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get as tall as Big Zach Heron, the oldest of the farmhands and a boyhood friend of Wallace Shadd. So far Mr. Heron was the biggest man, coloured orwhite, in the whole lake region, and that was proven in the contest at the Harvest Fair last year. Heron was a man who could be counted on, and L’il Leam admired him above all others. He was still Wallace Shadd’s closest friend. He had a tiny, frightened wife called Isobel, and he liked to whistle a tune when he walked.
    On the third Sunday in June, all of Rusholme was gathering for the annual Strawberry Supper. They’d be having the picnic on the church lawn after service since the Lord was good and there was no rain in sight. The winter’d been bitter with a short, sharp spring and the berries were not large and luscious like last year but small and hard and densely sweet. They spread the tables with white lace cloth from home and laid them with platters of roasted meats and fish and fowl, and bread and pickled eggs and the end of the root vegetables they put up last fall. There was a whole table just for the berries, tarts and pies and cakes and jams, and bowls and bowls of them just simple, hulled, with sugar.
    The lake wasn’t warm enough for swimming yet, but the young people could cross the road to splash their feet as long as a few stern adults went along to keep an eye. The Pastor’d preach about temptation because of how the boys and girls’d be mixing around the campfire later on. The adults knew all about those strokes stolen behind the flames and no one wanted to see an impropriety done on Strawberry Sunday.
    Addy had felt sick all morning. She thought it to be excitement because of the church supper. She’d nearly brought up her breakfast when she went to take the piefrom the oven and the smell got up her nose. She asked L’il Leam to do it for her so she didn’t risk the ruin of her new Sunday dress. Her older brother didn’t balk at using an oven cloth and touching a pie plate like some boys would. He set the pie by the window to cool and knew that Addy wanted Chester Monk to have a slice of it and admire her touch with the pastry.
    L’il Leam had his own heart set on the day. He was in love with Birdie Brown and even though she was the most beautiful girl in Rusholme, it was Leam she chose to love, because he was special and didn’t know it. She was small like him, and they came eye to eye with each other when her Mama wasn’t around and they had the chance, and he the courage, to have a word.
    They shared a kiss when the snow melted in April and it lingered still on L’il Leam’s lips. He’d been fixing his bicycle out back of the schoolhouse and Birdie’d come around the corner expressly to find him. She bent down, watching him through the wheel. “L’il Leam?”
    â€œWhy, hello, Beatrice Brown.”
    She pooched her lips and squinched her nose and L’il Leam thought that was the sweetest face and the only reason he called her Beatrice at all.
    â€œDon’t call me Beatrice, Leam. I don’t like Beatrice and I told you so before.”
    He acted contrite. “I’m sorry, Birdie.”
    She leaned in and pressed her face through the spokes. “I ate maple sugar. Smell it?”
    L’il Leam could smell the maple. He could also smell her hair and neck and the perfume of her young girl skin. He nodded and swallowed and didn’t know what to do about the closeness of her pretty face.
    Birdie leaned in further. Quick as a hummer and light as its feather, she brushed her cold mouth against his. “Taste it?”
    L’il Leam could taste the maple sugar, and her soft mouth and smooth skin, and wanted her to do it again, but he worried she might see how quick his pecker had sprung up in his trousers and be afraid of that. “You better get on now, Birdie.”
    Birdie smiled prettily and stood, swinging the top half of herself on the hinge of her