Chapter Thirty
Carson
I had been in tight spots before. Guiding trips where lightning storms swept in without warning. Solo treks where a wrong step could send you sliding into a ravine. Nights in tents with winds so strong the fabric snapped like a living thing.
But none of those ranked anywhere near as disorienting as the tension between Sienna and me now.
You’d think after sharing a sleeping bag, after kissing her like a man who’d forgotten restraint existed, after sleeping with her, that things would get easier.
Clearer. That either she or I would say something direct so we could at least categorize whatever this thing was.
But no.
Instead, we cleaned the Polaris ATV behind the lodge like two people who had committed a crime together and were waiting to see who broke first.
She scrubbed the fender with aggressive determination, hair swinging like a metronome of panic. I rinsed the undercarriage and pretended I wasn’t watching her every third second. The distance between us was maybe six feet, but it felt like a charged wire stretched from her to me.
Every time our eyes met, we both looked away.
Every time our arms brushed when passing tools, we froze like startled animals.
Every time she nervously pushed her hair behind her ear, I felt something inside me tip forward.
We hadn’t talked about the tent or the morning after.
Or the admission that slipped from her sisters’ mouths like gossip confetti.
She was avoiding talking about it.
And I was avoiding pushing her.
It was a perfect mess.
“So,” she said suddenly, voice an octave too bright, “we should check tire tread depth. Safety first.”
“Right,” I agreed, turning off the hose. “Good to know.”
Another awkward silence stretched out.
Another sideways glance.
Another near collision of breath and unspoken things.
I tried to focus on the work, tried to be that calm, competent guide I was hired to be, but my brain kept replaying the moment she fell into the lake, and I’d felt something break loose inside me. Something protective and primal and way too close to everything I’d sworn off.
I had gotten too close.
And now I didn’t know how to step back.
The Polaris was soaking, gleaming, and cleaner than it would ever need to be when the lodge’s back door flew open.
“Carson!” Sienna’s mom stepped out holding a basket of perfectly folded towels like a domestic general. She had that purposeful warmth that made people drop their defenses before they knew what happened.
But the way she smiled at me—bright, welcoming, decisive—made every muscle in my body tighten.
She knew something.
“I’m so glad I caught you,” she said, descending the porch steps.
Sienna froze with the sponge mid-scrub. “Mom…”
She ignored her and aimed a loving missile directly at me. “We expect you for Easter dinner tomorrow.”
My brain hiccupped.
“…what?”
“Easter,” she repeated. “Tomorrow. You live here now, so of course you’re joining us. We eat at three.”
I opened my mouth.
Nothing came out.
She continued cheerfully. “Just bring yourself. And an appetite. And maybe a jacket—Beck insists on grilling even when it’s cold. But we’ll have ham, red potatoes, all the good stuff.”
“ I-I don’t…” My chest tightened. Not painfully. Just sharply, in a way I hadn’t felt in a long time. “I don’t really do… holidays.”
My voice faltered because I used to.
I used to love Easter.
When my parents were alive.
My mom would make cinnamon rolls in the morning. My dad would hide eggs even though we were too old for it because he said tradition mattered. My brother and I would pretend not to care, then spend half an hour competing over who found the most.
But after they died, after I spent the first Easter without them, trying to hold my brother together, trying to pretend I wasn’t falling apart, I just… stopped.
By the time my brother built his own family, Easter belonged to them. And I never wanted to intrude. Never wanted to sit at someone else’s table and feel how empty my own was.
Family holidays were a wound I didn’t poke.
Sienna’s mom didn’t know any of that. She just patted my arm warmly. “Three o’clock. Don’t be late.”
Sienna made a noise like she was swallowing a live squirrel. “Mom!”
But the woman was already marching back inside, mission accomplished.
The door closed behind her.
Silence fell.
Sienna slowly set down her sponge. “You… don’t have to come.”
Her voice had a strange tremor of half-embarrassment, half-dread.
I exhaled, rubbing the back of my neck. “I figured.”
“They’re just…my family’s like that. They adopt everyone. You don’t owe them anything.”
“It’s fine.”
“It’s not! You looked like you’d seen a ghost!”
Well.
Close.
Just a ghost of my old life.
“Sienna,” I said, gentler this time, “I’m okay.”
She studied my face, really seeing it now. “You really don’t do holidays. Do you?”
“Not in a long time.”
Her expression softened, and it made my throat tighten again.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I should’ve stepped in. I should’ve stopped her.”
“You didn’t know,” I said. “Besides, your mom is… unstoppable.”
She snorted. “She is.”
“But,” I continued, “I don’t want you thinking I’m avoiding… all of this.”
Her eyes lifted to mine. “All of what?”
“You. Your family. The lodge.” My voice felt too rough, too honest. “I don’t want to step back unless… unless you want me to.”
Something flickered in her expression.
She opened her mouth, but nothing came out, and before she could figure out a reply, the screen door banged open again.
Beck popped his head out and shouted, “Carson! Tomorrow at three! Wear something with buttons!”
Then he vanished.
Sienna closed her eyes. “I hate everything.”
I laughed under my breath. “Your family is… a lot.”
“You have no idea,” she muttered.
“But…” I hesitated. “I’ll come.”
Her head snapped up. “You will?”
“That seems to be the expectation.”
“Carson, you don’t have to.”
“I want to.” The words came out before I knew I meant them.
But I did.
And the way her mouth parted made something warm unfold in my chest.
She took one step closer, barely a breath’s length. “Why?”
I swallowed. “Because I don’t want to pretend what happened didn’t happen. I like you.”
Her breath caught.
But before she could respond, before either of us could take another step into whatever that almost-moment was—
A striped blur slid into the shed.
Barcode.
The zebra trotted directly between us like a four-legged chaperone, swishing her tail judgmentally.
I stared. “Why is she here?”
“She picks locks,” Sienna said wearily. “She’s very accomplished.”
Barcode nosed my pocket. I stepped back. She nosed harder.
“She thinks you have apples,” Sienna explained.
“I don’t.”
“She disagrees.” Sienna shrugged. “Did you know her name is actually Macy?”
I scowled. “Then why the heck do you all call her Barcode?”
“My brothers.”
Barcode shoved her head against my hip, nearly knocking me into a stack of empty flower pots.
Sienna grabbed my arm, and suddenly we were standing close. Her breath mingled with mine, her palm warm on my wrist, her eyes wide and startled.
We didn’t move.
Barcode nudged her pointedly, as if to say, "Excuse me for interrupting your romantic crisis, but my apple schedule waits for no one."
She stumbled forward when the zebra’s head bumped her shoulder.
I caught her waist without thinking.
Her hands landed on my chest.
And just like that, the tension between us snapped back into place like an electrified line.
“Sienna,” I whispered.
Her lips parted. “Carson…”
Barcode let out a loud snort.
We both jumped.
She stepped back quickly, cheeks flushed. “Right. Okay. I’m going to get her back to her enclosure before she starts eating our water filters.”
“I’ll… check the fuel cells,” I said, trying to sound composed.
She tugged lightly on Barcode’s lead rope—where had that even come from?—and somehow managed to coax her forward. She followed her obediently, tail swishing, head high, as though escorting royalty.
Before Sienna rounded the corner, she glanced back at me.
Just a brief, bright flicker of something hopeful.
And I realized as she disappeared with the zebra…
I wasn’t scared of Easter dinner.
I wasn’t scared of the Harpers.
I wasn’t scared of being included.
I was scared because being around Sienna felt like remembering what I’d lost.
And maybe, what I could have again.
If she didn’t run first.
Barcode’s hooves clopped around the corner, fading as Sienna coaxed her back toward her enclosure.
I stood rooted to the spot beside the Polaris, hands still faintly tingling where they’d held her.
The brisk spring air hit the back of my neck, but it didn’t cool anything in me.
If anything, it made everything sharper—the smell of pine sap rising with the sun, the metallic tang of wet mud, the faint echo of Sienna’s laugh lingering in the shed.
I tried to breathe normally.
Didn’t work.
Tried again.
Still didn’t work.
Because somewhere between her mother’s ambush invitation, Sienna’s wide eyes meeting mine, and the ridiculous zebra shoving her head into my ribs, something had become unmistakably clear:
I wasn’t in the shallow end anymore.
I wasn’t even treading water.
I was underwater, holding my breath, hoping she’d come up for air at the same time.
I rubbed a hand across my jaw and forced myself back to the Polaris, but my mind wasn’t on gear or rides.
It was on Sienna’s face when I said I wanted to come to Easter.
The shock.
The warmth.
The fear.
All wrapped together like she didn’t know whether to smile or run.
Back when my parents were still alive, Easter meant crowded tables and loud laughter, my dad trying to fix a wobbly chair, my mom fussing over the roast until the whole house smelled like rosemary.
After they died, I avoided holidays because the quiet felt too big.
Too empty. My brother built a new family, and I stayed out of the way because grief makes you think stepping aside is safer.
I hadn’t stepped into a family holiday in almost a decade.
And somehow, without meaning to, Sienna’s mom had invited me back into something warm and chaotic and communal, something I’d convinced myself I didn’t need anymore.
But I did.
Maybe I did.
And that scared me more than anything.
The sun had shifted, warming one shoulder while the other stayed cool. It was grounding. I needed grounding.
Footsteps crunched behind me.
I didn’t have to turn to know it was her.
“I got her in,” Sienna announced, sounding simultaneously proud and exhausted. “Barcode only stole one glove and a granola bar on the way back.”
I turned. “She took a granola bar?”
“Yeah. The blueberry crumble one, straight from my pocket. Munched the wrapper right off.”
I groaned. “Sounds fitting
She smiled faintly—tiny, crooked, careful. “She has good taste.”
Being near her again felt like stepping into a field of static. Everything hummed. Everything waited.
Sienna brushed a loose strand of hair off her cheek and tried to play it cool, but the twitch was still there—a flick of her knee, a tap of her thumb against her palm, a restlessness that had nothing to do with zebras or gear prep.
“You okay?” I asked quietly.
“What? Yes. Totally. Fine.” She waved a hand. “Great. Wonderful. Loving life.”
“Sienna.”
Her eyes darted to mine, then away. “I’m not… I’m not great at big moments or little ones.”
“This wasn’t a big moment.”
“It was huge,” she hissed. “My mom just Easter-invited you! That’s, like, family-level stuff.”
“Isn’t that the point of Easter?” I tried to joke.
She didn’t laugh.
Instead, she swallowed hard. “I don’t want you to feel obligated. Or cornered. Or like we’re dragging you into something.”
I shook my head. “You’re not dragging me. I said yes because I wanted to.”
She tucked her hands into her back pockets. “Why?”
There it was.
The real question.
Because I want to understand her.
Because I want another chance to look at Sienna without her running away.
Because Sienna’s family scared me in a way that felt good.
Because something about her was making me remember things I thought I’d buried.
Because I want more.
Because I’m terrified of how much more.
None of that would come out right.
So I settled for, “Because… being around you feels like something I don’t want to walk away from yet.”
She stilled, and the wind shifted, pushing the scent of pine between us like a held breath.
“I’m not good at this,” she whispered. “At closeness. Or staying.”
“I know.”
“But I’m trying,” she added, voice quiet and sincere. “Even if I’m… twitchy.”
Her attempt at humor was small, but real.
It pulled something loose in my chest.
I stepped toward her slowly, giving her every chance to move back.
She didn’t.
Her eyes lifted, soft and vulnerable.
“Sienna,” I murmured, “I don’t need perfect. Or clear. Or defined. I just want a chance to figure out whatever this is.”
She inhaled shakily. “Okay.”
It wasn’t a definitive yes.
It wasn’t a straight no.
But it was enough.
And as that tentative, fragile something settled between us again, her mom’s voice echoed faintly from the porch window:
“Don’t forget, Carson! Three O’clock.”
Sienna groaned into her hands.
I laughed, really laughed.
A sound I hadn’t heard from myself in too long.
She peeked at me through her fingers. “Still coming?”
I nodded. “Still coming.”
Her shoulders relaxed just a fraction, and all I could think was that I’m in so much deeper than I realized.
And if she lets me…I won’t climb out.