Clara nods, all business. “The guest house has heat and hot water. Samuel, help them with their things. I’ll get some tea started and fetch extra blankets.”
The guest house is the smaller building I spotted, a neat, single-story structure about thirty yards from the main house. Clara leads the way with her lantern, the light bobbing across a well-worn path that Samuel must have shoveled earlier in the day. Poppy insists on limping, though she at least accepts my arm for support.
When we step inside the small guest house, Clara flips a switch and LED lights illuminate the entry, powered by thesolar panels I noticed on the roof. It’s simple but comfortable. The main room has a small kitchen area, a round table with four chairs, and a sitting area with a couch and two armchairs arranged around a wood-burning stove that’s already putting out blessed heat. Clara sets her lantern on the table.
“There are two bedrooms,” she says, gesturing down a short hallway. “You can stay in the one on the left, and your friend?—”
“Wife,” I blurt, hoping Poppy doesn’t contradict me. “She’s my wife. We’d prefer to stay together. I’m sure you understand.”
She nods. “Of course. The room on the right has a double bed with fresh linens. There’s a bathroom right across the hall.” She moves to the kitchen and puts a kettle on the propane stovetop. “I’ll be back in a few minutes to look at that ankle. I’ll bring some soup with me. You both look half-frozen.”
“You don’t need to—” Poppy starts, but Clara waves her off.
“Nonsense. Samuel was right to bring you here.” She pauses at the door. “There are extra quilts in the chest at the foot of the bed if you need them. I’ll be back shortly.”
And then she’s gone, leaving us alone in the gentle lamplight, with nothing but the crackle of the fire and the sound of Poppy’s quiet sniffling.
I lead her to the couch and sit across from her on the coffee table. Then I carefully tug each shoe off. Poppy’s eyes are puffy from crying, and she tries to protest, but I shush her. “Stop. I’m mad at you.”
I push her pants leg up to the knee and peel the sock from her left foot first, before moving to the right foot. I hook my fingers under the top of her long sock and ease it down. Her breath hitches when my knuckles brush against the soft skin of her calf, and I have to remind myself that I’m angry at her so I can focus on the task instead of how warm she feels under my hands. I work the sock over her swollen ankle with steady patience. When I risk a glance at Poppy, her eyes are glassy.
“Sorry,” I say. “I know it hurts.”
“It’s not that,” she whispers.
I pull the sock the rest of the way off her foot and then hiss. “Poppy Lewis. You didn’t tell me it was this bad.”
Deep purple bruising extends along the outside of her foot and up to her ankle. The skin around it is swollen, and the compression sock has left small weaves indented in the puffy skin. I run my finger lightly over the bruise, and although her left foot is cold from our trek, her right foot is hot. Inflamed.
An irritated growl escapes my throat. But then she whimpers, and my face flies up to meet hers. “Sorry, too rough?”
Her eyebrows meet in a deep V, and the corners of her lips are tugged down in a frown that takes my heart with it. “Why are you mad at me?” she says in a voice too small even for her.
She shivers, and I realize my finger is tracing small circles on her skin without permission from my brain. I join her on the couch, putting her injured foot over my lap. Then I tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear. She leans into the touch, but her frown’s not going anywhere. I keep my palm against her face.
“I’m mad because I wanted to be different. I wanted to be the one person you didn’t try to please.”
Her breath hitches. “What?”
I brush my thumb softly across her cheek, and it makes her eyes close. “You’re always trying to please everyone, to make everyone happy at your own expense. When you ordered a burger instead of the … I don’t know, tunafish surprise, I figured you realized you were allowed to want something for yourself around me. I wanted you to care more about making yourself happy with me than making yourself miserable to appease me. Dumb, huh?” Tears spill down her cheeks again. “Great, and I’m making you cry.”
She sniffs, but she can’t smile, no matter how hard her lips try to quirk up. “Youaredifferent,” she says over the crackling of the fireplace.
“Not different enough.”
“Poor Oliver,” she teases with a sad voice. “Mad that you couldn’t undo a lifetime worth of hardwiring in two days.”
“You’re doing it right now,” I say, wishing I could temper my frustration. “You’re trying to makemefeel better, but I don’t deserve it. I made you feel like you had to hide your own pain to get me home for family events I don’t even want to go to.” I run my finger over her foot, sliding it up and down her calf to her knee. “I should have said yes when you wanted to go see that train.”
“What?”
“The train. In the diner in Colorado. Mistletoe Mountain, or whatever it was. You wanted to see it. I wish I’d said yes. And the ball of twine. And whatever other quirky curio shop that caught your attention along the way.”
“We had to get home.”
“How’s that working out for us? We’ve done everything we can to get to Rochester. But every time we make a plan, the universe laughs and sets us on a different course. I should never have fought it.”
I don’t know when I started leaning closer to Poppy. I don’t know if I tipped her face up or if she angled it herself. But I know what her lips feel like against mine.
