Nick of Time by Tim Downs

standing on a street corner; she had hoped to wait for Nick’s call at Resurrection Lutheran Church on the outskirts of town. But when Nick’s call didn’t come at exactly nine o’clock she wondered if she was close enough to town to get reception. She knew that Endor’s only cell tower was an ugly eyesore standing in a field directly behind the Tavern & Grille—so for the last forty-five minutes she had been gradually working her way closer to the tower, hoping to improve reception and increase the chances that the call would finally come through.
    Alena had been standing on the street corner for twenty minutes now, enduring the looks from men in cars and pickup trucks who slowed down to ogle her as they passed—one of them even circled the block and came around for a second look. And all she could do was stand there, waiting for Nick to call— but each time they passed she lowered her head and shook her long black hair down to cover her face a little. She couldn’t help feeling cheap and ashamed somehow—but why should she? Those men were the ones who ought to be ashamed—the men who slowed down to drool over her and then drove home to their waiting wives.
    Alena had come down from the mountain extra early just in case Nick couldn’t wait until nine to call; that thought made her feel like a silly little girl. Apparently Nick had no problem containing himself until nine—or ten, or eleven, or whenever he finally got bored enough to call her. She wondered if he knew she was waiting on a street corner in the dark; she wondered if it would bother him if he did. Sometimes she wondered if anything bothered Nick; she wondered if he thought about her at all.
    One thing’s for sure: He’s not thinking about this wedding .
    But that thought made her feel angry and she scolded herself for letting her imagination run wild like that. Nick didn’t tell her to wait in the dark on some street corner—that was her choice, not his. She was standing outside the Endor Tavern & Grille because she didn’t want to go inside, pure and simple. She didn’t want to go inside because she knew the looks she would get in there—the looks and the whispers and the nodding heads that always made her feel like some kind of freak. Just because she lived on a mountain by herself; just because she had done so since the age of ten; just because she chose to surround herself with dogs of every imaginable shape and size; just because she had learned to command those dogs without ever speaking a word.
    Just because they think I’m a witch .
    But none of that was Nick’s fault. She loved Nick, and they were getting married on Saturday, and she wasn’t about to let her hatred for the people of Endor poison her thoughts about the man she loved. So she shoved the poisonous thoughts aside and tried to call up a pleasant memory instead . . . Six months ago, not long after they were first engaged, when Nick made the long drive up from Raleigh just to visit her.
    ***
    It was a clear and perfect night and they were lying on their backs on a blanket in a clearing in the woods, staring up at all the stars you can see only from the top of a mountain.
    Nick pointed at three faint dots in the sky. “That’s called Orion’s Belt,” he said, “and over there is—”
    “Stop it,” Alena said.
    “Stop what?”
    “Naming them. It’s wrong.”
    “It’s wrong to name stars?”
    “People only name things to control them. We don’t control the stars—we just like to think we do.”
    “People name things to understand them,” Nick said, “to classify them—to compare them. Take insects, for example—”
    “Nick.”
    “What?”
    “Shut up and look at the stars.”
    Half an hour passed in peaceful silence.
    “Nick.”
    “What?”
    “When do I get my ring?”
    “What ring?”
    Alena turned her head and gave him a look.
    “Oh,” Nick said. “That ring. Well, what kind do you want?”
    “I want a diamond,” she said. “A big one—a