Epilogue #3
There had been no nervousness that morning at my old apartment building.
There was nothing to be nervous about.
Because there was no doubt in my mind about Savea, about our future.
She was the one.
She'd always been the one.
She was across town at the Mallick house, letting the girls pamper her, likely listening to Peyton act all serious, giving her the "talk" about what to expect on the wedding night.
I was the calmest I had ever been as I slipped into a suit, as I shared a drink with all the men, as they reassured me that they would make sure Harry stayed on track while we were out of town for a few weeks - a gift from Charlie and Helen to us, three weeks on a beach in the Bahamas.
No drywall dust.
No tile samples.
No instant headache from the sounds of hammers and drills and electric sanders.
Just the two of us in the sand, the sun, the waves.
It had been exactly what we needed.
It eased the tension in our shoulders, the frustration in our souls.
There was nothing to worry about there.
We spent our days in bed, lost in each other, only crawling out when we needed something to eat.
When the day finally came for us to head home, we were tan, rested, ready to get back to Paddy and Petunia, back to life, back to the foundations we were building.
We'd left it all a wreck.
Paint cans everywhere, walls half-built, cut-outs from magazines tacked up to walls as ideas.
I didn't even think we had washed out the rollers from the last attempt to paint the bedroom.
"What the hell?" Savvy demanded as soon as we pulled up the drive, seeing the house for the first time in almost a month.
Half of the house had been covered in bright blue tarp then.
Tyvek had been wrapped around part of the house where we had needed to take the old wooden shakes off due to water damage.
The stacks of supplies had been piled to the side of the driveway.
But there were no tarps, no Tyvek, no supplies.
Because the house was finished.
As in... finished finished.
The addition we couldn't afford - and couldn't pull off because of the septic issue that we couldn't quite fit into the budget to fix yet either - was suddenly there, long, sprawling, with new red wooden shakes, gleaming windows, what looked like the two extra bedrooms, living room, half bath, and dining room we had wanted.
"Did you know about this?" she demanded to know, looking over at me with huge eyes, a slack jaw.
"No," I assured her, parking the car, pushing the door open immediately, hearing her door slam behind her as she did the same.
"They even did the porch," she said, moving in beside me as we made the way up to the door, now laid with a red brick path lined in hearty, happy-looking Black-eyed Susans.
None of which had been there when we left.
"This is insane," she added as I slid the key into the lock, stomach twisted in anticipation. "They already paid for the honeymoon. This is too much."
It was.
Way too much.
But I couldn't seem to find a bit of bruised pride at someone else having done the work that had been driving us crazy, that had been draining our bank account faster than we could fill it.
"Oh, my God. This is exactly how we had pictured it," Savvy gasped as we walked into the fully finished kitchen - all white like we had wanted, with the only pop of color being the bright blue cabinets of the oversized island.
There was a small white table-for-two beside a large white China cabinet.
"Those are the plates I wanted!" she shrieked, mouth open in a huge O. "They were sold out!" she added, rushing over to open the cabinet, holding one of the plates, running her hand over it. "And they discontinued it."
"And this range was back-ordered," I said, brows lowering.
"Come on, let's go see the rest," she said, grabbing my hand, pulling me in through to the dining room that - while it wouldn't host all our family and friends at once - had a table that could seat eight, an oversized sideboard, an entire wall full of windows.
The bedrooms and extra bath were off a hall that connected back to our old bedroom.
"This had to have cost a fortune," Savea said, worrying her lip with her teeth.
It wasn't that our family couldn't afford it. It was fair to say many of them were pretty much rolling in it. From their loan shark business all the way through to all their legitimate businesses, they had more money coming in than they could possibly ever spend.
It wouldn't hurt their bottom lines. Especially if they pooled together to get it done.
But, yeah, it would have cost more than I cared to think of. Especially to have it done so quickly for us.
"I don't think my heart can take anymore," Savea said as my hand pulled her back down through the hall, the dining room.
The family room was all that was left.
It was a large space with windows on three walls, a giant stone fireplace dominating the far wall.
"Can you imagine this in the snow?" Savvy asked.
"The snow coming down on all sides with a fire roaring.
It would be like being inside of a snow globe...
what's the matter?" she asked as something caught my eye, making me drop her hand, move across the fully furnished space, full of all the items we had pinned to an idea board, some of them 'wild fantasy' choices that we knew we wouldn't be able to afford for a long time.
Everything was perfect.
Everything had a place and was in it.
Exactly as we had imagined.
Except for something on top of the fireplace mantel.
Two things, actually.
A business card.
Balefire Industries.
And something else as well.
A golden casino chip with black notches.
I turned with it in my hands, Savea's gaze falling on it.
"No way."
But, then again, it was the only thing that made sense, wasn't it?
"Is there an address on the chip?" Savea asked, coming up beside me. I turned it in my fingers and, sure enough, there was. "I guess we are invited back."
And we were.
And we went.
Often.
Eventually, everyone stopped letting Savea win.
It turns out that there were still some things to learn about someone you had been living with for over a year and a half.
Savea had what it took to become the best poker player I had ever seen.
Savea - 11 years
"Wells, take the skirt off the pig," I called through the open kitchen window.
I found that motherhood was an endless cycle of you catching yourself saying phrases that you never could have seen yourself saying before.
Don't let the dog lick you in the mouth.
Why are there GI Joes in the toilet?
We do not pee on our siblings.
Why is there a bucket of earthworms under your bed?
Kingston and I had settled on having two children.
That was the plan.
But plans were a funny thing.
And we could practically hear God laughing when we went for the ultrasound appointment for my second pregnancy and there were two heartbeats instead of one.
Wells was our first, coming just a year after our wedding. He reminded me a lot of his Uncle Rush - light, easy, confident, prone to pranks and troublemaking.
Three years after he came into our lives, Sullivan and Rani followed.
Sullivan was a mini version of his father. Calm, patient, generous, kind-hearted. If Rani was too small, too weak - taking after me in the height and size department - you could always count on the much taller and stronger Sullivan helping her out.
Rani took after me in the way of looks. The same long, dark mass of hair, the same eyes.
And she - like all her siblings - loved animals.
But Rani, personality-wise, was much more like a mix of her Aunts Peyton and Jamie.
Unpredictable, yet mothering. Crazy, but also able to sit and work on puzzles or other tasks that required intense concentration for hours on end.
The farm had finally become a farm again, slowly over the years.
The chickens were first, providing fresh, cruelty-free eggs every morning.
The ducks came on their own every spring, landing in a stream that ran through the more wooded strip of our property. Kingston and I would go out onto the back deck, listening to their quacking as they swam around, as they ate all the insects that would have driven us crazy otherwise.
The pig, Mortimer, had come next. From the rescue, as I once told Kingston I had wanted.
And, of course, there were the dogs.
Paddy was still with us, a little slower than usual, not quite the crazy thing he had once been, but happily occupying one of the many dog beds scattered all around our home.