Page 184
“BRUTUS—”
“I SEE HIM I SEE HIM—”
“HE HAS A HAT—”
The Escalade barely cleared the circular drive before Ethan had the door open.
“Ethan honey, wait—“
And then he was running, both kids were running, across the snow toward the porch where the grizzly bear the size of a large vehicle sat wearing a Santa hat with patient dignity. As if he was an animal who had accepted his circumstances and decided it was easier to just give in. Bear stood beside him, barefoot on the porch in jeans and a flannel he hadn’t bothered to button, laughing at something. Tommy was out of the car now too, loping after the kids with his sketchbook clutched to his chest, and Michael was helping Isabelle out of the driver’s side, while Annie stood by the open car door and looked at all of it.
How can we be here again?
She was shocked yesterday when Isabelle and Mary Sue invited her to come to Sage’s spa day. She was even more shocked when Bear personally invited her to the Christmas party. And now back again.
The estate. The snow. The mountains behind it. The Christmas lights still on along the porch railing, throwing gold into the gray morning. Her kids’ voices carrying across the cold air in a place they would otherwise never see, let alone visit.
She stayed there. Just for a moment. Just at the edges of it, the way she always stayed at the edges, the habit learned over twenty years that the warm places were for other people.
She didn’t notice Sage until she was already down the porch steps.
She came across the snow wearing a beautiful cream sweater and green yoga pants that should be illegal, moving fast, her dark hair loose and her nose and lip ring shining, and she walked straight up to Annie with zero self consciousness wrapping both arms around her.
“There you are,” Sage said into her hair. “I’m glad you came…I missed you.”
Annie’s arms came up as she held the younger girl and didn’t say anything. She didn’t have anything to say. She just held on, in the snow, in the cold, in the middle of all of it, and cried a little more.
Sage pretended not to notice but did squeeze her a little more and whisper “Annie don’t. If you do, then I’m going to, and then mama will scold us cause we’ll make her cry too.”
Annie laughed through her tears.
“Ok Sage…but I’m crying more later”
Sage kissed her cheek and said “deal. Now come on. Mary Sue has kicked Cal out of the kitchen but I think she’ll let us sneak some cookies before breakfast”
Then pulling her along Annie smiled as the family - all went inside.
It was more than enough.
MARY SUE
Mary Sue Ellen was up before five am.
She didn’t need an alarm. She just always was, Christmas or not. Years of opening the diner before the breakfast rush had tuned her internal clock to the stillness just before the dawn.
She lay in the dark for a spell, listening to the wind outside and then got up, putting on her robe and slippers. As she made her way to the bathroom she paused and noticed Cal’s titanic-sized green sweater that Sage had claimed when she spent the past week with her. It still hung over the back of the chair like a ghost of laughter and warm hugs.
Mary Sue smiled softly. “I miss her,” she whispered into the empty dark.
Between Sage and Isabelle, her days had come alive again. She’d taught Sage how to run a real diner, how to cook food that made people linger and talk. She and Annie had shown both girls how to waitress, and the lunch crowd had swelled just to watch the two of them banter like old friends.
Their nights… Lord. Pure magic. High-school slumber-party energy right here in her little apartment above the diner. Mary Sue would sit in her old armchair, knitting needles clicking steadily, chiming in with her dry little comments while Sage and Isabelle carried on. The laughter that had filled these rooms — she hadn’t realized how much she’d missed it. How much she’d missed them.
She sighed, the sound small in the quiet.
I’m getting old.
Her apartment was calm and familiar, every creak and draft known by heart. She’d always found a deep, soothing refuge up here after long days downstairs. But ever since Sage… ever since the whirlwind of the last few weeks… Mary Sue had felt restless in her own skin.
