Chapter 11 Ember
Ember
My body is sore in the best way. My hair smells like pine and cold air. I feel both invigorated and emotionally wrung out.
Ransom said he wants us to be friends. It felt good to hear him say it. Too good. Like I was starved and being handed crumbs, and instead of walking away, I said thank you. Well, I said maybe, which is the same thing.
But the thing is that I don’t want to be his friend. I want to be his everything, and I want him to be mine. I want what Aksel has with Latika. What my parents have. What Freja has with Jonathan. I want the real thing. A life. A home. A future. I want us.
I want to live with him. I want to love him. I want babies and laughter and late-night arguments about nothing. I want all of it.
And no amount of denial will change the truth: I love him.
I can’t lie to myself, can I? Not when the reason I haven’t been able to build anything real with anyone else over the past five years is staring me in the face.
I’ve had chances—good men, good sex, good connections. But I never let any of them last long enough to become more.
Because none of them were him.
And maybe that makes me foolish. But at least now, I know the shape of my own heart. I also know that he’s building something with Calypso. God knows what he sees in her; she’s vapid, bitchy, and pretentious as hell, but…as they say, you can’t choose who you love.
I love him. He loves her. She loves him. Guess who’s the odd man out?
Maybe it’s time to move on.
Maybe? Hell, Ember, it’s been way past time to move on—for five years. You were supposed to have found someone and built a life by now.
But I didn’t know I was pining for Ransom—not really, I tell myself defensively—at least not until now, when this sharp alpine winter is ramming clarity down my throat like ice water.
He said he wants us to start over again, be friends.
My pathetic heart leaps a little at the possibilities.
Despite knowing it’s not healthy for me, not good for me, I let that hang inside me like a crystal from a chandelier—catching light and refracting it into something foolishly beautiful. Well, if I’m being honest, probably more foolish than beautiful.
For dinner, which is going to be casual as we are going to be dressing to the nines tomorrow for Christmas Eve, I pull on a soft sweater and jeans, even slick a little gloss onto my lips.
I look at myself in the mirror and find that I look nice, better than I have since I got here.
Hope is dangerous, Ember. It changes your posture.
I look away from the mirror, annoyed with myself, and head to the sunroom for pre-dinner drinks.
Everyone is already there.
Anika is playing chess with my father. Smarty pants. Thomas is running around with a car, pretending to be in the F1.
Heidi is sitting with Freja on a sofa, while Giselle is standing by the fireplace, talking to Jonathan.
Aksel and Latika are on the carpeted floor, watching their son play.
The fire crackles. There’s music low in the background, some soft French jazz that makes everything feel golden and warm until I see them.
He has his arm around her waist. Her laugh is curling through the air like perfume. And then—as if my stomach knew before my eyes did—he leans in and kisses her.
Softly. Casually. Like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
The room goes slightly off-axis. I stare long enough to be sure. To have no hope of misreading. No hope at all.
I feel hurt. Ridiculous. Humiliated.
He said he wants to be friends, and I built castles in the air even when I knew better. Serves me right to see them intimate. Serves me damn right to have my heart ripped apart.
Grow a spine, Ember. It’s high fucking time.
I tear my eyes away from them—his hand on her hip, her laugh looping around his neck like a silk scarf—and grab a glass of champagne from a tray on the side table.
White. Cold. Merciful. Just what I need to drown my sorrows.
“Darling!” Aunt Tanya sing-songs, waving me over to where she and Uncle Bob are curled on a tufted loveseat, wine in hand, legs tangled like teenagers. “Come here and save me from this old goat who’s trying to convince me that pop music has qualities.”
I force a smile and make my way toward them.
I sit next to Aunt Tanya, snuggle into her. I love my aunt. She can be a bit old-fashioned when it comes to my glasses and how I look, but she’s alright.
She kisses my forehead. “You had a good day?”
“Yes, Auntie.”
She hugs me close and strokes my hair that I’ve left loose to air dry, not wanting to blow-dry it.
Mama clears her throat. “Attention, mes chéris,” she announces, standing with a mock flourish that immediately quiets the room—well, not Thomas, who zooms past yelling, “Vroom-vroom,” at the top of his lungs.
Aksel scoops him up, grinning. “All right, champ, pit stop.”
Jonathan comes to sit next to Freja, and Giselle settles next to Heidi.
Margot beams, then clasps her hands like she’s presenting something grand.
“Before we enjoy a dinner of cassoulet and the best baguette you can find anywhere outside of Paris, I need to talk to you about Christmas Eve dinner. We are hosting our very own Murder Mystery Soirée!”
There’s a beat of silence. Then—
“Oh my God,” Freja deadpans. “Is this the year we all die in matching monocles?”
Margot ignores her. “It will be set in the 1930s. Think Agatha Christie. Think Poirot. Think murder, madness, and marvelous outfits.”
Aksel raises his glass. “Think chaos.”
“Think alcohol,” Papa mutters.
Mama giggles with delight. “I’ve hired an actual actor to play Hercule Poirot. He’s staying in the guest cottage tonight and will be ‘on duty’ tomorrow. He’ll guide us through the whole thing.”
“Grandma, will he have a mustache?” Anika asks, holding a rook up in the air.
“Darling Anika, he has a mustache,” Mama assures her.
“And speaking of dressing the part, I’ve also hired a stylist-slash-buyer to bring a selection of period clothing here tomorrow morning.
You’ll each have time to work with him to choose the perfect outfit.
Suits. Gloves. Dresses. Hats. Maybe even a feather boa or two for Bob. ”
Uncle Bob raises his hands. “As long as it comes with matching underwear.”
Laughter erupts, warm and generous. I find myself smiling.
“Do we get roles?” Giselle wants to know.
“Am I the doomed lord who came back from war half a man? Or am I the rakish gamekeeper?” Aksel muses.
“I didn’t know you were a DH Lawrence fan.” Giselle laughs.
“God help us if Aksel tries a British accent,” Heidi says, bemused.
“I can do Downton Abbey,” my brother protests, already slipping into something vaguely aristocratic and totally ridiculous. “Don't be defeatist, dear. It's very middle class.”
Ransom tosses a pillow at him. “Please don’t.”
Latika smirks. “He’s been practicing ever since he found out what Margot is planning.”
“Traitor,” Aksel protests, mock-wounded.
Calypso leans into Ransom’s side. “I call femme fatale,” she purrs. “I even have a fire-engine red lipstick.”
Of course, you do!
“I want to be the Phryne Fisher kind of a guest,” Freja decides.
Jonathan looks at Freja, amused. “I think that’s a different television show set on a different continent, sweetheart.”
Freja kisses his cheek. “Same time period, though.”
“I’ll be the detective’s disapproving spinster cousin.” Heidi raises her glass.
Mama raises a hand to silence everyone. “Mr. Poirot, the fake one, obviously, will tell you all your roles.”
Papa picks up his champagne glass and takes a long sip. “I wonder which one of us is going to be dead.”
“Darling, why, I can arrange for it to be you,” Mama teases.
There’s more laughter.
If I live in the moment, which I always strive to, everything feels okay.
The rhythm of being home, at the center of this slightly chaotic, yet always entertaining and deeply loving family, is safe and familiar.
But the ache remains. Dull but insistent. Like a bruise under the skin.
Ransom laughs at something Calypso whispers.
I can’t unsee his hands on her. Or the kiss.
I sip my wine, slower this time.
I let my family’s warmth fold around me like a quilt.
I let the fire warm my toes.
I let Thomas run wild with his toy car.
I let myself lean on what I know won’t change—this: my people, my place here.
I won’t let Ransom take my joy away. I can’t control how he feels about me or what he says or does, I can only control my reaction to him and his actions—and I decide to slot the pain, the longing, all of it away.
The man is not available.
He’s never been available to me.
“How about you, Ember?” Papa wiggles his eyebrows at me. “Who do you want to be?”
I laugh.
It’s an old joke.
“What?” Ransom asks, looking from Papa to me, a bemused smile on his face.
“Ember was Thomas’s age, and it was Halloween,” Mama begins, already laughing, her wine glass tilting enough to slosh a little.
“We’d been busy and forgot all about it.
The older kids didn’t care about costumes anymore”—she pauses, eyes gleaming—“well, Freja did, but she bought her clothes at the hooker store.”
Freja tosses her hair and lifts her glass. “I’d like to remind everyone I was an über sexy nurse.”
Jonathan raises an eyebrow. “You…ah…still have the costume?”
There’s a round of hooting and groaning, and Freja smacks his arm, grinning.
“Anyway,” Papa says, waving the laughter down, “Margot is completely flustered that she forgot Halloween. She’s convinced she’s emotionally scarring Ember, running around in a panic, holding a cardboard crown in one hand and a plastic sword in the other, asking over and over, ‘What do you want to be, bébé? A queen? A pirate? A fairy? What do you want to be?’”
Papa’s voice softens, and he looks at me with a love that only makes the story feel more golden. “And our Ember—her little lips trembling—looks up at Margot and says, ‘Mama, can I just be me? Can I just be Ember?’”
The room goes quiet in that sweet, sticky way families get when something true has just been said.
There’s laughter again, but gentler this time. A few awws. Aunt Tanya reaches across the sofa and squeezes my knee.
I feel Ransom’s eyes on me then, and when I glance his way, his expression is intense, as if I’m suddenly in focus for him.
Flustered, I look away.
“Well”—I sit up and add a dramatic flourish to my voice—“in the spirit of being someone else for a night, I’d like to be Ariadne Oliver. I think she’s one of Christie’s most misunderstood characters. Sharp, intuitive, constantly underestimated.”
“Plus,” Latika chimes, “she writes crime novels and eats apples. I mean—goals.”
Soon, there are stories about costume soirees and everything that’s ever gone wrong during such parties.
“So he tells me that he kissed Candy Whatshername because she was also dressed like a witch,” Aunt Tanya tells us all while giving her husband the stink eye. “Her outfit had a whole lot of lace while mine didn’t, so I can’t see how he could confuse us.”
“Christ, woman! That happened fifteen years ago, and you’re still whining about it?” Uncle Bob shakes his head in mock irritation.
Racquel, the housekeeper, announces dinner, and we all trudge to the dining room. I let the couples walk ahead of me.
I hold my niece’s and nephew’s hands and follow along.
“Is there a princess in the mystery dinner?” Anika wonders.
“I’m sure there is,” I promise her.
“And a Tank Engine?” Thomas looks up at me with solemn brown eyes.
“Oh, absolutely.”
He smiles happily like only a child can. “Cool!”