AllFreeNovel
Share Us
JOSIE
Well, she’d messed it up. Jumped too soon. After all those years of waiting and then being separated, she’d gotten drunk on contact and made a mess of things with Cameron.
“It’s snowing again,” Helen said, looking out the window.
“Have you heard from Evan?” Josie asked. They were sitting on the couch cutting up pieces of paper for the big round of games that the whole family would play before dinner. Fishbowl and Empire. Another Christmas Eve tradition. They’d play games and then the youngest of the kids would go to bed up in the rooms in the lodge and the parents and grandparents would stuff the stockings and drink some wine.
Add the finishing touches the next day.
And then it would be Christmas. There would be the mayhem of the morning, but that would be over by noon. And then an afternoon of laziness and reading books and playing games that had been stuffed in stockings. And after a Herculean clean-up effort the next day the lodge would be open again to guests. The restaurant full. The holiday over.
“Last night. He got to the airport but all the highways are closed so he’s still in the city.”
“There’s still plenty of time,” Josie said. And she touched her cousin’s shoulder, which was stiff and tense under her flannel shirt.
“Yeah,” Helen said with a smile that did not reach her eyes. “What about you? Are you okay?”
“Fine,” Josie said but Helen gave her the sympathetic look she’d just gotten from Josie.
The front door opened, letting in Max and Cameron with a blast of cold air.
The men put their backs to the door, arms full of wood, snow dusting their hair. And they were…laughing.
Max and Cameron were laughing?
The whole room noticed, everyone turning to stare at the two men as they carried the wood over to the fireplace and then kicked off their boots and hung up their coats. Chatting away about a summer Cameron planted trees in Northern Canada.
He’s had so many lives, she thought. So many. It’s no wonder he doesn’t want me. I’ve had one life and I’ve wasted it doing stupid things.
She stood, needing some air that hadn’t touched Cameron, and headed for the kitchen. Mom and Grandma Iris were in there, drinking tea or maybe whiskey in teacups. It was hard to know with those two.
“Josie,” Mom said, standing up straight. “Are you all right?”
No. I’ve blown up my life and I’m right back where I was when I was a kid, loving Cameron and not knowing what he thinks of me.
She opened her mouth to say fine. To smile and maybe ask for a teacup full of whiskey, but when she opened her mouth, nothing happened. There were no words. It was like her brain was saying—you can’t do this anymore. This is no way to survive.
“Oh honey,” Iris said, and Mom got out a teacup.
“Iris is having whiskey. I’m having tea. Which do you want?”
Josie pointed to the whiskey.
“I’ll be okay,” she said, and she knew that was the truth. The only way to survive heartache was to just push your way through. And she hadn’t done that years ago. She’d run from it and she’d been running ever since. If there was one thing she could leave this place with when Christmas was over, it was the knowledge that whatever came after this heartbreak was better than what had come before.
She felt good about that. Even if she did want to throw herself at her mom and cry.
The kitchen door opened and Cameron walked in. The storm outside had picked up its pace again and roared around the corners of the lodge like some kind of soundtrack to his entrance.
She took a sip of her whiskey and winced.
“Delia? Iris? Can you give Josie and I a second?”
Iris walked by Cameron and squeezed his hand. “I’m so happy you’re back,” she said, and Mom seconded that, and then they were out the door.
“Iris didn’t say that to me,” Josie said, trying for a joke.
“I always knew I was her favorite,” Cameron said with a smile. He stepped closer and Josie, instinctively, stepped back. Cameron stopped. Stricken.
“I just…I feel like a fool. You know? And I think I just need a second before we slip right back into being friends again. I know I rushed things,” she said. “Quitting my job and then trying to co-opt your work. It wasn’t fair. And I’m sorry.”
Cameron ran a hand through his hair and winced at her. “I think I just rushed things too,” he said and then looked down at her teacup. “Is that tea or whiskey?”
“Whiskey.”
“Can I—?”
She handed him the teacup and he shot it down. Josie, despite the pain and doubt, couldn’t help but laugh. “You all right—?”
“I just asked Max for his blessing to marry you.”
Josie stumbled backward onto a stool. “You did what?”
