Chapter Five
Ivy
Jace? You said his name is Jace?” I ask, trying to make my voice firm, but I can feel the weakness behind the words.
My breath feels caught in my throat. My thoughts race.
A slideshow of images passes through my brain: ice skating on a deserted rink, hot chocolate, the warmest of hugs, the ghost of our kiss, the feeling of his hands cupping my jaw.
“Yes, Jace! That’s it!” She pauses, her eyes taking in my distressed state. “Are you all right, dearie? You look like you’ve seen a fake Santa!”
Grey glides alongside me, comforting me as only she can, with a compassionate smile and eyes full of concern. “What do you say we take a walk and get a hot chocolate, huh?”
Numbly, I nod, grateful that my friend has the decency to know I need some frosty air in my lungs before I fall to the floor and shatter like the poor Christmas decoration I just massacred.
“Gladys, will you watch the shop for me? Dad is upstairs. I’ll bring you a croissant!
” Grey doesn’t wait for a response before she pulls us out the door and onto the sidewalk in front of the bookshop.
My dance bag has appeared around her shoulders, and one of her arms is threaded through mine, our bodies moving as a team toward Sparrow’s Beret.
“You don’t have a coat,” I mumble as Grey rushes us onward, no doubt frightened that pausing even for a moment could leave me frozen.
“I’ll be just fine. You, on the other hand . . .” She doesn’t finish the sentence but uses her free hand to open the door. The smell of butter, caramelized sugar, and rich espresso brings an immediate wave of comfort on a visceral level.
Sparrow looks up from the pastry case, her brown hair tied back in a ribbon. Her fringe bangs fall into her eyes as she straightens to greet us, and she lifts a hand to brush them out of the way. Her smile is wide before it drops, no doubt seeing the numb expression etched across my face.
“Ivy’s special version of your French hot chocolate, with extra whipped cream, please. Stat,” Grey says for me.
Sparrow gives a knowing nod, her elegant frame moving quickly to whip up the sweet concoction.
Lily appears from behind the swinging door that leads to the kitchen.
A wooden spoon in one hand is dripping melted chocolate onto the floor, her other hand carrying a tray of pains au chocolat.
The co-owner of Sparrow’s Beret and Sparrow’s ride-or-die friend and defender of all those she loves eyes my stricken face. “Did someone say ‘chocolate’?”
If I weren’t so stunned by the announcement of Jace’s presence in Birch Borough, I’d laugh and grab an iced sugar cookie from the nearby canister. Instead, I grin politely at Lily as she moves toward us, her apron covered in drizzles of chocolate and stretched tight over her expanding stomach.
“How are you feeling, Lily?” Grey asks beside me, one arm still wrapped around my shoulders and the other leaning on the counter between us and my two other closest friends in town.
“Oh, you know. This baby seems intent on two things: shenanigans and chocolate. He—or she—won’t stop moving.
The only time Baby stops jumping on my uterus is when Graham reads to us at night.
It’s not convenient. But I can’t blame this little one.
They clearly already know their daddy is a good one and recognize his kind voice. ”
Her hand, still covered in chocolate, gently rubs her stomach.
The sight pulls at my heartstrings. Lily and her husband, Graham, have been married for over a year and are now expecting their first child.
After a long road back to each other after a breakup, they had a second chance to heal their heartache.
Now, they are about to bring a life into the world.
A decadent hot chocolate with chocolate shavings sprinkled across the top of the whipped cream appears before me. The warmth of it radiates through a ceramic cup with a sparrow design painted on it.
Sparrow, too, has her own love story with Rafe, her French husband.
He calls her his muse as a musician and songwriter.
Currently, he tours across the country throughout the year and works with various artists to make music that plays on the radio or trends on social media.
If I remember correctly, he even has some shows coming up in Europe.
The two of them are madly in love, and it’s their happiness that has kept me believing that true love still exists at all.
I take a sip of the chocolate goodness and let it warm my throat, hoping it warms my soul as well.
“I didn’t think I’d ever see him again. Not really,” I say quietly to Grey next to me.
My hand is resting on the counter. Grey gives it a gentle press to affirm that I’m not alone.
He’s back.
Where has he been for eight years?
Jace and I were never in a relationship.
We couldn’t have had a second-chance romance like Lily and Graham.
We were never fated lovers, refusing to allow anything to keep us apart like Sparrow and Rafe.
But something in me believes that Jace and I missed out on a chance for a deeper connection.
After nearly thirty-four years of loving Christmas more than anything, maybe my reward this season is to see the hand of fate—or serendipity—ease the tension in my chest from so many unanswered questions.
But the news that he’s back in town hurts. And that’s a surprise.
I’m not sure how to feel about seeing the guy who never showed up. The guy who left me standing in the cold for hours, watching and waiting, hoping that if I just gave it one minute more, he’d appear. The next day, I stopped by every shop in town to ask if anyone had seen him.
Once, I thought I would have my own love story, but now I’m not so sure. And after all this time, I’ve realized that I can’t imagine that our one date meant as much to him as it did to me.
∞∞∞
After quieting my shock by sipping hot chocolate at Sparrow’s Beret and eating a gingerbread croissant in lieu of my usual protein bar, I feel ready to find the joy in my life.
Joy, for me, looks a lot like my little students who will soon arrive at my studio.
Grey went back to the bookstore while I proceeded alone to my dance studio, En Pointe.
What would any of my friends do about the situation I’m in, anyway?
Only Grey knows the extent to which Jace affected all other attempts at romance over the past eight years.
He was the measure by which I compared all other men.
A man I met one time has been the standard for first dates.
I shake my head at myself. Somehow, Jace became that important in my head, despite the fact that he stood me up and never spoke to me again.
It’s no wonder that, after all this time and after every effort, nothing has stuck.
I know what it means to be loved fully and yet never feel like you’re fully loved.
Because there are all different kinds of love—the love of a friend, the love of a parent, the love I have for Resin, and the love within a romantic relationship.
That’s the one that has only ever felt one-sided.
Maybe it was my perfectionism that annihilated any chance at romance before I could fully grasp it.
Maybe my individualism has repelled men.
I’ll admit I’m constantly dreaming, always wanting to be better than I am right now.
And I struggle with believing that I’m not a failure.
Unlocking the door to my studio, I flip on the lights and adjust the heater to warm the space, my thoughts distracted by this unexpected situation.
Oh, sure, there were times—years, even—during which I was convinced that I would end up with someone—someone like Dmitri—only to be jolted to reality by the revelation that what I perceived as affection was someone else’s version of a placeholder until something better came along.
Objectively, I know that I’m worth the effort to hold on to, but experience tells me no one will be capable of it.
It’s hard to see other people moving on.
I see Sparrow and Lily living their best lives with their husbands, and I hear talk of families starting all around town.
Grey isn’t tied down, but her heart is also not free.
It’s clear to us all that she’s been in love with her best guy friend, Boston, since they met at literary camp when they were teens.
Even she can’t understand the depths of the loneliness I sometimes feel.
It creeps in at the edges, whispering that while I’ve wanted to dance with someone throughout the journey of life, it’s been pointless to hope for a partner.
From the depths of my dance bag, I pull out my slippers and slide them on, the pointe shoes so worn they are merely an extension of my foot.
The thing about being a dancer is that I understand all too well the power of partnership.
With the right person, I can spin faster and literally fly through the air.
I can do things I never thought possible when I trust that someone can catch me.
It’s exhilarating, and it’s frightening.
Dancing in partnership brings a rush of adrenaline that has, so far, been unmatched.
That feeling ends on the dance floor. With my ballet slippers on and my hair pulled up, I adjust my dance sweater and leggings.
I move to warm up at the barre. When I think of an anchor for life, the barre is it.
The simple wooden contraption adhered to the wall is the thing I return to time and time again, never feeling disappointed.
I’ve had some of my best moments at this very barre.