Chapter 10 #2
Late. Very late. After the dinner and the dancing that Holly introduced by sheer force of will and the second bottle of Marco's remarkable wine and the moment on the dance floor where Anthony put both hands on my waist and moved like a man who doesn't do this often and knows exactly what he's doing when he does.
The girls are in their suites, the sounds of laughter carrying faintly down the corridor. Holly and Justin have disappeared. The resort is quiet except for the night staff and the fire still going in the main lounge.
We're in the small library, just the two of us. Where it started, in a way, where he held my hand for half an hour and told me I was unguarded, not reckless. Where he spanked me. There's a symmetry to ending here that I feel but don't say.
He's got his bourbon. I've got the last of the wine. The fire is doing what it does.
"Amber said yes," I say.
"She's part of your people." He says it simply. "Helping you helps her."
"They like you," I say. “My people.”
"Madison's still deciding."
"Madison's always still deciding. That's how she shows she cares."
"Then I'm honored." He picks up his bourbon. "The piece did well today."
"It's still going."
"It'll go further." He says it with the flat certainty he uses for things he's already calculated. "That editor who emailed, make sure you call her Monday."
"I was planning to."
"First thing Monday."
"Anthony."
"First thing," he repeats, and looks at me. “You deserve this and I don’t want you to talk yourself out of it.”
The look. The register. The specific warm weight of it. The ‘you’ll be over my knee if you disobey me on this’ look.
I decide every morning for the rest of my life is going to involve someone telling me to do things I was going to do anyway with that exact expression.
"First thing Monday," I say. "Yes."
"Good girl."
There it is. My favorite two words from my favorite voice. I wonder if it'll always land like this or if I'll get used to it.
I hope I never get used to it.
He sets down the bourbon and reaches for me, and I go and he tucks me in against his side with his arm around me and we sit in the firelight and I think about Sunday.
"I'm coming back in January," I say.
"I know."
"To see the elk migration."
"I know."
"And I'm going to need to look at the cabin."
His arm tightens. "I know."
"You know a lot of things."
"I pay attention," he says.
That's it. That's all of it in two words. He pays attention. Not to the things it's easy to notice like the view, the obvious, the surface. He pays attention to the things underneath.
To me. He pays attention to me, specifically and completely, and I am going to spend a very long time learning what it feels like to be known like that.
I cannot wait.
"I need to call my landlord on Monday," I say.
"Before or after the editor?"
"After the editor. You said first thing."
He laughs. "After the editor," he confirms.
Sunday morning comes cold and clear.
The girls have breakfast with me in the main lodge, all five of them, loud and loving and full of opinions about the trip back and January and the cabin and whether I'm going to redecorate it, which becomes a twenty-minute conversation that I mostly listen to while eating the best eggs I've had in recent memory.
Anthony comes in at nine.
He gets a coffee and sits down with us and immediately Madison starts asking him questions about the ranch with the specific focused energy of someone who has been waiting for access and is going to use it.
He answers all of her millions of questions.
He answers Emily's questions about the bear cub's diet with the same patience.
He lets Lily ask about the reindeer's names and explains the thing about earning them and she looks at me with an expression that says: I understand everything now.
He stays for an hour.
He wasn't going to, I don't think. He came to say goodbye, and he stayed because my people are his people now and he was paying attention to them because they matter to me.
When the girls eventually pile toward their cars in a cloud of hugs and promises and Madison saying she's going to follow the fox release content obsessively, I walk them out and come back inside to find Anthony at the table with his second coffee and Colt's borrowed copy of the resort opening program, pretending to read it.
He waited for me.
I sit back down.
"Four hours," he says.
"To drive back, yeah."
"Text me when you're home. Do not text and drive, but if you pull over for gas or food, text me then too. Let me know you’re safe."
"I will," I say.
He reaches across and tucks a strand of hair back and leaves his hand there for a moment, warm against my jaw. I lean into it.
"January," he says.
"January," I confirm.
"The landlord."
"After the editor."
He smiles. "Good girl."
I'm going to drive four hours home and call my landlord and call an editor and build something new from the pieces of what's changing, and I'm going to do it knowing exactly what I'm building toward. Who I’m building toward.
The elk calves, growing strong in the straw.
The fawn who stands on her own now.
The reindeer earning their names.
A cabin on the east side with good morning light and fiber internet.
A tall quiet man who brought me coffee before I asked and calls me good girl when I do the thing and holds my hand in library armchairs and asks what I need before he tells me what he has.
The road home is four hours. January is six weeks. Spring is when the bear cub goes back and the foxes are released and the world opens up again after winter.
I have never looked forward to spring so much in my life.
MAYA: I'm home.
HOLLY: Safe drive?
MAYA: Perfect.
EMILY: How are you feeling?
MAYA: Like the version of myself I was always supposed to be and just needed the right year to get to.
MADISON: That's the best thing you've ever typed in this chat.
LILY: Did you text him?
MAYA: He was the first text when I pulled in.
CHLOE: And?
MAYA: He said: good girl. Call the editor tomorrow.
AMBER: I love him.
EMILY: We all love him.
HOLLY: Justin asked him about it on Sunday morning. Anthony said and I quote 'it's the best thing that's happened on this mountain and I built most of this mountain.'
MAYA: He did NOT say that.
HOLLY: He said the first part. I added the second for flavor.
MADISON: Still true though.
LILY: She found her person on a mountain road.
MAYA: I did.
MAYA: Because of an elk and a bumper and Holly's complete inability to stay out of things.
HOLLY: You're welcome.
HOLLY: I'm always going to take credit for this.
MAYA: You absolutely should.
EMILY: Same time next month for book club?
MAYA: Same time next month.
MAYA: I might have some travel content to share by then.
CHLOE: The elk calves?
MAYA: The elk calves, the fawn and the foxes eventually… And a cabin in Colorado with good morning light.
MADISON: She just got home and she's already writing about going back.
LILY: That's love.
MAYA: Yeah.
MAYA: I think it is.
HOLLY: Now go call the editor in the morning like he told you.
MAYA: Yes, ma'am.
MADISON: She said yes, ma'am.
MAYA: Goodnight. I love all of you.
HOLLY: We love you back. Always.