“Maybe I’ll bring them to you, if I’m ever in the area.”
Her gaze searches my face. In the early morning sunlight, she looks diffused, her edges softer. Like a mirage, a dream. “You think you’d be back around here again?”
“I don’t usually go back to the same area more than once,” I say, sliding my hand along the bottom of the steering wheel, the worn leather slick beneath my fingertips. “I’ve always liked to just keep going, seeing new places.” I hesitate. “But I like it here. I’d come back. You know, to see what Myra and Melissa are performing at karaoke.”
A grin starts out small on her face and stretches slowly, the way the sunrise comes over the horizon, brightening everything in its path. “Last holiday season they did ‘Santa Baby.’ It was fantastic.”
Laughter punches out of me. “I bet it was.”
“Come on, Justin,” she says, opening the door, letting a gus of frigid air in. “Let’s get home.”
We unhook the jumper cables and she throws it into the back of her truck. It lands with a loudthump. When I try to hand her back her coffee, she waves me off and tells me I can make her more at home before she climbs back up in her truck and heads for the exit, leaving me standing beside my car watching her.
Another gust of chilly wind whips at me, and I finally get in the car. My phone is sitting in the cup holder, and I stare at it for a long moment before reaching for it. Pull up a contact I haven’t texted with since I got to Fontana Ridge.
My recruiter, Amy.
I type out a text and press send before I can talk myself out of it, before I think through what I’m asking. The blue bubble sits there, staring back at me.
Any chance I could extend my contract in Fontana Ridge?
“Thisisnotevenclose to what I was expecting,” Jack says as we pull into town that afternoon. The streets are packed with cars and people holding cups of cider, hot chocolate, apple donuts, or bags of roasted nuts. There are dogs on leashes and little kids with pumpkins painted on their rosy cheeks.
“What did you expect?”
I luck out and find a parking spot on the bridge that someone is vacating and maneuver my truck into it. The river below is sparkling in the autumn sunshine, glinting like diamonds.
Jack’s eyes are wide as he takes it all in. “Something smaller, definitely.”
I hum beneath my breath, looking at the festival from his eyes. Fontana Ridge always shows up for community events. They take over the entire town, each business decorating their storefronts and hosting sales to lure in all the tourists and townspeople that flock our little mountain escape for them. They take months of planning, weeks of preparation, and days to execute to perfection. And I love each and every one of them.The townwide Easter egg hunt. The Strawberry Jam. Trail Days. The Christmas tree lighting. And so many more.
The Harvest Festival is my favorite, though. The pumpkins and hay bales. Carnival rides and food booths. Stuffing myself with fried food with my parents and rentingPractical Magicfrom the video store to watch when we get home, tired and sticky and happy.
“What do you want to do first? My parents told me this morning that they would probably be here around four, so we have an hour to kill.”
He points at a couple passing beside our car, candy apples in hand. “I want one of those.”
A smile inches up my lips. “That can be arranged.”
We make our way through the throng of people, looking for a candy apple booth, although we stop when I find one selling kettle corn.
“So,” Jack says, digging for a handful of popcorn from my bag. “The point of the festival is to eat until your button pops on your pants.”
I point down to my own pants, olive green and tied with a drawstring, and shake my head. “Pants with buttons are rookie work.”
His laughter is warm and rich and it slips down my spine like honey, settling somewhere deep inside me. It brings a smile to my face that I can’t push down, no matter how hard I try.
I’m still smiling at my feet when Wren, Holden, and the kids find us a moment later in the candy apple line.
“Stevie,” Wren yells, people between us, drawing my attention up to her. She’s so short I wouldn’t have seen her in the crowd except for Holden beside her, tall and imposing, his hair pulled back in a loose bun at the nape of his neck. He’s wearing a flannel and has Wilder perched on his shoulders. Wren and June are in matching sweaters, their curly hair tied back in identicalloose braids, and they look so wholesome it makes my heart ache with happiness.
“Hey,” I say when they’re close enough to not have to shout. “You guys look cute.”
June beams up at me and wraps her skinny arms around my middle. She rests her chin on my stomach and looks up at me. “You look pretty today, Aunt Stevie.”
It is my deepest pleasure to be considered an auntie by this little girl.
“Thank you, June Bug.” I hug her a little tighter before letting go.
