Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Sundays in Mapleford were usually quiet. This one was no exception.
Snow clung to rooftops, a light covering which muffled the world into quiet, lying there like powdered sugar on a sponge cake. The church bells chimed at nine as they always did, and the Mapleford Diner hummed steadily like a warm engine at the heart of town.
Which is what it always had been, unofficially.
Noah pushed through the glass door, greeted by the holy trinity of diner smells—coffee, butter, and blueberry pancakes.
“Morning, Noah!” Janette called from the counter. “You want your usual?”
“Yep,” he said. “And an extra coffee to go for Elsie. She’ll pretend she doesn’t want it, but we both know better, right?”
“Already brewing,” she replied with a smile.
He slid into a booth near the windows, shrugged out of his coat, and glanced at his phone, not because he was waiting for anything but because he was absolutely waiting for something and trying very hard not to be obvious about it.
No messages from Eli.
Why would he message you? He’s working with Aileen. He said he’ll help—what more do you want?
Noah didn’t want to answer that particular question, and it didn’t stop him from staring at the blank notifications like an idiot.
Elsie Moran breezed in, wearing a sweater splattered with paint, a scarf big enough to double as a blanket, and the kind of energy only an elementary school art teacher could maintain on a Sunday.
“There you are,” she said, dropping into the seat across from him. She leaned back with a sigh. “If one more seven-year-old glues their fingers to a lantern jar, I’m going to start drinking.”
“You teach elementary art,” Noah said. “I assumed that came with the job.”
“Only on parent–teacher conference nights.” She opened the menu, even though Noah knew she always ordered the same thing. She squinted at him. “What’s up with you?”
“Nothing,” Noah said too quickly.
Elsie huffed. “Yeah right. Your face is doing the thing.”
“I don’t have a thing.”
She snorted. “Are you kidding? You have so many things, you should come with a glossary.”
Janette brought over their coffees—one black, one with caramel syrup and whipped cream. That was for Elsie, who insisted she drank it “for the kids”.
She took a sip, then stared at him. “All right, spill it. I haven’t seen you this twitchy since you tried to build your ‘structurally sound’ gingerbread gazebo.”
“That gazebo was—”
“Held together with hope and frosting. But back to you.” She leaned in. “Is it because of the bakery guy? Aileen’s brother, Eli?”
Noah inhaled wrong and choked on his coffee.
Elsie leaned across and slapped his shoulder. “You okay, champ?”
“Fine,” he wheezed. “How do you even—?”
“This town has fewer secrets than a kindergarten cubby.” She sagged against the back of the bench.
“And while I knew Aileen in high school, I don’t recall much about her little brother, apart from his name and that he was into art.
” She straightened. “Okay, let’s start with Home Depot.
You were seen. With him. Holding hands.”
“It wasn’t like that,” he protested.
“People also saw you standing too close at the bakery yesterday.”
“We weren’t—”
“Don’t even think about lying. One of those people was me. And Janette said you’ve been staring at your phone for the last five minutes like you’re manifesting a text message.”
“Janette,” Noah called out, glaring at her, “betrayal hurts most when it comes from family.”
That earned him an eye roll before Janette went back to serving another customer.
“She’s not your family,” Elsie said with a smile.
“Excuse me? This diner raised me.”
She laughed so loud two old men at the counter glanced over with obvious disapproval.
“So?” she asked. “Do you like him?”
Noah hesitated. He hadn’t admitted it out loud yet—not to himself, not even in the privacy of his thoughts.
He’d replayed their Home Depot meeting at least fifty times.
The warmth of Eli’s hand. The sly teasing.
The way Eli had walked away with a faint smile, almost as if the moment had surprised him too.
“I don’t know him,” Noah said.
“But you want to,” Elsie pressed.
Noah stared into his coffee. “Yeah,” he murmured. “I do.”
Elsie softened instantly. “Oh, buddy.”
“It’s—” Noah scrubbed a hand through his hair. “It’s been a while.”
“I know.”
“I haven’t felt this spark about someone since—”
“I know,” she said again, more gently this time.
Noah’s stomach tightened. Although he’d dated occasionally during the two years since Tyler’s exit, none of it ever stuck. He’d convinced himself he was fine. Busy. Content.
Then Eli Winters walked into Home Depot and held his damn hand as though it was nothing and something, all at the same time.
“I feel stupid,” Noah said quietly. “It was one weird moment. He’s probably forgotten it already.”
Elsie studied him. “Do you forget things that matter?”
“No,” Noah admitted.
“So why assume he does?”
Because people leave.
Because he didn’t want something he had no right to expect.
Elsie nudged him. “You signed him up to help with the Festival, right? I mean, I would’ve, if it had been me.”
“He’s helping with the lights tomorrow. Aileen roped him into volunteering.”
Nothing ever changed in Mapleford. Aileen had been bossy in high school too.
“Mmm.” Elsie cocked her head. “So you get to spend the whole day with him.”
“I mean—not the whole day—”
“Don’t be dense. You’re pairing yourselves off the moment he arrives.”
Noah stared into his coffee again. “Do you think I’m reading too much into it?”
Elsie gave him that exasperated look he swore she reserved for shy children and emotionally constipated adults. “Noah, you don’t do casual attraction. You do capital-M Meaningful. If you’re feeling something, it’s real.”
He swallowed hard.
“And besides,” she continued, “he looked at you like you were a surprise he wasn’t expecting but didn’t hate.”
Noah laughed. “That’s weirdly accurate.”
“It’s my job to observe,” she said smugly. “And also to meddle. Speaking of—lantern workshop. Tonight at six. You in?”
“Of course,” he said. “Kids can’t glue their fingers to jars unsupervised.”
“Exactly.” She sipped her coffee. “Anyway, I’m excited to meet your bakery boy properly.”
Noah choked again. “He’s not my—”
“He could be.”
He froze.
Elsie’s voice dropped a little. “Don’t be scared.”
His heart thudded. “I’m not—”
“You are,” she said. “But that’s okay. You deserve something good. Something new.”
He stared down at his hands.
It felt as if someone had opened a door inside him he wasn’t ready to walk through, but God, he wanted to.
I want it to be tomorrow already, so I can see Eli’s face in the morning light. I want to hear him say something sarcastic about tangled lights.
What he wanted most was to feel that brush of electricity again.
But do I deserve all that?
Elsie nudged his foot under the table. “Noah Carter.”
“Yeah?”
“Whatever happens tomorrow, don’t freak out.”
“Define ‘freak out.’”
“Don’t overthink. Don’t self-sabotage. Don’t hide behind work. And for the love of Christmas, do not run away.”
Noah huffed. “Okay, but that was a lot of instructions. Not sure I can remember them all.”
“Try.” Elsie grinned. “I believe in you.”
Noah tried to laugh it off, to swallow the nerves knotting under his ribs, but the truth—the real truth—pushed its way up through the noise.
“I really hope he shows up,” he confessed.
Elsie smiled. “I think he will.”
“I hope so,” Noah repeated.
“Why?”
Noah considered, his heart stumbling over the answer.
“Because,” he said finally, “when he looked at me, I felt something I haven’t felt in a long time. And if he shows up tomorrow—”
“You get to feel it again,” Elsie finished.
He nodded.
She squeezed his hand. “Then he’ll show.”
From your lips to God’s ears.
That evening’s lantern workshop was, predictably, chaos.
Kids shouted for more tissue paper. Someone spilled glitter on the gym floor, and while Elsie looked pissed, she also looked resigned. A six-year-old glued two jars together and proudly declared it “a friendship lantern,” which nearly made Noah cry.
I freakin’ love this town. He loved what he did. And for the first time in years, he wondered whether he could love something more.
Someone.
He hadn’t let himself want that for a long time, but right then under the warm gym lights, he felt the faint stirring of hope.
Tomorrow, Eli would show up at the community center.
I’ll see him again. I want to hear him laugh. And maybe, just maybe, Noah would brush hands with him.
Totally by accident, of course.
If luck was on his side, he’d see that spark in Eli’s eyes again.
Someone tugged at his sleeve, and he glanced down, breaking into a huge smile when he saw Jimmy Melkin’s star-shaped lantern. “Hey, that’s awesome.”
The eight-year-old’s face glowed with pride. “It’s for my mom. I wanna make sure she sees it in the parade.”
“She’ll love it,” Noah assured him. Jimmy’s dad had passed the previous year in a road accident, and the town had pulled together to make sure his widow and little boy lacked for nothing.
“Okay, you can go,” Elsie announced, appearing at his side. “You’ve done your duty.” She smirked. “And you have the glitter in your hair to prove it.”
He groaned. “You’re telling me now?”
Her eyes sparkled. “But you look so cute.”
Noah grabbed his jacket and headed for the door, accompanied by a drawn-out chorus of “Bye, Noah,” from several kids. Outside, a fresh layer of snow had fallen, and he trudged home through it, his breath fogging the air, his heart drumming too fast.
What if this time is different?
What if letting someone in doesn’t break me?
What if Eli Winters is the beginning of something, not the end?
Warmth settled in his chest.
Instead of going home, he went to his workshop, turned on one small lamp, and cleaned the workbench for the fourth time that week.
He wanted everything to look good, in case he had a visitor.
The man who’d held his hand in a hardware store like it was nothing—and made Noah feel everything.