of our hair and leaving us crazy kids alone. I imagine it won’t be much longer until in-home care has to start, with nurses in sturdy shoes always bustling around Sam.
Nessa will be here, too. Sam told me quietly about their conversation while he sucked on his nighttime fentanyl, his brow wrinkling as he said he wasn’t quite sure she wanted the farm. She does. She will.
A soft round of applause comes from below our window like rain. I slip out of bed to see, and there they stand before the porch, so many: Charlie and Nessa and Zach and Maggie and Ben and Eli and Allison and Shawn and Melissa, all standing around Daniel, clapping their fingertips against their palms, gently exuberant. Daniel gives an awkward little nodding bow. I wish I could wake Sam up to see it, all these people gathered only for the love of him. No. For the love of us. He needs his sleep now more than anything, though, so instead, I lean in closer, the cool glass pressing up against my forehead.
Nessa sees the motion and looks up and waves, though she can’t possibly see who it is in the dark. The porch light catches her face, and she looks so happy, so simply happy, my beautiful girl. I tap my fingers against the window, once, twice, in reply, and go back to bed.
* * *
“Molly, Molls. Wake up. You have to see this.” The bed is empty beside me, and panic seizes me before I register Sam’s words. He stands at the window, the light framing his face, motioning for me. For one perfect moment, he is healthy, waking me up once again to watch a deer in the fields or a hawk circling the sky. His hand is planted firmly on the windowsill, his elbow trembling, and I stumble out of bed to brace him up.
Then I look, and I see what I couldn’t in the dark night. There are hollows carved into the field, symmetrical circles spiraling endlessly into one another like the spine of a seashell. Small circles and big ones, spun out into an impossibly intricate pattern. On and on, and it takes my breath away. This is it exactly, what Sam has wanted. I can see in an instant how they will come—of course they will. Everyone will want to come, to see something as beautiful as this.
Sam peels his hand off the window and points. There, on the road, there’s a truck, parked on the shoulder, the dust still settling around it. The door opens, and a man drops out and walks around to the edge of the shoulder. It’s too far to see his face, but we can see him plant his fists on his hips.
I turn my head to look at Sam. And he smiles.
Author’s Note
While the people, places, and events in this book are completely made up, I did base the circlers on a real group of people called “circlemakers.” In the 1970s, Doug Bower and Dave Chorley created their first crop circle in the UK, and from those efforts, a movement was born. As of 2006, an estimated fewer than fifty circlemakers were building crop circles around the world, using pressers—which they call “stalk stompers”—to make mysterious works of art in farmers’ fields.
Their work is fascinating. If you’re interested in learning more, I highly recommend picking up Rob Irving and John Lundberg’s The Field Guide: The Art, History, and Philosophy of Crop Circle Making and visiting their website at Circlemakers.org.
Reading Group Guide
1. Munsen is a dying town, and Sam wants to breathe new life into it with his creative scheme. How accurately do you think The Fifteen Wonders of Daniel Green portrays small-town America? Have you ever been to or lived in a place like Munsen?
2. Daniel travels across America and has stayed in many different towns; on the other hand, Molly has lived in the same place for most of her life. How do you think they differ in their definitions of home, and how would you describe it for yourself?
3. Even though we only see Claire in flashbacks, she is a strong character throughout the present narrative. Why do you think it is so hard for Daniel to let her go, and how is she different or similar to Nessa?
4. How did you feel about the progression of Daniel and Nessa’s friendship? Are you happy with the status of their relationship at the end of the book?
5. Why do you think Nessa hides her obsessive-compulsive disorder from Daniel until midway through the book?
6. Why do you think everyone in Munsen feels responsible for finishing Daniel’s final circle?
7. If you were designing a crop circle for your hometown, what would it look like? Why would it look like that?
8. Charlie loves his father, but it is unclear if he forgives Sam for the pain he inflicted on him when he came out. How do you reconcile your feelings toward a family member’s imperfections or intolerance?
9. Although the group of circlemakers is decidedly not from outer space, do you have any stories about aliens or other paranormal activity that have provided just a pinch more mystery to your life?
10. What are the messages or inspirations you took away from reading this book, and how would you describe the one that resonated strongest with you?
11. Where do you think Daniel, Nessa, and the rest of the residents in Munsen will be in five years? What do you think will have changed, and what will stay the same?
A Conversation with the Author
Do you remember the moment when that first spark of inspiration flashed through your mind for The Fifteen Wonders of Daniel Green?
I was in college—nine years ago as of publication date, yikes!—so it’s a little blurry at this point, but I do remember messing around on YouTube. At the time, YouTube was a much smaller place, and it was possible to stumble across something new without falling down an endless black hole of videos. I found a clip about how crop circles are made and just found the whole process so fascinating. I dug into the Circlemakers.org website; even back then, they had a very helpful curated list of resources to learn more. I knew I had to write about it, so I did! I wrote three chapters for my senior year creative writing class, one of which was from a completely different and pointless fourth character’s perspective, which will now never see the light of day! And then I proceeded to neglect them for another six years, thinking about Daniel and the Bartses during my commutes without writing a word before finally sitting my butt down in front of a notebook in 2016 to finish a draft.
Vermont plays such a rich role in your book. Do you have any background with that part of the world?
I do! My great-great-uncle built a cabin on a lake in Vermont in 1926, and my family has been going there every summer since long before I was born. The town is pretty rural, full of dirt roads and farmland and wonderful people, and when I learned more about farming when I was in college in New Hampshire, I felt drawn to writing about that side of Vermont.
Each character is so different and richly realized. Additionally, they all feel so familiar and therefore accessible. Which character is most like you, and why?
Honestly, I think every main character I’ve ever written has a little part of me in there somewhere. Maybe that sounds kind of self-centered, but writing can be a very self-centered (maybe introspective is a nicer word) process! The most obvious answer would be Nessa, because I also have OCD and a lot of her stories about grappling with the disorder before her diagnosis and dealing with the diagnosis once it came are very similar to my own. And I do love Anne of Green Gables! But Nessa’s a
lso much more outgoing than I am, so there’s a bit of wish fulfillment there. Personality-wise, I’m more of a quiet Daniel type, all too aware of and a little embarrassed by my own shyness. Finally, I was really starting to get into baking bread around the time I wrote Molly’s first chapter, so I guess that’s where you can find me in her!
Did people you actually know inspire any of the characters in your story?
There are bits and pieces of real people in lots of those characters, just like there’s bits and pieces of me. I don’t know if I could ever base a character entirely off a person in real life—I’d be too worried that I’d get it wrong or that, in trying to be honest, I would hurt some feelings along the way. I’ve already had a few friends ask if they’re “in the book,” so now I’m doubly careful to make sure no one is!
Nessa is in love with Anne of Green Gables. If you were to sit in the open air on a porch with a view of the rolling Vermont hills, what would you be reading?
Hmm. The honest answer is probably whatever’s next on my to-be-read pile; sadly, I rarely have time to revisit my favorites, although I did reread Anne in college! But if time were unlimited, I would probably reach for one of my all-time favorites—maybe The Sleepwalker’s Guide to Dancing by Mira Jacob or Born Confused by Tanuja Desai Hidier or Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann. I’ve also felt a strong urge lately to revisit Megan McCafferty’s Jessica Darling series now that I’m supposedly an adult, so those might show up, as well.
Will you describe your favorite writing place for us?
I do most of my writing in my home office, which is my favorite room in our house. We built a desk that spans the whole width of one wall out of some IKEA cabinets and a countertop, and one side is for working and the other is for my craft supplies. The “working” side is right in front of a window that looks out on our street, which is a nice distraction when my characters just won’t cooperate with this whole plot thing. The corgi who’s usually sitting at my feet begging for attention doesn’t hurt, either.