Moving to new places, they say, is fun.  

They lied. Quite often, actually, because it was less like moving and more like running, and America was a strange place for a Brit with a pixie cut and far too many stamps in her passport. Toft couldn’t say why she’d chosen New Jersey, USA, out of all places…but she needed someplace different. Someplace new to make the forgetting as simple as remembering and uncross all the lies that had twisted up inside of her chest. Really, she had no reason (just now) to be upset. Sure, moving had taken a bumpy start, but things had all been settled quite quickly: an apartment found, a temporary position at a grocery placed, and a bicycle newly bought. Things were, for all intensive purposes, looking up.

Still there was the unpacking and the sorting and the matter of furniture, but all of that would have to wait. And yes, it was true that living out of boxes had left her in oversized red sweatpants and a shirt bright blue enough to raise the dead, and maybe her jacket had more holes than Swiss cheese, and perhaps cowboy boots didn’t really complement anything, but really. What could you expect? Just then, Toft couldn’t worry about clothes—she needed to resort the business of her mailing address. So she did what seemed best, at the time: went next door and knocked, hoping her new neighbors would be kind enough to help her out. People generally were like that.

She rapped at the door once or twice, then shoved her hand in her pocket, and waited.