Chapter 17
seventeen
HOLDEN
McKenna finds me in the bakery the next morning, while I’m surrounded by the hum of whirring mixers and trays finishing in the oven. The air smells like sugar and cinnamon and everything I’ve ever known.
I should feel at peace here. Instead, I feel like I should be doing something—anything—to make the noise in my head stop.
Our story is unusual, but it’s predictable: three days in December, repeat the following year. Then, we switched from once-a-year visits to every six months and weekly video calls—and even that was a recipe I could follow.
Now I don’t know what this month looks like. Or the next.
She’s quiet at first, like she knows she’s walking into a storm that hasn’t broken yet. She pours a mug of coffee, hops up onto the metal counter like she’s done since we were kids, and lets the noise of work fill the space between us.
“You look like a sad little Who that’s missing out on Christmas,” she finally says.
I manage half a smile. “It’s still October, Kenna.”
She chews on the inside of her lip, both hands wrapped around her coffee mug. The gingerbread-print ceramic catches my eye—another gift from Laila that somehow migrated down here.
She’s literally stamped everywhere on my life.
“So it’s real, then?” McKenna asks quietly. “She’s gone?”
I drag a hand through my hair and sigh. “She said she needed time, and I told her to take it.”
I watch her chew on my words, weighing what she wants to say next.
“That’s very mature of you,” she says gently.
I stare at my hands. “It’s not what I wanted to do.”
Part of me wanted to cover her mouth so I wouldn’t have to hear the words, or jam my fingers in my ears and pretend she never said them. I know she thinks she doesn’t deserve me, but I can’t wrap my head around love being something you earn.
She never had to earn mine. I’ve always given it to her freely.
But it explains why she struggles so much with telling me how she feels. We’ve never viewed love as the same coin, and that only makes my heart ache more.
“I try not to push, but I think you need to be honest here. Say the words out loud.”
I lift my eyes to hers and wait.
“You’ve always been the steady one in this family,” she says. “Dependable, honorable, all that stuff I make fun of you for. But sometimes I think that makes it hard for you to say what you want.”
“I tell her how I feel,” I say automatically, then wince, because we both know that’s not true.
I filter everything I tell Laila through a “don’t scare her away” lens. I’ve taught myself that it’s easier to play it safe than to risk losing.
“That’s what I thought,” McKenna says. “If I were Laila—and you knew it wouldn’t freak me out—what would you tell me?”
I look at the counter, then back up, voice low.
“I’d tell her I love her. That she’s not a pawn, or an agenda.
She’s a person, a beautiful one. I want to spend the rest of my life with her.
I’ve tried to picture moving on if she decided we didn’t work anymore…
but I can’t. I could, but I don’t want to. ”
McKenna’s eyes shine a little. “There it is,” she says. “That’s what you needed to say.”
I wish I could say that I felt better, but I don’t. Laila isn’t here.
She nudges my shoulder gently. “Now figure out how to tell her that.”
I huff out a laugh that doesn’t quite land. “Feels more like foolish,” I admit. “She says she has to fix herself first, rebuild, all that. I get it. But I don’t know how to just… do nothing.”
McKenna hops down from the counter and steps closer. “But Holden—you’re not doing nothing. You’re waiting. And it’s not the kind of waiting that comes with waiting for next year to come; it’s the kind that comes with waiting for her to find her way out of the woods and back to you.”
I stare at the ceiling. “It doesn’t feel like that, though, Kenna. It feels like she’s just…gone.”
She tilts her head, soft but firm. “She’s spent her whole life either running or shrinking herself to fit her mother’s expectations. You think she won’t notice the person who’s letting her figure out who she is? Who’s giving her the space she needs?”
That hits deeper than I expect.
“She’ll find her way back,” McKenna continues. “Just keep doing exactly what you’re doing. Bake, laugh—keep building her recovery space. My dear brother, she just took a flying leap with a bungee cord, and you are her airbag. Just keep reminding her of that.”
I glance toward the bakery window. The porch light outside glows faintly against the morning gray, still on from last night.
“She didn’t really say she’d be back,” I whisper. “Not out loud.”
But I felt it in the way she kissed me, her touch.
“Then trust her to follow the path she lights herself,” McKenna says. “And make sure you’ve got a backup in case one of hers snuffs out.”
When she walks back out the door, the bell rings once, clear and soft.
I stand there for a long moment, staring at the window, the hum of the bakery wrapping around me like a heartbeat.
Then I flip the porch light switch off and back on again. A ritual, I guess. A promise renewed.
The day passes in a blur of orders, deliveries, and distractions that don’t work. By the time the sun dips behind the oak trees, I’m officially done for done.
My last two batches of pumpkin-gingerbread people for The Storybook Cafe burned, and there’s no sense in hoping for a different result when my mind is elsewhere.
I turn the sign on the door to “CLOSED” and hop in my truck. I can still smell Laila everywhere, even though I live my life surrounded by pumpkin spice. She wears a scent this time of year that doesn’t quite match the one in the bakery, burned into my memory.
I’m halfway to Ever After Farm before I even notice that’s where I’m heading.
Luke’s truck is parked near the barn, and Ella is on a ladder, untangling a string of lights that hung between trees last night. They both glance my way when my truck door closes. Luke at least tries to look normal, but Ella drops the lights and immediately climbs down the ladder.
“Is everything okay?” she asks.
I don’t think much of it because after last night, it will probably be a fair question for the next week. Especially for Ella.
“You look like a man with a lot on his mind,” Luke says, hooking a hand around Ella’s waist. Protective, exactly the way I’d be with Laila.
There’s no sense in beating around the bush, so I don’t sugarcoat it. “Laila’s gone.”
Ella’s face softens. “I heard. But only once she was on the road. She knew I’d have tried to talk her out of it if she told me before.”
Which is exactly why she left my apartment before she knew I’d be up for the day. I still haven’t decided if that makes it feel better or worse.
“Last night was pretty heavy stuff,” Luke says.
“I don’t blame her.” My eyes go between the two of them. “She asked for time and space, and I know she needs it, but it’s hard. I don’t—” I swallow. “I just don’t know if that means distance or goodbye.”
Silence settles between us for a long moment. The farm has a gentle hum tonight, nothing like last night. It’s peaceful, like what’s done is done, and the only way forward is forward.
“That’s not why I came by, though. I wanted to ask about the enchanted letters.”
They exchange a look.
“What about them?” Ella asks. “I’m not sure how much help we can be.”
“How do they work exactly?”
Ella blinks. “I always put them in the enchanted mailbox. One of them, anyway. And then it just…does its magic thing, I guess?”
“Interesting,” Luke says. “I don’t think I always used the mailbox. Sometimes I’d just put it under my pillow, and it would be gone when I got back.”
This gives me hope that my plan might actually work. Sebastian has his theories about magic and how it nudges people together in this town. I’m not sure why he cares, but my reasons are simpler.
“Oh, well, that’s lovely,” Ella says, smiling up at him. “I suppose they really do have a mind of their own?”
I clear my throat. “That’s sort of what I was hoping for. But I might’ve given them a little boost.”
Worry shadows Luke’s face. “Look, man, I know you’re torn up about Laila leaving, but magic isn’t the solution.”
Ella elbows him in the ribs, earning me a grunt and a mumbled apology.
“What he means is, magic is tricky.” She shoots him a withering look before she turns back to me. “Would you like to tell me about it?”
I wasn’t nervous before, but I am now.
“Sebastian gave me a coin. About a year ago? And I noticed it got warm in my pocket whenever I leaned toward a decision that brought me closer to Laila. Being more honest and open, you know? Less afraid to tell her how I felt.”
It hasn’t done that since October. The metal’s been cold every time I touch it, like it knows something between us fractured. Maybe that’s just how magic works, it mirrors what it’s given.
Ella’s eyes round. “Really? I don’t suppose it’s all that different from the letters. Not if you’re soulmates,” she whispers the last word almost reverently. “But that means she’d have to believe in them.”
“The last day of our weekend together last year, she told me she did. Believe in them, that is.”
“Really?” She lets out a soft sigh and presses her hand to her heart. “That makes our conversation earlier this week make more sense.”
“What did you talk about?” I ask. I’m being nosy, but if it helps, I want to know.
“You. Charlotte. I didn’t realize she was in so deep, emotionally.”
“I gave her the coin. I’m wondering if—maybe—it’ll extend the magic to wherever she is? Maybe I can write to her.”
Luke scratches his head. “Like a homing device?”
I shrug. “I guess. Magic doesn’t make much sense to me. But I have to try, don’t I?”
Ella nods empathetically. “You do. She may not be ready to hear it yet, Holden. But I think that your lives are already aligned. This is, like you said, just a boost.”
“Come into the house.” Luke claps me on the shoulder. “Mom would love to hear about this. We’ve got fresh cider.”
“Gran would also love to hear about this,” Ella says, winking at me as she hooks her elbow in mine. “You’ll fit right in here with all the romantics. Except Luke.”
“I’m coming around,” he yells as he opens the screen door.
“You are.” Ella giggles. “Do you know my dad’s story about The Gumdrop Trail?”
I nod. “They’re all sort of legendary around here. Didn’t Aurora Thorne put them all into a treasury?”
“She did. Consider the letters gumdrops. Every letter is a light back home.”
It hits me then—why she named her gingerbread man Gumdrop.
Maybe every letter, every crumb of what we built, is just a way home.