Chapter Twenty-Two
Twenty-Two
The following Saturday I shook Mia and Kitty awake before the sun rose and prodded them into the parking lot, where Alex and his minivan were waiting for us. The side door slid open, revealing Greyson and Nina, both blinking groggily.
“Why did you make me get up this early?” Nina complained.
“You invited yourself, remember?” Alex said.
“At least you know where we’re going.” I climbed into the passenger seat and fluttered my eyelashes at Alex. “Can I know now?”
“Nope.” He took my hand and kissed it. “It’s a surprise.”
Three days earlier, Alex had stopped by my condo after dinner and told me to clear my schedule for Saturday but wouldn’t tell me where we were going.
To my annoyance, he’d told Mia and Kitty, and their excited yelps had reached me from where I sat on the patio.
You’re a genius, Mia had told him. Whatever we were doing, it had to be good.
Alex drove north on the turnpike, which did nothing to narrow down the possibilities.
Almost everything was north of us. It wasn’t until we passed into Orlando and Alex put on a Disney playlist that I put things together.
His rendition of “I’ll Make a Man Out of You” (in which he sang all the parts, even Mulan’s) earned a round of applause from all of us, while Nina’s “Poor Unfortunate Souls” was so spot-on I was slightly worried for my own soul.
And me? I was confused. Sure, I’d watched all three High School Musical movies at the Zefron-a-thon, but I wasn’t one of those Florida residents with a season pass.
I’d been to Disney only a few times. One of those was the summer after I’d moved to Florida.
Mia was nine, and Kitty was six. Both girls had been infected with a severe case of Frozen fever, so Beth flew down with all three kids and met me in Orlando.
It had been a weekend full of walking, and princesses, and a crabby four-year-old who couldn’t care less about Queen Elsa or Mickey Mouse.
He’d loved It’s a Small World, though, and forced me to take him on it a dozen times.
Alex glanced over at me. I smiled at him, unsure how to react. What about this had made Mia call him a genius? Disney would be fun, but why did it have to be a secret?
“Just wait,” Alex said. “You’ll understand.”
“There it is!” Greyson shouted when we arrived, not at Magic Kingdom, but at Epcot. Ahead of us, the silvery golf ball–like structure of Spaceship Earth rose above the park. Alex pulled into a space, and I could sense everyone in the van staring at me, waiting for me to puzzle it out.
I shook my head. “I’m sorry, but I’m not sure what I’m supposed to get.”
Alex grinned. “How do you feel about finishing your list today?”
I blinked. “But the last item is . . .” I looked at Alex, then out at Spaceship Earth.
“Oh!” I turned back to him, my smile matching his.
All this time I’d been looking at flights and hotels, desperate to figure out how to visit five more countries before my birthday, when all I’d needed to do was look at my own state, where there were eleven “countries” less than four hours from my house.
“This is . . .” Emotion caught in my chest. I’d said I was okay with not finishing the list, but I wasn’t. I’d gotten so close, which only made missing the mark worse. “Thank you,” I said.
I leaned over to kiss him, and shouts of “Gross!” rang out from the back seat.
I whipped around. “Really, Nina?”
“What?” She elbowed Greyson beside her. “Peer pressure.”
—
Canada was our first country of the day. We passed into Victoria Gardens, flowers in every color blooming all around us. Alex and I slowed, letting Nina and the girls pull ahead.
“It’s almost your birthday,” he said. “How are you feeling?”
He put his arm around my shoulders, and I sighed into him. “Sad. And happy. And confused.”
“Makes sense.”
I looked ahead to where Greyson skipped alongside Mia and Kitty. “Greyson seems like she’s doing better. How’d it go with the family psychologist?” After Greyson’s outburst the night she’d snuck onto the yacht, Alex had called her psychologist and started going to weekly appointments with her.
“I wanted to talk to you about that.” Alex stopped walking and turned me to him.
“Greyson and I have been talking.” My pulse picked up, worried he was about to ask me to come with them to L.A.
It wasn’t something I expected, but I’d thought about what to say if he asked.
And when it came down to it, I just couldn’t leave.
Florida, my condo, Nina, the Serendipity—they were home.
“And Greyson’s right,” he continued. “If Maggie wants to be her mother, then she needs to fit into Greyson’s life. Not the other way around.”
I stared at him in disbelief. “You’re staying?”
“We’re staying.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
I threw myself at him, nearly knocking him into a tree. I grabbed his face in my hands and couldn’t stop kissing him, so happy I thought I’d float away.
“Dad! How many times do I have to remind you of the rules? What I wouldn’t give to be abducted by aliens right now.”
I let go of Alex, finding Greyson and the others a few feet away. “I told you I couldn’t abide by the rules, Grey,” Alex said, and pulled me to his side.
Greyson rolled her eyes, but she was smiling too.
We spent the day traveling through each of the countries Epcot had to offer, stopping for photos in front of each pavilion and eating our way around the world.
We had macarons in France and baklava in Morocco.
In Japan, Nina, Alex, and I had sake, while the girls slurped down rainbow shaved ice.
By the time we stopped to eat lunch, I was so full I swore I’d never eat again.
“This is it!” Kitty said, skipping ahead as we passed the border between China and Norway, the last of the countries I needed to get to ten and check the final item off the list.
“Here,” Alex said. He pulled out his phone as the rest of us stood in front of a replica of the Gol Stave church.
“How do you say ‘cheese’ in Dutch?” I asked.
“We’re in Norway,” Kitty said. “They speak Norwegian.”
“Right. I knew that.”
As the sun set, we squeezed into the crowd of tourists around the World Showcase Lagoon, finding the perfect spot to view the fireworks moments before they began.
Nina pulled out a selfie stick from her fun bag and took pictures with the girls, who murmured excitedly with each shimmer of light.
A rainbow glow shone on Mia’s and Kitty’s faces, and I was grateful for this one moment in which their pain was dulled completely.
Another firework cracked to life above the water, and as I turned to watch it burst and fizzle in the sky, my eyes fell on Alex beside me, who was looking not at the girls or the fireworks, but back at me.
He pressed a kiss to my hair, and I rested my weight against him, my heart thundering in time with each explosion of color above us.