Chapter 5 #2
Erik huffs a quiet laugh beside me. “Mrs. Levin would take that as a compliment.”
“She threatened to haunt anyone who modernized this place,” I reply. “Very explicitly.”
“So did everyone else.”
Through the window, I spot her behind the counter.
She’s small and sharp-eyed, gray hair pulled into a tight bun that hasn’t shifted since the nineties.
Mrs. Ruth Levin. She’s barely five feet tall, built like a bird with opinions, and wearing her usual red cardigan, sleeves rolled up, glasses perched low on her nose as she writes something meticulously on a receipt pad.
She looks exactly the same. It comforts me.
Mrs. Levin always felt like the grandmother I never had.
She’s petite, Swedish, and perpetually smells like ginger and wool.
She used to slip ginger crisps into my coat pockets when she thought my mother wasn’t looking, winking like we were accomplices.
For later, she’d whisper. Life makes you hungry.
The bell jingles as we step inside, and warm air rushes over us, carrying the familiar scent of plastic, cardboard, and something sugary near the register.
The store hums with purpose, volunteers comparing lists, parents quietly dropping off new toys, and teenagers hauling boxes toward the back room like this is just another December morning, because for them, it is.
Mrs. Levin looks up immediately. “Well, well, well,” she smiles, peering over her glasses. “If it isn’t Savannah Diane Joy, back in Pineview. To what do we owe the honor?”
My chest tightens at the sound of my full name, but luckily for me, Pineview is filled with sassy old women with great comedic timing.
“Hi, Mrs. Levin,” I chuckle. “It’s really good to see you.”
“You too, dear.” She studies my face like she’s flipping through a photo album in reverse. “You look like your mother,” she says finally. “Not how she looked at the end. How she looked when she laughed.”
The words hit clean and sharp.
I swallow. It’s a compliment I’m happy to receive. “Thank you.”
She nods once, satisfied, then turns her attention to Erik. “And you? You’re late.”
“Barely,” he scoffs.
“Barely is still late,” she replies, but there’s affection tucked into it. “The donations came in early. It’s a good year this year..”
Erik pulls an envelope from his coat pocket and holds it in the air. “This is ours. Ages four to eight.”
She taps it once with a finger. “You always were practical.”
He smiles like it’s a compliment he’s earned.
Mrs. Levin’s gaze slides back to me. “You shopping, or supervising this one?”
“Shopping,” I quip. “With this one.”
“Hm,” she hums and nothing else.
Erik grabs a cart, metal rattling softly as he pulls it free. He rests his hands on the handle like it belongs there, like he belongs here. “All right,” he prepares himself. “The Christmas Kindness Drive budget says ages four to eight. Where do you want to start?”
I hesitate, suddenly aware of how close he’s standing. Close enough that I can smell his clean soap and something woodsy underneath it all. It’s familiar in a way that feels almost rude.
He is breathtaking. Even under unforgiving fluorescent lighting, the kind that exposes everyone else, he somehow looks better for it.
His face is all sharp planes and quiet confidence, angular enough it feels unfair, like he was carved with intention instead of born.
The stubble along his jaw isn’t just there; it traces downward, dark and thick along his throat, inviting in a way that makes my thoughts go slow and very unhelpful.
“Sav, where do you want to start?”
I come back to, slightly embarrassed. “Younger kids,” the words tumble out of me, as I turn down the first aisle sharply. “Let’s start with the four year olds.”
Immediately, I regret it.
The space is tight, shelves pressing in, volunteers weaving past with careful smiles.
Erik follows, his presence filling the narrow aisle behind me, solid, unhurried, and unavoidable.I reach for a stuffed bear just as he shifts.
His chest brushes my shoulder, barely, but it’s enough for me to feel something.
“Sorry,” he murmurs near my ear, his breath warm.
“It’s fine,” I affirm, my pulse disagreeing.
We fall into a rhythm with checking lists, stacking toys into the cart, bumping fingers like it’s accidental when it definitely isn’t.
“So,” he says casually, lifting a box of wooden blocks. “You still in the city?”
“Yes.” I pause. “Brooklyn now.”
He nods. “Makes sense.”
“How so?”
“You always liked places that pretended they weren’t part of something bigger.”
I blink. “That might be the most accurate thing anyone’s ever said to me.”
He smiles. “You publishing books yet, or still fixing other people’s commas?”
“Editor, for now,” I laugh. “Romance.”
His brows lift. “Romance.”
“Ironic,” I add quickly.
“No,” he counters. “Actually… it fits.”
I smile, brushing the hair behind my ear, feeling my cheeks flush as red as Christmas garland lining the ceiling. Further down the aisle, something catches my eye.
It’s a snow globe.
Small. Simple. A tiny town square frozen mid-December, glitter suspended in perfect anticipation.
My breath stutters.
My mother loved snow globes. She collected them like evidence that joy could be contained and preserved.
One Christmas, I attempted to make one for her.
I gathered all of the supplies: a figurine of a mother and a daughter hand carved in sealed wood, a mason jar, distilled water, glycerin and too much glitter. So much glitter.
She cried when she received it. Nailed it.
Over the years, the epoxy failed and the figure started floating awkwardly suspended in the gooey glittery substance. She didn’t mind. I made many mental notes on where it all went wrong.
I reach for it before I can stop myself and the world pauses around me.
Erik notices instantly.
He doesn’t ask. He just steps closer, his hand warm and steady at my elbow, grounding without claiming.
“You okay?” he asks quietly.
I nod. “Yeah. Just… memories.”
“Good ones I hope?” The question feels more layered.
I keep my eyes on the snow globe until I can’t resist to look into his deep baby blues. “Mostly.”
He squeezes once and I get my first taste of just how strong his hands really are. The compression helps to bring me back, to ground me despite my mind wandering to thoughts of how Erik might be strong in other ways. When I breathe again, the moment passes.
We keep shopping.
At the checkout, Mrs. Levin rings us up herself, sliding the receipt into The Christmas Kindness Drive envelope.
“Your mother always said the best gifts,” she tells me, “were the ones that reminded children they could be more than what the world handed them.”
I nod, throat tight.
“She was right,” Mrs. Levin adds. “She would be so happy that you are here.”
Outside, the cold snaps against my flushed skin. Snow drifts down, catching in Erik’s hair.
“This is going to be harder than I thought,” I admit out loud.
“The shopping?” he asks.
I hesitate. “Working together.”
A corner of his mouth lifts. “Good.”
“Good?”
“Means it still matters.”
We stand there, with the almost full cart between us, the store behind us and tradition settling in.
“So…,” Erik shifts, thumb hooking casually over the cart handle, like he’s trying not to make it obvious he doesn’t want to leave either. “Want to go another round? I think we could squeeze a bit more shopping in. Really spoil the kids this year. There are more toys back at the community center.”
The invitation is gentle and hopeful.
“I would love—”
My phone rings.
I don’t need to look. My body already knows. The timing is too precise. Too cruel. I close my eyes for half a second, swallowing the scoff in my throat.
Dammit, Aunt Carol.
Erik’s gaze flicks to my coat pocket, then back to my face. He doesn’t look annoyed. He looks understanding. He already knows what kind of weight follows me around.
“You should get that,” he breathes. “Carol mentioned you’ve got some things to take care of while you’re here.” He pauses. “It sounds heavy.”
Something in my chest grips at the word. “I’m sorry,” I apologize, already reaching for my phone, already feeling the afternoon slipping through my fingers. “I just—”
“You don’t have to explain,” he interjects quickly. Too quickly. He’s making sure not to ask for more than I can give.
I hesitate anyway. “This is… the reason I came back,” I admit. The words feel fragile, like they might break if I handle them wrong. “I have to close my mom’s estate. Paperwork. Meetings. Boxes. It’s not…,” I stop, swallow. “It’s not optional.”
He nods, slow and constant. “I know.”
There’s no accusation in it. No disappointment he doesn’t have the decency to hide. He simply accepts and somehow that hurts more than if he had pushed.
“I don’t want this to feel like a rush,” he adds. “Or like you owe me time you don’t have.”
“I don’t,” I say softly. “I just…”
“I know,” he says.
For a moment, neither of us moves. The cart sits between us, half full of joy, half full of waiting.
“Hey,” he breaks the silence finally, a small smile pulling at his mouth. “The kids are still getting spoiled. That part’s handled. That’s what is most important here.”
“And the rest?” I ask, wanting reassurance in this moment, but knowing I shouldn’t ask for it when everything in my life is so unclear.
He doesn’t respond and the phone keeps ringing. I step back, already grieving the space opening between us even as I answer the call.