Ann Savidge found the canvas chair with her name on the back and let herself sprawl out in it. A stagehand came by with a beer and handed it to her.

“Thanks.”

“You’re welcome”

She took in a deep breath and sipped from the bottle. The coolness moved down her throat to her stomach and spread to the rest of her body from there.

“Ah,” she said. It was a long, drawn-out sound of relaxation.

From where she sat, she could see the director walk to the microphone, carrying a clipboard.

“Good work, people,” the director said into the mic. “We got a lot done today. We’re right on track. If we maintain this level of progress, we will certainly be ready to open in a week and a half. Now, for the notes.” She looked at the clipboard. “Gloria, you don’t have to let Roger say his entire line before you interrupt him. The important part of that exchange is the interruption, not his line. Devon, you’re doing a great job of keeping your face more toward the audience pretty much all the time. In the apple scene, though, you need to remember to face a little more toward Bernice than you’ve been doing.” She continued through the notes for another ten minutes and then said, “And that’s all I have, a nice, short list. Go home and get plenty of rest. We’ll polish Act 2, Scene 1, and Act 3, Scenes 2 and 5 tomorrow. If we have time, we’ll run Act 1 from start to finish. It’s Friday and since we’re doing so well, we’ll knock off early.”

Everyone cheered. The stage suffered momentary chaos while the actors and crew busily put things away and left. Ann and Gloria were among the first to finish and exit.

“Let’s stop by Charlie’s for a few minutes,” Gloria said.

They walked to Charlie’s, conveniently located directly across the street from the theater.

As they walked in, Ann said, “I’m not drinking on an empty stomach.”

“They have pizza,” Gloria said.

They ordered a pizza and soft drinks, asked for the bill to be split, and each paid half.

Ann picked up her change and gave it a quick look, as usual, for interesting coins.

“I got a wheat penny,” she said, delighted.

“What’s a wheat penny?”

“It’s one minted before 1959, so it’s old. Oh, and look! Here’s a half dollar. You don’t see those anymore.” She turned it over. “Oh, my goodness. It’s a walking liberty.”

“What’s a—”

“A walking liberty is one minted between 1916 and 1947. Let me see your change.”

Gloria poured hers on the table and Ann looked at it, pushing the coins around with the tip of her finger. “You have a wheat penny, a King George penny, an Indian head nickel and a walking liberty. This is no coincidence.”

“Tony,” she called the bartender.

“Just a minute,” he answered.

He finished making change for another customer, then walked over.

“Did you get any change today differently than usual? Did someone come in with a bunch of coins and ask to exchange them for bills or something?”

His eyebrows shot up. “How did you know? A guy came with a bag of rolled coins. He said he didn’t use banks, and none of them would exchange his coins without charging him a fee, so he asked if we would. I said ‘sure’.”

“Isn’t that kind of risky? Suppose he made some of the rolls short?”

“I weighed them. We have a machine that weighs the rolls and says how much money is in them. So, how did you know?”

“You have an unusually large number of older coins, coins that are mostly out of circulation these days. They could be worth a lot some day, maybe for my great-grandchildren, or their great-grandchildren. I’d like to buy them from you.”

“Well, you’re in luck. I just put the first few rolls in the cash register. The rest are stilled rolled up. You can have them all for just a thirty percent markup.”

“What? You can’t do that. You’re not a licensed coin dealer. You can’t charge a fee.”

“You didn’t expect to get them for face value, did you? You know they’re worth more than that.”

“I could buy them at an on-line auction for a lot less.”

“Then I guess you better do that.”

“Huh. I wouldn’t even pay normal retail prices for them. Definitely not your unwarranted inflated price.”

She sighed and turned to Gloria. “I guess it was too good to be true.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

The bartender snorted and walked away.

Ann put her elbow on the bar and leaned her chin in her hand. “Everybody always tries to take advantage of me.”

“Not me,” Gloria said.

“I didn’t mean you. Men, mainly.”

“Oh, yeah, men. Beasts.”

“That’s right.”

“Um, does that include Thomas?”

Ann thought. “Thomas has been okay so far, but they always disappoint in the end. So, probably, yeah.”

“Oh, too bad. I like Thomas. He seems really nice.”

“They can really surprise you.”

“I suppose.”

The pizza came. They each picked up a slice to eat.

The bartender came by.

“Okay, you win,” he said. “Twenty percent markup.”

“Get lost.”

“Ten percent.”

“Look. If the total face value is over $100, I’ll give you an extra ten bucks.”

“Might as well not bother.”

“Up to you. Like I said, you’re not a dealer, so anything is gravy. Don’t think I don’t know you’re sticking the extra in your own pocket.”

“Fine.” The bartender glowered at her then stalked away. He returned in a few minutes with a heavy bag of rolled coins. He handed her a slip of paper. “This is the tally. The bag will be short one roll each of halves, quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies.”

“Thanks.” She wrote out a check for the amount on the slip, less the missing rolls.” I’ll give you cash for the extra after I count it. Gloria and I will take it to that table right there,” She pointed to the closest empty table, “and count it right now.”

She picked up the bag. “Woh, heavy.”

Gloria rubbed her hands together. “I love counting money.”

They went to the table, sat down, and started counting. First they counted the rolls of each denomination and matched the total to the tally on the slip. Then they measured all the rolls against each other to make sure they all contained the same number of coins. Next they opened a roll of each and counted the coins inside to make sure it held the full amount. Last they added all their totals together and compared the end result with the amount on the slip. It matched.

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Ann pulled out a ten-dollar bill and started to get up.

“Wait,” Gloria said. “How do you know they’re all old coins?”

“Oh, good point. We’ll have to open every roll.”

Gloria smiled. “Yeah. I love handling naked money. Even if it isn’t mine.”

One at a time they opened the rolls. Ann and Gloria looked at each coin, exclaiming over the dates. When they finally finished she sighed.

“One hundred fifty dollars’ worth of history. A few coins weren’t very old at all, and I didn’t see any that were extremely rare or precious, but altogether a very nice bunch to add to my collection.”

She picked up the ten and took it to the bar. “Here you go,” she said to the bartender. “You’ll be pleased to know I didn’t see anything in there that will make me rich.”

He snatched the ten and put it in his pocket. “Like you would tell me if you did.”

“You’re probably right, but it’s true this time.” She went back to the table.

“I think I’m going to head home,” Gloria said. “I need to get up early for swimming.”

“As usual,” Ann smiled. “I’ll see you at the pool at six.”

They left the bar and went to sit at the bus stop. Gloria’s bus came first, and Ann’s wasn’t far behind.

Ann disembarked at her apartment building, stopped in the lobby to check her mailbox, and took the elevator to her floor. Once inside her home, she kicked off her shoes and went to put her new coins with her collection. She didn’t sort and put them away; that could wait until she had the time to savor the experience. She went back to the kitchen, sat down at the table and looked through the mail. Nothing much; just a bill, two advertisements, and a magazine. She was reading the magazine when her phone rang. She dug it out of her purse and looked at it. It was Thomas.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Ann. How was your day?”

“Tiring but good. How about you?”

“Boring. I’m glad tomorrow’s Friday.”

“Me, too. I love my work, but I need to relax.”

“Let’s find a good movie tomorrow night.”

“Sounds good to me.”

They talked for a while. Ann told him about her new haul of coins. Thomas complained about work.

“You’re always complaining about work,” Ann said. “Why don’t you look for a different job?”

“Maybe I will. In fact, one of the guys at work was talking about a place he and his wife visited last week. Memory Grove Village. It sounded great.”

“That’s an odd name for a town. Memory Grove. And you don’t hear any place being called a village anymore.”

“I know. He said it was a small town, only about five thousand people, but they have everything. Museums, concerts, theater, and I don’t know what all.”

“How can such a small town support all that?”

“I think they get a lot of tourists. He said their hotel room was awesome, and the price was really reasonable, too. Anyway, maybe I’ll check it out.”

They talked a little longer, and then Thomas said he was getting hungry for his supper, so they said good-bye.

“Memory Grove,” she mused. “I need a vacation. I think I’ll look it up.”

She booted up her laptop, opened the web browser, and typed “Memory Grove Village” into the search engine. There were millions of hits. She amended the search to “Memory Grove Village vacation”. Still a lot of hits. She looked through the first page of links. One mentioned tourism, so she clicked on it.

“Need to relax?” the page asked. “Visit Memory Grove.”

“I do need to relax,” she said aloud.

She read the list of attractions and activities.

“Impressive.”

The list included paintball, live theater, indoor and outdoor concerts, climbing walls, water slides, cross country skiing, gym and spa with a pool, museums, fine dining, hiking, an amusement park, an aquarium, and the list continued. There was even a small zoo.

“As soon as this play is over, I’m taking a vacation. Maybe I’ll be lucky and the play will be a flop and close early. Bite my tongue. I shouldn’t be wishing for a flop.”

****

Friday’s rehearsal went very well and the director dismissed everyone at noon. Ann and Gloria decided to go do a little shopping. Ann could have spent the rest of the day browsing the numismatic section of the hobby shop, but Gloria wanted to shop for clothes, so they compromised and spent fifteen minutes in the hobby shop before shopping for clothes the rest of the afternoon.

Time passed quickly and soon Ann was saying, “Oh my goodness, I have to get home and get ready to go out.”

“You and Thomas having a night out?”

“Yeah, we’re going to a movie.”

“Oh, which one?”

“I don’t know yet. Thomas always chooses a few and I pick one from those. If I don’t like any of them, I choose a few more and he picks one from those.”

“Well, have fun.”

“We will, thanks.”

****

It was a nice night, so after the movie Ann and Thomas walked from the theater to a little bar and grill they liked. On the way they passed an open square with a water fountain. Ann had often thrown pennies in the water and made wishes. The wishes were always for inconsequential things, like a sunny day, a good hair day, no junk mail for a week, things like that.

She had a penny, so she tossed it in the water.

“Penny for your thoughts,” Thomas said.

She laughed. “I wished for a late winter. I’d like to postpone the cold weather.”

“Good luck with that.”

She sat on the edge of the fountain pool and took a deep breath.

“Sometimes I just love the smell of fresh air.”

“Sometimes?”

“You’re right. All the time.”

Suddenly Thomas dropped to one knee and grabbed both her hands. “Ann—”

“Don’t!” Ann was startled. Her heart started to race, kicking the inside of her chest with every beat. She felt panicked.

Thomas opened his mouth, his smile replaced by a worried look. “What’s wrong?”

“Stop, stop, stop,” Ann said frantically.

Thomas got up and sat down beside her. He put his arm around her, but she held herself rigid against him.

“Ann, what’s wrong? Come on, breathe. Everything’s okay.”

He held her silently until she calmed down and was breathing normally again.

When he could tell she was relaxed, he said, “I’m sorry for scaring you, but I just want you to marry me—”

“Aaa,” she yelped, stiffening again and breathing like she was cornered. “No, no, no, no, no, no, no.”

“One ‘no’ would be enough,” Thomas said stiffly. “I didn’t know the idea of marrying me would be so distasteful.”

“No, no, no,” she gasped, “it isn’t you.” She paused, breathing rapidly and holding her stomach. She bent forward. “Oh, I don’t feel well,” she said.

“Are you going to be sick?”

“No, no, just give me…a minute.”

Thomas sat back down and held her again. This time when she calmed down, he turned to face her, holding her by the arms.

“Okay, what’s going on?” he asked.

“I don’t know, I don’t know. The thought of getting married just panics me. I don’t know why. It’s been that way as long as I remember.”

“Something must have happened. A boyfriend who treated you badly? Some traumatic event?”

“I just don’t know. I think there was something,” her breathing quickened again, “but if I try to think about it I get so scared I have to stop.”

“You need help, Ann. I can help you find a good therapist.”

“Oh, please, no. I don’t want to.”

“Sshh, sshh. You don’t need to think about it right now.”

He sat quietly as she closed her eyes and leaned her head on his shoulder.

“Thank you for just letting me lean on you. And for not pushing me.”

“No problem. Has this happened before?”

“Once. Since then I’ve always been able to see the proposal coming. Until now. I think I knew, but I have always been more comfortable with you than anyone, and I wanted things just to go on as they were. Indefinitely, I guess. I know that isn’t realistic, but I didn’t think about it.”

She was feeling a little agitated again. Discussing anything even remotely connected to marriage was somehow disturbing.

Thomas stood up again. “Let’s get you home. And we’ll only talk about the movie and maybe one or two other inane topics on the way.”

Ann smiled slightly. “Okay.”

****

The play ran for three months. Ann was sorry it didn’t last longer, but she was eager for a vacation, so it was hard to feel too bad about it.

On the next to last night, Gloria and Ann stopped for a drink before heading home.

“You’ve been talking about needing a vacation for weeks,” Gloria said. “When are you leaving?”

Ann laughed. “I haven’t actually made any plans yet. I’ll call my travel agent tomorrow. Maybe I’ll fly to some remote island. Or go for a long cruise. I want to go someplace different, I think. Somewhere I can relax and do nothing for a couple weeks. Or more. It would be nice to find a place that isn’t crowded.”

“Well, good luck. I hope you find it.”

They finished their drinks, walked to the bus stop, and sat down to wait for their busses.

As they sat in silence, Ann’s brain was buzzing, reviewing moments in the play, plans for relaxing, and whatever crossed her mind. Suddenly she sat up.”

“Oh!”

“What?”

“I just remembered something about a place to go on vacation. Memory Grove Village. Thomas told me about it months ago. It’s small but it has everything. I can go to the theater or a museum or an aquarium. Or I can go to a spa, for a wilderness walk, swimming, rock climbing. Anything I want to do. I heard they even have a fancy restaurant where you can ask to be seated with someone at random. That sounds adventurous.”

“You can do that at any restaurant.”

“If you did, they’d think you were weird.”

“I suppose. Can you look around the room and choose the person you want to sit with?”

“I don’t know. But I don’t care. It would be interesting either way. Oh, gotta go. Here’s my bus.”

“Okay, bye. Have a great time on your vacation.”

“Thanks. I’m sure I will.”