The After House by Michael Phillip Cash

display. There were framed yellow maps and newspapers describing the changing town.
    “Hamlet?” she asked, showing she was a good listener. “Not,” she thought.
    “Small town.” Hugh pointed to an old map. “Glaciers carved out our harbor about twenty thousand years ago. They left behind all those big boulders dotting the hills. We have a natural harbor.”
    “What does that mean?” Remy asked, warming to his enthusiasm. He talked lovingly of his little museum, his arms working to point out this and that. Remy watched the enjoyment in his face, lost in the deep resonance of his voice. Her mother’s words from a few days ago echoed in her head. “Once you know, you just know.” She searched her memory from the beginning with Scott. He was fun. She enjoyed him, but there was not the gut-punching sense of…what? What was she feeling? She forced herself to pay attention to him. Was it lust? Could desire have been doing this?
    Surely coupled with loneliness, the need to interact with a man was strong, but this was something else. Shehad male students whom she worked with daily. She never saw them as anything more than bodies that needed to be stretched to their capacities for exercise. Licking her lips, she wondered if his pecs were dusted with hair or smooth. Oh, he would never be interested in someone like her. He was smart, worldly, knew about this kind of stuff. All she knew about was yoga and what kind of mayo to put on a sandwich.
    Hugh smiled. “It means that ships can sail right into the harbor and dock here. That makes it easy to get cargo on and off the ships. That’s very important.” He took her to a large chest of drawers, polished to within an inch of its life. She saw that it belonged to a famous family in the area. “This is all significant.” He moved his hand expansively. “It shows that furniture was made here. This was no backwater. It was an important place.”
    The tour felt intimate, his voice hushed, reverent.
“It’s hard to believe we’re talking about fish.”
Remy didn’t realize she’d said it aloud.
    “No, no. They’re mammals. They breastfeed.”
    “We are talking about whales?” Remy asked quietly.
    They came upon a diorama of a Native American village. “We weren’t the first settlers in the—”
    “We?” she questioned, raising an arched brow. She was aiming to concentrate better. She didn’t want to make a fool of herself. Squashing her attraction, she focused on his tour.
    “We, as in my father’s family. They are longtime residents of the area. Anyway, getting back to the subject, we weren’t the first settlers here. The Matinecocks firstsettled here thousands of years ago. They sold the land to the English for a collection of hatchets and knives, some shirts, nails, and needles.”
    “Not a great deal for the Matinecocks,” Remy said.
    “I’m not very proud of it,” Hugh said. “But that was the way of it.” They stared at the collection of shells and arrowheads. He picked one out of the display, toying with the sharp point against the pad of his thumb. For a minute, he seemed lost in thought, as if he was debating something, then he blurted, “They’re mine.” He was embarrassed.
    “He’s a nerd,” Remy thought. Happiness overwhelmed her. It didn’t bother her. “Me too,” she wanted to shout.
    “I dug most of these up on my parents’ property. Not something I like to admit on a first date.”
    “Is this a date?” Remy asked, her tone teasing, the dimple in her cheek showing. She liked the way he looked at her, his gray eyes caressing her face.
    He tucked the arrowhead carefully in the case. “I’m sure you’ve been on worse.”
    She turned to look him full in the face. It wasn’t fair to have such a handsome mayor. He probably fought off his constituents. “Who says this is bad?” she asked softly.
    The lights flickered, breaking the mood.
    Hugh directed her to the next case. “The area grew, becoming famous for its mills.