“InNorthanger Abbey, it’s spelled as two words, and it refers to the game ofrounders, which is a cousin of what we now know as baseball. Some people have tried to credit her with the name of the game, but that’s been debunked. But the really salient point here…”
Hawk fell into a monologue about popular misconceptions of the Regency era, just as I’d hoped he would, and I could practically see the tension bleed out of him as we climbed to the peak.
I wanted to believe that he’d purged all of his anger and frustration, that we could go back to being Jack and Hawk in perfect harmony, that the hard part of the hike was over.
But as we sat at the top of the trail, admiring the 360-degree views of Little Pippin Hollow and the surrounding countryside while eating the cherry oatmeal cookies I’d brought, I realized I was wrong.
“We can’t lose this, Jack,” Hawk murmured as he chewed. “I can’t lose it. All of my most special moments have been on this mountain. This place… it’s part of who I am. We need to protect it by stopping the development. I wish you believed that?—”
“If anyone can make it happen, you can,” I agreed carefully. “That I believe.”
“But you don’t want me to try, do you?” he said flatly. “When all is said and done, despite everything I’ve said to you on thesubject, despite everything at stake, you want the Aerie Resort to go forward as planned.”
I opened my mouth to brush him off with my usual disclaimers, but this time, I stopped myself. Hawk felt like I was listening to him but notreallylistening to him? Well, maybe part of that was because I’d been holding back so I wouldn’t upset him.
My feelings about the development were as complex as my feelings for Hawk himself. I loved this mountain. There were a million hidden worlds in every shady glen, under every fallen log, around every bend in the trail, and Hawk had pointed most of them out to me over the years. I never felt more free than when I visited here. And I wanted the place to remain untouched forever, for Hawk’s sake.
But it wasn’t just about what I wanted or what Hawk wanted either.
When I weighed that against the responsibility I owed to my employees who needed regular paychecks, or to my mom, who deserved to enjoy her semi-retirement in the Hollow after decades of debt and struggle back in Portland, or to the rest of the town, which badly needed new infrastructure…
“I don’t want to fight with you about it, that’s for sure,” I hedged.
Hawk shot me a look, and I sighed. Hawk had given me honesty; the least I could do was return it.
“Yeah. I think it would be a mistake not to let the development move forward. With proper oversight, obviously.”
“Because money is more important than this?” He swept a hand out over the vista.
“Because moneyisimportant,” I said, my own patience fraying a bit. “As anyone who’s ever done without could tell you.”
“But you’re not doing without! Panini Jack’s is doing great,” Hawk insisted, “just like Sunday Orchard has done fine for centuries, so why?—”
“The orchard does just fine because Webb—and now Knox—work their asses off to make sure it does, just like I do with the diner. But it’d be nice not to worry, come November, if I have enough to make it through until the tourists come back.” I exhaled sharply and went on in a more measured tone, “And it’s not just about me, Bird. There are a lot of Hollowans who’ve had to turn to online sales to make money through winter. Nan and Len at the yarn shop. Mrs. Cleeward with her candy. We’re doing as much as we can, supporting each other and creating our own local network. You know I’m committed to making the diner as farm-to-table as possible. But how much business do you think Scoops does on a given day in January? Barely enough to keep Frank Bediako’s lights on.”
I bit my tongue against the other truths I could tell him—about nights I’d gone to bed hungry after my dad died because there simply wasn’t money to pay for his medical billsandour rentandenough food for a growing teenager; about how I’d woken up in a cold sweat at least twice a week after buying the diner, worried I’d made a mistake and my mom and I would end up back in a tiny apartment again—but I’d never wanted to burden Hawk with those stories, especially now when he was dealing with his own shit.
“There are other ways,” he insisted. “If folks are that worried, let’s think up another business concept…”
“Sure. But I don’t have any great ideas, do you? If there were another easy solution just sitting there, don’t you think someone would have figured it out already? Evola is the business that’s here with their wallet out, and they’re saying all the right things. Hollowans don’t need nebulous future ideas; they need moneynowso they can pay their rent and fund their kids’ schools andkeep their roads plowed in the winter. It’s easy to say, ‘Let’s stick to our ideals,’ when you’re not the one paying the price for them.”
He scowled. “You make it sound like I don’t care about the people of this town.No onecares more about—”
“Of course you care about the Hollow,” I agreed. “Just like I care about preserving this mountain as much as possible. That’s what I mean when I say it’s a complex issue. It’s not black or white. We all need to be willing to compromise. But when it comes down to it… I believe the development needs to move forward. It’s really the only way to achieve both objectives.”
Hawk chewed on his lip for a long moment and was quiet for most of the hike back down the trail. When we got to the final half mile, he spoke up, and I could tell by his firm jaw that he’d thought himself around in circles until he’d ended right back in the angry place where he’d started.
“I understand what you’re saying about the money. I know that’s a very real issue. But you’re letting that blind you. You talk about oversight, but it feels like I’m the only one who’s bothering to look closely at this while everyone else is telling me to sit down and be quiet. Letting Evola move forward with a proposal that has the wordclear-cuttingin it isn’t the right way to save the townorthe mountain. The development needs to be stopped before it ruins this place that my dad… and lots of other people… love so much.”
I tried to hide my sigh of resignation. It was clear he was going to dig in and pick this as the literal hill to figuratively die on. He was expectingmeto rethink my position but refused to rethink his own.
“Okay, then,” I gritted out.
His nostrils flared. “Don’t patronize me, Jack Davidson Wyatt.”
“Oh, we’re middle-naming now?” I ran my tongue over my teeth. “Fine. You’re spoiling for a fight, and I’m not gonna give it to you, Henry Hawkins Sunday. You can’t just keep things the way they are indefinitely because you’re scared that something bad could happen. That’s not how life works.”
“Well, I say it is.”
