Chapter 24: First Kiss

The nets had to be dried. That was the only reason. After a storm you spread the nets on the grass above the landing and let the evening sun get into them, or they rotted, and Mei had three nets and the old one with the hole in it, and they had been lying wet in the bottom of the ferry since the chain. So at dusk on the twenty-fourth she spread them out on the slope above the north landing, under the willows, in long overlapping fans, the brown mesh steaming faintly in the low gold light. Fish helped. He couldn't do much with his hands bound, but he could hold one end while she walked the other out, and he did, without speaking, all four nets, and when they were done he stood at the edge of them looking down at the lake. Mei sat down on the…