Chapter 13
I spend the rest of the day in a weird haze of nervous energy.
I try to do my paperwork, but I just can’t focus.
I fiddle around in the storage area, even though Presley already organized it perfectly.
I polish the bar top until it gleams. Dolly arrives for her shift around three and takes a look at me.
“Well, you’re fidgety today.”
“I am not fidgety.”
“Sugar, you’ve wiped down that same section of the bar four times in the last five minutes. What in the world is going on?”
“Wyatt and I are going on a date tonight.”
Her face lights up. “Finally. About time you two stopped dancing around each other.”
“We’re taking it slow.”
“Uh-huh.” She doesn’t seem convinced.
“We are. We had a whole conversation about it. About how we’re gonna be smart and not rush into anything and make sure we know what we want before we complicate things.”
“And how do you think that’s working out for you?”
“Terrible so far. I’m a nervous wreck.”
She laughs. “Well, that’s because you like him. Really, really like him. And that’s scary when you don’t know what’s coming next.”
“So how did you get so wise?”
“Honey, I’ve been watching people fall in love in this bar for many, many years. You pick up a few things.” She starts slicing lemons. “Can I give you some advice?”
“Please.”
“Stop trying to figure out what you’re gonna do in October right now. You’ve still got months. That’s a lot of time. You just focus on tonight, on getting to know him, on seeing if this thing between you is real or if it’s just proximity and loneliness.”
“Proximity? You think it could just be proximity?”
“Oh, no. I think it’s real, for sure. But you have to figure that out for yourself.” She points the knife at me. “Now go on upstairs and get ready for your date. Wear something nice, but not too nice. Remember, this is Copper Creek, not Atlanta.”
* * *
At 6:45, I’m standing in front of my closet, having a minor crisis.
Everything I brought from Atlanta is just way too formal.
The dresses are cocktail appropriate, the blouses need statement jewelry, and the shoes require valet parking.
I finally settle on a pair of dark jeans, my nice ones without any paint stains, and a soft blue sweater that Dolly convinced me to buy at a boutique in town last week.
It’s casual, but pretty, and it makes my eyes look brighter.
I leave my hair down, just a little bit of wave to it.
Minimal makeup, simple silver earrings. I look like someone who might belong in Copper Creek, definitely not like the Eleanor Whitfield from Atlanta. Like Eleanor, just Eleanor.
At exactly seven, there’s a knock on my door. I take a deep breath, check myself in the mirror one more time, and open it. Wyatt is standing there, also in dark jeans and wearing a button-down shirt, navy blue, rolled up at the sleeves. And he looks just so good, it should be illegal.
“Hi,” I say, suddenly feeling very shy.
“Hi.” He’s looking at me like I’m the only thing in the world worth looking at. “You look beautiful.”
“Thank you. You clean up pretty nice yourself.”
“Well, I tried.”
He offers his arm. “Ready?”
I take his arm, lock my apartment door, and let him lead me down the stairs.
This is our first real date, the first step toward figuring out whether this thing between us is real, whether it’s worth the risk.
As we walk out into the warm evening, his hand finds mine as if it belongs there, and I think maybe it could be.
So I say, “Are you gonna tell me where we’re going, or is this a surprise?”
“It’s a surprise. Well, sort of.” We walk toward his truck. “I’m cooking.”
“You’re cooking?”
“Yeah, at my place. I mean, that’s okay, right?”
To me, it’s more than okay. It’s unexpected in a way that makes my stomach do something interesting. “That’s perfect. That sounds perfect,” I say.
Wyatt’s truck rumbles down Mountain Road and then turns onto a narrow street I haven’t noticed before, one that cuts away from the main road and disappears back into the trees.
We follow it for at least half a mile, the forest pressing close on both sides, before the trees open up and his cabin comes into view.
It’s small, a single-story building made from dark wood with a stone chimney and a wide front porch that stretches the full length of the house.
String lights are wound around the porch posts, not the kind you put up for a party, but the kind that have been there long enough to just become part of the place.
A rocking chair sits near the front door, and beside it, a small table with a mason jar of wildflowers that someone clearly just picked.
Behind the cabin, the mountains stretch out in an endless ridge, the last light of evening turning them that particular shade of blue and gold that makes your breath catch.
“Oh,” I say softly as he kills the engine.
“Yeah.” He looks at me, and there’s something about his expression. “It’s not much.”
“Wyatt, it’s beautiful.”
He nods, pleased but trying not to show it, and then hops out of the truck to come around and open my door.
Inside, the cabin is exactly what the outside promised, a single open room that serves as the living space and kitchen, with old wood floors worn smooth by years of use.
A stone fireplace takes up most of one wall, and even though it’s too warm to use tonight, I can tell from the stack of seasoned logs that it gets plenty of use during the colder months.
A simple sofa in dark leather, a couple of wooden chairs, and a table that looks handmade, sturdy, and beautiful.
The kitchen is small but well organized.
It has a gas range, a butcher-block counter, and copper pots hanging from a rack.
Everything has a place, and everything is clean, but not sterile clean, not trying to impress clean like I used to see in the city, just a quiet tidiness of someone who takes care of what they have.
What catches my eye is the windowsill above the kitchen sink. It’s lined with small carved wooden figures: a deer, a bear, an owl, a fish, a little horse, no bigger than my thumb. Each one is different, clearly handmade.
“Did you make these?” I ask, picking up the little bear and turning it over in my fingers.
“Yeah, it’s something I do, mostly in the mornings when things are quiet.” He’s already moving around the kitchen, pulling things from the refrigerator. “Started when I came back from the service, needed something to do with my hands.”
“They’re gorgeous, Wyatt.”
“It’s just whittling.”
“It’s not just whittling.” I set the bear down carefully. “They’re art.”
He glances at me over his shoulder, surprised. “Well, thank you.”
I settle onto one of the tall stools at the kitchen counter and watch him cook. Of course, I offer to help him, even though I’m probably one of the world’s worst cooks, but he declines.
He moves through the kitchen with the same confidence he shows behind the bar. I realize he’s making trout as he unwraps two fillets from butcher paper. They’re golden brown and fresh-looking, and he handles them with care.
“Where’d you get those?” I ask.
“Caught them this morning. Off the creek, about a mile up the mountain.” He sets them on a plate and reaches for a cast-iron skillet. “My grandmother taught me how. Said if you’re going to live in the mountains, you might as well learn how to eat what the mountains give you.”
“Well, that sounds exactly like something she’d say.” I smile, thinking about having dinner at Dolly’s, about Meredith’s eyes and the way she’d squeezed my hand and told me not to worry. “She’s something else.”
“She is.” He sets the skillet on the stove and drizzles oil into it. “She liked you, by the way. Told me so afterward, which, trust me, is not something she does easily.”
“Oh yeah? Well, she told me that I’d gotten you all tied up in knots.”
Wyatt lets out a groan. “Yes, I remember.”
“I didn’t know what she meant at the time,” I pause, “but maybe I think I’m starting to figure it out.”
He goes very still for a moment, the oil shimmering in the skillet, and then looks at me with something in those blue eyes. He clears his throat and turns back to the stove, laying the fillets in the pan with a satisfying sizzle.
“She also said I needed some knots,” he adds. “Said I’d been too settled for too long.”
“Do you think she’s right?”
He doesn’t answer right away, just watches the trout cooking.
“Yeah,” he says finally. “I think maybe she was.”
He seasons the trout simply with salt, pepper, and a little squeeze of lemon. The smell that rises from the skillet is incredible: butter, lemon, and something earthy.
“What else are we having?” I ask, leaning forward on my stool, feeling my stomach start to rumble a bit.
“Roasted potatoes. They’re already in the oven. Collard greens with bacon and a little apple cider vinegar. And my family recipe for cornbread, of course.”
“Wow, you really had this planned out.”
“I did.” He flips the trout, golden and crispy on the first side. “Wanted it to be good.”
There’s something in the way he says it, simple and honest, with no performance, that makes my chest ache a little.
This man, who could have taken me somewhere impressive, instead chose to stand in his own kitchen and cook me a meal from scratch.
He caught the fish himself this morning and took the time to plan it out.
It’s the most romantic thing anyone has ever done for me, and it doesn’t look anything like romance the way I was taught to recognize it.
* * *
We eat at a small table by the window. He has set it simply: forks, plates, and cloth napkins that have been washed many times and are soft and worn from use. There’s a mason jar of sweet tea that sits between us, and he pours mine before his own.