Tea Leaves & Pine Trees

Chapter One

LAKE LAKEWOOD

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Summerton Newsletter

Hey, hey, it's Rey!

For this week's newsletter I would like to start by reminding everyone to please log their charity obligations or donations for Whittlevale's townhall. Whittlevale's mayor, Joan Thistleton, has passed on her gratitude and has offered a free visit to their museum upon request. Please email me if you're interested at all!

This week is also our annual Floral Festival! We have a couple of spots left at the Flora and Fauna Market this weekend, please email me through your reservation if you'd like to secure one of those spots. The more the merrier!

Also! Don't forget this coming Thursday is our Floral Bonfire, hosted at Dianna's! I look forward to seeing you all with your families there.

I'd also like

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A knock on the door drew my attention from my laptop screen, and I glanced up with a small smile as Monique Hassan poked her head in, dark hair greying at the roots and ends, and crows' feet cornering her kind, dark eyes.

"Sorry, honey," she apologised with a wince and glanced at my laptop briefly. "The mayor would like to see you."

My smile strained a little, but I didn't let it slip. I hit save draft on my email to Joseph Abercrombie et al, and followed Monique to the office across the hall, much larger than my own, and with a floor-to-ceiling window that looked down across Main Street.

The sight always took my breath away.

Summerton was the town every other town aspired to be like. With a population of 782 - a number expected to jump to 783 in June when our local pet store owner, Lisa McClain, gave birth to her second child - Summerton was unsurprisingly clean and compact.

The wide streets were slightly sloped and allowed space for cyclists on their morning commute. All the shop fronts and small townhouses were colourful and vibrant, cleaned regularly with freshly wiped windows, and a seasonal flower bed on the sidewalk in front. The road was cobblestone, the footpaths cream brick, and the Vienna lamp posts lining Main Street were 3-headed and powered by solar panels between 7PM and 7AM.

Nestled at the foot of a mountain, with an infinite pine forest to the west and south, and a majestic lake stretching to the horizon beyond the forest, Summerton was quaint but vast.

Homey.

Our residents were happy, but it was more than that. They were safe, and they were cared for. Our education system ensured the proper schooling of all children and teenagers no matter their financial or familial situations, and I ensured an endless list of employment opportunities to keep the economy steady and the residents fortunate. No one went with nothing, and no one slept without a roof over their head and a mattress beneath them.

No one was ever truly unhappy here in Summerton. No one except for the man in front of me, who never seemed to have a reason to smile.

"You wanted to see me?" I asked, shutting the door.

The large office chair facing the window slowly turned around with a creak. The noise gave me goosebumps, but it was nothing compared to the grimace I contained when those dark green eyes finally fell on me, the scrutinising gaze and bushy eyebrows accentuating the man's disapproval.

Mayor Samuel was, to put it fairly, a man of great balance. No one else in all of Summerton could chew as noisily, glare as hard, or struggle to seat his oversized ass in a chair as much as he could – and yet no one else in all of Summerton could stabilise a crumbling, broken society and turn it into the strong, independent town it was now. Mayor Samuel had... a simple personality but all his simple decisions had benefited Summerton greatly, and no one could deny that.