Epilogue
Asher
“Anything worthwhile takes time, work, and effort. A relationship is no different.” I found myself saying to Dane, who was looking at me like I’d grown two heads.
“Uncle Ash—“
“Just—” I put my hand up, and he quieted. “You’re a smart kid. I mean, of course, you are. You’re my nephew,” I teased, which earned me an eye roll. I chuckled.
Fuck, the kid in front of me was now a young man.
Almost done with his senior year, about to head out to college and start to trek his own way in the world.
And somehow, I still saw him as a ten-year-old who was always excited about me showing up to his baseball games and talk my ear off about Spiderman.
How much had I missed thanks to me not coming home as much as I should have?
A lot. Thankfully, these last couple of months had changed that.
I was back home, living in Sugarloaf.
Living in the cabin I had built. But what no one knew was that one more move was coming soon.
One that would make me an hour away from my sister, but I would still be close enough to help her out with her kids when she needed me to.
Close enough that she wouldn’t have to ask I’d see things and be able to pitch in.
I’d promised Ember we would figure shit out, and I hadn’t broken that promise. In these last few months, we’d only been apart a total of seven days. One week. And even that had felt like too much.
“Let me guess, Mom asked you to talk to me because she saw me with Britt?” The kid was way too smart for his own good.
“Buddy.” I scratched the back of my neck, and he shook his head, looking away and out towards my house. We were both leaning against the fence at the back of the yard. My sister and Ember, along with my two nieces, were inside watching a movie. “She’s worried. I get you might have… urges.”
“Oh god!” he groaned, covering his face with his fingers. “Look, Uncle Ash, I get it. You’re going to tell me to wait and—“
“No, I’m not,” I said, straightening my back.
“What?”
“I’m going to tell you to be safe if you do something, and that’s a big if.”
“Uncle—“
“Look, kid, I’m not stupid,” I cut him off. “I was your age once,” I pointed out and somehow managed to do it without wincing at how old that made me sound. “I got you something.” I took a box out of my pocket and handed it to him.
“Oh my god,” he groaned, his face red with embarrassment. But he still took it and shoved it into the front pocket of his hoodie.
“What I am going to tell you is, if you think you’re old enough and responsible enough for sex—“
“Uncle Ash,” he complained, tossing his head back and looking at the sky.
“If you can’t talk about it, you shouldn’t be doing it,” I added, and to his credit, his back straightened and he crossed his arms.
“Fine, what do you want to talk about? Let me guess.” Attitude laced his voice. “How actions have consequences? Because I know that.”
“I know you do, kid.” He’d seen it with his dad. “Make sure to treat her right. Respect her.”
“I know that. Britt isn’t just any girl.”
“I know that, too. You guys have been friends since when… second grade?”
“First,” he corrected. I ran my tongue over my teeth.
“You have any questions?” I asked and felt his eyes on me before he looked away. “Spill… say what you wanna say.”
“You’re moving again,” he guessed, and I blinked.
“I am.” This had me turning to look at him. My nephew and I were now the same height. Time went by too fast. “How do you know that?”
“Because I’m not an idiot, and you’re not one, either,” he muttered, running his fingers through his brown hair.
“What does—“
“Ember is in Moonlit Pines. She works at the hospital out there,” he pointed out like it was enough sense. “She’d not just any girl, and you’re not going to risk losing her because you’re an hour away. My guess is you’re going to ask her to marry you.”
“You’re right.” I crossed my arms over my chest. The ring had been burning a hole in my pocket the last couple of days. It looked like I was going to have two conversations with the kid. “I was thinking since I’m not going to be here, what if you keep renting this place out?”
“What?”
“And maybe, whatever college you decide to go to, I can invest in two properties for you to keep doing it while you’re in school. If you don’t think it’s too much.”
“You want… to hire me?”
“No, kid, I want to be a silent partner. What you did the last year here? The money you made… it was genius. Illegal as hell since you didn’t actually have permission and you were a minor for most of it but…
” I shrugged. “I can’t deny you have an eye for the hustle.
Plus, it’s thanks to you that I met the love of my life.
So… if you think it’s something you can handle, or shit, if you have a different business idea, I want you to know you have my support. ”
“You’re not just giving me money, right?” I knew better. Dane would never accept it.
“Nope. I’m serious. I think you’re a brilliant kid with a good instinct for business. I want to invest in you.”
“But you’re already paying for college.”
“Just say thank you,” I grumbled, looking away.
“Thank you.” He came closer and hugged me. Patting his back, I held him a little longer before we parted.
“Good talk?”
“Yeah.” He cleared his throat.
“Just be safe. No glove, no love. Not just because of babies but because you don’t want to catch anything that will make your dick fall off.”
“Jesus, Uncle Ash.”
“What? It’s true. Be smart. Make good choices.”
“I will. I wasn’t even… I wasn’t even thinking about having sex,” he shared, but I shot him a look that said, ‘Come on, really?’ “Fine. I’ve thought about it, but I wasn’t planning on doing it. Mom just caught us making out and freaked.”
“Sounds like a mom.” My lips twitched, and he chuckled.
“Yeah. We’re not even together.” He sighed, obviously unhappy about that.
“Say again?”
“She said we’re both going away to college and shouldn’t start something when we have so much more happening and we could both end up on different ends of the country.”
“Sounds like a smart girl. Even if it sucks.”
“She is.” He nodded, looking away.
“Everything that’s supposed to be, will be.” I hated how generic it sounded, but fuck, I believed it. “I mean, look at me.”
“True.” He turned, and our eyes connected. “That’s what I keep telling myself. If you found someone, I’ll definitely find my way back to Britt,” he said, half-joking, half serious. I chuckled.
“Ha-Ha. Funny,” I mumbled. “We good?”
“We’re good.” He nodded, and we headed back inside. When we stepped into the kitchen, the first thing I saw was my woman. My princess.
“Hey, Dane!”
“Hey, Em!” He hugged her and walked to the living room.
“How did you talk go? He okay?”
“Yeah, baby.”
“Good.” She smiled as she walked towards me. “You think you have one more talk in you?” she asked, taking me a little off-guard.
“Sure.” I took her hand in mine, and we stepped back outside. This time, I sat down on the comfortable patio furniture back there and had her sit on my lap. “What’s up?”
“I was thinking…” she started to say, but I could feel her nerves radiating from her. Nerves I had somehow missed. This was important.
“What’s up?” I asked. “Everything okay?”
“So, I’ve been thinking… What if I applied to the hospital here?” she blurted. A brow rose on my face.
“Here?”
“Yeah, I mean…” She licked her lips, leaving then glossy and pink. “I can work anywhere.”
“True…”
“And it would only be an hour away from the girls. Everyone’s so busy now anyhow.
It’s not like we get to see each other like we used to.
” That’s when it hit me. Why she was suggesting this.
Fuck. Here was my woman, my beautiful princess, offering to give everything up to live with me.
I’d planned on surprising her tomorrow morning when I drove us back down to Moonlit to show her the place I’d bought for us.
But I was going to have to adjust and overcome when it came to my talk with her.
“But if you applied here, that would give you an hour commute,” I said calmly.
“Hour com—“ She quieted as I slipped a key out of my pocket and placed in on her open palm.
“Ash?”
“I didn’t want to impose and push my way into your apartment, so I bought a place in Moonlit. A cabin for the two of us.”
“You bought…” She blinked. “You what?”
“It’s a three-bedroom two-bath with craftsmen features. It’s a good size with a nice yard. Closer to the hospital and the main part of town,” I shared. “It’s under both our names.”
“But… your work?”
“I can do most of my stuff online, and when I have to travel, I’ll do that, but you’d come with me anyhow. I want to be with you. Closer to you. Move in with me,” I asked. “Either way, that key is yours. I know we started fast and furious, so I understand if this is too much—“
“I’ll move in,” she interrupted, her hands cupping my face. “I wanted to ask you to move into my apartment, but I thought you’d think it was too small.”
“I don’t, but this place is something we could grow into.”
“Grow into?” she repeated. The way she stared at me could have taken me down to my knees. I shrugged.
“One day. When you’re ready.” I wiped away an errant tear that rolled down her face, and she leaned in closer.
“Have I told you how much I love you today?” she asked, quietly enough for my ears only.
“Yeah, but I will never get tired of hearing it,” I answered and meant it.
Life was a rollercoaster, full of highs and lows and curveballs you never saw coming. But sometimes, it was in those moments when you found the best things in life. Falling in love with my princess at first chill, during a blizzard, sure as hell was mine.