Epilogue
Harper
One Year Later
The mountain air smells like fresh pine and sawdust — my new favorite scent combination.
I step over a stack of lumber and into the open main room of the new cabin, the late-afternoon sun pouring through the huge picture window Ethan insisted on.
The frame isn’t fully trimmed yet, but the view is already breathtaking with rolling evergreens.
You can see the distant glimmer of Cady Springs below, and the ridge where Ethan’s grandfather once stood and decided to build a life. Now we’re building ours.
Ethan’s boots thud softly behind me. “Careful with that board,” he says, nodding at the slightly wobbly plank bridging the unfinished section of floor. “It’s not secured yet.”
“I know,” I say, even though I absolutely did not know. I shuffle to safer ground, and he shakes his head fondly.
He’s wearing his usual winter flannel, sleeves pushed up, sawdust clinging to his forearms. His hair is a little longer, his beard a little thicker, and his eyes — those impossible, quiet-green eyes — still look at me like I’m the best part of his every day.
“This room is huge,” I say, turning a slow circle. “I didn’t realize until just now.”
“That’s because the walls finally went up.” He steps beside me, folding his arms as he surveys the space. “It’ll fit whatever we need. Big kitchen, big fireplace, room for a long table. Plenty of space for holiday craziness.”
I elbow lightly into his side. “You mean the craziness caused by your hoarding habit?”
He clears his throat. “I don’t hoard.”
“You saved a used napkin from last night’s dinner, Ethan.”
He grunts. “It wasn’t used. It was … lightly creased.”
I laugh and he tries to look grumpy, but the corner of his mouth betrays him.
We wander through the frame of what will be our bedroom, then the study, then the little nook he wants to turn into a reading corner for me. I already have the perfect shelf in mind for my snow globes.
When we step onto the future front porch, sunlight catches the ring on my finger.
I still stare at it sometimes, startled that something so small can hold so much meaning — a year’s worth of love, fights about napkins, stolen kisses in grocery aisles, late-night plans, quiet mornings, and a thousand little ways he shows me he’s mine and I’m his.
Ethan stands beside me, hands on his hips, surveying the land like he can see the generations before us walking the ridge.
“You really did it,” I say softly. “You kept it.”
He nods once. “We kept it.”
For years, I captured memories in glass because I was afraid of losing the real ones. Now I live in moments I never want to trap behind anything — moments like this, out in the open, filling me to the brim.
“What are you thinking?” he asks, curling an arm around my waist.
“That next Christmas is going to look incredible here.”
His chin brushes the top of my head. “Next Christmas it will be a mountain palace.”
“With heat,” I add.
“And maybe a dog.”
I tilt my face up. “A dog?”
He shrugs. “Figured we could use something that barks when I’m not around.”
I smile. “I like that idea.”
Ethan turns me toward him, hands sliding to my hips. “What about … a future here? A family. Kids running around. Holidays that aren’t staged by the mayor.”
“I want all of that,” I say.
He lowers his forehead to mine. “Good. Because I’m building this place with space for everything we’re going to need.”
Sawdust floats between us in the fading light, and he kisses me. It’s soft and sure, reminding me of the way he did the day he proposed. But it’s deeper now, colored by a year of loving each other for real. When he pulls back, I’m smiling too wide to hide it.
“Come on,” he says, lacing our fingers. “Let’s go home.”
The old cabin waits down the trail — the one we’ll keep for guests and memories — but this place, this rising frame of timber and promise? This is our home in the making. Our real beginning.
As we walk hand-in-hand down the ridge, snowflakes drifting around us, I realize it’s a miracle how things happened. Neither of us were looking for this. He certainly didn’t want a bride for Christmas. Poor guy had no idea he would be bought by a girl who makes wishes and memories in glass.