Chapter 16
Max
When there’s a knock at the door, I expect it to be the extra pillows I requested from the front desk, not her—standing there holding up a folded gray T-shirt.
“I got you a shirt to wear tonight,” she says.
It takes my brain half a second too long to register her words, which might be because she’s very much looking directly at my chest.
Was she—No. Probably not.
But maybe?
“We’re Not Lost?”
I read off the shirt, trying to keep my voice even.
“It’ll make sense, I promise,”
she says, with a quick grin, then turns and disappears before I can even react.
I stand in the doorway for a few seconds, staring after her like I’ve just been hit by a very cute, very enthusiastic bus.
I close the door and toss the shirt on the bed, then drag both hands down my face.
Oh, I’m in trouble.
I put the shirt on after tugging on clean jeans, still trying to wrap my head around what’s happening. I grab my phone and shoot a text to Nico.
ME
She brought me a shirt.
NICO
A shirt??
Like… one of yours?
Or did she—
ME
It say.
“We’re Not Lost.”
NICO
Oh my god.
I bet you anything she has a matching one.
Something clever and cute.
I like her already.
ME
You don’t even know her.
NICO
Don’t need to.
She’s buying you emotionally unhinged T-shirts.
It’s happening.
You’re basically married.
100 bucks says she’s doodled your initials in a heart somewhere already.
I groan and drop onto the edge of the bed.
ME
I’m not trying to make this weird.
She’s amazing.
But I don’t want to be the creepy guy who falls for the girl he offered a ride to.
NICO
Why not?
ME
Because she deserves better than that.
Because I don’t want to mess this up.
Because it’s been like…36 hours.
NICO
Which is basically a decade in repressed male emotions.
Seriously.
You like her?
You respect her?
Then stop overthinking it and just show up.
Be in it.
If it becomes something, it becomes something.
ME
She just texted. She’s ready.
NICO
Go.
Break a leg.
Try not to combust if she smiles at you again.
I stand up, take a breath, and head to her door.
She opens it before the second knock.
And... wow.
She’s wearing the matching shirt and smells like something warm and citrusy that I now associate with comfort and chaos and every moment on this trip where I’ve wanted to kiss her but didn’t.
“Hi,”
she says, flustered and adorable.
“Hey.”
Somehow, it comes out calm. As if I’m not melting inside.
The walk to the restaurant is short, and the air is cool and clean, carrying the scent of pine and something slightly sweet.
We step through the doors of Lucky’s and instantly walk into a party. There are banners and balloons. People packed into booths and folding chairs. A buffet table lined with Crock-Pots and Tupperware. A made-up dance floor. A woman in a sequin vest is playing the accordion, and I’m ninety percent sure a man in the corner is holding a live chicken.
We pause at the entrance. April looks delighted.
I’m stunned to the spot.
She scans the wall and bursts into a laugh.
“Oh my God.”
“What?”
She points to a poster taped beside the hostess stand.
“Join us to celebrate Fred Ketten’s 90th birthday.
Location: Lucky’s Restaurant.
Potluck Dinner. Please bring a side dish.”
It takes a second for it all to register, and my brows lift before I can stop them. A birthday potluck? For a stranger?
She beams.
“This is amazing.”
“We can go somewhere else if you want,”
I offer.
“Maybe get pizza?”
“Are you kidding? I love people-watching.”
Before I can say anything else, a teenage hostess in a T-shirt that say.
“TEAM FRED”
approaches.
“Just the two of you?”
April gazes up at me, eyes bright, waiting for my cue. I look at her, then at the room, then back at her.
“Two,” I say.
The hostess nods and waves us toward a table near the back.
We follow the hostess through the restaurant, weaving around folding chairs and balloon clusters and at least three separate conversations happening about the same potato salad.
She leads us to a U-shaped booth tucked into the corner of the room—perfect for people-watching and conveniently just far enough from the speakers to avoid shouting over the accordion.
I slide into the booth, and Max follows, settling beside me with a polite nod to someone across the room who waves like we’ve lived here our whole lives.
“Menus for you two,”
the hostess says, placing them in front of us.
“We’re celebrating Fred Ketten’s 90th tonight, but the full menu is available.”
“Which one’s Fred?”
I ask, already smiling.
She points toward the corner.
“The one holding the chicken.”
Sure enough, there he is—an older man in suspenders and a party hat, cradling a chicken like it’s a baby. The chicken looks alarmingly calm about the whole thing.
Max looks composed enough—leaning back, arms loose on the table—but the tight set of his jaw and the way his eyes keep darting toward the festivities give him away.
He seems to be trying very hard to appear cool about the fact that we are dining in the middle of a poultry-adjacent birthday bash.
When he catches me watching him, he gives me the tiniest smile.
He stayed. For me, and I don’t think he realizes just how charming that is.
“Your waitress will be with you shortly,”
the hostess adds, then disappears into the crowd.
I flip open the menu, eyebrows lifting.
“Wow. They’ve got paella and chicken fried steak, and tacos, and wait, is that lobster?”
“They’re not messing around,”
Max says, scanning his menu.
“This is like, six restaurants pretending to be one.”
“It’s either wildly ambitious or deeply chaotic.”
“Honestly?”
I grin.
“My favorite combination.”
A waitress arrives—young, with a nose ring and .
“TEAM FRED”
button pinned to her apron. She places glasses of water in front of us, each with a slice of lemon floating on top. Then she asks.
“What can I get you to drink?”
“Orange soda, please,” I say.
“Iced tea,” Max adds.
She nods and disappears, and I turn slightly in the booth to face him. He’s still taking it all in—the décor, the crowd, the fact that the chicken has now migrated to a table and is being hand-fed grapes.
“You’re not fond of social gatherings in general,”
I ask,“ or only when it’s strangers?”
“In general,”
he replies.
“I’m a people person, but only when I get to choose the people.”
“Totally fair.”
I nod.
“I used to be the same way.”
He tilts his head at me.
“And now?”
“Now… I still get overwhelmed, but I fake it better,”
I say with a soft laugh.
“My mom was the kind of person who could talk to anyone. Anywhere. I mean, she made friends in hospital waiting rooms. The kind of friends who showed up with tamales and pi?atas.”
His expression softens.
“She sounds incredible.”
“She was.”
I pause, thinking about how many memories of her are wrapped up in her voice—her laugh.
“When she got sick, we were always surrounded by people, so when she started getting too tired to be the one starting conversations… I started doing it for her. To keep the mood light. To make her smile.”
Max is quiet for a beat.
“That’s a lot to carry.”
“Sometimes it was.”
I trace a finger along the rim of my glass.
“But also… it was something I could do. When everything else felt out of control, at least I could try to bring her joy.”
He nods, slow and thoughtful.
“She must’ve been proud of you.”
I blink down at my menu, swallowing the tightness in my throat.
“I hope so.”
Max doesn’t rush to fill the silence. He just lets it breathe—lets me breathe—and there’s something in that patience that’s...grounding.
“Being the oldest feels like a responsibility more than anything. I’m the one who has to hold it all together. Make the right choices, set the pace, and I’ve made peace with that most days, but this job—this opportunity—it's the first thing in a long time that feels like it's mine.”
The waitress returns with our drinks and sets them down without interrupting. I thank her, then look back at Max.
“Getting to this interview—it’s not just about me. It’s about proving that everything we gave up, everything we went through… it led somewhere.”
He nods, and something about the way he looks at me—like he's seeing past the jokes, the easy smiles, the girl in the gas station T-shirt—makes my chest ache in the best way. Without overthinking it, I reach across the table and place my hand over his. His skin is warm, steady, reassuring in a way that catches me off guard.
“I hope one day I can repay you for this,”
I murmur.
“You could’ve been any creep offering me a ride at the airport, expecting something else, and instead… you turned out to be a wonderful stranger.”
His eyes meet mine, and something shifts—quiet but certain—in the space between us.
I’m about to say something—something real. She’s looking at me with her eyes softened, steady in a way that feels almost fragile, as if she might actually trust me with it. And for a second, the words are right there, pressing against my tongue—I like you. I feel this. There’s something here, and I don’t want it to slip past us. I don’t want to waste it, but before the words make it out, we’re interrupted.
“Well, would you look at this darling couple!”
I turn toward the voice, and a trio makes their way to our table: an older woman with hair that could hold up in a hurricane, a man with a ‘Birthday Boy’ sash slung proudly across his chest, and yes—a chicken held under his arm like it belongs there.
“Hi,”
April says brightly.
“You must be Fred?”
“The one and only.”
He grins.
“And this is Peaches.”
“And I’m Lori,”
the woman adds, reaching for April’s hand like they’re old friends.
“Fred’s wife, emotional support human, and former bowling league champion.”
“She’s very social,”
Fred adds, nodding to the bird.
April beams.
Lori glances at our shirts.
“I am obsessed with the matching T-shirts! You two are just the cutest. You have to join us at the potluck.”
I open my mouth to politely decline—gently, firmly, with gratitude and boundaries, but April responds instead.
“Oh, that’s really kind, but we didn’t bring a side dish. We’re just passing through—”
“Pfft. Nonsense,”
Lori says, waving it off.
“You look like a wonderful couple, and Fred hasn’t stopped talking about introducing Peaches to some fresh faces.”
I glance at April, hoping she’ll refuse, but she’s already standing.
“If Peaches insists…”
Of course she is.
Fred lifts the chicken toward her.
“She likes to be pet right between the wings.”
April strokes Peaches.
“You’re majestic,”
she says with a straight face.
Then Lori loops her arm through mine.
“Come on, sweetheart. Let’s get you fed.”
She leads us toward a long table decorated with streamers and .
“Family Only”
sign taped to the front… which April promptly ignores.
“Sit here,”
Lori says, motioning to the spot beside her like it’s always belonged to me.
“Clearly reserved for people who were emotionally adopted by the town within five minutes.”
I sit, obviously, and watch in stunned silence as this woman I’ve known for less than two minutes loads my plate with mashed potatoes, mac and cheese, what I think is jambalaya, and a slice of something that might be meatloaf or fruitcake. I honestly can’t tell.
April leans in beside me.
“You’re handling this well,”
she says, smirking.
“I’ve surrendered to whatever this is.”
Her laugh makes me forget how much noise is around us. Then the parade begins, starting with a police officer.
“Howdy,”
he says, tipping his hat.
“Sheriff Carter. Welcome to Cloudcroft.”
“It’s a great party,”
April replies, shaking his hand like she’s running for mayor.
Then comes a woman with a badge that reads Elaine Cloudcroft Books.
“If you two lovebirds are sticking around, you’ll need to come visit the bookshop. We do poetry readings and have a whole romance shelf that’s just spicy enough.”
Then a tall guy in an apron and a backward hat.
“Luis. I run the ice cream shop across the street. First scoop’s on me if you’re here tomorrow.”
“We’re just passing through,”
April says, but she’s hugging them, laughing, lighting up the whole damn room.
I shake hands, nod, and smile, standing beside this woman who somehow makes a birthday party for a man holding a chicken feel like home.
Sheriff Carter watches the whole thing, then leans toward me again, eyes twinkling.
“Your wife is delightful.”
With her joy and openness radiating and her arms still loosely wrapped around someone she met thirty seconds ago, I don’t correct him.
“Yeah,”
I mutter, “she is.”
A few minutes later, Fred settles into the seat across from me, placing Peaches in his lap. She clucks once and immediately dozes off, unbothered by the world.
“She likes you,”
Fred states, like it’s a compliment of the highest order.
“I’m honored.”
He forks a piece of sausage onto his plate, then glances around the room.
“So, how long have you and your girl been together?”
“Oh—we’re not... I mean, we just met. We’re on a road trip. Kind of a fluke, actually.”
Fred raises one eyebrow, like he’s been on this earth long enough to know a story when he hears one.
“Just met, huh?”
“Yeah,”
I state, suddenly very aware of how ridiculous that sounds when she’s out there hugging strangers in a matching T-shirt and looking like joy incarnate.
“Airport layover gone sideways. I offered her a ride.”
Fred hums, taking a bite of potato salad.
“And you’re smitten.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me. You like her.”
“She’s—she’s great.”
“You’ve been watching her like a man who just discovered the concept of wonder.”
I glance toward the middle of the room where April is holding a toddler in one arm and dancing in a circle with two older women who are definitely teaching her a line dance. She’s laughing so hard she nearly drops the baby. Then someone hands her a cupcake, and she cheers like she won the lottery.
“She’s easy to like,” I admit.
Fred wipes his mouth with a napkin, then leans back in his chair, giving me the full weight of his ninety years.
“So what are you going to do to get the girl?”
“We’re just traveling together.”
“Sure.”
He nods, clearly humoring me.
“It’s temporary.”
“Of course it is.”
He shrugs and nods toward my shirt.
“You’re the guy wearing the matching T-shirt, son. Guess you’d know best.”
Then he stands, scoops up Peaches, and disappears back into the party, leaving me at a table that feels a whole lot emptier without her beside me.
April is still dancing, still radiant, still completely unaware she’s the most unforgettable part of this entire detour.