Chapter Thirty-Six
Summertime In A Lake Town
Colton
Morning light from the windows of the master bedroom casts dazzling golden shadows across the shiplap accent wall. I yawn and stretch, but Cheyenne’s weight is no longer pressed into mine. The en suite bathroom is dark, so I sit up and rub my hands down my face to wake up.
And then I hear it.
A song from the Choose Happy playlist I curated drifts upstairs, followed closely by a distinctly feminine voice.
I pull on a pair of shorts and take the stairs two at a time. The music is streaming through the Alexa in the kitchen, but Cheyenne is in the sunroom. She has her back to me, yesterday’s curls piled messily on top of her head and hips swaying gently to Jimmy Buffett while she swipes a paintbrush across a canvas.
My wife.
Reality is sinking in now that yesterday has faded. The reality where Cheyenne is mine and only mine to love for the rest of my life. Where we will raise Milo—and God willing, our own children—in this very home together. Where we’re both still healing and breaking old habits, but we will do that together. We will communicate as openly as she did with me last night, and we will cherish every moment spent together.
I’ve been with more women than I’d like to count, most of them in a purely physical sense. It was never love. I didn’t know that then, but I know it deeply now. The love I have for Cheyenne dives deeper than physical attraction, it’s an emotional intimacy that is built on something substantial: trust. It’s not fleeting chemistry and it’s not fizzling infatuation, it’s a love that is as equally steadfast as it is ardent.
I look down at the gold wedding ring on my finger—my father’s band. We were standing in my dad’s kitchen when I told him I was marrying Cheyenne. First, Dad hugged me, and then he disappeared upstairs. Moments later, he came back with a velvet box.
“She left hers here,” he’d said. “They’re not supposed to live in a dusty box, son. Give them the love story I couldn’t give your mother. That’s what she would have wanted.”
Yesterday, I slipped my mother’s ring over Cheyenne’s knuckle, and she slipped my father’s over mine. And maybe he’s right—maybe we were the love story they were always meant to tell. Maybe my mother hoped for that even when she left so long ago.
I purposely step on the creaky floorboard three paces from the island. Cheyenne startles, but she glances over her shoulder and smiles softly. Early morning sunshine haloes her, accentuating the curves of her body and framing her in golden light. Her paint spattered t-shirt just barely hides her favorite pair of blue and white plaid flannel shorts.
Wordlessly, I cross the room, pull her to me, and kiss her. “Good morning, Mrs. Del Ray.”
“Mm,” she murmurs, smiling against my mouth. “A very good morning indeed, Mr. Del Ray.”
I let my fingers dance lightly up the ridges of her spine. “I see that you’ve found inspiration again.”
“Oh, um…” The corner of her mouth curls, and she settles her arms around my neck. “It’s hard not to paint now that I’ve started again. I only meant to come down for a little while to let you sleep, but I guess time sort of got away from me—Why are you smiling like that?”
“Like what?” Fingers pressing into her lower back, I drop a kiss on the summer freckles dotting her nose.
“Like you think I’m goofy.”
“Considering I like to laugh,” I say, chuckling, “I think that would be a compliment.”
Her teeth sink into her lower lip. A groan rumbles in my chest, and I brush hair that’s escaped her bun from her neck. I trail soft kisses along the exposed line of her neck, and her head tilts to give me easier access. My wife smiles like lavender, fresh morning air, and lemons. It’s a dizzying combination.
I lean back slightly before I can get carried away. “Keep painting, sweetheart. I want to watch.”
“Colton—”
“Uh-uh. No Coltons about it.” I turn her back to her canvas and slide my arms around her waist, resting my chin on her shoulder. “Go on, Fini. Lift your sails.”
She hesitates but she reaches for her brush after a moment. Ukulele strings drift in from the kitchen and she hums along, but her steady hand never falters. Not even when I press the occasional kiss to the sensitive skin of her neck or murmur sweet nothings into her ear.
Blue and orange and red are blended into turquoise and ochre and cerise. Sailboats bob in frothy lake water. People unrecognizable by face dot the shorelines and jump off the dock and mill around on the deck. Waves roll onto pebbly lakeside sand. Striped blue and white chaise loungers rest on billowy green grass. Tiny shops with pastel awnings are nestled on the left side, and the historic wooden rollercoaster of Palmer’s Park is tucked into a cerulean sky.
It can’t move, of course, but it feels alive. It’s like I can feel the texture of the sand, smell the smoking grill, and hear cool water lapping against sundrenched skin. It’s a lake town in summertime, and summertime in a lake town.
When she sets her paintbrush on the tray of her easel, her body releases a long sigh. Her shoulders relax and her hands come to rest over mine, her thumb tracing my wedding band with reverence.
“Collie?”
“Yes?”
She kisses the underside of my jaw and shifts to look at me. “Can we go get Milo from your dad’s house?”
Months ago, I’d have never imagined missing a child after being separated for less than twelve hours. Today, the question makes me smile.
“Yeah,” I say, dropping a kiss on her exposed shoulder. “Let’s go get our boy, my love.”
Going to get Milo becomes a full family brunch at Dad’s. Gran arranges strawberries into a heart shape, Hazel flips blueberry pancakes, and Jolene insists on setting the outdoor table all by herself. My dad grills sausages, and Graham tugs his shirt off to jump in the lake with Milo while Nash quizzes Ember on her next novel. I tease Jordan about getting married before him, and he says since Graham got married first , second and third places don’t count.
Now, after brunch, I wander down to the dock. Indi sits facing the lake, her damp blonde hair twisting at the tips of her sun pinkened shoulders. Her toes skim the water and her fingers curl around the edge of the dock, light wash denim shorts contrasted by a red bikini top.
I lower down next to her slowly. I sink my feet below the surface of the lake and squint up at the sky to comment on a boat shaped cloud, but my stomach growls.
Indi side eyes me. “Casanova, we literally finished eating like ten minutes ago.”
“Okay, one, that was only brunch,” I say, holding up a finger. “My wife and I worked up quite—”
“ No ,” Indi says, plugging her ears. “Colton, do not finish that sentence.”
Grinning, I say, “And two, I don’t think the nickname Casanova is very applicable for me anymore.”
“I’ll stop calling you Casanova when you stop calling me Blue.”
“Not a chance.”
She shrugs and faces forward again, her shoulders tensing. Sunglasses try and fail to keep her hair out of her face, so she tucks it behind her ear. I would typically open the conversation, but this time, I don’t. Cheyenne is busy helping Milo build a boat in a bottle while Jolene hovers at her elbow. I’ve got all the time in the world.
“You know that I’m really happy for you guys,” she says quietly. “Right?”
“So she says through tears.”
Her mouth curves into a frown. “Why are you narrating me in third person?”
“I’m just making an observation.”
“Yeah, well.” She shrugs. “I mean it.”
“I know you do. But I also know you’re scared of what happens next.”
She angles farther away from me. “I’m used to Maine winters. I’ll be fine. Might even ask Dad to keep the dock in so I can sit on it all year.”
That’s not possible and we both know it.
“Indigo, look at me.”
A sharp breath fills her chest. I don’t use our sister’s full name like Jordan does. It feels too impersonal, too cold. But I need her attention, and it does the trick. Cool blue eyes meet mine and thinly veiled fear lurks in their depths.
“Cheyenne and I will never remove you from Milo’s world, or you from his,” I say. “We might be adopting him, but he’s still your little brother just like you’re my little sister.”
Indi doesn’t say anything. She bites the corner of her lip and glances away.
I pull a piece of paper from the pocket of my swim trunks and pass it to her. “If you’re interested, we want you to live with us, and be Milo’s nanny when we need it. My wife is planning to paint more often, so it would be helpful if she needs some uninterrupted creative time. But it’s not just that; we also want you around, Blue.”
For the first time since I gave her the nickname last year, she doesn’t scowl. Laughter parts her lips as she looks at the number on the paper, and she lifts her hand to press the back of her wrist against her welling eyes.
“I haven’t cried since we lost her,” she says. Moisture clings to her pale lashes, turning them a shade darker. “It makes it too real.”
I blow out a weighted breath. “I know it does.”
And I do. Indi had eighteen years with our mother that I didn’t, but at the end of the day, it’s the same loss. The same void that no one, not even someone as instinctually maternal as Hazel, can fill. But maybe the hollowed void isn’t supposed to be filled. Maybe it’s there to remind us that, once upon a time, they were too.
“Keep your head held high, darling,” she murmurs, quoting our mother. I recite the second half with her. “That way you can cry, but the tears won’t fall.”
We don’t say and no one will see . It’s not about keeping our emotions locked up, it’s about not letting them get us down. If I’m going to cry about my late mother, I will do so while I remember the best parts of her, because I’ve spent the better half of my life trying to forget her.
“She’s here, Blue.” My voice rasps, but I continue anyway. “Not physically, maybe. But she’s in the best parts of each of us, and she’s in that locket.” I gesture to the gold necklace resting on my sister’s collarbone. “She’d be proud of you, too, Indi. Might not have said so, but she was. I know it.”
She sucks in a breath and nods. Footsteps echo on the dock behind us, signaling Jordan and Graham’s approach. Graham’s dark hair is damp, and Jordan’s hands are tucked in his pockets.
Neither of them says a word. They lower onto the dock, the four of us lined up on the dock with our faces tipped toward the sun. It feels like our mother is sitting right here with us, laughing at seagulls swooping across the lake, wrapping her slender arms around our shoulders, and murmuring I love you as she kisses the tops of our heads.
That evening, just as the sun begins its descent over glass-like water, I turn into the beach parking lot. It’s mostly empty, and the breeze whispers of summertime’s impending close, but we don’t mind. In a lake town, you hold on until you are forced to let go.
Cheyenne balloons a blanket onto the sand, and Indi pulls two Giorgi’s pizza boxes from the backseat of Tripp’s Bronco. Milo excitedly passes fruit punch Capri Sun pouches around to each of us, and cheese stretches from the pizza slice to his teeth. He laughs when I lean over to break it, making sauce dribble down his chin onto his bare belly. Cheyenne hands him a napkin, but Indi waves it away, saying she has a better idea. It just has to wait until we’re done eating. I kiss a spot of sauce from Cheyenne’s cheek, and Milo follows Indi’s lead when she pretends to gag.
Indi takes Milo’s hand in hers, and they run across the sand until they splash into the August-warm lake water. Milo’s contagious laughter lights up the evening, and Indi lets him dunk her under.
I glance at my wife, and she smiles knowingly. My shirt comes over my head and her Billabong shorts are left in the sand. Hand in hand, I steer her away from the shoreline to the dock jutting out from the beach.
“Colt,” she says breathlessly. “What are you doing?”
Smiling, I say, “Do you trust me?”
Warmth shines in her blue eyes. “Infinitely.”
We take off down the dock, boards sun-warmed beneath our sandy toes. We jump in, hands linked, the lake water soothing our sunburned skin.
Life isn’t perfect. If that were the case, flowers would no longer need rain, eyes would no longer need tears, and night would no longer need day.
But the four of us? Cheyenne, Milo, Indi, and myself?
I will tell anyone who asks about perfection that we came the closest.