Gage #2
And when she gets to that part, her voice softens, the air shifting in the fort like the memory still has weight.
The storm came like it always does—sudden, loud, demanding.
And for the first time, the girl next door didn’t have to do it alone.
Reece swallows.
I watch her fingers on the page, the way her thumb strokes the edge like she’s grounding herself.
She reads about the generator, the cocoa, the blankets, the way she sat in my old room and remembered our history like it was carved into the walls.
And then the platform.
The second catch.
The confession.
The train moving while the world changed between two people who had spent years stepping around the truth like it was fragile.
Reece’s smile grows, then wobbles, then steadies.
She laughs softly at some of my lines—at the “emotionally unreliable boots,” at the “raccoon with a membership,” at my mother’s “holiday special.” She pauses to glare at me when I describe her as “a spreadsheet with feelings.”
“That’s slander,” she says.
“That’s character development,” I counter.
She flips me off gently with the page.
I smile and kiss her temple, quick and soft, because I can. Because she lets me. Because I’ve earned this kind of closeness by choosing her with patience instead of pressure.
Reece pretends she doesn’t melt into it.
She absolutely does.
She keeps reading.
And then, one day, the fort they used to dream about wasn’t a dream anymore.
It was right there in the yard, lit warm and gold, built steady and sure.
The kind of thing you build when you stop being careful and start being brave.
Reece’s breath slows.
She turns the page.
It’s blank.
Just empty white.
No words.
No text.
Nothing.
She blinks once, then again, flipping it back like maybe she missed something.
“Gage,” she says slowly, looking up. “Did your printer—”
I shift.
My heart is hammering.
The string lights glow soft and steady like they don’t realize they’re about to witness a life-altering moment.
“Reece,” I say, voice low.
She freezes.
Her eyes look up.
And when I move—when I shift onto one knee inside a fort like a man who has fully surrendered to the romance of his own life—her hand flies to her mouth.
Her breath catches.
Then, because she is Reece Callahan and joy always comes out as disbelief first, she lets out a startled laugh that sounds like a sob trying to be polite.
“No,” she whispers.
“Yes,” I say.
She shakes her head like she’s arguing with gravity. “In a fort?”
“In a fort,” I confirm.
Her eyes are bright.
Not tears yet.
Just that shimmer she gets when she’s trying to be brave and she’s losing to emotion.
I reach into my pocket and pull out the ring box.
My hand is steady.
My chest is not.
Reece’s gaze locks onto it like it’s a lightning bolt.
Then it flicks back to my face.
Her voice is barely a sound. “Gage…”
I swallow.
I tell her the truth in the simplest language I know.
“I spent years living next door to the best thing that ever happened to me,” I say quietly. “And I told myself it was enough to just… be near you.”
Reece’s eyes spill over. One tear slips down her cheek, and she laughs again like she’s furious at her own face.
I keep going, because if I stop, I might fall apart.
“I don’t want ‘near you’ anymore,” I say. “I want you. In my house. In my life. In every season. When it’s easy and when it’s hard. When you’re laughing and when you’re quiet. When your brain is running and when you finally let yourself rest.”
Reece’s lips part, but no words come out.
I take a breath. My voice goes softer.
“I want to keep choosing you forever,” I say. “Will you marry me?”
She makes a noise—somewhere between a laugh and a sob—and drops the book into her lap like it can’t hold her anymore.
Her hands shake as she reaches for me.
“Gage,” she whispers, and her voice breaks. “Are you serious?”
I let out a quiet, breathless laugh. “Reece, I built a fort.”
She laughs harder through tears, shoulders shaking, and the sound is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard.
Then she nods. Once. Sharp. Like she’s settling it.
“Yes,” she says.
My whole body goes still.
She nods again, more emphatic. “Yes.”
My throat closes.
Reece holds her left hand out like she’s afraid to breathe.
I slide the ring onto her finger.
It fits like it was always meant to.
Reece stares at it, stunned, tears on her cheeks, smile trembling.
Then she looks up at me and laughs again, full and bright and disbelieving.
“You’re insane,” she whispers.
“I’m in love,” I correct.
She blinks fast.
Then she reaches for my face with both hands and kisses me.
Perfectly Reece—fierce and warm and real.
When she pulls back, her forehead rests against mine.
“I can’t believe you did this,” she murmurs.
“I had to,” I say.
She sniffles and laughs. “Of course you did.”
I brush my thumb along her cheek, wiping away a tear. “Okay,” I say softly.
Reece’s brows lift. “Okay?”
I smile, the same quiet smile I gave her a hundred times in a hundred tiny moments.
“Now we keep going,” I say.
Her eyes shine again. She nods, and this time the nod looks like home.
“Okay,” she whispers back. “We keep going.”
We choose spring because we’re stubborn and sentimental and because winter is the season that makes us humble.
Because New York in spring feels like the world exhaling after holding its breath—trees budding, sidewalks warming, the air softening into something that smells like possibility.
Because we survived another winter together.
Not just the weather.
The fear.
The carefulness.
The old scars.
We survived it with cocoa and routines and laughter in the kitchen while the wind tried to rattle our windows into surrender.
We get married when the earth is coming alive again.
When the neighborhood looks less like a survival story and more like a love letter.
The venue is on a golf course not far from home—wide green grounds that look like they were designed for peace.
The building itself is rustic-charming in the way Reece loves: warm wood beams, big windows that flood the space with light, twinkle lights threaded through the rafters like stars decided to show up early.
It isn’t stiff.
It isn’t overly formal.
It’s cozy elegance—like you can laugh loudly in it and no one will shush you.
Like you can be yourself.
I’m upstairs in the bridal suite, waiting for Reece to walk in for our first look.
I know she’s here before I even see her.
I hear her laugh in the hallway—bright, slightly breathless, the kind that means she’s holding about twelve emotions at once and the only way her body knows how to carry them is to turn them into a laugh.
It loosens something in my chest immediately.
If Reece is laughing, she’s okay. If she’s okay, I am okay.
“Alright,” my mom whispers behind me like we’re about to witness a lunar landing. “Positions.”
“I’m already in position,” I murmur. I’m facing the window like I was told, hands clasped in front of me like I’m pretending to be calm. I am not calm. My heart is doing that stupid thing where it acts like we’re sprinting—even though I’m standing perfectly still.
Linda makes a tiny, happy sound that could also be a warning. “She’s coming.”
Rosie’s voice follows—stage-manager cheerful. “No one move. This is our moment.”
One of the dads—mine or hers, I can’t tell—clears his throat in that very dad way that says I’m not emotional, my eyes are just… reacting to pollen indoors.
Someone shushes him immediately.
Then the door opens.
Soft steps. Fabric whisper. The room goes quiet in the way it does when someone important enters.
A beat passes, and I feel it—Reece right behind me, close enough that I can sense warmth.
She taps my shoulder.
It’s gentle, almost playful, like she’s reminding me this is still us. Still the two kids who grew up feet apart. Still the girl who used to poke me with a pencil during homework when she wanted my attention.
I turn.
And every thought in my head disappears.
She’s standing there in white that isn’t loud or fussy or trying to be anyone else. The dress is Reece—clean lines, soft movement, simple elegance that somehow makes her look even more like herself. Like she decided to show up as the truest version of her and let the world love it.
The veil is the part that breaks me. It frames her face like a promise.
Her eyes are glossy, but her mouth is doing that brave little smile she uses when she’s trying not to cry—like she’s daring her feelings to behave.
My chest goes painfully quiet.
The same settling I’ve felt a thousand times—on our porch, on the train, in a storm-lit living room—drops into place like it’s always known where it belongs.
Home.
I take one step forward without meaning to.
“Hi,” I manage, like I haven’t said her name in twenty years.
Reece’s laugh wobbles out of her—half joy, half nerves. “Hi.”
My mom makes a strangled sound behind me.
“Susan,” my dad warns softly.
“I’m not doing anything,” my mom whispers, and then immediately does something by aggressively dabbing her eyes with a tissue like she’s trying to sandpaper her tears away.
Linda is crying openly. Not even pretending. Just full-on, proud, mother-of-the-bride crying.
Reece’s dad clears his throat again, louder this time, and Rosie whips her head toward him with the intensity of a prosecutor.
“Sir,” Rosie says, pointing with the bouquet like it’s a gavel, “you are allowed to have emotions. This is a safe space.”
“I’m fine,” he says, voice thick.
Rosie nods. “That’s what everyone says right before they melt.”
Reece turns her head slightly like she’s trying to absorb all of us at once—our parents, Rosie, this room, this day. Then she looks back at me, and her smile gets softer, truer.
I swallow. My throat is too tight to do anything dramatic, so I do what I can.
I let my eyes take her in—slow, reverent, like I’m memorizing.
“You…” I start, and the words don’t work.
Reece’s eyebrows lift a little. “Go ahead.”
I exhale, helpless. “You’re unfair.”