32. Michelle
Chapter 32
Michelle
I normally like Thanksgiving. Normally.
“You’re a Grinch,” Sara says, waving a floppy piece of ham my way.
I bat it away.
“The Grinch doesn’t like Christmas , Sara. Wrong holiday.”
Dad chuckles from the corner of the kitchen, mixing gravy. “I bet he loves Thanksgiving actually. Because it’s not Christmas.”
“Or,” Sara offers, dangling the ham piece down to Rocket, who jumps to snap it up, “he hates Thanksgiving because it’s the last holiday before Christmas. He knows it’s coming. It’s like the day before school. Nobody likes the day before school.”
My dad and I exchange a look, then both shrug.
“Good point, honey,” he says with a twitching smile.
I didn’t realize I’d missed these conversations with my family. It’s been years since we’ve spent this much time together. I always spent holidays with Allen’s family.
Thanksgiving was always Mom’s favorite holiday. There were turkey-themed plates and thick cotton napkins with little autumn leaves. A cornucopia sat in the middle of the dining room table, overflowing with fruit. And the turkey was always burned. I tried many times to make my own. Hours and hours. Years and years. But at a certain point, it was a beloved tradition to have terrible turkey.
Once I was married, my traditions with Allen became quiet Thanksgivings. Dishes with neat garnishes instead of hefty butter. Polite politics and no dessert. It’s like I’ve taken steps back into childhood, like the last five years didn’t exist.
Sara didn’t make it out the last year either. She couldn’t afford the plane ticket across the country. I wish we had now. Dad is smiling again. I wonder if having his daughters close is the thing he’s most thankful for. Everything is different now, yet the same.
“This looks so good,” Sara says, dipping her finger in the gravy.
At that moment, Lisa storms into the kitchen and shoos her away. Sara, Dad, and I aren’t cooks. Lisa, however, is spearheading Thanksgiving almost as well as some project managers at my company. They should consider hiring her.
“Touch nothing, dear,” Lisa snaps.
George pokes his head in, flashing my dad a raised eyebrow.
Dad stiffly nods in understanding. “How can we help?” he offers.
Smart man, my dad.
“Lars is bringing deviled eggs.” Lisa crosses to the oven, pulling out a green bean casserole. “Carol is bringing potato salad. The girls … well, normally, Emily makes a boxed brownie recipe that Cliff hates,” she says with a chuckle.
Cliff.
My palms shake every time I pass the back door. I know he’ll be walking in at any moment, and after last night, I’m even more on edge than I should be. I can’t endure another night at his house.
Even in the short time I’ve known Emily and Brittany, it feels wrong that the girls aren’t here for a holiday. It’s only been twenty-four hours since one of them ran through my kitchen and stole a banana or a cup of coffee, but I’m already missing the patter of little shoes and snapping of sneaker shoelaces.
“Who’s bringing the burned turkey?” Sara asks with a teasing grin.
“Burned? Lord, no. Cliff is in charge of the turkey,” Lisa says. “And last year, it was the best damn turkey I’d ever eaten. Even your mother didn’t mind sacrificing tradition.”
Leave it to Cliff to conquer the hardest item on the menu. And for my mom to accept it.
I take the last few dishes into the dining room. We installed the table’s center leaf to gain extra room. With the inn guests joining and too many people in Copper Run, we needed as much space as we could get. It’s already crowded and stuffy in the house, but everyone seems too distracted by the TV and Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade to care.
“Oh my God, is that the Backstreet Boys?” Sara says, scrambling to the coffee table and clicking the remote.
The volume grows louder with sounds of the boy band singing. I smile to myself. It’s windy in New York—more than usual—and everyone is bundled in coats and hats. But I know Brittany is jumping with joy to see them anyway.
“Hey now, look at that turkey!”
I turn at the sound of George’s impressed voice. His arms are outstretched as he approaches the dining room threshold. Standing in the doorway with a tinfoil-covered pan is Cliff.
He looks so undeniably Cliff . His jaw is freshly shaven. His hair is a little more windswept, forcing small strands onto his forehead and the little hidden specks of gray along his temple to peep out. His heavy jacket is pulled over a yellow-and-orange sweater, and that ever-familiar grin pulls up one side of his mouth.
Lisa takes the turkey from him, and I stare as Cliff shucks off his coat. His broad baker’s shoulders fill out the sweater so well. He pushes up the sleeves. His strong, veiny forearm leads down to his watch-covered wrist and long fingers with that faded burn on the back of his hand.
I finally look back up, and his blue eyes are already locked on mine. My feet won’t budge, and my heart is only racing faster.
“Hey, Michelle,” he says. It’s stiff. Unfamiliar. His forced smile is even worse.
“How are the girls?”
“They called me this morning. Brittany was very excited about the parade.” Cliff breaks our stare, looking beyond me at the TV. His smile fades.
More people filter in until, eventually, Cliff stands in the corner with Lars, hands tucked in his pockets as they discuss news or maybe the parade or something. I feel so small, so insignificant, being so far away from him.
Lisa claps her hands. “Everyone ready?”
There’s a humming assent and additional claps.
“Shells, mind turning off the TV?” Dad asks.
I do, but I don’t miss Cliff’s face falling when it clicks off. I wonder if he was hoping to see his daughters. I almost turn it on again, but Sara steals the remote and pushes me toward the table. She pulls out a chair and sits me right next to Cliff.
He side-eyes me with a wry smile, shifting in his seat uncomfortably.
“Hey,” I whisper.
“Hey.” He smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. The fan of wrinkles doesn’t crease even a little. His words are cordial. Nice.
We dig into the food, passing around small dishes between conversation—though none between Cliff and me.
I’m quiet. I’ve always been quieter in crowds, but I watch Cliff carry seamless discussions about sports or books because that’s the man he is. I wish I were half as approachable.
I stare as his lips press against his water glass. I admire the bob in his throat when he swallows. He laughs at something someone said, and his casual smile shows slivers of his white teeth.
I inhale and exhale.
“Have you ever been to the parade? Shelly?”
I look up at the sound of Lars’s voice. Half the table is staring at me. Heat travels from my chest up to my throat. There’s no way my face isn’t beet red. My dad has his fork half raised to his mouth.
“Oh,” I answer. “No. I live in Seattle, not New York.”
“And are you excited to go back to the city?” George interjects.
I hesitate, and I can’t help but steal another look at Cliff. His jaw is set as he stares down at his fork full of mashed potatoes, as if waiting for my answer. But he won’t look at me.
Irritation spreads through my chest and down to my fingers.
Why the hell won’t he look at me?
I smile with pretend pride. “Yes,” I answer. “Of course.”
“Wow. It must be a great life there,” Lars marvels.
“It is. I love it there.”
“You would never know it though,” Sara chimes in. “She’s a natural at running this place.”
George raises his wineglass. “Hear, hear!”
I manage a weak, affirming laugh. But it drifts apart to nothing when Cliff also politely raises his glass.
My heart stops as he finally looks at me—finally gives me a smile, one that isn’t entirely forced, but maybe sad—before drinking his water, then setting it back down.
And that’s all the acknowledgment I get from him. Of course it is. Because I did what I always do. I tried to hold everyone in my life with a tight, ruling fist. I can do that at work—it’s why I’m great at what I do. It’s why I love it. But I can’t control someone like Cliff. He’s the least influenceable person in the world.
How could he, at any point, think I don’t have feelings for him?
I have feelings.
Happiness.
Longing.
Frustration.
The tightness in my chest is so all-consuming that it feels like I’m getting shoved deeper and deeper into a six-foot grave I dug for myself.
Oh, I have feelings for him all right.
I have?—
The next thought makes me freeze.
I think I might be in l ?—
The whole room shifts, and I’m a little dizzy. My fork clatters to my plate, and the lump in my throat is so heavy that I feel like I might choke.
Sara’s hand touches my forearm. “Shells, you okay?” she whispers.
Beside me, Cliff’s eyebrows tilt inward. His lips part. I jerk my eyes back to my plate with untouched cranberry sauce and potato salad.
“I’m fine,” I murmur.
I grip my skirt in my fists as conversation passes in the blink of an eye. I don’t know when lunch transforms to the late afternoon, but eventually, I rise from the table to put out dessert.
Apple crumble cake, chocolate-filled croissants, and pecan pie. Cinnamon rolls oozing with icing. Pumpkin cheesecake. Only one person could have baked all this.
I find Cliff staring as he crosses the living room with a cup of coffee in his hand. He laughs with my dad, then Lisa and George, and the guests. His blue eyes sparkle when he finds something extra funny, and the smile reaches the little crinkles beside his eyes. Other people laugh with him, like he’s a battery of energy for everyone here.
I grit my teeth and curl my lips in. My chest tightens. My fists clench.
And all at once, I know it as clear as day.
I love him.
I love him .
Sarcastic, floppy-haired Clifford Burke.
I love the man that I— damn it —set up with my sister . The man who told me he’s sorting through his feelings for me, and I was too stubborn to address them. The man who called me in a panic when he lost his girls. The man who depended on me, who gave me a bed under his roof, even when we hadn’t talked for days.
I love this man.
I pinch my eyes closed. And instead of feeling elated—I’m in love —I’m angry. I don’t know if it’s with myself or him. For making me fall in love with him so suddenly that I realize it on Thanksgiving , of all times. I figure out I love this stupid man when he packs away the remainder of the turkey into Tupperware containers and slides them into the inn’s fridge, taking none for himself because, damn it, he’s a good guy.
I’m in love with a good guy .
I’m seething in the corner as he hugs my dad and my sister goodbye. I grit my teeth when he walks over, tensing his jaw and reluctantly pulling me into a hug.
He’s warm. He smells like baked bread and vanilla and cinnamon, but underneath all that is the citrus. The real Cliff that I know. Me. Not anyone else.
I’m so angry that I could be split from the inside out, and when he lets go quicker than he did for anyone else, it only infuriates me more.
I stare as Cliff leaves through the back door. I watch with narrowed eyes as the chill from outside winds through the kitchen, sending goose bumps over my skin. I focus on the blinds as they snap shut on the glass when he closes the door.
I stand there for too long, focusing on the bare trees outside. The dead grass.
I should probably give Cliff space. Let him heal from my own mistakes.
But I’ve never been that kind of woman.
So, I pass by Sara, rip open the back door without a jacket or a care, and storm my way through the setting sun, right over to Cliff’s house.