Chapter Nine
Bedtime Stories
Hazel
Collectively, I’ve known Samuel Del Ray for twelve years. It doesn’t sound like long next to my age of sixty, but those first eleven years were some of our most formative ones. The years between seven and eighteen, the ones where we developed our unique nervous tics and decided which ice cream flavor would always be our favorite.
This familiarity is how I know something is off tonight. I can’t tell what—he’s been his mostly normal self during supper with his kids and their partners, listening and occasionally offering a few words—but I can feel it. That same nervous energy is vibrating in him like when we were sixteen and he held my hand in a decidedly non- platonic way for the first time.
It could deal with learning about his former wife’s death or the young son she left behind. Sam is an overthinker. He didn’t choose his favorite ice cream flavor—vanilla, at that—until he was ten, and he could never play pool with me on stormy nights without overanalyzing every shot he made. I don’t expect him to feel normal in the face of losing Kathleen.
The thing is, that wouldn’t make him nervous. More serious and more contemplative, yes. Nervous, no.
It distracts me enough that I nearly drop a scoop of freshly churned vanilla ice cream in the pan of simmering blackberries instead of the small dessert bowl. I correct myself, but not before Sam’s mother has noticed. Once a journalist’s eye, always a journalist’s eye is Elizabeth Del Ray’s slogan.
“Everything all right, dear?” she asks, bumping her shoulder into mine. Cool evening air sifts into Sam’s kitchen, the doors between the house and deck pushed open, and birds twitter cheerfully in the backyard. “You seem distant.”
I drag the metal scoop through the ice cream. “I’m fine. Just thinking is all.”
“Don’t think too hard. I used to tell Sammy his head might explode if he did that, you know.” A hint of wistfulness softens her age-lined face. “Even when he was about the same age as Milo, he was always thinking. You could tell, too, because he’d sort of wrinkle his nose and squint.” She laughs outright. “A lot like the expression he made as a baby when he needed to poo.”
A smile curves my lips. “He still sometimes makes that face, doesn’t he?” Realizing how that sounds, I hurry to add, “When he’s thinking, I mean. Not, well, you know.”
“His Poo Face?” Lizzie asks, mercifully leaving my solecism alone. I nod. “Oh, certainly. Look.” She lifts her soapy hands from the sink to point a wooden spoon, dripping wet, in Sam’s direction. “He’s wearing it now. But honestly, hon, it could very well be that he needs to use the restroom. Men aren’t always the most forthcoming creatures.”
I laugh. I can’t help it—I’ll never be able to think of Sam’s thinking face the same way. Dark brows knit, mouth contemplative, eyes not quite focused.
It’s Saturday, and Past Sam would’ve been in the office. Present Sam spent the day taking Indi and Milo to the Omaha Zoo and brought me fresh blueberry lemonade as I was closing up the flower shop. He wears navy linen shorts with a white short sleeve button up and boat shoes. Sunglasses are perched on his collar, and his dark, graying hair ruffles in the tepid breeze.
Love swells in my chest like a wave.
“I’ve been asked to see why it’s taking so long…” Colton trails off when he steps over the threshold. He looks at us, over his shoulder at the table he just came from, and then back to us. “What, exactly, are we looking at?”
Lizzie speaks up before I can, and with significantly more candor. “Your father. He has his Poo Face on.”
“His Poo Face?” Colton glances at his father again, then shrugs and continues into the house. “I think you’re talking about his Stern Brunch Daddy face. Graham has the same one.”
“Graham has the same one what?” Preceded by Ember, Graham walks into the kitchen with an empty pitcher in his hand.
“What is a stern brunch daddy ?” Lizzie asks incredulously.
“The exact definition is unknown to me, but in romance novels, it relates to a guy who is insanely protective behind closed doors but outwardly kind.” Colton glances at Ember. “Right, Em?”
Ember’s cheeks are pink, whether because Graham murmured something to her or from Colton’s question, I don’t know. “Um…sure?”
Graham frowns. “I’m not a stern brunch daddy.”
Colton points at him. “You’re being one right now.”
“Technically,” Ember says, “he’s not.”
“But other times,” Colton presses, “he is.”
Graham and Ember exchange a look that makes him scowl while she grins. She says “yes” at the same time as he says “no.”
“Oh, hey, before I forget.” Colton disappears down the hall. Pale pink tissue paper pokes out from the top of a white gift bag when he returns. “I meant to give this to you guys a while ago and I forgot. Thanks for letting me borrow the paper from your shop, Em.”
“Anytime,” she says cheerfully.
Graham sets the pitcher on the island and narrows his eyes as he reaches into the bag. He pulls out a small, oval shaped wooden sign. An almost reluctant smile tugs at his mouth as he turns it for Ember to read.
“A lovely lady,” she reads aloud, “and a grumpy man live here.”
“Awwww.” Jordan steps into the house with a hand pressed to his cheek. “That’s so disturbingly accurate it hurts!”
The comment earns him glares from both of his brothers.
“I wanna see!” Jolene bursts into the kitchen, pauses to look at the sign in Graham’s hand, and throws herself into Colton’s legs. “Did you get something for me, too, Uncle Coat?”
Colton swings her onto his shoulders. “You’re not getting married.”
“For at least fifty years,” Jordan adds.
“All right.” Lizzie herds everyone toward the door. “Everyone out. Except for my darling eldest grandson to help carry dessert to the table.”
Jordan tips his head back in surprise. “Me? What about Graham and Colton?”
“We’re here to grab a game,” Graham says.
Ember lifts the pitcher. “And for more water.”
“I’m typically here for food,” Colton says. “Or comic relief.”
“Graham is the groom,” Lizzie says, patting Jordan’s cheek affectionately, “and Collie is entertaining your daughter.”
Jolene shrieks with laughter when Colton bows, keeping his hands firmly braced on her legs. Graham smirks at his oldest brother before he and Ember cross to the board game shelf in the living room, his hand at her lower back. Beyond the open doors, Sam leans down while Milo talks animatedly to him. Indi, Cheyenne, and Sydney discuss something that makes all three young women smile, Indi’s attention pausing to check on Milo every few seconds. Beside me, Lizzie and Jordan go back and forth about how many dessert cups he can carry without dropping any.
It's not my family—not by blood or by marriage—but it feels like my heart family. And maybe that’s the truest family of all.
When I get downstairs after reading bedtime stories with Jolene—she insisted on five, which is three more than usual—Sam isn’t reading in his chair like I expected. His Patrick Lencioni novel sits on the side table beside a torn cork coaster from The Pier, but Sam is nowhere to be found. I double back and check his home office—empty. I check the laundry room—nothing. I know he’s not upstairs because his bedroom was dark when I walked by a couple minutes ago.
Settling my softest cashmere cardigan around my shoulders, I quietly let myself outside. It doesn’t look like Sam is sitting in his Adirondack chair, but maybe he went down to the dock (installed, after much debate, by his go-to installers). He wants to put up a brighter light so it’s easier to—
Light blazes to life in front of me. I blink as I stop in my tracks, trying to comprehend the scene before me. Loose stemmed purple dahlias form a narrow path down to the dock, bulb lights have been strung from dock post to dock post, and in the center of it all, Sam stands tall and broad.
My Sam, wearing my favorite navy suit with a white dress shirt and a silky lavender pocket square.
I approach the dock slowly, only then realizing fully what’s happening. My steps slow and my awareness of my own appearance heightens—a simple white sundress and sherbet orange cardigan, curls frizzing around my face.
“Sam…” My voice hovers barely above a whisper.
Smile lines crease Sam’s whiskered cheeks as he holds out a steady hand to me. When I take it and I step onto the dock, I know . I know this will be the hand I hold for the rest of my life. The hand that supports me on difficult days, applauds me on the outstanding days, and simply holds me on quiet ones.
It strikes me now, only hours later, why he was wearing his thinking face.
Wordlessly, Sam squeezes my hand before he slowly lowers to one knee. Or maybe he’s not moving slowly at all; maybe I just want the moment to go slow enough to move so slowly that I remember every detail.
The tepid breeze twisting his salt and pepper hair above his deeply tanned forehead. The way his palm sweats under mine, like maybe he feels a little bit nervous, too. Purple dahlia petals that contrast the weathered white boards of the dock. The navy of his suit jacket making his eyes reflect deeper blue in the twilight.
How bulb lights sparkle against an elegant solitaire resting in a red velvet box he holds up between us in the sticky air.
“Hazel,” he begins and then stops. He smiles, crinkles fanning around his soft eyes. “ Lilah . I have loved you since you became the girl next door when we were seven years old. We didn’t know it back then, that our futures would hold so much time apart. By no small miracle, we were also led here. I can’t promise to be perfect, and I’m not sure I’ll ever know why I deserved you twice. But I can promise you, my dear, that I will always love you.” He pauses, his throat bobbing as he swallows hard. “Hazel Delilah Palmer, will you marry me? Will you let me love you for the rest of my life?”
A tear lands on my lip as I nod. A nod that starts slowly and rapidly picks up speed, certainty propelling the movement. “Yes. Yes, Sam, I will absolutely marry you,” I whisper.
And then he’s standing, and his arms are around me, steady like the posts that support the dock, and his lips find mine. I tilt my head, and he tilts his, teasing and taking. This kiss tastes a little bit like forever. Like salty tears and blackberry vanilla cake and sticky lake air, too, but mostly, it tastes like forever.
My hand trembles between our chests when he lifts it to slide the ring over my knuckle. His lips, warm and slightly swollen, press against my finger reverently.
“What do you say, Lilah,” he murmurs, his eyes smiling. “Is this a happy moment?”
I think it’s hard to recognize your unhappiness , I’d told him last summer, until you’re presented with happiness .
“The happiest of moments,” I tell him. I hope my eyes are smiling right back at him.
“I love you, Lilah,” he says quietly, and he drops a kiss on my temple.
I trace my fingertip across the firm line of his jaw. “I have always loved you, Samuel Del Ray, and I will always love you.”
He kisses me again, deliberately slow and achingly tender, but it only lasts a moment before we’re interrupted.
“She said YES!” Jolene hollers.
Sam smiles against my mouth, kisses me once more, and places his lips near my ear. “The five bedtime stories were a ruse so we had time to set up, my dear, but I appreciate your willingness. Your gullibility, however, is mildly concerning.”
Amusement curls warmly in my chest. When I turn, I’m greeted by perhaps the only view as important as that of the man behind me. All four of Sam’s children—Jordan, whistling with his fingers; Colton, catcalling; Graham, smiling wider than usual; and Indi, carrying a sleeping Milo in his shark pajamas. Jolene races ahead of everyone in a pink princess nightgown. She’s flushed, barefoot, and breathless when she grabs my hand to see the ring, and laughter bubbles over when her grandfather swings her into his arms.
I know we’re taught that gold at the end of a rainbow is a myth, but I think maybe that’s because we’ve been searching for the wrong kind of gold. My gold is these people, and with a soft smile, I decide that I’ll continue chasing it for the rest of my life.