There is a giant chair now sitting beside the usual one under the trees. It was impossible to miss in the morning, on a walk, even with the light grey from the clouds blocking the sky from view. It wasn’t twilight or dawn, when the light plays tricks and everything flattens out until it looks as if you are walking through a painting rather than standing in the world.

The new chair, red as the sort of wagon we used to play in dragging our loads of books back to the library or each other until our arms burned, dwarfs the one someone nestled among the trees. It is the same color, a red that is never seen in nature. I wonder at both chairs. No one in town has ever admitted to putting the first one there. I doubt anyone will admit to putting the second one there. I’ve never seen anyone sit in the first one or smelled the sharp, unmistakable smell of fresh paint retouching the first. But it looks as new as the giant’s chair.

I don’t move any closer to see if there are tracks marking the path that the chair was dragged or wheeled into place. It would be worse to move closer and see no tracks. It is better to believe that there have to be tracks. I turn and hurry into town, not glancing behind me once, not even when I hear the call of a bird that shouldn’t be there. No one makes a chair without a reason and I don’t want to know the reason for this one. Tomorrow, I’ll walk the long way ‘round to town.