Chester platform, Saturday evening

Caucasian woman, mid 20s, brown curly hair pulled back in a clip, wearing a vest, knitted sweater, long jean skirt, thick stockings and hiking boots. Surrounded by Big Carrot bags. Eating an almond raisin bar. (3 for $5.99)

The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing, Melissa Bank (Penguin)

About 220 pages in:

In post-op, he will tell you he is honored that you threw up on him. He will stay with you in the hospital all day, every day, and as late as he can at night. After visiting hours, when the night nurse says he has to leave, he will hide there with you, closing the curtain partition and keeping his feet up on your bed.

You stand alone in your grandmother's room collecting bags of dead batteries, wads of Kleenex balls and loose safety pins from the back of her drawer. You move to the bed lying in the indent of her form, facing the window to see what she would have seen, listening to the chatter of the schoolyard outside. She'd taken your hand and rubbed it over her lower stomache. "Can you feel it? It's massive." She'd gotten so tiny. She'd confessed she'd taken her wedding dress out of storage and tried it on again, an 81 year old woman looking at a reflection of herself sixty years earlier. Then she'd wrapped it up, walked down the hall and thrust it down the garbage chute.