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Cal nodded. Isabelle stood just behind Mary Sue with her binder, laptop, and planner, then followed Cal to the truck.
They sat in the truck for ten minutes while Isabelle gave him crisp, efficient updates. Pavilion was nearly finished. Full band flying in from Missoula. Michelin-starred catering team arriving tomorrow from San Francisco. Lighting, sound, heaters — all confirmed.
Cal stared through the windshield at the cars passing on Main Street.
“Bear?” Isabelle said. “Are you listening?”
He nodded.
She studied him for a moment, then leaned over and kissed his cheek. “You’re a good man, Cal Meridian. And Sage is a lucky girl.”
Cal managed a small smile. Something in his eyes must have told her not to push, because Isabelle — who was very good at her job — changed the subject smoothly.
“Michael lands tonight. I’ll stay with Mary Sue and Sage until it’s time. That way you two can bond over Magic The Gathering and hot chocolate.”
Cal nodded. Then he looked at her. “Isabelle. Thank you. For everything.”
She smiled, gave him a few final notes, a quick hug, and headed back inside the diner.
Cal drove home.
It felt like the longest drive he’d ever taken.
He stepped back inside the house he had called home for years and loved deeply. It still looked the same. It just didn’t feel the same. Not without Sage Thompson.
His eyes went to the living room.
The fourteen-foot blue spruce stood tall and proud in the corner by the window, filling the space with the sharp, clean scent of fresh forest. He’d cut it himself two days ago — partly because it needed doing, and partly because swinging an axe for an hour had been better than standing in the kitchen failing to drink hot chocolate he’d made for two without thinking.
The tree was completely bare.
The decorations waited in neat boxes along the far wall — strings of lights, boxes of ornaments, everything he’d bought with almost military precision, choosing colors and styles that might make her face do that bright, surprised-happy thing he was already addicted to.
He hadn’t touched any of it.
On the legal pad lying on the counter, beneath seventeen tightly written lines of party logistics, the final item read in his neat, compressed handwriting:
Tree — with Sage.
Cal walked over and stood there for a long moment, staring at the words. Then the corner of his mouth lifted — a small, private smile no one else would ever see. He picked up the pen.
Underneath everything else, he added one more line:
Stuffed animals. Lots of them.
26
MICHAEL
“But… I… I need a car…” Michael shifted his weight from one soggy red Converse to the other, clutching the handle of his carry-on like a lifeline. “Ummm, maybe maybe—”
“Sorry, the system is like down, okay?” The girl behind the rental car desk didn’t even look up. She was chewing gum with lazy pops, scrolling on her phone, long acrylic nails clicking against the screen.
Michael felt his eyes sting. He pushed his thick black-rimmed glasses up his nose. “The… whole system?”
“Duh,” she said, still not glancing at him.
He blinked rapidly. “You know, I’m pretty good with computers. Maybe I could help bring the system back up? I could just—”
