Chapter 37 #3
She laughs, finally, swats at me with one floured hand. “Okay, okay, I get it.”
I mean every word. Every single damn one. I never thought I’d want this again. A future. A next year . But I do. I want it with her.
And if that means Hank has to suffer in a Santa suit and I have to suffer through twinkle lights choking every doorway, then so be it. I’m all in.
She glances at me over her shoulder, one hand still on the mixing bowl. “Do you have an ugly Christmas sweater?”
I’m still pressed against her back, my arms around her middle, nose buried in the crook of her neck.
She mentioned the ugly Christmas sweater tradition in passing. It started after Lane died. Her mom brought home a sweater so hideous it made everyone laugh for the first time in weeks. From then on, it just stuck—something light in a day that hadn’t felt light since.
We decided we’d spend Christmas morning at my family’s house for breakfast, then we’ll head to her house that afternoon. Tell our families that we’re official now, that it’s not for convenience or the water rights or whatever the hell we all thought this was.
It’s real now, and I want everyone to know. I want to walk into her mom’s house holding her hand and not have to pretend we’re still figuring things out.
“I’ll find one,” I say into her shoulder. “I’ve got a couple days.”
Wren twists to look at me, one brow arched, expression dry. “Tomorrow is Christmas Eve, Sawyer.”
I pull back, confused, frowning. “No, it’s not.”
“It is.”
“It can’t be.” I grab my phone out of my back pocket and check. The screen lights up with the date.
Shit. December twenty-third.
My stomach dips a little. It is. How the hell did time move that fast?
I lock the screen and shove my phone back in my pocket.
I think back—vaguely—to Jenna saying something about Christmas being in a couple of days.
I’d just come out of a colic surgery on a gelding that had been touch-and-go for hours.
My hands were still raw from scrubbing out.
I was thinking about the owner pacing the parking lot.
About whether the horse would make it through the night.
Not Christmas. Not decorations or timelines or what day it even was.
I hadn’t even looked up when she said it.
“I’ll find one,” I repeat, locking the screen. “I’ll even make sure it’s got bells and battery-powered lights or something.”
She grins and turns back toward the counter, pouring the batter into a pan. “Good. If I have to suffer, so do you. I think that’s the rule of marriage.”
She slides the brownies into the oven, wipes her hands, then picks up her phone. “Now,” she says, swiping, “you’re gonna hate this, but I don’t care.”
Wren grins as Christmas music plays and she starts swaying her hips, just a little, her hair catching in the light as she backs away from the counter. “Dance with me.”
“Right now? To this?”
She wiggles her eyebrows. “It’s a requirement. I made a whole list of things for us to do.”
I shake my head and huff out a breath, but I’m already stepping toward her. “Do I want to know what else is on that list?”
“Nope,” she says, looping her arms around my neck. “You’re better off just saying yes.”
I snort, and then she starts doing something with her elbows. It’s like a chicken dance, but worse. I don’t even try to name it.
“Oh no,” I say, grinning as I watch her. “What is that?”
“You married this.” She spins in a sloppy circle, then throws her hands up like she’s just stuck the landing.
So I match her. Sort of. I do an exaggerated side-step and then some kind of clumsy hip move that makes her double over laughing.
“Stop,” she says, holding her stomach. “You look like you’re in pain.”
“I am in pain,” I deadpan. “From watching whatever that elbow thing was.”
She laughs harder, eyes crinkling. “Okay, that was rude.”
The music blasts on, and we both keep dancing—if you can call it that. We’re out of sync and out of breath, but neither of us cares. It’s stupid. Loud. Fun. Her hair’s falling out of the clip she tried to twist it into, and I think this might be the happiest I’ve ever seen her.
She turns, grabs the bowl off the counter, and swipes a finger through the leftover batter. Then she walks right up to me and drags it across my nose.
I stop moving. “You didn’t.”
Her grin goes wide. “I did.”
I look at her—her red hair falling in her face, her smug little smile—and before she can go back for more, I grab the bowl with one arm and swipe my finger through it fast.
Then I drag it straight across her forehead.
Wren gasps. “You cheater.”
“It’s not cheating, I’m just faster than you.”
“You—”
She lunges for the bowl again, but I’ve already got it behind my back. I swipe my finger across both of her cheeks this time.
She gasps again, then tries to spin out of my reach, but I catch her around the waist with one arm and hold her there.
“You wouldn’t,” she says, breathless, eyes wide.
I dip my fingers again, then swipe a streak right down the side of her neck.
Her jaw drops. “You’re deranged.”
“You started it.”
“You’re demonic.”
“You ambushed me. This is payback.”
She’s laughing again, squirming in my grip, her cheeks pink and sticky with batter. Her ridiculous Christmas pajama pants are twisted at the waistband, and her hair’s falling in her face, and there’s chocolate across her skin.
And fuck me, she’s so goddamn pretty.
Not just now, but always. She looks wild and happy and beautiful. Like joy in motion.
We’re both out of breath from laughing too hard, dancing too badly. We’ve made a mess of the kitchen. Of each other.
And I’m standing here, staring at her like I’ve never seen her before. But I have. I’ve seen her every day for weeks. At the ranch. In my truck. In my bed, in my kitchen, in all the places that used to feel so quiet and alone.
She made them loud again. Fuller. Better.
And I think— this— this is the kind of life I want. Not something perfect. Not something curated. Just this.
I want the music too loud. I want the dancing that turns into kissing. I want brownies on a Wednesday night and batter on the counter and her laughing so hard she can’t stand up straight.
I want twinkly lights in the hallway and Hank in a goddamn Santa hat. I want her bare feet on my kitchen floor. I want the quiet after. The way she leans into me like she belongs there. The way I feel when she does.
I want this life. With her in it. Every messy, ordinary part.
I dip my head and lick the batter off her neck. She gasps, a real sound, sharp and breathy, and her fingers dig into my arms like she’s trying to keep herself steady.
I don’t stop.
I kiss along her jaw, then drag my tongue higher, chasing the taste of her skin, the warmth of her throat. She pulls back half an inch like she wants to say something, but the second I look at her—really look at her—it’s over.
I don’t just want her. I need her. Not in some possessive, surface-level way. I need her in a my life just feels wrong without her in it kind of way.
I stare at her, breathing heavy, my hand curled around the back of her neck.
I fucking love her. I love her so much it hurts.
She swallows, eyes flicking down to my mouth. “That was not on the list.”
I lean in, mouth barely a breath from hers, and say it against her lips. “Then re-write the list. Because I’m not done yet.”
Her lips part, her whole body pulling in tighter to mine.
And just like that, we’re not dancing anymore.
* * *
I wake up before I realize I’m awake.
No dream this time. No sound. Just this slow, restless awareness in my chest, like something’s pulled me to the surface and won’t let me go back under.
I reach for my phone—4:14 a.m.
Hank’s snoring at the foot of the bed, limbs sprawled out. Wren’s facing the other way, back to me, her hair everywhere—half tangled in the pillows, caught on her shoulder. One of her legs is tucked under the covers, the other kicked out across the sheets.
The nightmares don’t come as often when she’s next to me—but some nights, like this one, it’s not the dream that wakes me. It’s the date.
Christmas Eve.
Five years.
I sit up slowly, careful not to wake either of them, and climb out of bed. My footsteps are quiet against the hardwood as I make my way to the kitchen. It’s dark except for the soft blue glow of the coffee maker.
I grab a glass from the cabinet and fill it at the sink. My hand’s steady, but my chest feels tight.
Five years ago tonight was the worst night of my life.
I think about that version of me all the time—the one who called the ambulance, who rode with his wife to the hospital already knowing what he was about to be told.
The one who stood in a sterile white room and held Julia’s hand while someone gently explained there was nothing more that they could do.
I remember every second of that night.
Every sound. Every smell. The cold of the tile. The way it felt like time just split in half.
And then there was Violet. I never got to meet her. Never got to hear her cry or hold her against my chest. I remember the way the doctor said we’ve done all we could, Dr. Hart , and how final that felt. Like the last page of a book I didn’t want to finish.
Since then, I’ve existed.
Gone to work. Fed the dog. Worked on the ranch. Trained at the gym. I got through it. Not over it. Just…through.
And then somehow, Wren showed up.
And I don’t mean that in some dramatic, save-the-day kind of way. She just came into my life and didn’t ask for anything I wasn’t ready to give. She just stood next to me and handed me pieces of myself I hadn’t realized were still lying around.
And God, I love her for that.
But I still miss them, so much. Julia and Violet. Not just tonight. Every day. Even when I’m happy. Even when I’m okay.
I take a slow sip of water and lean against the counter, thinking about the life I was supposed to have, and the life I have now, and how grief isn’t either/or. It’s both.
I put my glass in the sink and turn to head back to my room, but my feet slow without warning, like they’ve stopped listening to my brain. I pass the hallway light switch, barely brush my hand against the wall like I always do, and then I just…stop.
It’s there. The door. Same as it’s always been. Closed. Untouched. The only one in this house I’ve never opened, not since that day.
I glance at my bedroom door, still cracked open, still safe.
But my eyes drag back to that door like they’ve got a mind of their own.
And before I can talk myself out of it, before I can get too rational about it and shut this whole thing down, my hand reaches up to the ledge above the doorframe.
The key’s still there. Cold. Familiar. Heavy as hell.
I don’t know why I’m doing this. Maybe it’s Wren. Maybe it’s something about having someone else in the house again that makes it feel a little less haunted.
I open the door.
The air hits me first. It’s stale and soft, like time stopped in here. Like it’s been holding its breath for five years.
The lavender walls are exactly the same. The butterflies—those little decals Julia spent hours arranging just right—still flutter in perfect, frozen patterns across the far wall. I step in as if the floor might collapse under me. Like if I move too fast, it’ll all dissolve.
The crib is there. Fully assembled. Finished. Ready.
Violet’s baby blanket—pale pink, stitched with tiny violets along the edges—is folded neatly inside, right where Julia left it. There’s a fine layer of dust on it now.
The books are still stacked beside the rocking chair.
Goodnight Moon, Corduroy, The Runaway Bunny, The Hungry Hungry Caterpillar —the classics.
I remember picking them out with Julia. I looked forward to it more than I let on—reading to her belly at night, my hand resting there, pretending Violet could hear me.
Maybe she could. I don’t know. But I’d sit there and read like it mattered, like she was already here, already listening.
And for a while, that made it real for me.
I sit down on the edge of the rocking chair, my hand dragging across the arm of it. The cushion lets out a tiny squeak under my weight, and that sound—god—that sound cracks something open in me I didn’t even realize was still sealed.
And then I do the thing I haven’t let myself do for years.
I weep.
I cry in a way that’s not quiet or pretty or graceful. My chest tightens, and I lean forward, elbows to knees, because I physically can’t hold it together. My face is hot, and I can’t tell where the tears stop and the snot starts, and I don’t even care.
I press my hand over my mouth to keep the sound down, but it still slips out. That deep, broken thing I’ve buried under work and silence and half-assed sleep. It doesn’t care about time or logic. It just wants out.
I think about Violet. About what she would’ve looked like. Would she have had Julia’s dark curls? My eyes? Would she have Nora’s need to narrate every moment out loud? Or would she have been quiet, curious, and thoughtful?
Would she have loved the cows and goats and pigs like her mom?
Climbed up in bed with us in the mornings, her hair all tangled and her body all warm and sleepy?
Would she have fallen asleep on the couch in front of the fire with some cartoon still playing while her chest rises and falls under a throw blanket?
I think about how we were supposed to be a family. And how now, all I have are ghosts.
And the grief…it’s not clean cut. It’s not something I can fold up and put away once it’s “time.” It lingers. Shifts. It became part of the way I move through the world.
It’s missing her and loving who’s still here. It’s the door that stayed closed and the one I finally opened. It’s the life I imagined and the one I’ve got.
And I’m still learning how to live inside both.
I wipe my face with the heel of my hand, but the tears keep coming, and I let them.
For once, I fucking let them.