by Olivia Miles
“Come on in,” he said with a little grin. “It’s still your house.”
She wasn’t so sure about that, and she certainly didn’t think of it that way, either. She’d left this house within two months of married life, making a home of her shabby city apartment instead, but as she reluctantly toed the kickstand on her bike and began a slow walk to the front porch, she felt as if no time had passed at all since she’d lived here.
She could still remember the day they’d found it, just a few short months before their wedding. It had come on the market as a rental, which seemed like the perfect solution for their long-term plans. Sure, it had needed work, which was why it wasn’t attracting tourists and was well within their price range, but the owner said they could do with it as they pleased, and besides, it was only supposed to be temporary.
But even though it was short-lived, it was special. A little piece of the world that was theirs and theirs alone. The first kitchen she’d cooked in, the first dining room where they’d shared meals, as proper adults at their own table—a concept that felt so strange and exciting at the time.
Still, it wasn’t her home any more than her apartment above the shop was his. She walked up the familiar path, or hobbled, really, and clenched her teeth against the pain as she took the steps. She knew if she showed any weakness, Kyle would step in, put an arm around her, and she wasn’t sure she could resist his touch another time.
Wasn’t sure she wanted to, she thought, catching his eye as she reached the door.
“I haven’t ridden a bike in years,” she said ruefully.
“Some things take a little getting used to, but once you get the hang of it, it’s like you never stopped.” His eyes locked hers, and she swallowed hard against the pounding of her chest. She had the feeling that he wasn’t talking about the bicycle right now.
“I can’t believe you still live in this place. It feels like yesterday that we were moving in.” Their friends and family had all pitched in, even though their belongings were meager. A hand-me-down sofa, a coffee table that Kyle had made himself, a mattress until he was finished carving the headboard.
“Remember how I carried you over the threshold?” Kyle said now as she took the final step onto the porch.
She resisted a smile, but not for long. “You tripped on that loose board and nearly killed us both.” She laughed at the memory. She hadn’t thought of it in a long time.
“Well, it’s all fixed now,” Kyle said quietly.
Brooke was preparing herself for the fading carpet, the walls that could have used a fresh coat of paint, the nail holes that she strategically covered in cheap framed art prints.
Instead, she was met with stained hardwood floors, crisp walls in a warm neutral color, and sunlight billowing in through the windows, where her curtains still hung.
“It looks amazing,” she gasped, taking it all in. “We talked about doing all this, remember? If we held onto the place, for when we visited.”
“For when we came back,” he said, nodding. “I remember. I remember everything.”
She pulled her eyes from his, tearing herself from the memories that were washing over her in waves.
“You didn’t take down the curtains,” she whispered. They were prettier than she remembered, and now she knew why she’d had to ask for the fabric for a gift. It hadn’t been cheap, and back then, had certainly been outside of her budget.
With the changes that Kyle had made to the space, they fit better than ever before.
“You worked too hard on those to ever take them down,” he said, giving her a hint of a smile. He jutted his chin to the floor. “Believe it or not, this wood was under the carpet the whole time. And the paint, well, it’s just a fresh coat.”
“It’s…wonderful,” she said, venturing farther inside to realize that other than unleashing everything that was already there, the house was the same as it had been the day she’d left.
“Better than the apartment you found in New York?” He raised an eyebrow, clearly remembering the conversation they’d had about the place. Of course, it had looked much different in the pictures than it had in real life.
“I cried the first night there,” she admitted now with a little smile, and not because of him. “It took a lot of time to fix up and make my own.”
Her own. He nodded at this, and the room fell silent. She used the opportunity to look around, at the mantle, which he’d replaced with one of his carvings, at the framed photo that rested on it.
Their wedding photo.
He followed her gaze. “Didn’t seem right to shove it in a box or a drawer.”
She didn’t know what to say to that, but one thing was very obvious. “I thought you didn’t do woodworking anymore.”
She looked at him, questioningly, and he walked into the adjacent kitchen, pulled some ice from the freezer, and dropped it into a plastic bag. “This stuff, it was just for me.”
She looked at the dining table, the one that been his gift to her, seeing it with fresh eyes. There was so much care, and detail, from the turned legs to the grain of the wood.
“You have a real talent, Kyle,” she said, letting her gaze drift back to him. “I wish you wouldn’t give it all up.”
His mouth was firm, his eyes sad. “Running the pub takes a lot of time. The business is struggling, but I don’t need to tell you that.”
No, he didn’t.
“I never wanted the pub to fail,” she said softly.
“And I never wanted to run it,” he replied, shocking her. It was the first admittance. In the past, he had always been so defensive, so determined to prove to himself that he was making the right choice, even when she knew that he wouldn’t be happy.
Now, realizing that he wasn’t, she didn’t feel any better.
She looked out the window, out onto the trees that led to the glimpse of the lake, to the rocky shoreline where the two chairs that he’d made still sat.
“I used to love sitting out there, watching the waves, dreaming about our life together.”
He came to stand beside her at the counter, following her gaze. “We had a lot of plans. But there was another plan, too. Do you remember it?”
A chill rolled over her as she stared out the window, thinking of him beside her, so content, the breeze on their faces, a mug of coffee in his hand, just like right now, like any other morning.
“We always said that after we’d made it, gone out into the world and done all we’d planned to do, that we’d find a way back to this house, and we’d live out our golden years sitting right there on those chairs.”
Tears prickled the back of her eyes, blurring her vision, and she looked away, quickly wiping at her cheeks with her back turned to him.
“Oh, I’m not sure we ever really meant it,” she said casually, even though she knew it wasn’t true. That it had been another grand plan, another pipe dream, more like it. “That would have required buying this place.”
“I did buy it,” he said flatly, forcing her attention.
She stared at him for a moment, not sure of what to say. “Oh. Wow.”
Technically, she supposed that did make it their home.
“I should have told you,” he admitted now, sighing heavily. “It’s all in my name, but I still should have said something. The owner gave a good deal, sort of a rent to own arrangement.”
She shook her head, knowing that it was important, that she should know, but at the same time, she wasn’t sure that it mattered. If she counted their night at the barn dance, then there was only one date left on their agreement until they went their separate ways forever, in every sense of the word.
“I’m glad you kept it,” she said, thinking that it would have stung to know some other couple had snatched it up, made a home of it, lived a life that she had given up or never found.
He heaved a sigh. “Not so sure I’ll be keeping it for long.”
She frowned at him. “What do you mean?”
“The pub is underwater
. I’m sure that doesn’t surprise you.”
Her shoulders dropped when she saw the disappointment in his eyes. “So you’ll need to cash out the house to save the business?”
“Something like that,” he said, turning his back to pull together some ice in a bag.
Brooke walked around the small space, toward the dining table, running her hands softly over the grooves of the wood, the stain was even more rich and beautiful than she’d remembered. She smiled, about to tell him so, when something caught her eye.
A stack of papers, with the bank’s letterhead.
Loan papers, she realized with a start.
She inched closer as her heart began to race, scanning quickly, until she looked up, seeing Kyle staring at her, his expression pained.
“You’re applying for a loan for the pub?” It was all there, in black and white, but somehow still she needed to hear him say it because he knew what this meant every bit as much as she did. A business loan wasn’t easy to get, worse when you had two people in the same family trying for one, and he’d known it all along.
“Ryan thinks the only way to keep the pub going is to change it.”
“And you?”
He shrugged. “Guess my problem has always been the same. I can’t let go of the past, even when I know I should.”
He held her gaze for so long that her heart felt like it had dropped into her stomach. Standing here, in this house—in their home—she felt like she had gone back to the past. Never left it.
And maybe that’s what she should have done.
“Good thing we’re getting divorced then,” she quipped, but damn it, there was an edge to her tone and the tears threatened the back of her eyes.
“Brooke. This wasn’t my idea. This wasn’t part of the plan when you first came back.”
“And since when do you stick to plans, Kyle?” The tears in her eyes were hot now, threatening to fall, and she didn’t even try to stop them as she pushed past him and down the porch steps, ignoring the pain in her ankle. It would mend—but her heart…it never had. It was just like that awful day, the last time she was here, when he’d told her he wasn’t coming to New York, that he’d made his decision, that he was staying right here.
That something else was more important to him than a future with her.
She’d packed her bags, knowing there wasn’t much she wanted to take, that she was looking to her future now, that anything from the past would only hold her back. She’d sat in the bedroom, on the old faded quilt, letting the tears silently fall, willing him to come inside and tell her to stay as much as she willed him to come in and tell her he had changed his mind.
Instead, she’d heard the opening and the closing of the back door, and she’d quietly slipped the thin bands off her finger, and set them down on the bedside table, before walking out the front door, and not looking back.
Kyle stepped toward her now, but she moved back quickly.
It was a mistake kissing him. Just like it was a mistake coming here.
Maybe, it was a mistake coming back to this town.
*
Dinner with her family was the last thing Brooke was up to tonight, but she’d spent too many years alone in an apartment to do the same again. She arrived early and told her mother that she’d be looking through the attic for any old pieces of furniture that might be used in her apartment. The truth was that she needed to be alone, to think, but she also needed to do something she’d avoided for years.
Face the past.
Her mother had kept a trunk for each of the girls, where she kept their baby blankets and school yearbooks, treasures that they might someday want to keep, junk that she as a mother couldn’t readily part with, no matter how inconsequential it now seemed.
Brooke dropped onto the wooden floor and opened the chest, her heart thudding at what she already knew would be inside, but it sank just the same when she pushed the top back, revealed her tulle veil, carefully resting on her satin wedding gown.
She stared at the dress for a minute, realizing that it was more beautiful than she’d remembered it, or perhaps given it credit. Or maybe she hadn’t wanted to remember how perfect it had been.
Or how perfect Kyle was, either.
For a little while, at least.
She closed the trunk and set it to the side, vowing to take it into her shop when she left tonight. She lived in Blue Harbor now, and she owned a bridal shop. This belonged with her more now than it did inside a dusty attic, even if it hurt too much to look at it.
The trunk felt heavy as she moved it to the side, heavier than its contents should weigh, at first glance. Curious, she opened the lid again and carefully slid her hand under the skirt of the dress, her fingers finding something leather. Her wedding album.
She knew she could close the lid again. Shove the entire trunk back in its place. Pretend she’d never sought it out, never found anything related to her past.
Instead, she carefully set the dress on an old armchair and pulled the album free. She ran her fingertips over the ivory cover. The date of their union was embossed with gold, and as she turned it open to reveal the first page, she felt a lump form in her throat at what she saw. Two smiling people, holding hands, looking into each other’s eyes. It was a black and white shot, but even still, she could see the radiance in her face, the joy in Kyle’s smile. The promise of so much ahead of them.
Until it had all taken a turn.
She swallowed back the tears that prickled her eyes, not wanting them to fall and ruin the still-capture. The proof that once upon a time all that she had needed to make her happy was Kyle.
That he had been enough.
And that she couldn’t remember the last time she had smiled like that again, since leaving for New York. Or coming back.
There was more in the trunk, too. Yearbooks with yellowing pages, a plastic box containing her senior prom corsage, now so dried out and brittle she was nearly afraid to handle it. Loose photos were scattered in a shoebox and she leafed through them, smiling at the memories of long summer afternoons on the water with her sisters, and crisp fall days at the orchard with her cousins.
But there was more. A napkin from the ice cream parlor with a date scrawled at the bottom. She held it closer in the dim light, trying to discern the handwriting, not recognizing it as her own, until she realized that it wasn’t her handwriting, but it was equally familiar all the same. It was Kyle’s. And there, in black ink, was the proof of their first date.
At Harborside Creamery.
She remembered now. She’d ordered the raspberry ice cream, and he’d bought her the largest size, even back then, making her self-conscious, but happy all the same because it meant it would take longer to eat, and that meant more time in his company. And she’d wondered if he’d thought of that too. If it had been part of his plan.
If it had been part of his plan last time they’d gone, too.
Quickly, she looked through the rest of the souvenirs: movie ticket stubs and strips of photos from the booth at the bowling alley of her and Kyle in silly poses, looking so happy that it made her laugh out loud.
And there, under a trinket he’d won for her at the Summer in the Square festival one year, was another napkin. This one from the café, before it was owned by Amelia, back when going to a restaurant on their own felt like a big deal. And there, in the corner, was another marking. Another date, only it was blurred out, and the paper was stiff, as if it had been caught in the rain.
She closed her eyes, remembering now. Their first kiss had been in the rain, right after their first dinner at the café. It had come down while they were walking down Main Street, and they hadn’t thought to bring an umbrella. They’d run for Kyle’s car, shielding themselves with what little they had on them until they’d given up, standing at the corner under the streetlamp, their hair drenched, the rain falling into their eyes. And he’d told her she’d never looked prettier. And she believed him. Because that was the thing about Kyle. He always made h
er think of her best self. He’d always made her reach for her dreams.
She set the two napkins to the side, knowing what she would find next, because it was all there now, every small piece of their history. She remembered. And as she picked up the napkin for Fiorre’s, she knew that he did too.
That he hadn’t just asked her out on six dates.
He’d planned them.
“You up here?” There was a knock at the open door, followed by heavy footsteps. It was Gabby, already climbing the wooden stairs to the attic.
Brooke quickly set everything back in the chest and wiped her eyes, but there was no time to hide the evidence.
“Memory lane,” Gabby observed, coming to stand next to her. She sneezed, and then sneezed again.
“I was up here looking for old furniture I might use in my apartment,” Brooke explained.
Gabby didn’t look convinced. “And you happened to find your bridal trunk, complete with your wedding album and every other high school memento that Mom can’t bring herself to toss?”
Brooke looked down at it. “I’m sort of glad she didn’t.”
Gabby reached out a hand and took the album, smiling as she turned the pages. “I forgot how beautiful that dress was.”
“I did too,” Brooke admitted, letting her gaze rest on it. “I was so busy dreaming of bigger and more exciting things, I don’t think I realized how wonderful I had it.”
“Are we talking about the dress or something else?” Gabby asked, giving her a look of suspicion.
Brooke ran her fingers over the skirt of the gown and let her arm drop. “It wasn’t easy for me to leave, you know.”
Gabby’s expression stiffened. “We never thought it was.”
“And New York…it had a lot to offer. But not you, or Jenna, or Mom and Dad.
“Or Kyle.”
Brooke looked back at the trunk and all the memories it held. “Kyle and I weren’t meant to be. Other things in life always got in the way.”
