27. Chasity
CHASITY
The idea of staying lodges itself in my chest like a startling, warm breath.
It stops being a vague, someday-maybe fantasy and becomes a tangible thing.
I sit at the front desk of the inn, Lachlan’s laptop propped open in front of me, the glow of the screen illuminating my face.
Outside the big paned windows, Calico Peak is a postcard.
Fresh snow blankets every roof and branch, softening the edges of the world, and the Christmas lights strung along Main Street blur into soft jewels of color.
In the kitchen behind me, Lachlan hums an off-key Christmas carol, the scrape and clatter of him prepping for breakfast a familiar, comforting rhythm.
He has no idea that I am scrolling through rental listings, my entire life teetering on the edge of a decision.
"One bedroom apartment above the bookstore.
" "Cozy cabin, five miles from town." "Duplex for rent, inquire with Ellen." Seeing addresses, lease prices, and blurry photos of empty rooms makes my heart kick against my ribs. A current of pure terror zings through me, hot and sharp, but it’s followed by a fizz of unmistakable excitement. It’s one thing to drift through days in a place; it's another entirely to look at a floor plan and think, mine.
A few days later, the decision gets ripped from my solitary, panicked hands. Rosa marches into the inn, spots the rental page still open on my phone, and claps her hands together with the force of a thunderclap.
"No, no, sweet girl. You can’t trust those online pictures. Ellen’s cousin uses a filter that hides the mold."
Before I can form a protest, she’s appointed herself my real-estate coordinator.
My afternoon becomes a whirlwind tour of every available space in a five-mile radius.
We squeeze up a narrow staircase into a tiny apartment above the bakery that smells intoxicatingly of yeast and sugar. Rosa pokes at the window frames.
"Questionable insulation. You won't freeze. But you’ll hear every single conversation on Main Street."
Next is a small cabin nestled against the edge of the woods, its porch looking out over a sea of snow-dusted pines.
It’s quiet and beautiful, but feels a little too isolated.
Then comes the aggressively floral duplex owned by Ellen’s cousin.
The air inside is thick and suffocating with the scent of stale cinnamon candles, and every wall is covered in wallpaper depicting unsettlingly cheerful roses.
"The smell never leaves," Rosa whispers, her nose wrinkled. "And Maggie snores. You can hear it through the walls."
As I stand in a living room with pale yellow walls and a big, sunny window, listening to Rosa detail the pros and cons of propane versus electric heat, a profound shift occurs.
I am no longer calculating escape routes.
I am mentally arranging furniture. My worn armchair would fit perfectly in that corner.
A bookshelf could go right there. The realization settles over me, quiet and undeniable.
I’m not just thinking about staying anymore. I’m thinking about how.
Lachlan leans against the check-in counter, wiping it down with a damp cloth even though it’s already spotless.
He asks about the square footage of the bakery apartment with a studied casualness, his focus seemingly on a stubborn water ring.
Taven, nursing a beer at one of the small tables, scoffs when Rosa loudly suggests he should put in a good word for the little cabin by the woods.
“I’m not campaigning for custody of the runaway bride, Rosa.” He takes a long sip, his gaze flicking to me for a brief, unreadable moment. “She can make her own decisions.”
Even Ben, who stops by to drop off Lachlan’s mail, reacts with a gentle sort of distance. He hears us talking about Ellen’s duplex and just nods.
“If you find a place you like, let me know. I can take a look at the wiring before you sign anything.”
Their restraint is a physical weight. It anchors me more than any grand declaration could.
No one tries to influence me or paint a romantic picture of what my life could be here.
They just offer quiet, practical support, their actions all saying the same thing: We want you to be happy, even if that happiness doesn't include us.
The space they give me is both terrifying and the most profound act of care I have ever received.
Later, the inn is quiet. Lachlan finds me on the porch, staring out at the snow that falls in fat, lazy flakes through the golden halo of the porch light. I hug my arms around myself, the cold seeping into my sweater.
“I’m scared,” I admit, the words a puff of white in the frigid air. “What if this is just another huge mistake? What if I build a life here and wake up one day and it’s just as wrong as the last one?”
He leans against the railing beside me, not touching, just a solid presence in the darkness. He watches the snowflakes drift down, letting my fear hang between us without trying to swat it away.
“Then you’ll leave,” he says, his voice low and steady. “And I’ll help you pack. If you called me from a rest stop in Ohio because you decided this wasn’t it, I wouldn't be mad. I’d just want to know you were okay.”
He turns his head, his warm brown eyes meeting mine. There is no agenda there, no hidden plea. Just honesty. The selfless, unconditional truth of his words makes my chest ache. It cracks something open inside me that I thought had long since sealed over.
Taven says nothing as I juggle two paper bags, my boots slipping on a patch of black ice behind the diner. He just takes them from me, his grip certain, waiting for me to find my footing. The small kindness unravels the knot of anxiety I’ve been holding tight all afternoon.
“It’s just… irrational,” I say, the words spilling out in a frosty cloud. “I don’t have a job lined up. My entire life is packed into three suitcases and a car that barely runs. What am I thinking, looking at apartments? It’s completely irresponsible.”
He stops beside his truck, his green eyes fixed on me.
He doesn’t offer platitudes or try to solve my logistical nightmare.
He just listens as I tick off all the reasons I should pack up and go back to a life that makes sense on paper.
When I finally run out of steam, the parking lot feels unnervingly quiet.
“Have you considered,” Taven says, his voice a low rumble, “that happiness might deserve equal weight in the equation?”
The question hangs in the cold air, sharp and clear.
My mouth opens, then closes. I have no answer.
For years, I treated my own emotional state like an inconvenient variable, something to be managed and suppressed in service of the grand plan.
The idea that my own joy could be a valid data point—as important as a budget or a career path—is so foreign it stops my brain cold.
A few days later, I stand inside a small cabin on the town’s perimeter, the air smelling of pine and old wood. Ben is with me. He doesn’t talk about feelings or forever. He moves through the space with a quiet purpose, his rough hand brushing against a wall.
“The foundation looks solid,” he murmurs, his head tilted. He ducks under the kitchen sink, the sound of him tapping on pipes echoing in the small room. A moment later, he emerges, wiping his hands on his jeans. “Plumbing’s old, but it’s copper. That’s good.”
He points out the window to the narrow dirt road, now a thick blanket of white. “This road doesn’t get ploughed first. You’d want to make sure you have four-wheel drive.”
Standing there, watching him map out the practical realities of a life for me here, a startling clarity hits me.
Lachlan’s easy acceptance, Taven’s challenging honesty, and now Ben’s quiet, steady support.
None of them are asking me to carve away pieces of myself to fit into their world.
They are just handing me tools. With startling certainty, I realize they’re helping me build a life where I get to exist fully inside it.
By the end of the week, brochures and scribbled-on napkins cover the small desk in my room.
A glossy flyer for a two-bedroom apartment sits next to a printout of the little cabin Ben inspected, marked up with my notes in the margins.
Check insulation. Propane cost? Outside, snow falls in a thick, silent curtain, burying Calico Peak deeper in white.
My phone buzzes on the desk, a notification from a rental app, and I don’t feel the familiar jolt of anxiety.
Instead, a quiet hum of purpose settles in my bones.
I trace the floor plan of the cabin with my finger, imagining where I would put a desk to write, a chair to read.
A future, my future, begins to take shape in these flimsy papers.
It’s a fragile thing, built on impulse and a string of maybes, but for the first time, it belongs entirely to me.
My life with Jason had a blueprint, one we were both expected to follow.
Every choice felt like a compromise, a small sanding down of my edges to make a smoother fit.
I remember wanting to take a pottery class, the excitement fizzing in my chest, and the way he just smiled, a patient, dismissive little smile.
“When would you have time for that, honey?” he’d asked, and just like that, the desire deflated, another silly impulse to be packed away.
I learned to stop wanting things that didn’t fit the plan.
Here, my wants are not treated as inconvenient detours.
Lachlan listens, truly listens, when I talk about what I might want to do for work, tossing out ridiculous and brilliant ideas with equal enthusiasm.
Taven asks questions that make me dig deeper, forcing me to own my desires instead of apologising for them.
Ben just quietly prepares for them, pointing out which roads are best for winter driving and offering to look at the wiring in a potential apartment.
Love, I am learning, is not a negotiation.
It is not about making myself smaller so someone else has more room.
It is standing in a snow-dusted town, surrounded by possibilities, and feeling seen.
Fully and completely seen, in all my messy, uncertain glory, by three different men who seem to want nothing more than for me to finally, finally, take up space.