Danielle
“I knew giving you our address was a bad idea,” Ainsley says. There’s no malice in it, and she looks a bit like a zookeeper as Sokka and Roscoe mill about the room behind her.
She leans against the door frame, raising a brow.
“I just. I need some advice, and didn’t know where or who else to go to, I guess. ”
“Is Erick at work?” Ainsley says, raising a brow.
Danielle shakes her head. He had taken Harper to lunch and then to the movies.
“Erick is not only the last person I would go to for relationship advice, but he’s also the wrong gender, and probably in love with me. This isn’t something you ask a guy. Andrew isn’t here, is he?”
“He just left for the rink with Jamie,” Ainsley says, soft smile turning into a full-on grin now. “He finally convinced him to get back on the ice.”
“Probably for the best, since he’s leaving in a couple of weeks.”
Ainsley must hear something in her voice because her gaze softens just a fraction before she steps aside.
“Come in,” she says, gesturing inside, “they shouldn’t be home for a at least two hours.”
Danielle returns her smile, grateful, and steps through the front door into the mansion that, two years ago, she would have killed to live in. Would have killed to have been with the man who built it for his family, but now she’s just walking into a friend’s house.
Sometimes she finds her past resentment for Ainsley hard to believe .
Now, she just thinks that it was all wasted time when she could have had a camaraderie and friendship with the woman standing in front of her, starting a pot of coffee.
She had everything that Danielle had thought she wanted. Jet, the house, his love… and now she’s lived and lost more than she could have ever imagined. She’s grieved and part of her always will, but she wants to live, too.
She’s also experiencing the bone-crush of falling in love for herself.
What she had thought she had felt all those years ago for Jet is nothing compared to this.
The miracle of liking someone, and knowing that they like you too. How rare it is, how beautiful it is. She wants to keep it in her heart and treasure it forever. Save Andrew’s secret smiles for her alone.
“I think Andy wants to try a relationship,” Danielle says, “for real, for real.”
“That is brand new information,” Ainsley says, setting two mugs on the counter as Danielle sits, resting her elbows on the smooth surface. Fall air is coming to Lake Placid, and Danielle can’t say she doesn’t love the feelings that come with Autumn in the mountains .
“I never would have guessed by how many times he’s been on my couch, whining like a lovesick teenager while Jamie pets his hair and tries to soothe him,” Ainsley adds, grinning. “You should see it, it’s pretty funny.”
“I think men are just as bad as we are,” Danielle says, looking down at the counter, “they just try to hide it. Because society.”
“Society,” Ainsley says, rolling her eyes. “How are you feeling about it?”
“I mean, I knew it was coming,” Danielle says, resting her elbows on the counter, “but I don’t know what to do. He brought it up at the lake the other day and I kind of just.. brushed it off? He didn’t ask me to respond and we were a little busy.”
“Jamie thought you were getting a fever with how flushed you were when you came back,” Ainsley says, grinning. “Can Andy kiss as good as I think he can?”
Danielle’s eyes cut to Ainsley, face heating.
“Oh, come on,” Ainsley says, “don’t deny me. Andy is a man who looks like he knows what he’s doing. Jamie and I have learned almost everything together. ”
“Andy is probably better than what you can imagine.” Danielle says, covering her face with her hands in embarrassment.
“I knew it!” Ainsley says, grinning. She sets out two mugs and grabbing packets of hot chocolate powder. She pours them into the cups, then pours hot coffee over them. “Do you like him?”
“I’ve liked him since he walked through the door of the bookshop,” Danielle says. “He’s everything I’ve ever wanted.”
“I’m going to ask you something, and you can’t get mad because I think this is why you’re hesitating,” Ainsley says, sliding her a cup of coffee. “If Emerson was still here, would you be waiting, or would you have taken the jump already?”
This girl, a former mortal enemy, has pinned her down so fast it almost gives Danielle whiplash.
Because isn’t that what’s been holding her back the entire time?
Isn’t that what made her go to the cemetery the morning before the lake?
So that she could have some sort of clear conscience before she decided if she should go for it?
Isn’t that what had frozen the words in her throat when Andy had said he liked her ?
Even though he’d never pressured her for a response to him confessing feelings and went back to work with her like nothing happened out of respect for her? When he’s been there waiting for her to sort out everything in her head, and had all but promised he isn’t going anywhere.
Emerson was gone, had only been gone for two months, and Danielle is already moving on, making a daughter out of Harper and a family with Andrew and how is that fair?
How is it fair for her to keep moving forward when Emerson is gone and will miss so much of Danielle’s life when they had shared all of it? How is it fair for Danielle to be happy, to feel the heart-racing, earth shaking kind of love that Andrew is so ready to hand her?
“It’s not fair,” she whispers, sipping her coffee, “it’s not fair that I’m here and she’s gone.”
“It’s not,” Ainsley says, nodding. “It’s not fair, and I know that it’s painful, and I’m not going to sit here and try to tell you what she would have wanted because that’s not helpful. I’m also not going to sit here and tell you that your pain isn’t totally, one hundred percent valid. ”
“Then what’s the point of me even being here?” Danielle asks, trying for a joke to lighten the heaviness that is suddenly filling the air.
“You needed a friend,” Ainsley says, simply.
“And as a friend, I’m going to tell you that you can’t let your pain stop you from living your life.
You have to figure out how to balance the grief, and the happiness that will keep coming.
Sometimes grief comes in waves, sometimes it feels like gentle spring rain.
But it’ll always be there. What matters is what you do with it. ”
“Is that how you and Jet did it when Coach Thompson died?”
“That’s how we’re all still doing it,” Ainsley says, wrapping her hands around her mug.
“There are always moments when we look around and think that he should be here, that he should be experiencing this life with us. There are times when Jet can only hold onto me, he’ll miss him so bad.
But we don’t hide it, we aren’t ashamed of it.
We just take our feelings at that moment, speak them into open air, and then continue to live. ”
Danielle stirs her spoon around her mug, watching as the coffee swirls around, a small cyclone, a symbol of her life .
“I just feel so guilty,” Danielle says, “like it’s not okay for me to even entertain wanting a life with Andy when everything still feels so fresh. I still wait for her to call me on her way home from work. And every time she doesn’t, I’m reminded that she’s gone.”
Ainsley sets a comforting hand on her wrist. “We all deserve joy, even in pain. It might not feel that way, but it’s true. There’s always light that shines through the darkness. Andy might just be yours.”
“Aunt D,” Harper says as Danielle tucks her in that night. She looks serious, and when Harper is serious, Danielle knows to pay attention.
So, she sits at the edge of Harper’s bed while she pulls the blankets up. Harper reaches for her stuffed dog, a favorite as of late, and plays with its ears.
“What’s up, Sparrow?” she asks, brushing Harper’s hair out of her eyes.
“Do you like Andy?”
She’s not sure how she should answer, so she picks the safest way. “Of course, I like Andy. Why wouldn’t I like him? ”
“No, Aunt D, do you like Andy?” she asks, with a huff. “Because he likes you, and I like him. I think he’s good for you.”
Danielle has to laugh at that. “Why do you think he’s good for me, wise one?”
“He makes you smile,” Harper says, “and he brings you places. He’s nice, and he holds the door open for you when you get in his truck. He does all the things dad used to do for mama, just for you.”
“You’ve thought a lot about this, haven’t you?” Danielle says, blinking her eyes to stop their burning.
“Only every day since I met him,” Harper says with a shrug. “He likes you.”
“How do you know?”
“I asked him,” Harper says with a shrug, looking back at her stuffed dog. “All you have to do is ask a question you want an answer to.”
“I wish it stayed that simple,” Danielle says with a smile.
“If you like him, you should say so,” Harper says, turning on her side. She hugs her dog to her chest and closes her eyes. “I like him.”
“You’ve said,” Danielle says, raising a brow .
Danielle runs her hand over Harper’s head gently, not moving as she watches her breathing slow. She hates that growing up takes simplicity out of life, complicates things beyond recognition.
She stands with a sigh, flipping Harper’s nightlight on as she closes the door, phone buzzing in her pocket.
Andy: I’m on my way over
Danielle: now?
Andy: if I don’t come now I never will
Danielle: title of your sex tape
Andy: okay, Jake Peralta
Danielle leaves the front door open, screen door protecting them from the summer bugs that swarm her porch light. One thing about living in the mountains, you’re going to get mosquitos no matter what you do to combat them.
It doesn’t take long for Andy to show up and knock on the door three times. She takes a breath, stands up, and heads down the hallway, only to see that Andy has retreated back down the porch steps and is pacing back and forth on the path .
“Hey,” she says, stepping outside. She rubs her hands up and down her arms against the chill of the night.
He stops where he is, looking at her like a man starved, like they hadn’t just spent the day at the bookshop together, like if he doesn’t look now he might never get the chance again.
“Hey,” he says. He looks down at the ground and lets out a breath. “I’m sorry.”
“What are you sorry for?”
“I get ahead of myself,” he says, not looking at her. “When I do relationships, or want one, I tend to jump in head first and not really look around before I do. I said a lot to you at the lake the other day, and I think it scared you, and I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to do that.”
“You didn’t,” Danielle says, shaking her head. “It takes a lot more than honesty to scare me off.”
“I know it’s not a good time,” he says, shaking a head and running a nervous hand through his hair as he starts pacing again. “I shouldn’t have said anything, and I’m sorry. I just didn’t know what to do with all these… feelings . ”
Danielle needs him to stop moving, but she doesn’t think he can.
She walks down the porch steps as he turns back towards her, and she grabs his elbow as he passes her, pulling him to a stop.
“Andy,” she says. He turns to face her and she takes his hands in hers. They’re shaking, and she can feel the thundering of his pulse against the skin of his wrist. “Breathe. In for seven, out for seven.”
His eyes meet hers, and he closes them, breathing slow as she counts quietly.
“Good?” she asks, after several repetitions of the cycle.
He opens his eyes. “Good.”
“You didn’t scare me off,” she repeats, shaking her head at this idiot man with his big feelings and heart on a silver platter for her.
“I had to think for a minute. It’s a lot, Andy.
We’ve only known each other for two months and I’ve been grieving the entire time.
You’re asking me to take a jump that I didn’t know if I was ready for. ”
“Did you?’
“Did I what?”
“Think? ”
“I did,” Danielle says, squeezing his hands softly. “And I talked to Harper.”
“She’s a good sounding board,” Andy says, nodding with half a smile, “even when she calls you out on your BS. What did she say?”
“She said,” Danielle swallows hard, “that you treat me the same way Jack treated Emerson, and that you’re good for me.”
“She told me that you need a little bit of fun in your life,” Andy teases, taking a step closer to her. His breath quickens again, but this time it isn’t because he’s anxious.
“Of course, she did,” Danielle says, rolling her eyes. “She said she’s okay with it.”
“She did?” Andy asks. He’s breathing as if he’s run a marathon to get to her, and she feels like her heart could explode it’s beating so fast in her chest.
“I’m a bit of a mess, and I’m trying to work through something monumental. You’ll be taking on me, and a first grader, and I don’t even know how going back and forth between New York and North Carolina is going to work.”
He looks up at her, eyes shining with hope .
“I’m not saying it’s going to be easy,” Andrew says, staring directly into her eyes.
“When have our lives been that way? It’s going to be hard.
I know it is. It’s going to be back and forth, New York, North Carolina, halfway across the country and back again…
my schedule is going to be packed, and I don’t know how often I’ll get to see you. ”
He pulls her to him gently, and she looks anywhere but at his eyes, so clear and honest, to steady herself. Steady her breathing as he continues.
“I do know that if you can make it through your grief and being a mom, and I can make it through public evisceration and anxiety, we can do this. We can do this, Dani, and it would be so worth it. I love you, and I love Harper, and I have never in my life wanted something as badly as the family we’ve started to create. Please, say you want it too.”
“I do, Andy,” she whispers, looking up at him. “I want it so bad. I want you so bad.”
“Be my family, D,” he says softly. “I swear, I’ll take care of you both.”
She throws her arms around his neck, leans up onto her tiptoes and kisses him in a way that says forever, when she knows they only have right now .
“Okay,” she says, pressing their foreheads together. “Okay.”
He kisses her again, and she can’t get enough. His hands are moving over her slowly, reverently, as he presses her up against porch.
“Okay?” he whispers, lips ghosting across her jaw to the spot just under her ear before he moves them down her neck. His arms slide around her waist, pulling her closer.
“Okay,” she sighs, sliding her hands down his back and under the hem of his shirt so she can get at his skin. “Inside.”
“Harper?” he mumbles, pushing her shirt up slowly.
“Asleep,” she replies breathily. “Andy please .”
“I’ve got you, Dani,” he says, lifting her up so her legs are hooked around him. He pulls open the screen door and steps into her hallway.
The door swings shut behind them and he sets her down, lips finding hers again.
“I’ll take care of you.” He repeats it softly, like a prayer.
“Promise?”
“Promise.”