Ten
When they rounded the corner onto Division Street, the inn stood proud.
The Colchuck anchored the end of the street as it always had.
Chin lifted, shoulders square, as if it hadn’t taken a sucker punch from a bully.
The city snowplows had been by recently—fresh snow berms flanked the yet-to-be-shoveled sidewalk, footprints and dog tracks weaving through them, indicating locals had been walking by anyway.
A little snow wasn’t a reason to isolate.
As they reached the inn, their pace slowed.
The home glowed against the grey dusk.
Colorful Christmas lights traced the steep-pitched roof in precise lines.
White along the eaves, red and green tucked into dormers, with the kind of careful symmetry her father used to insist upon.
These weren’t thrown on haphazardly. They’d been deliberately placed. The loose gutter had been secured, too.
“Did you hang Christmas lights when I wasn’t looking?” London asked.
“Wasn’t me.”
Harper’s Carhartt jacket wasn’t quite warm enough to take the edge off the cold. She flipped the collar up and squinted toward the roofline.
“That’s Joel’s ladder.”
“How do you know?”
“I’m an excellent amateur sleuth.” Harper nudged an elbow into London’s waist. “It says Der B?ckerei on the side. He must’ve forgotten it.”
They stood for a moment, taking it all in.
Amazing what a little holiday cheer could do.
The place didn’t look as downtrodden anymore.
Not finished, but no longer wounded. Its black eye was healing.
From the sidewalk, it looked like The Colchuck should in December.
Lights inviting guests to stay awhile. A large wreath on the front door with an oversized bow and Santa and Mrs. Claus figurines in the center.
“That wreath has to be Katie Madsen—how did she have time?”
London noticed the sidewalk in front of the inn had been shoveled, too.
“That wasn’t done when we left, right?”
She stared at her family’s inn in disbelief. They’d left a construction site for coffee and come home to Christmas on full display.
“Definitely not done.”
Harper stepped closer and looked through the sitting room window. Paper snowflakes were taped inside—the kind elementary school children make with crooked lines and too much glitter. “Looks like the kids got involved.”
A small sign had been staked into one of the piles of snow that had fallen from the roof, handwritten in black marker.
WELCOME BACK, COLCHUCK!
Underneath the words, someone had drawn a smiley face with hearts for eyes.
Harper leveled the sign. “Of course they did this while we were out. You’d never let anyone help if you were standing here.”
“I would.” London huffed a quiet laugh.
But would she?
Locals had approached her on repeat and offered help. Even with a deadline, she hadn’t asked. She’d said polite thank yous and offered obligatory hugs. But she hadn’t asked for help. Not once. Unless you count bartering with Harper for her help.
Whoever’d shoveled had been determined. They’d cleared the snow off all the stairs and brushed off the banister caps. Even sprinkled salt on the steps.
This town was serious when it said, “We’re here for you.”
“Wow,” London said. “This is unreal.”
Harper’s hand found her lower back without hesitation. Not a pat. Not a brief touch. A steadying support.
“It’s gonna be okay,” Harper said quietly. No teasing. No jokes. Just there.
“I didn’t even ask for help.”
“You didn’t have to.” Harper’s thumb moved against the seam of London’s puffy coat.
The words landed somewhere tender.
“I thought if I handled it myself, I’d feel—in control.”
Control meant not getting hurt. What she hadn't accounted for was that controlling everything—the inn, the grief, the story she told herself about Harper—hadn't protected her at all. It had just made her the last to know she was already broken.
Harper’s voice softened. “Control isn’t always the best thing.”
Sebastian opened the front door to find them both staring up at the house from the sidewalk. “You weren’t supposed to see this yet!”
“You were behind this?” London choked out a laugh, but her eyes were beaming.
“Oh, I didn’t do anything. I just let Katie inside so her kiddos could decorate. Those snowflakes are aggressively asymmetrical, but I’m told it’s the thought that counts.”
London wiped quickly below one eye. “It’s perfect.”
The inside had work left to be done. But the outside—what the world saw—was perfect.
“I was hoping for a bigger reaction, but you do you. While I have you, let’s go over these new listings, okay?”
“Yeah, of course,” London followed Sebastian into the sitting room, where he’d set up a card table and folding chairs. The open walls added a touch of incompleteness.
“I’m actually gonna head across town,” Harper said, rocking back on her heels. “Gonna work on the cabinet doors in a friend’s woodshop.”
# # #
“I saw that.” Sebastian pointed to a folding chair and scooted in, close to an open laptop. A sharp contrast to his business attire, he was wearing what he probably considered construction casual. Dark jeans, fitted camel sweater, Timberland boots.
“Hm?” London pulled the chair gently across her new floors, careful not to scuff. The scrape of metal legs across the new wood made her shudder.
“Harper,” he clarified. “I saw her hand on your back.”
“Oh, that.” London sat, smoothing her hands over her thighs. “Old habits.”
Sebastian looked straight into London’s soul.
“That was not old habits. A couple days ago she was giving you the cold shoulder and speaking in monosyllables like you were her least favorite coworker. What changed?”
“Don’t we need to go over the listings?”
“We do,” he agreed. “But there’s time. This is far more important.”
Sebastian flipped the lid of the laptop closed with dramatic formality and rested his forearms on the plastic tabletop.
London studied the fireplace. Had there always been a chipped brick along the bottom?
“I really don’t know, Bash. We went to coffee and—”
“You went to coffee!” he interrupted, his grin spreading slow and wide, Cheshire cat smug. “That’s where you were. I figured Home Depot. You. Went. To. Coffee.”
“Yes,” London said, matter of fact. “We went to coffee. We worked all morning and the three o’clock slump hit. Caffeine was required. It doesn’t mean anything.”
“Hmm, based on what I saw, it means something.”
“Truly, it doesn’t.”
“You know,” Sebastian started, fluffing his perfectly blown-dry part. “The first year I worked here, you two were unbearable.”
“What?”
London had been called a lot of things in her life. As far as she knew, unbearable wasn’t one of them.
“Unbearable in love,” he continued. “She’d come down early and fix whatever Frederick had already fixed just so she could spend time with you. You’d look annoyed but lean back into her.”
London studied the fireplace more.
“You’d sneak off and make out in the empty guest rooms.”
“We did not!”
“You did. I know things.”
“Perhaps, but all this means is we’re old now. That was forever ago. Things change.”
“You may be old now, but I’m forever twenty-nine. Look at these cheekbones.” Sebastian slipped a hand across the table and took London’s. “But seriously. Find out what that meant. You won’t know unless you ask. And last I checked, you’re still in love with her.”
Goddamn Sebastian and his knowing things.
London sat with the accusation. One Laurie’d lobbed at her, too.
What did it matter if she was? In a week, the inn would be finished, Harper’s obligation would be fulfilled, and she’d sign the divorce papers. Deal made. Deal kept.
Sebastian flipped the laptop back open.
“Fine,” he said. “Expedia first. It’s the most complex. High-resolution exterior photo first. We need one with the lights. People book with their eyes.”
London stood, looking at the laptop screen and grateful to be pulled back into work. “Use the one from last year. No change needed.”
“I thought of that.” He clicked through the stock images they already had online. “But maybe we take a new one today. Give it a fresh start. And then a new photo shoot inside when Harper’s—when you’re done.”
London raised an eyebrow.
“Let’s use the one from last year.”
Sebastian clicked. London focused on the screen. Much easier.
# # #
By the time they’d finished editing listings, dark had set in. Sebastian had left to go to that night’s tree lighting ceremony with friends, and London was again alone in the warm glow of a single lamp in the corner of the sitting room. She could turn on the overhead lights but didn’t.
The inn was quiet in a way only empty buildings are. Hollow in places. The sound of every movement carrying farther than it should. A space that hadn’t quite decided what it was yet.
London sat at the folding table and clicked through the photos they’d selected for the ads.
The Colchuck at Christmas, beaming. Interiors of guest rooms, but none of the main level.
Shots of Front Street, lit in all its holiday glory.
Photos guests had sent of vistas from the Enchantments.
Some she’d taken as well. A photo of a family of deer in the front yard.
And one—just one—of her dad on a ladder, clipping a strand of lights onto the gutters when she was a child.
The inside was being refinished, but there was still some nostalgia here.
History.
There were still memories worth remembering.
Outside, the new Christmas lights blinked patiently. She heard someone down the street laugh. A car door slammed. Life moved along, as it always did.
London leaned back into the folding chair and studied the sitting room. New floor. Open walls. A stack of drywall, just waiting to be installed. It was strange just how fast everything had come back together. Stranger still how much had changed since Harper stepped in.
She closed the laptop and sat in the silence for a moment.
Stillness.
Her life had been nothing but motion for so long. The stillness felt like a heavy blanket on a cold night—comforting and suffocating at once.