Chapter Twenty #2
“Why not? The inn is safe. Your project is done. Tilly has Florence wrapped around her paw.” She took his hands. “You’ve been living in other people’s stories your whole life. Maybe it’s time to write your own. Think of the places you’ll get to see, the maps you could be designing wherever you go!”
Charlie stared at her for a moment and, at first, she panicked.
This was a bad idea. He doesn’t want to leave York for an adventure.
Of course he doesn’t, and he sure as hell doesn’t want to abandon it for some girl.
But the initial confusion in his eyes seemed to settle as fear gave way to possibility.
“You want me to come to Nashville,” he said slowly.
“For a visit. Just a visit. See how it feels to be somewhere new.” Eva squeezed his hands. “I’m not asking you to give up York. I’m just asking you to give yourself the chance to see what else might be out there. For both of us.”
“Like a fairy tale in reverse,” Charlie murmured. “Instead of the princess leaving everything behind for the prince, we both get to choose.”
“Exactly. No rescuing required. Just … choosing.”
Before Charlie could respond, Florence appeared in the hallway. “There you are! Come, both of you. I have something for Eva.”
They followed her back to the main room, where Florence clinked her own glass for attention. The crowd quieted.
“Friends,” Florence began, her voice carrying.
“Margaret Wells saved this inn in 1947. She saved it over and over again through the years with fierce advocacy. And this week, her memory saved it once more, through the story Eva told, the trail Charlie created, and the community that rallied to preserve it.”
She pulled out a wrapped package. “Eva, dear, would you come here?”
Eva made her way through the crowd, aware of all the eyes on her, including her mother’s. Florence handed her the package with ceremony.
Inside was Margaret’s green leather journal—the one Eva had found that first day, now professionally restored. The gilt edges gleamed, and the lock had been repaired.
“Florence, I can’t—”
“Margaret would want you to have it,” Florence said firmly. “Some stories need new endings. And you’re rather good at providing them.”
Eva clutched the journal, feeling the weight of history in her hands. “Thank you. For everything.”
“No, love. Thank you. You’ve given us all the greatest Christmas gift—hope.”
As the evening wore on, Eva found herself pulled into conversation after conversation. Her parents had integrated seamlessly into the gathering—her father deep in discussion about Roman Britain with Dr Hartley, her mother actually laughing at one of Trinkett’s theatrical stories.
“You’ve done something special here,” Mrs Morrison said quietly, approaching Eva by the fire. “Margaret would be so pleased to know her story is being told properly. Not as tragedy, but as triumph.”
“That was always the real story,” Eva said. “People just needed reminding that not all fairy tales end with ‘happily ever after’. Some end with ‘happily ever choosing’.”
Near midnight, as the celebration began to wind down, Eva said goodnight to her parents who’d been given a room at The Riddle and Quill Inn by Florence.
Heading outside to the small terrace behind the inn, Eva took a moment for herself.
Snow was still falling softly, muffling the sounds of York settling into Christmas night. It was here that Charlie found her.
“I’ve been thinking about what you said,” he began without preamble. “About living in other people’s stories.”
Eva waited, watching the snow catch in his dark hair.
“You’re right. I’ve been so focused on preserving the past that I forgot to imagine a future.” He turned to her, eyes bright with something new—excitement mixed with terror. “I’ll come to Nashville. In February, after I finish the renovations needed on the property.”
“Really?”
“Really. I want to see your world. Meet the infamous Courtney. Eat whatever grits are.” He smiled ruefully. “Terrifying as it is, I want to see who Charlie Blackwood might be outside of York.”
“And I’ll come back,” Eva said. “To help launch the trail properly. To see who Eva Coleman might be when she’s choosing her own adventure. And not following mysterious books that fall.”
“Is that really how this all started?” Charlie asked.
“I got dumped, and booked the first flight to London. And yes, Margaret thumped me quite literally on the head.”
“You really do have a way with stories.”
A familiar clicking of claws made them look down. Tilly sat at their feet, tail wagging, a sprig of mistletoe tied to her collar with a red ribbon.
“Did she have that earlier?” Eva asked, laughing.
“Florence might have helped,” Charlie admitted. “She did say Margaret believed in giving fate a push sometimes.”
“How are you going to manage to kiss me once Christmas is over?” Eva teased. “When there’s no convenient mistletoe?”
Charlie pulled her closer, his voice low and warm. “I’m sure we’ll be able to create our own piece of magic. In York. In Nashville. Wherever our story takes us.”
The kiss was different this time—still passionate, but also full of promise. Of planes to catch and cities to explore and stories yet to be written.
Later, alone in her room, Eva sat with her notebook—the one Charlie had kindly gifted her. Its pages were once crisp and blank, now it overflowed with scrawls of Margaret’s story, waiting to be shaped into something more.
She opened Margaret’s restored journal and found a blank page. After a moment’s thought, she wrote:
December 25th The Riddle & Quill Inn, York
Once upon a time, a lost girl came to York looking for Christmas magic and found something better—the courage to write her own story.
Margaret Wells taught her that love isn’t just what happens between two people—it’s what happens when you decide the world deserves better than your broken heart. It’s choosing kindness when bitterness would be easier. It’s believing in magic even when the signs aren’t clear.
Soon, I’ll go home. But home doesn’t mean what it used to. And in February, Charlie will follow—not because it’s a fairy tale, but because we’re both brave enough to see what happens when you stop living the story everyone else wrote for you.
I don’t know how our story ends. But I know it will be one we choose to write together, one page at a time.
She closed the journal, putting the sprig of mistletoe from her apartment, still carefully wrapped in tissue, in the notebook.
Eva looked out of the window at York sleeping under its blanket of snow.
The Christmas lights twinkled like stars, each one a small miracle, a tiny act of faith in the darkness.
She didn’t need signs anymore.
But she saw them anyway.