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Sam scanned the orchards. U-Pickers laughed and posed for photos with apples on their heads, babies in the baskets, hugging trees. She lifted her head to study the sky, blue as her eyes. The clouds moved across the sun, blocking it out for long distances at a time, causing the landscape in front of her to become illuminated one patchwork piece at a time: the rolling hills lined with grass and endless rows of trees, peach, tart cherry, apples of every variety; blueberry bushes sitting at the bottom of the hill where the rain pooled; the old red barn where high school kids doled out baskets for fruit, which Sam's father weighed when they returned; the old shed where more high schoolers handed out free donut samples and sips of apple cider to arriving cars; the farmhouse with shutters- designed with apple cutouts- where her grandparents, Willo and Gordon, lived; the blue-green waters of Suttons Bay stretching out beyond the trees, the Old Mission Peninsula jutting into it; the family cornfields that sat across M-22 and would soon be cut into an intricate corn maze filled with spooks and goblins to scare fall visitors.
This slice of northern Michigan was Sam's home, her whole world.
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