Epilogue
JULIET
End of summer
The lake had grown quiet in the final weeks of August. Most of the tourists had packed up and left, taking their jet skis and loud music with them. What remained was a calmer version of the place I’d known my whole life.
We had bought the cabin. It happened faster than I expected, and I took that as a sign it was meant to be. Now it was ours, and we were working on updating and renovating parts of it and possibly expanding it in case we wanted to think about a bigger future… like children.
Every time I walked through the door, I still felt a small rush of disbelief. This little wooden house with its big window overlooking the water was where we were building our life.
Bastian was still the same man in so many ways. He was rough around the edges, always trying to one-up himself on everything, and I noticed he carried the weight of everything he’d done before me heavily on his shoulders.
He still got quiet some evenings, staring out at the lake like he was waiting for the past to catch up. But there was someone waiting for him when he came home now. Someone who chose him every single day, even on the hard ones.
Me. And I’d be by his side for the rest of our lives.
I sat on the rickety little dock behind our cabin, the evening sky a soft gold color as the sun was setting.
I dangled my feet in the water when I heard his footsteps. I looked over to see Bastian walking closer, a beer in each hand. He sat down beside me, close enough that our shoulders brushed.
“Your dad called earlier,” he said eventually, voice low. “Asked if I could help him winterize the big boat next month.”
I smiled a little and leaned my head on his shoulder. Ever since they’d had that initial talk, things had been like this between them. Civil but still a little weird.
My dad was holding onto his disapproval, which was fine, but he was seeing Bastian several times a week under the guise of needing help fixing things. I knew this was my dad’s way of trying to mend their relationship.
“Fixing broken things has always been his way of dealing with emotional ones.”
“Yeah.” He let out a slow breath. “Still feels strange sometimes. Like we’re all walking on eggshells. But it’s better than the silence from before.”
Yeah, it was definitely getting better with each passing day. Maybe one day, things would be back to a semblance of normalcy. I turned to look at him.
“We’re figuring it out. All of us. One awkward conversation at a time.”
He reached over and laced his fingers with mine. “I keep thinking about us actually building something here instead of just hiding in it.” He gave me a small, almost shy smile, and brought my hand to his mouth to kiss my knuckles. “You still want that? Even with all the mess we brought with us?”
“More than anything,” I said honestly. “I want mornings like this and nights where we don’t have to whisper.
” I rested my head on his shoulder and watched the sun dip lower.
I was starting fall online classes in a few weeks and couldn’t wait to throw myself into them and help out at the marina during the busy months.
For the first time, I wasn’t chasing a different life. I was building one.
Later that night, a storm rolled in across the lake.
The wind picked up, thunder rumbled low in the distance, and the rain began to hammer against the cabin roof.
We were already in bed, the lights off, when the first big flash of lightning lit up the room.
I smiled against Bastian’s chest, the old, warm memory rising without effort.
He pulled me closer, one big hand rubbing slow circles on my back.
“You okay?” he asked softly.
“Yeah.” I tilted my head up so I could see his face in the dark. “Just thinking about all the storms we’ve been through. The ones when I was little… and the ones we’ve faced together now.”
He was quiet for a moment then he kissed my forehead, long and lingering, whispering how much he loved me.
Thunder shook the windows, lightning flashed again, and I closed my eyes and pressed closer to him, listening to the steady beat of his heart.
He held me tighter, kissed my hair, and said into the night, “It’s you and me against the world, baby.”
Yeah, it was.
And as the storm raged outside, I fell asleep in the arms of the man who had always felt like home.
The End.