Return To You: A Small Town, Second Chance Romance

14. Ethan

fourteen

Less than an hour later, I pull up to a cute little cape house, clean white siding, dark shutters, flowers in a hanging basket off the front steps. The key is under the fake rock right where Lucas said it would be.

The beauty of living in a small town, but also—seriously?

Whatever. I’m happy to have something to keep me busy.

The door opens without a creak. A cat jumps in front of me out of nowhere, then jumps on the back of a light gray couch, watching me.

The small living room faces French doors that open on a deck overlooking a small and colorful garden, pastures and forests extending beyond the rustic picket fence. I could see myself living in a place like this, someday. When I settle down. There’s something about the coziness and peacefulness. It’s unpretentious yet homey.

The cat hisses at me. “Easy there, tiger.” Crouching at his level, I extend my hand. He sniffs me hesitantly, then slits his eyes at me. I decide against trying to pet him.

Besides, I have a door to fix. As I turn to go down the hallway and find the bedroom, my eye catches on a series of photos set on the mantle.

I know these people.

And it makes sense. Small town.

But no. It’s more than that. There’s a photo of Colton. A photo of Shannon and Dennis.

And a collage of photos of a pudgy baby, a toddler with huge brown eyes, a little girl with a thick mane of black curls sitting on the lap of a woman with the same hair, the same smile, the same eyes.

My heart pounds loudly. I whip around. This isn’t Colton’s house. Colton wouldn’t have a pale gray couch, a white carpet… The Harpers? I know their house, and unless they’ve moved… I open the hallway closet. A woman’s shoes and coats neatly lined. A faint perfume I’ve become addicted to.

Grace.

I’m in Grace’s house.

I turn around and take in the rest of the space.

Small. Tidy. Apart from the pictures, totally impersonal.

It might as well be staged for an open house.

No books strewn haphazardly. No stack of mail. No glass in the sink. No cereal bowl left to dry. No shoes in the entrance. No wilted flowers. Not even a trace of chip crumbs on the sofa or on the floor.

What happened to you, Grace?

Colton’s words to me echo. ”Maybe it’s best you stay away from her while you’re here.’”

Be best for me, too, to stay away from her.

I just need to get the job done and get out of here.

Kicking my shoes off, I trudge to the bedroom and pause at the entrance. This is where she sleeps. Under a bedspread that has a girly color—taupe? mauve? I never knew what these were. But suddenly it feels important.

My phone dings with a text. It’s Lucas, checking if I found the place.

I shoot him a quick answer, shake my weird thoughts away, and wiggle the stuck closet door. After some careful give and take, it opens wide enough for me to step into the large walk-in closet and take a look at it from the inside.

Grace’s scent assails me, creating a weird feeling that takes a hold of me somewhere deep in my gut, and I have to fight the urge to bury my face in her clothes.

What the fuck is wrong with me?

Under the watchful gaze of the cat, who’s now on the bed, I unhinge the door. It’ll need some sanding first. I carry the door outside, careful not to let the cat out, and using the basic tools I find in Lucas’s truck, I sand it where it’s been scraping against the frame. Once I’m back inside, I’ll adjust the hinges to keep it from tilting.

Walking back into the house, I force myself not to look at the photos on the mantle. I want to do this job and get out of here asap. Truth is, I’m enjoying the job itself. It keeps me busy, and out of my head, which is not a fun place to be right now.

As I reach the bedroom, I stop in my tracks. There’s a large box on the floor, the lid to the side with the cat sitting on it, watching me. Daring me, it seems.

“What the hell, fella? You wanna get me in trouble?”

“Meow.”

I set the door against the wall. “I don’t have time for this shit.” I crouch to pick up the mess so I can do my job without stepping on it.

Is this garbage? There’s a disposable coffee cup sticking out of the box. Why would Grace—or anyone—keep a disposable coffee cup when she’s clearly a neat freak?

Resisting the urge to look through the box—could she be a closet hoarder? Is there such a thing as a closet hoarder?—I shove it back inside but my hand freezes. The cup has a name on it.

Grace.

In my handwriting.

What the fuck? Is that the cup I brought her on the first day of preseason camp? This time I take a good look at the contents of the box, my heart hammering in my chest.

A jersey takes up most of the space. I know this jersey. Still, I unfold it.

King.

How old is this thing?

Setting the jersey aside, I continue my exploration, blood roaring in my ears. There’s a stack of letters in colorful envelopes, tied together with a twine. Are these love letters? Not from me. I never wrote Grace.

What the heck, I’m checking.

It’s fucking Christmas cards… from Mom. In their envelopes. I open one, and it’s folded to the paragraph where she gives news about me. I open another, and another, and it’s the same. Each year, Mom sends a Christmas letter with news from all of us. We joke that she obviously tries to give each child the same space on the page, and so if one of us had nothing particular going on that year, it had a lot of filler.

Grace has each one unfolded and refolded so that when you open it, the first thing you see is the paragraph about me. With unsteady fingers, I stack the letters back together and don’t bother reattaching the twine. I’m not letting this go.

She and I are going to have a little conversation. She’ll know I went through that box.

Oh yeah, she’ll know.

Setting the letters aside, I dig deeper into the box.

A puck.

And another puck.

A plastic sleeve with newspaper cutouts. Seeing the first one, I know what each will be about: me. Me and Hockey.

At the bottom, there’s another small Ziplock bag with a tiny loop of twine. That brings up no memory at all.

Little figurines of wood roll around. I pick one up. It’s a coarse doll carved in maple. There are others, some showing better craftsmanship than others. Did I carve these?

Maybe. Since they’re in this box, I’ll go for yes. I must have been… what? Twelve?

Jesus.

To the side, there’s a piece of bark that feels fairly recent. The wood isn’t decaying or turning to sand the way bark does after a few years. I pick it up and turn it around, revealing the carving I very distinctly remember.

A Heart Prank Reign

My vision blurs as I trace the letters with my finger—the anagram of our names, carved into a majestic oak tree where I’d built a treehouse for us. We’d worked hours on finding an anagram that would mean something without giving our relationship away. No G + E for us. Not only did we want secrecy, we deserved more than what everyone else was doing.

We meant so much more than that.

We wanted to seal our relationship, and how better than by putting our imprint in the woods that sheltered our love?

That was when we’d decided we were it for each other.

Why did she carve out the tree trunk? I turn it in my hands and notice some burn marks. I put it back in the box.

The cat meows and jumps from the lid of the box to the bed and starts licking its paws.

I stand up and sift through the rest of her shelves. Just in case she keeps a box for any and all boyfriends? You can never be too sure.

I find nothing and feel ashamed I even considered that Grace might be… a psychopath?

She’s not.

She’s a liar. Not the bad kind, though.

Except when it comes to me.

Absentmindedly, I hook the door back up, fiddle with the hinges. Screw them the way they should be to stop the door from tilting. Satisfied with my work, I pick up the box and call Lucas.

“All good?” he asks.

“Yeah, all set. Wasn’t much.” I tell him what I did. “But uh… there’s a problem with the cat.”

“What cat?”

“The owner has a cat and uh… it’s been puking and shitting everywhere. I mean, it’s not a pretty sight. Thought you’d want to let the owner know. I don’t know much about cats, but they might want to take it to the vet ASAP.”

“Oh shit. Sorry you had to deal with that.”

“That’s alright. Just… thought they shouldn’t wait.”

“Definitely. I’ll let her know right away.”

“Great.”

“I’m on another job, so whenever, no rush, just leave the truck at my house, keys under the seat.”

“Gotcha.”

I hang up and take the box and set myself on the gray couch, looking outside the cute little garden. The view extends far away, up a distant hill, and a thought strikes me. Pulling the map app up on my phone, I’m pretty sure I’m right. Just for the heck of it—not that it matters at this point—I’ll check on that later. As I pocket my phone, the cat jumps onto my lap and purrs.

I give it a scratch between the ears.

“How long you think she’s gonna be?” I ask as it starts kneading its paws on my thigh.

Maybe thirty seconds into that, the cat stretches, and then I hear the engine, and the door, and her voice.

“Damian? Oh my god Damian, baby, are you okay?”

Damian jumps off the couch and greets Grace with perfectly healthy and happy purrs.

That’s my cue to stand and turn around, the box in my hands.