Chapter Text
Sunday mornings in Elmridge are all but choreographed. After the final hymn fades beneath the vaulted ceiling of St. Agnes Church, the congregation pour out onto the stone steps in pastel clusters, like sugar cubes dissolving under the hot sun. White gloves are snapped back on, hats adjusted, heels clacking across the concrete among the soft chatter, the scent of sugar and sun-warmed pastry hanging thick in the air.
Rey follows her mother out into the churchyard, adjusting her gloves and smoothing her buttery yellow skirt as she goes. Her shoes pinch a little, and the sun is already warming the asphalt, but no one in Elmridge complains on a Sunday. Not in heels. Not in front of God.
Her father parts from them both to make conversation with his colleagues, chattering about recent changes in the market and the latest in car manufacturing. These events are one of the only times Rey doesn’t feel his presence. Doesn’t feel the grip of a hand on the back of her neck.
Down by the folding tables, the church bake sale is already in full swing. There are loaves of banana bread wrapped in plastic, lemon bars sweating in their trays, and Mrs. Tico’s famed vanilla sheet cake holding court beneath a lace-draped umbrella.
Rey stands off to the side, chatting with her friend Rose as they watch a group of boys from school try to one-up each other carrying boxes of baked goods to the donation car.
“I don’t know why they bother," Rose rolls her eyes, arms crossed tightly against her chest, eyes narrowed as one of the taller boys, Snap Wexley, pretends to nearly drop a box of cupcakes. “Mama says showing off for attention is just asking for a scraped knee and a bad reputation.”
Rey glances at Rose sideways, biting back a smile. “And what about choir practice last week?”
“That,” Rose says primly, “was performance. Entirely different. Artistic expression.”
“Chrissy said you nearly knocked her off the risers,” Rey smirks, unable to keep the teasing out of her voice, “twice.”
Rose’s mouth opens indignantly. “Chrissy Anders would say anything to make herself look good. She could trip over her own shoelaces and blame it on Eisenhower if someone believed it.”
Reys laughs quietly, covering her mouth with her gloved hand, enjoying the momentary ease. But the brief quiet is quickly interrupted by her mother’s voice drifting sharply across the yard.
“Reyline! Darling!”
Rose arches an eyebrow. “Sounds like you’re being summoned.”
Rey sighs softly. Her Mother is stationed behind the pie table in her best blue dress and pillbox hat, back straight, chin proud as she slices her famous cherry lattice with precision. A woman who prides herself on two things: her God and her pie crust.
“Won’t you be a dear and help with the rhubarb,” she calls. “I can’t slice and serve and make change all at once!”
Rey mutters a goodbye to Rose and crosses the grass, brushing crumbs from her skirt and careful not to step in the lawn divots. She’s barely picked up the knife when she realizes her mother isn’t alone. A cluster of women stand around the table, parasols bobbing, gloves fluttering. Mrs. Anders, with her pearls and wine-breath laugh; the younger Mrs. DeMarco, pretending her lipstick isn’t smudged while her husband makes small talk with his boss; and a quiet Mrs. Powell, who always looks like she’d rather be somewhere else.
Mrs. Anders leans forward, her voice low and honeyed. “I hear he’s coming today.”
“Who?” Rey asks, blinking through the sunlight.
Mrs. Powell smiles faintly. “Mr. Solo. He’s been at church twice since his wife passed, but he never stays for the social.”
“Haven’t you got better to do than keep count, Shirley?” Rey’s mother chastises, batting away her friends’ hand as she reaches for the cherry bakewells.
“Oh, like you don’t notice, Eleanor.” Mrs. Powell rolls her eyes, managing to steal one of the small pies before she can get swatted again.
Rey turns her head slightly, pretending to adjust the pie trays.
“It’s not like he isn’t loaded. Every man here quivers in his sight. I’m pretty sure he could get all our husbands fired the moment he wanted to,” Mrs. Anders rolls her eyes.
“Well, I’m sure your husband will stay in line, Eileen,” Rey’s mother says with a clipped tone.
Mrs. DeMarco laughs under her breath. “Poor thing. Imagine, back from the war, only to lose his wife before spring…” she trailed off, pretending to sip from her paper cup.
“It’s such a shame. I heard his wife died suddenly. Fell down the stairs. Can you imagine?” Mrs. Powell cuts in.
“Well, she was a delicate little thing…” Rey’s mother trails off as she puts away another of the empty foil trays.
“Still wears his wedding ring, you know.” Mrs. Anders murmurs behind her hand. “I can’t even begin to imagine being all alone in that house.”
Mrs. DeMarco tsks, fanning herself. “No wife to feed him. No one to press his shirts. Alone in that house like a widower in a Brontë novel. A man like that shouldn’t be left to eat tinned soup and burnt toast.”
“Oh, don’t pretend you wouldn’t march over there with a roast if you had the excuse,” Mrs. Powell scoffs.
“I’d do more than march,” Mrs. DeMarco mutters with a wink.
Rey blushes and focuses intently on the pie. But something inside her prickles. Mr. Solo. The name has a kind of weight.
She remembers him vaguely. Broad shouldered, dark-haired, rarely speaking. Always in a pressed white shirt, collar buttoned, even in the summer. She’s only seen him from a distance, but his silence is more noticeable than most men’s noise.
And then the air shifts.
The women behind her stand upright and Mrs. DeMarco’s fanning becomes a rapid movement.
Rey feels it before she sees him. The way the crowd seems to pull taught, conversations softening only slightly. She follows the tilt of the women’s heads.
Mr. Solo is making his way down the church steps. Alone.
He’s dressed in charcoal slacks and a crisp white shirt with the sleeves rolled once at the elbow. No hat. No tie. Just him, tall and solid, with a face that never gives anything away. Not grief. Not interest. Not anger. Just stillness.
Rey blushes as she watches him. He's tall, she thinks. Not like the kind of tall where you think to yourself, "oh, he could pick me up." No. He is absolutely massive in every sense of the word. His dark hair falls around his collar, with tendrils curling slightly around his face in a way that makes him look effortlessly tidy, but with something there that says "I didn't stand in front of a mirror with hairspray," like her father does.
He walks with his hands in his pockets as he reaches the bottom of the steps, greeting Pastor Hux before turning to the congregation and calculating his first move. Rey turns to the pies, wondering which one he might pick if he happens to come over.
Rhubarb, she thinks.
“Speak of the devil,” Mrs. Anders murmurs into her paper cup of lemonade.
Rey’s mother straightens, one hand on the pie knife, the other smoothing the tablecloth.
Mr. Solo stops a few feet from the table, gaze flickering briefly across the pies. His eyes are dark, thoughtful, his hands held behind his back. Rey feels the stirrings of curiosity twist into something sharper. She glances at him again. He isn’t beautiful, not in the clean, magazine way boys are. But he has a gravity. Like he owns the space around him without asking.
“Mr. Solo,” her mother smiles as he approaches. “We were just saying how lovely it is to see you here.”
“How kind of you, Eleanor,” he says with a smile and a nod of his head. “The lemon’s gone?” he asks, his brows furrowing.
“You’re a nick too late!” her mother says playfully. “But the rhubarb’s still warm. Reyline, dear, fix the man a slice.”
Rey steps forward before she realizes her breath has caught. She cuts a perfect triangle and lifts it onto a plate with a practiced ease that belies the sudden dryness in her throat. Mr. Solo’s eyes land on her briefly. They don’t linger, but they don’t avoid her either. She feels the heat rush to her cheeks.
He looks at her when she hands it to him. Not too long, but his eyes hold hers for a beat too many. Just long enough for her to look away.
“Thank you,” he says, his voice low and clipped.
Rey’s mother jumps in, voice rising to a tone meant to carry: “You know, Mr. Solo, our church has a little outreach program. We send the girls ‘round to help out. Shopping, tidying, that sort of thing. A good way to serve the Lord and learn some skills. My Reyline’s been looking for something useful to do with her afternoons, haven’t you, sweetheart?”
Rey’s eyes widen, just slightly. Her mother hadn’t said a word about this. “Oh, but Mama-“
Mr. Solo shakes his head, polite but firm. “That’s kind of you, but unnecessary.”
“Oh, now don’t be silly” her mother insists, laughing as if it’s a joke. “A man working full days can’t be expected to cook for himself. And what kind of a mother would I be if I didn’t raise a girl who could keep a proper home?”
Rey looks at her shoes.
The silence stretches. His eyes land on her again, though more direct this time, as his gaze sweeps over her in a pass that makes Rey's back straighten.
Then Mr. Solo speaks. “Twice a week,” he says finally. “If it suits her.”
“Oh, it suits her just fine!” Her mother beams with a hand on her shoulder before Rey can answer for herself, as if he’d just accepted a marriage proposal. “It’s be our pleasure, isn’t it, Reyline?”
“Yes, Mama,” Rey murmurs.
Mr. Solo nods once and turns, pie in hand, disappearing into the crowd without another word. He doesn’t say goodbye.
As soon as he’s gone, Mrs. DeMarco leans in, her voice dripping with delight. “If I were ten years younger, I’d be begging to deliver casseroles.”
But Rey isn’t listening. She’s watching Mr. Solo’s back retreat into the crowd, her stomach twisting with something that isn’t quite fear, before her mother's voice startles her back to her senses.
"Reyline," her mother says briskly, tapping the table. "Your gloves, dear. Don't slouch."
"Yes, Mama," she replies automatically, straightening herself. Her gaze darts briefly back across the yard, but Mr. Solo has already moved on, disappearing behind a group of churchgoers after shaking the hands of a group of men in the congregation, including the pastor.
Her fingers tighten around the pie knife, feeling a strange prickle at the back of her neck, like someone watching from a distance, but no one is looking.
No one ever really does.
When the crowd finally begins to thin, Rey helps her mother pack up the remaining pies, folding the lace tablecloth and stacking empty foil trays. The heat is still cloying, and her dress clings uncomfortably to her skin.
Rose finds her again, lingering near the now abandoned lemonade stand, looking flushed from arguing with her younger brother.
"Did you see him?" Rose whispers eagerly, eyes wide.
Rey keeps her face neutral. "Who?"
"Mr. Solo!" Rose rolls her eyes impatiently. "My Daddy mentions him all the time but I've never actually seen him. He looked exactly as I thought he would - miserable."
Rey huffs a laugh, unable to keep a small smile from her lips. "He just seems... serious. Besides, his wife just died."
Rose tilts her head thoughtfully. "Mama says men who don't smile probably have dark secrets."
Rey's stomach flutters strangely, a feeling something like dread, though she isn't sure why. "Your Mama also says Chrissy is a darling girl."
Rose snorts quietly. "Chrissy's about as darling as a mosquito."
Rey laughs despite herself, grateful for Rose's knack for turning everything into something to laugh at.
She glances back at her mother who is carefully stacking pies. Rey steps closer, lowering her voice so only Rose can hear.
"Mama just volunteered me to help at Mr. Solo's house. Twice a week."
Rose's eyes widen, turning to look at Rey. "She did what?"
Rey shrugs helplessly. "Apparently it's good for me."
Rose looks briefly scandalized, then a sly smile curves her lips. "That sounds dreadfully boring, but at least you can find out if he really does eat cold soup and the souls of happy people."
Rey shakes her head, but can't stop the nervous smile that tugs at her mouth. "You're terrible."
Rose loops her arm through Rey's, leaning closer. "And you're stuck," she teases gently. "Poor thing. Alone in that big house with nothing but a grumpy old widower."
Rey rolls her eyes, but her stomach twists slightly again. She glances back at the empty church steps where Mr. Solo had stood.
As they walk back toward the dwindling crowd, the air around her feels warmer than before. Rose chats brightly, moving from topic to topic, but Rey's thoughts drift, pulled back to the quiet, serious man who'd left nothing behind but an empty pie plate and a strange, heavy feeling at the base of her throat.
It's nothing, she decides firmly.
It's just the heat.