The Christmas Blanket: A Second-Chance Holiday Romance Read online

  “Moose?” I asked, first to the dog, and then my eyes found River’s. “Our Moose?”

  River’s jaw ticked, but he otherwise said nothing, dropping my suitcase to the floor with a thud.

  Moose was making the strangest squealing noises I’d ever heard, and I knew it took every ounce of willpower that mutt had to keep his ass on the floor as he looked up at me with his tongue lolling out of his mouth. His tail was waving furiously, his mahogany brown fur long and silky just like I remembered, although the fur around his mouth was peppered with gray now, and he had the same scar over his nose from when we’d first found him abandoned and bleeding in the woods.

  “Oh my God, it really is you!” I dropped to my knees then, opening my arms, and that was the only permission Moose needed to leap onto me once more. I fell backward at the impact, my petite frame no match for the ninety pounds of muscle that dog had on him, but I was laughing all the same as he licked my cheeks, my chin, still making those same squealing noises.

  “Traitor,” River murmured under his breath, and then he left us at the door, shrugging off his coat and hanging it on the rack by the fireplace.

  “I can’t believe you still have him,” I marveled, rubbing Moose behind the ears. I didn’t care that his breath smelled like he’d been eating dead skunks for dinner a week straight — I never thought I’d see this dog again, and now that he was in my arms, I couldn’t imagine how I ever left him behind.

  “What, did you think I’d just kick him out?” River bit back. And I thought I heard him mumble something under his breath, but couldn’t be sure what.

  “Of course not,” I answered softly, patting Moose’s head once more before I stood. I didn’t want to say it out loud, but the dog was at least eleven years old now, if not more. We never were sure of his age when we found him. “I guess I’m just surprised to see him, that’s all.”

  “Well, today is just full of surprises, isn’t it?”

  The joy Moose had brought evaporated in an instant, and I frowned, watching as River shook the snow from his boots next before dropping them by the fireplace. He peeled off his hat and gloves, and then it was just him in a pair of dark jeans, a beige, thermal, long-sleeve shirt, and two mismatched socks with holes in the toes.

  Nothing had changed, and yet everything had.

  River was older than when I’d left, that much was obvious, but now that we were inside and in the warm light of his cabin, I could see it. I could see the lines of his face that weren’t there before, the creases of his eyes, the strong line between his brows. I could see the bit of gray dotting his stubble prematurely, something his father had, too, when he was younger. His hair used to be so long it’d curl around the edge of his baseball cap, but now, it was just a fade, cut short and simple. His arms were bigger, his chest, too — the lean frame from the days he’d played ball replaced by a body I barely recognized. It seemed everything about him was more sculpted and manly, such a contrast from the boy who’d stood in my rearview mirror and watched me drive away.

  And while I stood there and studied my ex, he didn’t so much as give me a second glance before he was headed for the kitchen.

  I watched his head disappear inside the old yellow refrigerator long enough to pull out a can of Budweiser, and then he cracked it and drank half in one gulp.

  At least some things never change.

  Moose was still circling around my feet with a wagging tail as I stripped off my own coat and hung it next to River’s on the rack, finally taking in the scene of the small cabin.

  It was essentially one large room, the only door one in the back corner that I assumed hid a bathroom. Everything else existed in a sort of chaotic harmony inside the shared space — a tiny kitchen with appliances older than we were, a small folding table cracked at the edges with three mismatched metal chairs around it, a queen-size bed in the corner with navy sheets, two worn pillows, and a simple quilt on top of it. There was a large leather couch that I thought I recognized as the same one his dad used to have in the den, and three shelves of books lining the wall by the fireplace.

  It smelled a little like cinnamon, a little like firewood, and a little like whiskey — all wrapped in one.

  There seemed to be little projects scattered everywhere else — a half-built something or other in the center of the room, with saw dust and tools littered around it, a half-finished puzzle on the folding table next to a deck of cards splayed out in a half-finished game of solitaire. A book was spread open, face down, the coffee table in front of the couch serving as a bookmark — and it looked halfway finished, too.

  So many things started, not a single one completed.

  Again, I found myself thinking how some things never change.

  I cleared my throat as I unwrapped my scarf, hanging it over my coat. “Well, I would say thank you for helping me, but since you really didn’t help as much as you forced me against my will into your house…”

  “I saved you from hypothermia,” he grunted back. “So yeah, you’re welcome.”

  I rolled my eyes.

  The sooner I get out of here, the better.

  “I would have just called Daddy, if there was any damn cell service on this road,” I said, pulling my phone from my back pocket and sliding my thumb over the screen to unlock it. “If you just give me your WiFi password, I can text him and be on my way.”

  “I don’t have one.”

  I peeled my eyes away from my phone screen where I’d been ready to connect after verifying that, as suspected, I had zero bars of service. “Excuse me?”

  “You heard me, Sparrow,” he said, leaning a hip against the kitchen counter and taking a sip of his beer. I used to adore that little nickname, but it only made me glare at him now. “No WiFi.”

  “What do you mean, no WiFi?”

  “I mean, I don’t have it.”

  I blinked. “I don’t understand.”

  “I don’t have it,” he said again, slower this time, punctuating each word. “Never have. I don’t have a need for it.”

  “You don’t have a need to be connected to the world?” I asked, but then I shook my head, holding up a hand to stop him before he could come up with some smartass remark. “Whatever. Just let me use your house phone, then.”

  “Don’t have one of those, either.”

  “What?” I asked, incredulously and maybe a little too excitedly, since Moose let out a bark and started hopping around my feet again.

  I was still staring at River with my mouth open like a trout when he chuckled, tipping his beer toward me. “No Internet. No phone.”

  I blinked several times. “You have got to be kidding me. How the hell do you survive? Don’t you work? Don’t you need a way to get in touch with people?”

  River shrugged. “I work, but I don’t need a phone or Internet to do it. And people know where to find me if they need me.”

  I pinched the bridge of my nose, letting out a sigh I hoped would give me a little patience to survive this interaction. “Fine,” I gritted through my teeth. “Can you just give me a ride up to Mom and Dad’s, please?”

  “No can do.”

  This time, I couldn’t help the growl that came from my throat. “You’re so maddening! Just take me home so we can both end this nightmare before Christmas.”

  “Trust me, Eliza, I don’t want you here anymore than you want to be here,” he said, his voice low and rumbling so much it shook my own chest. His eyes were hard on mine when he crushed the can in his hand and chucked it into the trashcan next to him. “But there’s a fucking blizzard going on outside, and whether you planned for that or not doesn’t change the fact that it’s happening. I can’t drive anywhere, and neither can you, and neither can your dad, even if you could get in touch with him. That is the reality of the situation.” He threw his hands up. “Sorry if it doesn’t meet your storybook picture you had in mind.” Then, he pushed off the counter and dipped back inside the fridge, mumbling the next sentence so low I almost convinced myself
I didn’t hear it at all. “Just like everything else in your life you left behind here.”

  The wind howled outside, the wood cabin creaking against the pressure as if to hammer home the point River had just made. And I stood there by the fireplace, obstinate and frustrated, not wanting to take no for an answer.

  “So, you’re telling me that I’m stuck here?” I deadpanned, gesturing toward him before I let my hand fall against my thigh with a slap. “With you.”

  “Until the snow lets up and it’s safe for either me to drive you, get your car unstuck, or you to walk your happy ass the last dozen miles home?” He cracked open his new beer with a grin that told me he was more pleased than not. “Yep.”

  The word popped on his lips, and I shook my head, wondering how this could possibly be my life. I hadn’t seen River since a week after we signed our divorce papers, on the day I left Wellhaven with a vow to never return.

  A vow I stupidly broke, all in the name of being home for the holidays.

  I sighed, looking down at Moose who was still wagging his tail furiously and smiling up at me like it was the best day of his life.

  That makes one of us, pup.

  A heavy sigh found my chest as I stared at my reflection in the small, dingy mirror of River’s bathroom.

  As I suspected, the only door in the back corner of his cabin had the bathroom behind it, and it was small, but clean — as clean as an old cabin bathroom could get, anyway.

  There was no counter space, save for the small edge around the off-yellow ceramic sink, and it held only River’s toothbrush and toothpaste in a little plastic cup. I tried my best to find space for my own toiletries, but ended up setting them on the back of the toilet, since that was the only place they’d fit.

  I felt a little more like a functioning human after brushing my teeth and washing my face, changing into a pair of sweatpants and oversized sweater, and pulling on my thickest pair of wool socks. As much as I wanted to pull all my heavy black hair off my neck, I left it there for warmth, seeing as how the fireplace was the only thing warming the entire cabin.

  My eyes were just as black as my hair, the brown of the iris so dark you couldn’t tell the difference between it and my pupil unless you really stopped to stare. I was uncharacteristically tan for this time of year, thanks to my time in New Zealand, and it made the cream sweater I wore blaze in contrast.

  I hadn’t even been in Vermont for a full day yet, and already I could feel my lips drying out, so I ran a sheen of lip balm over them and rolled them together, taking in my appearance one last time before I abandoned the bathroom and rejoined my gracious host.

  River was still in the kitchen, only this time he was holding his beer in one hand and a spatula in the other, browning hamburger meat on the stove.

  That sight hit me like a semi-truck, because with just one blink I could see him ten years younger, doing the exact same thing in the first house we rented together as a couple. His eyes were softer then, younger, not as worn by life.

  I’d loved that boy.

  I’d loved him since I was twelve years old, before I could even truly understand what love was at all. I’d loved him through all the hell we put each other through, the ups and the downs, the other boys and girls we used mostly to make the other mad or jealous before always finding our way back to each other.

  He was the one.

  He was the one I’d married two months after high school graduation, the one I’d moved in with two months after graduation without a single hesitation or concern that it wasn’t the best decision I could have ever made, and the one I swore I’d spend the rest of my life with — going on adventures, having babies, growing old.

  It seemed like another lifetime.

  The man who stood before me now was nothing I recognized.

  Nothing more than a stranger.

  I cleared my throat once I’d shoved my airport clothes in my suitcase, and I held my hands in front of the fireplace, trying to get warm again. Moose had settled into a curled-up ball by the fireplace, too, and his tail wagged gently when I bent down to scratch behind one ear.

  “Whatcha making?” I finally asked River after enough awkward silence to last me a year.

  “Dinner.”

  “Obviously,” I said as he drained the meat, setting it aside. He put the skillet back on the stove then and added a heap of butter, and I salivated a little as it sizzled to life. “But what?”

  “Shit on a shingle.”

  I let out a low, sarcastic laugh through my nose. “S.O.S. How fitting.” Then, my nose wrinkled of its own accord. “I can’t believe you still eat that stuff.”

  River shrugged, adding flour to the skillet. “What, you too good for it now?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “You might as well have.” He stirred the ingredients together with more force than necessary. “I didn’t expect company, alright? This is what’s for dinner. You can have some or not. Up to you.”

  River poured milk into the mixture on the stove without another word or glance in my direction, and I sighed, looking up to the ceiling like God could help me.

  “Look, if we’re going to be stuck together, we might as well try to get along,” I said, joining him in the kitchen. I grabbed the loaf of bread off the top of the fridge and pulled out six slices — four for him, two for me — and popped the first two in the old toaster on the counter.

  River eyed me, but then his brows furrowed once more, and he kept his focus on the gravy.

  “You and me, get along?” He shook his head. “When has that ever been the case?”

  “So maybe we try something new.” I leaned a hip against the counter, crossing my arms and watching him salt and pepper the gravy. “God, this stuff looks so nasty,” I said, but couldn’t help the smile that spread on my lips next. “But I’d be lying if I said my stomach isn’t growling at the smell of it.”

  Something close to a grunt was the only response I got.

  “I remember the first time your dad made this for me,” I said after a moment, trying again for civility. “I think we were fourteen? It was sophomore year, after homecoming. We were drunk, and he was so mad at us.” I chuckled, remembering the way River’s dad had cursed us out the entire way home after picking us up. “But he also couldn’t stop laughing at us. And then he made us this…. this goop,” I said, waving my hand over the gravy. “To soak up the booze,” I mimicked in my deepest voice. “Remember that? And he was telling us how it was a staple meal in the military back in the day, and how his dad had made it for him. And—”

  “I don’t really want to go down memory fucking lane, okay?” River slung the ground beef into the gravy mixture he’d made, stirring it a few times before he abandoned it altogether. “Serve yourself.”

  He walked away without another word, giving me his back as he retreated into the bathroom.

  And I just stood there, shocked silent, wondering what I’d said wrong.

  Wondering if it was going to be like this until the snow decided to let me out of this cabin jail cell.

  Unsurprisingly, we ate dinner in silence — me practically done with my plate by the time River rejoined me to make his, smelling faintly of cigarette smoke. I hated that he still had that habit, and found the words to tell him so on the tip of my tongue, but I somehow managed to keep them at bay.

  If I was going to be stuck with him for God knew how long, I didn’t want to nag him.

  I was tired of nagging him.

  It was one of the many reasons I’d put him out of his misery and delivered him a divorce.

  It seemed so long ago, the conversations that turned into fights that turned into us staring at each other at a complete impasse, knowing this was where we would end. I wanted to get out of this town, see the world, travel, explore. I wanted him to go with me.

  He wanted to stay.

  It was as simple and as complicated as that.

  No matter how I tried to convince him that we could travel and then come
back, that we could go see the world and still come see our family here at home, he wouldn’t budge. He loved the small-town life, where I only longed for more.

  And we were so young and so stupidly in love that we didn’t think to talk about what we really wanted before we got married.

  More than that, what I wanted changed.

  When I was eighteen, an engagement ring on my finger and a field of butterflies in my heart, being married to River and living here in Wellhaven was what I wanted. I wanted the house and the yard and the dog and the kids — just like my parents had, and his parents, too.

  But something in me shifted around age twenty-three.

  Suddenly, more and more of our friends were coming home from college, or from traveling the world. I would look online and see photos of our friends in exotic countries, eating amazing food, seeing amazing sights. I listened to them talk about their time at college, the classes they took, the parties they went to, the sporting events and bars and clubs and travels abroad.

  And I realized it then — there was only so much living you could do in a small town.

  I can’t explain the thirst that was born in me then. I didn’t just want to get out, I had to get out — just as much as I had to inhale my next breath in order to keep surviving. My dreams were overhauled, and no longer did I envision the house and the kids — at least, not as soon. Instead, I saw River and myself drinking wine in Italy, snorkeling off the coast of Australia, taking a dip in the hot springs in Iceland, hell, even hiking the mountains in Oregon.

  I didn’t even consider it, the possibility that River wouldn’t want those same things.

  But when I brought it all up to him, you would have thought I’d told him I cheated on him with his best friend.

  He wanted nothing to do with it. He wouldn’t entertain the possibility of leaving. He wouldn’t even consider taking a long vacation when I proposed that as a compromise.

  He didn’t want to leave Wellhaven. Period.

  And that was it. The first little snowflake that balled into another, rolling rolling rolling, until the snowball was so big and heavy, we couldn’t breathe beneath its force.