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10 Build Your Dream Home Here First the towers fell, then the Dow. A few years later, while she was still recovering from the blind fumbling accounts of people crushed to dust— her nights chocked with emergencies, smoke, the newsfeed, the taped and sniffed envelopes, the falling— that’s when they’d built the place, a roomy number bricked back from the corner. A bank offered low interest, veterans no down. In every closet they’d make love. They’d space out the bushes, lay toast and coffee on the porch. It worked for a while, their screened-in story, where a half-deflated soccer ball wedged the door. Drunk on lilac, they cheered whenever a bee seemed to veer off course. Now boxes packed with their belongings cover the lawn. She checks the buttons on her blouse and worries about her husband’s smoking. Will the lilacs survive? Will their mild, wilting odor still lure the bees? In some parts of the world, the wood of the lilac is carved into knife handles or flutes. Līlek, from the Arabic, meaning “slightly blue.” ...

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