Chapter 8 Holly
Holly
The show was perfect.
I'm standing in the wings watching the final bows, and I can barely breathe. Marie is radiant—curtsying, beaming at the applause. The Nutcracker Prince takes her hand for the final bow, and the audience is on their feet.
But I keep looking at Evan.
He's stage right with the other party scene parents, and I'm going to die at how good he looks in that tux. The tailcoat, the perfect fit, the way he moves with absolute confidence like he's been doing this his whole life, not like he learned it yesterday in his office.
He is a natural.
The curtain falls. The house lights come up. Backstage erupts—kids hugging, parents congratulating, Mrs. Kowalski giving notes for tomorrow's matinee.
Marie runs straight to me.
“Did you see?! Did you see?!”
I catch her in a hug. “You were amazing. So amazing.”
“I didn't forget anything!”
“Not once. You were perfect.” I pull back, hands on her shoulders. “I'm so proud of you.”
Emma appears, pulling Marie into another hug, then Tom, then my parents emerging from the crowd.
“Sweetheart, you were wonderful,” my mom says, kissing Marie's forehead.
My dad spots Evan standing to the side, and reaches out to shake his hand. “Evan! That was great. Thank you so much for stepping in.”
“Happy to help,” Evan says, and I hear the warmth in his voice.
My mom takes his hand next. “You were wonderful up there. So dashing.”
“Wow, thank you.”
“Well, thank you for helping our Holly.”
I catch his eye over my mom's shoulder. He's smiling.
Emma pulls me aside while everyone's still congratulating Marie. “Okay, he's perfect. You know that, right?”
“Emma—”
“I'm just saying. Tom likes him. Mom likes him. Marie's obsessed with him.” She grins. “And you can't stop looking at him.”
“I'm not—”
“You are.” She squeezes my arm. “Have fun tonight. I'll see you back at the house later?”
“Yeah. Later.”
I make my way backstage to change. Evan's already out of his tux, back in jeans and a sweater. He looks good in that too. Of course he does.
“Ready to go?” I ask.
“Let me grab my stuff.”
We say our goodbyes to the family—Emma giving me one more significant look, Marie making Evan promise he'll be back tomorrow. Then we're out the stage door and into the December night.
The festival is still going, but winding down. Families heading to their cars, vendors starting to pack up booths. The lights are still twinkling though, strung between lampposts and wrapped around tree trunks.
“Want to walk through town?” I ask. “See the festival? Or whatever part is still happening tonight?”
“I'd like that.”
We drop off our things in Evan’s car and start walking, no particular destination. Just moving through the square, past the bakery (closed now, but the window display still lit), past the bookstore with its romance novel event poster still in the window.
I step over a curb awkwardly—there's equipment from one of the booths scattered on the sidewalk—and Evan reaches out, catching my hand.
“Careful.”
“Thanks.”
He doesn't let go.
Neither do I.
We keep walking, hands clasped, and I'm hyperaware of every point of contact. His palm warm against mine. His thumb occasionally brushing my knuckles. The way our steps have synchronized without trying.
“So,” I say after a while. “How do you know about the Marie/Clara thing?”
“Elsbeth was a retired ballerina. Danced with the Royal Ballet.”
I stop walking.
“I'm sorry, what?”
He turns to face me. “I didn't mention that?”
“You definitely didn't mention that! Evan! Your nanny was a professional ballerina and you just ... casually left that out?”
“It didn't seem relevant.”
“Not relevant?!” I'm trying to keep my voice down but honestly. “You spent an hour in the car telling me about Gene Kelly movies. You could have mentioned that Elsbeth danced for the Royal Ballet!”
“Fair point.” He starts walking again, pulling me gently along. “We'd watch The Nutcracker on TV during the holidays if my parents weren't home. Different productions—New York City Ballet, Royal Ballet, Bolshoi. She'd explain the differences, why certain companies staged it certain ways.”
I'm listening, picturing young Evan curled up with Elsbeth, watching ballet on TV while his parents were out.
“She gave me a book about it one Christmas,” he continues. “The history, the different variations, all the productions. She wanted me to see all the roles for boys—the Nutcracker Prince, the toy soldiers, the Mouse King, all the character dances in Act II.”
“She wanted to normalize boys dancing for you.”
“Yeah.” His voice is soft. “She did.”
We're at the edge of the square now, which opens to a small park. The massive oak tree stands in the center—the Wish Tree for the duration of the festival—and it's covered in lights and paper.
“So wait,” I say, stopping again. “Is this not your debut in The Nutcracker too?”
He shakes his head with a chuckle. “No, it is—I swear. I was never in it. But as you said, Elsbeth wanted me to see that boys belonged in all types of dance.”
“That's the sweetest thing I've ever heard.”
“Is it?”
“And the saddest.” I squeeze his hand. “Because she saw you, Evan. She really saw you. And then—”
“And then I went to boarding school.”
We stand there, hands clasped, the festival lights twinkling around us.
“What about you?” he asks. “You said you were 'almost Clara' once?”
I take a breath. “Yes, but I didn't get to dance it.”
He waits.
“I went to that ballet school from the time I was five. It was my whole life. At eleven, I was cast as Clara. Started rehearsals, learned all the choreography. I was so ready.” The memory is sharp even now. “Two weeks before opening night, I got mono.”
“Holly—”
“Out for two months. Missed the entire run.
By the time the next year came around, I'd grown four inches. Too tall for Clara. A new group of younger girls were ready for their chance.” I look up at the oak tree, the wishes fluttering in the breeze.
“I kept dancing for a few more years, but it was never the same.”
“That's why this matters so much. Marie's debut.”
“It's not just her. It's me too. My chance, the one I lost.” I turn to face him. “That's why I had to save this show. Why I was so desperate on Friday.”
He's looking at me with such tenderness that I have to look away.
“So we both gave it up,” he says. “Just different reasons.”
“Yeah. We did.”
EVAN
We're standing under the oak tree now, and I'm trying to process what Holly just told me.
Almost Clara. Cast, rehearsed, ready—and then gone. Not because someone told her to stop, but because her body betrayed her at exactly the wrong moment.
At least I had a choice, even if it was the wrong one. She didn't get that.
“This is the Wish Tree,” Holly says, gesturing up at the branches. Paper wishes flutter in the light breeze, hundreds of them, catching the light from the strands wrapped around the trunk. “It's a town tradition. Everyone writes a wish for the new year and hangs it up.”
“How old is this tree?”
“Over a hundred years. My great-grandmother hung wishes here when she was little.” She's looking up at the branches, and the lights catch her face. “Pretty much everyone in Pinewood Falls has made a wish on this tree at some point.”
“Do they come true?”
“Sometimes.” She smiles. “Or maybe people just remember what they wished for and work toward it. Hard to say.”
There's a small table nearby with paper and pens, protected under a canopy. A sign reads: “Make a wish for the New Year.”
“I don't believe in wishes,” I say.
“Humor me.”
She picks up a slip of paper and a pen, thinks for a moment, then starts writing. Her handwriting is quick, decisive. She folds the paper, reaches up to hang it on a lower branch.
“Your turn,” she says.
“I'm good.”
“Evan. You just performed in The Nutcracker. You can write a wish.”
“Those two things are not related.”
“They absolutely are. Both require suspending disbelief.” She holds out a pen. “Come on.”
I take it. Look at the blank paper.
What would I even wish for?
“I'm going to get us some drinks,” Holly says. “There's a booth that does peppermint mochas. Be right back.”
She walks away, and I'm left alone under the tree with a blank piece of paper and a pen.
Wishes aren’t my thing. I believe in strategy, planning, execution. In making things happen through effort and intention, not hoping the universe will provide.
But.
I pick up the pen and write:
To stop feeling like a guest in my own life.
I fold it quickly, before I can second-guess the words. Reach up and hang it on a high branch, tucked behind other wishes where Holly won't see it.
“Got them!” Holly is holding two cups, steam rising in the cold air. “One peppermint mocha for you, and one for me.”
“I didn't say I wanted—”
“You're in Pinewood Falls during festival weekend. You're having a peppermint mocha.” She hands me the cup. “It's a requirement.”
I take a sip. It's sweet, aggressively sweet, with that artificial peppermint she loves so much.
It's also perfect.
“See?” She's grinning. “You like it.”
“I didn't say that.”
“You're smiling.”
“I'm tolerating it.”
“Sure you are.” She takes a sip of her own, looking up at the wishes fluttering above us. “Thank you. For all of this. For helping with the show, for being here, for—everything.”
“You don't have to keep thanking me.”
“Yes, I do. You didn't have to do any of this.”
I turn to face her. The tree lights are reflecting in her eyes.
“I wanted to,” I say. “I haven't had this much fun in ... years.”
“Come on,” I say, before I can do something stupid like kiss her in front of the entire town's Wish Tree. “I'll drive you to your sister's.”
I'm getting ready for bed when my phone buzzes.
Holly
Emma says hi. She has approximately 47 questions for me.
I smile, type back.
Hi to Emma. No questions here. Just the lake.
Peaceful?
Very.
Good.
I should say goodnight. Let her go. We both need sleep—tomorrow's another show.
Thank you. For tonight.
I thought we weren't thanking each other anymore.
I'm making an exception.
Why?
I stare at the screen, trying to figure out how to say this without saying too much.
Because I wanted to be there. Not because of any deal. Just because.
I'm glad you were.
See you tomorrow?
I'll be the one stress-managing backstage.
And I'll be the one in the tux.
Can't wait.
Goodnight, Holly.
Goodnight, Evan.
I set my phone on the nightstand and stare at the ceiling.
I'm in so much trouble here.