Chapter 3
Sadie
The festival crowd thinned as evening settled over Silver Ridge, families heading home with sleepy children while couples lingered over the last hot chocolate vendors.
I should have been back at the bed and breakfast, reviewing tomorrow's set list or returning Keisha's increasingly frantic calls.
Instead, I found myself at the main gate at exactly ten o'clock, anticipation humming through me like a half-written song finding its melody.
Gavin emerged from the shadows carrying a thermos and small backpack. He'd traded his festival apron for a heavy wool coat, but his scowl remained firmly in place. When he moved toward me, I caught his scent on the cold air—pine soap and kitchen spices. Perfectly him.
"You came," he said, surprise threading through his voice.
"Did you think I wouldn't?"
"Crossed my mind." He gestured toward a trail winding up into darkness beyond the streetlights. "Twenty-minute hike. You okay with that in those boots?"
I looked down at my designer ankle boots—cute but definitely not hiking appropriate. "I'll manage."
The path climbed steadily through stands of pine and aspen, snow crunching under our feet while our breath formed clouds in the crisp mountain air.
Twice my boots slipped on loose rock hidden beneath white powder, and both times Gavin's hand appeared at my elbow, steadying me with the same careful attention he gave his cooking—competent, protective, sending warmth racing up my arm even through our coats.
The third time I stumbled, he caught my hand properly, his fingers warm and callused against mine. "Here," he said simply, and didn't let go.
The contact sent harmonics through my chest—not just attraction but recognition, as if my body had been waiting for his touch without knowing it. When his thumb brushed across my knuckles, I had to bite back a soft sound that would have revealed far too much.
"So what made you leave Calgary?" I asked as we climbed, partly curious and partly needing distraction from the way his touch was rewriting my internal rhythm.
"You really want to know?"
Something in his tone made me pause. "Only if you want to tell me."
He was quiet for so long I thought he wouldn't answer. Then: "Burned out. Had a breakdown in the middle of service one night. Threw a pan across the kitchen and walked out."
The raw honesty caught me off guard. Most people dressed up their career changes, made them sound like brave choices instead of desperate escapes.
"Spent three days on my apartment floor, listening to..." He stopped walking. "This is going to sound crazy."
"Try me."
"Your music. Small Town Dreams. Played it on repeat until my neighbors complained."
My heart stuttered, missing a beat entirely. That album had been my most personal, written during a period when I was questioning everything about the path I'd chosen. I'd poured my doubts and hopes into those songs, never knowing who might need to hear them.
"That song, the title track, was like you were singing directly to me. About finding peace in smaller places, about dreams that don't require you to lose yourself." He started walking again, faster now. "Gave me permission to want something different."
"Gavin." I caught his arm, feeling the solid strength beneath wool. "That's not crazy. That's exactly why used to I write music."
His pewter eyes found mine in the darkness. "Used to?"
The question hung between us, heavy with implications. Instead of answering, I said, "Show me this beautiful thing you promised."
We crested a ridge, and the view opened up before us in a crescendo of wonder.
Silver Ridge spread below us in a constellation of warmth, Christmas lights twinkling between bare tree branches, the ski runs tracing silver lines down distant mountainsides.
Above us, the sky was velvet black and studded with more stars than I'd seen since childhood.
But it was the comet that stole my breath completely.
The comet, C/2022 X1 Kringle, hung in the northern sky like nature's own Christmas ornament, its warm glow pulsing against the darkness while its tail stretched behind in a delicate stream of cosmic dust and gas, shimmering like the most ethereal tinsel imaginable.
The whole celestial display looked like sheet music written in light across the darkness—a melody too beautiful for earthbound instruments to capture.
"Oh," I breathed.
"Gets brighter every night," Gavin said softly, his breath warm against my ear as he stepped close behind me. "Reaches its zenith on Christmas Eve, then starts its journey back into deep space by Christmas morning."
He led me to a fallen log that made a perfect bench, then pulled the thermos from his pack.
The scent of spiced cider rose into the cold air as he poured it into two metal cups, steam curling up like incense.
I settled beside him, close enough to feel the heat radiating from his thigh where it pressed against mine.
"This is incredible," I said, accepting the warm cup gratefully. "How did you find this place?"
"Hike all over these mountains when I need to think. This spot felt like the center of something important."
For the first time in months, the constant pressure in my chest eased, like I could finally take a full breath. The beauty of the scene, the warmth of the cider, Gavin's solid presence beside me—it all combined into something that felt like coming home to a place I'd never been.
"There's a local legend about the comet," Gavin said after a few minutes of comfortable silence. "They say if you make a wish under Comet Kringle's light, it has to be authentic, the comet sees right through to your heart."
I turned to look at him, noting the way the celestial light caught the silver in his pewter eyes. "What would you wish for?"
"Haven't decided yet." His gaze dropped to my mouth for just an instant before meeting my eyes again. "What about you?"
The question I'd been asking myself for months rose to my lips before I could stop it. "I wish I could remember why I used to love music."
Gavin nodded. "So," he said, his voice careful, "going to tell me why you're really here?"
I took a long sip of cider, tasting cinnamon and star anise.
"Because after this festival, I'm quitting music," I said. "Walking away from all of it."
If he was surprised, he didn't show it. "Why?"
"I used to write songs because I had to.
Because there were things inside me that would die if I didn't give them voice.
Now I write them because my contract says I have to deliver twelve tracks by March.
" The words came out like a confession, raw and honest. "I can't remember the last time I wrote something that mattered. "
"Small Town Dreams helped me because it was true," he said quietly. "Because you understood something about finding peace in unlikely places."
"I was young when I wrote that. Felt so wise." I laughed, but it came out bitter. "Now I'm almost thirty, and I feel like I know less about everything."
"Maybe that's the point. Maybe wisdom isn't about having answers. Maybe it's about asking better questions."
The words settled into my chest like seeds looking for soil. Above us, the comet traced its ancient path across the sky.
"Can I tell you something?" I asked.
He nodded.
"This afternoon, when you sent that stew to my green room? It was the first time in months that someone took care of me without wanting something in return."
Recognition flickered in his expression. "What do people usually want?"
"Access. Photos. Introductions to my manager. It's not malicious—it's just how the industry works. Pure generosity feels extinct."
"Not extinct," he said quietly. "Just rare."
We sat watching the comet's slow journey across the star-scattered sky, the cider warming me from the inside while Gavin's presence anchored me to something real and solid.
“Maybe I was meant to come here,” I said finally.
He was quiet for a moment. "Maybe some things are meant to find each other."
We stared at each other in the comet's warm glow, and something shifted in the space between us. The attraction I'd been fighting crystallized into something deeper. We'd been moving toward this moment across years and miles and broken dreams.
"Gavin," I whispered.
He leaned closer, and I could see the reflection of starlight in his eyes. "Yeah?"
"I want to know what it feels like."
"What what feels like?"
"To be cared for by someone who doesn't want anything from me except me."
His hand was warm against my cheek, thumb brushing across my skin with devastating gentleness. Above us, the comet traced its ancient path across the star-scattered sky, and I felt like we were the only two people in the universe.
"Sadie," he whispered, my name back.
I closed the distance between us.
The kiss started soft, tentative, like we were both afraid the other might disappear.
But when I didn't pull away, when I leaned into him instead and my hands found the wool of his coat, something ignited between us.
His arm came around my waist, pulling me closer against the solid warmth of his chest, and I tasted cider and winter air and promises I'd forgotten how to believe in.
When we finally broke apart, we were both breathing hard, foreheads pressed together in the comet's gentle light.
Around us, the December night hummed with possibility, and I could hear the distant sounds of the festival winding down—families heading home, vendors packing up, the quiet settling of a small town preparing for sleep.
We pulled back naturally, the moment complete without needing to be interrupted. The comet hung above us, patient and eternal, carrying its cargo of cosmic dust and human hopes toward Christmas Eve.
"I should probably head back," I said eventually, though every part of me wanted to stay here in his arms, under the stars, pretending the rest of the world didn't exist. "Early rehearsal tomorrow."
He nodded, but neither of us moved immediately. The comet blazed overhead, and I felt like we'd just participated in something cosmic and eternal.
"Gavin?"
"Hmm?"
"Thank you. For showing me this. For seeing me."
"Thank you for letting me."
As we made our way back down the mountain, his hand occasionally steadying me on the tricky parts of the trail, I found myself humming again. The melody was new, born from starlight and spiced cider and the taste of possibility on my lips.
Maybe I wasn't ready to quit music after all.