They sat at the big scrubbed-pine kitchen table and Grannie brought them muffins, cookies and fruit bread. The kitchen was always warm in winter because Grannie cooked on a massive old cast-iron range. On the walls there were glossy green tiles with convolvulus patterns on them, and the floor was covered in green-and-cream linoleum squares, which were always so shiny you could slide across them in your socks. On either side of the range there were two small stained-glass windows, with apple trees and puffy clouds and faraway hills. When she was little, Jessica had always wondered what it would be like to live in Stained-Glass Window Land, and walk along the winding path between the apple trees, to see what lay beyond. Renko had taken off his huge gray windbreaker with the fake-fur collar and Grandpa Willy had hung it up for him. He looked skinnier than ever in his blue-and-white Connecticut Huskies sweatshirt, and his wrists were so thin that his bracelet watch was loose. He sat opposite Jessica, but kept his eyes fixed on his chocolate muffin.
