Chapter 17 Ivy
SEVENTEEN
IVY
Saint Pierce looks exactly the same.
Brick buildings, flickering crosswalks, the coffee shop on the corner that knows my order and spells my name right forty percent of the time. The streets are wet from melted snow, reflecting the leftover Christmas lights like the city is trying to hold onto the holiday a little longer.
I’m the one who’s different.
I walk to work with my Creative Director badge clipped to my blazer and a hollow ache under my ribs that no promotion has managed to fill.
I throw myself into the job.
I build decks. I lead brainstorms. I say things like “quarterly projections” and “brand synergy” and don’t even flinch.
Our Chimney Gorge campaign is still lighting up the analytics dashboard.
Margo practically waltzes through the office with pride.
Clients want more “authentic seasonal storytelling,” which is fancy for “make people cry and then click the donate button.”
On paper, this is everything I wanted.
In reality, I keep smelling woodsmoke that isn’t there.
I hear bells in car commercials and my throat closes. Every time my inbox pings with a new social alert, I expect to see a tag from Chimney Gorge, a photo of the sleigh, a grumpy man in flannel lurking at the edge of the frame.
Sometimes he’s there.
Someone posts a picture of Donner in a wreath. Another of the seniors holding cocoa. Once, there’s a blurry shot of Rhett in the background, head tipped, smiling at something off-camera.
I scroll past fast.
If I pause, it feels like pressing on a bruise.
I tell myself I’m adjusting. That it’s normal to miss a place you put so much heart into. That what I feel is nostalgia, not heartbreak.
It’s a lie, but I say it anyway.
Melanie calls when she can between feedings and naps and Everett being “way too cute for his own good, it should be illegal.” She sends pictures—Everett in a tiny knit hat, Everett sleeping on Lucas’s chest, Everett staring at the camera with big solemn eyes like he’s already judging us.
I cry every other time I open one. Happy tears, mostly. But there’s a thread of longing woven through, something like I want that. I want someone who stays.
I don’t say it out loud.
Not even to her.
Not yet.
A few days before New Year’s, the city decides to have one last hurrah.
Saint Pierce calls it the Winter Lights Finale—one more evening where they turn everything on at once. Trees wrapped in white, snowflake projections on building walls, a live band in the plaza, food trucks, couples holding hands in puffy coats.
Margo sticks her head into my office around four.
“Garland.”
I look up from my laptop. “Yes, boss?”
She’s wearing lipstick that means she’s in a mood. “You’re coming to the finale tonight.”
“I have a deck due tomorrow,” I protest weakly.
“Your deck can wait,” she says. “The sponsor loved our numbers. They want us to capture one last burst of city holiday content for next year’s teaser. Also, you look like you’ve been living in that sweater for three days.”
“I have not,” I lie.
She arches a brow. “Wear the red coat. The one from Chimney Gorge. Meet me downstairs at six.”
My heart stutters. “Why?”
“Because I said so,” she sing-songs. “And because I have a surprise. Trust me, Garland. You’re going to want to see this.”
She disappears before I can argue.
I grumble at my screen, but an hour later I’m shrugging into the red coat anyway. The one from the Jubilee. The one that still smells faintly like cold air and pine if I inhale like a maniac.
I catch my reflection in the bathroom mirror. Same brown eyes. Same curls. Same face that fell for a man on a mountain and tried to pretend it was just altitude.
“Get it together,” I tell my reflection. “You’re a professional. You can attend a lights festival without having a crisis.”
My reflection looks unconvinced, but she follows me downstairs anyway.
The plaza is buzzing.
The big tree in the center is still up, strung with white and gold lights that haven’t been turned on yet. Food trucks line the edges. Kids twirl with battery-operated sparkler wands. The air smells like kettle corn and roasted chestnuts and some kind of maple thing that makes my stomach grumble.
Margo is nowhere to be seen.
I tap out a quick text: Here. Where are you?
Her reply pops up instantly.
MARGO: Front steps. Face the tree. And… don’t hate me.
That’s ominous.
I step off the building’s front stoop and turn toward the tree, scanning for her.
I don’t see her.
I see the sleigh.
It’s not the full setup from Chimney Gorge—that would be insane—but it’s a smaller version, a two-person antique painted the same deep red, sleigh bells looped across the side.
It’s parked on a stretch of fake snow laid over the plaza bricks.
There are portable spotlights and a camera on a tripod and—
My heart stops.
Rhett’s standing next to it.
For a second, I’m sure I’ve finally cracked. That I’ve conjured him out of daydreams and leftover trauma and the ghost of bells in my head.
But then he shifts, and the lights catch in his hair, and the breath I suck in hurts because it’s real.
He’s wearing a dark wool coat instead of flannel, but the way he stands is the same—solid, grounded, like nothing could knock him off his feet. His hair’s a little shorter. His jaw’s still unfair. His eyes scan the crowd once, then land on me like they were wired to find me first.
Everything inside me goes loud.
“Ivy,” someone murmurs in my ear.
I jump. Margo’s appeared at my side, smug as a cat who stole the canary and also the canary’s publicist.
“What did you do?” I hiss.
“I facilitated,” she says. “Rhett called the office. Said he had ‘content and other things’ he wanted to discuss.” She makes air quotes. “I told him if he was going to disrupt my star creative’s emotional equilibrium, he had to do it with a campaign-worthy gesture.”
“Margo,” I say, half horrified, half grateful, heart pounding. “You had no right to—”
“I had every right to safeguard my investment,” she counters. “You’ve been walking around here like a ghost with a good eyeliner game. Also, shocking grand gestures test well with our key demographics.”
I can’t help it. I laugh, a shaky, helpless sound.
“What is this?” I whisper.
“Jubilee Meets the City,” she says. “Mini cross-promo. One-night event, limited-time content, heartfelt apology baked into a brand story. You’re going to hate it and love it, which means it’s good.”
I drag my eyes back to the sleigh.
To Rhett.
He looks nervous.
That alone almost knocks me over.
Mr. Quiet and Steady looks like he’d rather be face down in a snowbank than standing here in front of half of Saint Pierce, hands flexing at his sides like he’s not sure what to do with them.
A small crowd has already gathered, drawn by the sleigh and the lights. People murmur. Kids tug parents’ sleeves. Someone whispers, “Is this, like, a proposal thing?”
My palms sweat.
Rhett takes a breath.
Then another.
Then he reaches up and taps his phone, which is hooked to the plaza’s speaker system. A familiar jingle of bells flows out, soft at first, then steadier.
My footage.
He’s playing one of my videos.
The big screen at the edge of the plaza—normally used for movie nights and election results—flickers to life. Donner and Comet’s breath in the cold air. The birch lane. Seniors’ gloved hands on Mrs. Hadley’s quilt.
Then his voice comes through the speakers.
Not the clipped, reluctant tone I’m used to hearing when he’s forced into a quote. This is something else—careful, low, like he sat in a quiet room and meant every word.
“Two things can be true at once,” his voice says over the bells. “You can love the quiet and still want more. You can think you’re protecting someone by pushing them away, and really you’re just protecting yourself from being happy.”
The screen switches to the couch shot.
Our socks. Our legs. The quilt.
My heart trips.
“I thought I could live the rest of my life with just the mountain,” his voice goes on. “Horses. Snow. Old memories. Then a woman in a red coat fell into my sleigh and made a joke about OSHA and ruined everything.”
The crowd laughs. I cover my mouth.
“She filmed the town I thought I’d already seen every side of,” he continues. “She made it new. She made me talk. She made me remember that quiet doesn’t mean alone. And then when it got hard, I did what cowards do.”
The music softens, just bells and a faint piano line.
“I let fear make my choices,” he says. “I told myself she’d be better off without me. That the life she wanted and the life I knew how to survive couldn’t fit together. She called me out.”
My throat closes.
“She was right,” his voice says. “I was a coward. I hurt her. And I’ve been miserable ever since.”
The video fades into a still shot: the Chimney Gorge tree, lights glowing. No people. Just the sense of something waiting.
The audio clicks off.
The plaza is very, very quiet.
Rhett steps forward, turning to face me fully. I feel every pair of eyes on us, but in this moment it might as well be just him and me.
He clears his throat. “Ivy.”
Hearing my name in his actual voice, not just recorded, does something dangerous to my knees.
“I got a job in Saint Pierce,” he says, loud enough for the mic in his hand—where did that come from?
—to catch it. “Private security. Ruin helped. I start after New Year’s.
I’m keeping the cabin. I’ll still work the Jubilee.
I’m not giving up that part of me. But I don’t want to hide up there anymore. ”
The words sink in slowly.
“You’re… moving here?” I manage.
“Splitting time,” he says. “But yeah. I’ll be here. In the noise. In the mess. In line for coffee behind people who say ‘venti’ without irony.”
Some of the crowd chuckles.
His eyes never leave mine.