Page 27 of Mistletoe & Mischief
The following morning, Maya awoke in time for breakfast with the only other guests at the bed and breakfast: Winnie and Tom. The older couples had gone back home. Felicity fussed over Winnie, Tom, and Maya adorably, making more coffee, eggs, and bacon than anyone really needed.
“There’s a storm coming tonight,” Felicity warned them as she zipped around. “Maya, are you sure you want to move out to the mansion today? It’s possible you won’t be able to get out for a while.”
Maya felt as though she carried a secret. Brad was coming; it was clear he wanted to stay the night. “I’ll be okay,” she told Felicity.
“You’ll call if anything happens?” Felicity demanded. “Conor has a snowmobile. We can come out there if need be.”
“She wants to be cooped up in her mansion in the snow!” Tom announced. “I think that’s romantic.”
“You should write a book while you’re out there,” Winnie said. “Doesn’t it sound romantic to be alone with your thoughts, surrounded by snow?”
“I keep looking at your food blog,” Tom said sheepishly. “I love what you wrote about the burgers at the diner!”
Maya’s cheeks burned with embarrassment and, admittedly, pride. It was true that she’d gotten better about updating the blog in recent days. She’d even posted an article about the Christmas Festival, featuring the numerous food stalls. Perhaps due to social media, several Hollygrove residents had discovered the posts and spread them widely, wanting to show off their pride in their small town. Now that she’d left New York, her readership was wider than ever. That was counter-intuitive— but she’d take it.
After breakfast, Maya packed up her suitcase and slotted it into the back of Phoebe’s trunk. Tom, Winnie, Felicity, and Conor waited for her in the living room and swallowed her with hugs. Felicity demanded twice that she come to town “immediately after the roads are clear” so that Felicity would know she was all right.
“Keep me updated about Sarah,” Maya told Tom, giving him a final squeeze. He was just a little bit older than Phoebe, and Maya had begun to feel motherly toward him. She couldn’t explain it. She was pulling for him.
Maya went to the grocery store, ready to stock up on supplies. Although she knew Rainey Michaels was at the elementary school with Brad, she half-assumed she’d run into her around every aisle, and she simmered with anxiety. Maya filled her cart with fruits, vegetables, meat, fish, pasta, ingredients to make pasta sauce, fine chocolates from Switzerland, pastries for breakfast, and plenty of bottles of red wine from various regions of France and Italy. Nick’s voice was in her head frequently, reminding her of the best ingredients and how best to prepare them.
That had been the Nick she’d fallen in love with, she reminded herself. The one who knew how to prepare delicious, soul-affirming food. Perhaps she could still love those memories, even if the “real” Nick had been so cruel.
Maya drove to the mansion and carried her groceries into the kitchen, where she stored them in the fridge and shining cabinets. Due to the size of the storage, her items barely took up ten percent of the space. She imagined herself like a doll in a very big playhouse.
It was Wednesday, more than a week since Maya had gone to the nursing home. Twitching with nerves, she called the nursing home, hoping they’d tell her Aunt Veronica was ready to meet.
“She took a turn for the worse yesterday,” the nurse on duty told her. “Unfortunately, she needs her rest.”
Maya felt helpless. She retreated upstairs to another hallway and began to dig through drawers and closets, listening to podcasts in her headphones. Although she didn’t discover the heirloom, she did stumble through heaps of expensive items— old ballgowns, tuxedos, antique mirrors, gorgeous paintings, secretary desks, and antique children’s toys. One of them, a rocking horse that looked to be from the forties or fifties, forced Maya to imagine her own mother, just a toddler in such a big house, laughing and playing.
The car accident that had taken her mother’s life on Christmas Day, 1981, was difficult for Maya to remember. She’d been six years old, buckled in the backseat, listening to the radio, and singing along. Her parents had been holding hands in the front seat as her father had been driving. And then, there had been nothing but sound and light and squealing tires. There had been nothing but blistering pain.
Maya’s mother, Bethany, had died on impact. But her father had died three months later. He’d been okay for the first several days after the accident, but he’d soon fallen into a horrible coma that he never came out of. The doctors assumed it was the result of a head trauma they hadn’t clocked immediately after the accident.
Maya racked her mind for more memories of her mother. Was it possible she’d told her about this mansion? About her regal grandmother and gorgeous sister? Or had she truly left all this behind without a second thought?
Maya’s podcast stopped abruptly. She realized Brad was calling her; he’d arrived. She flung down the circular staircase and found him at the front door, beaming. Already, the snowfall from that morning had intensified. The flakes were enormous, melting across Brad’s hat.
“Come in!” she exclaimed, trying to shake off her bad memories.
Brad carried a paper bag of groceries: Oreo cookies, red wine, and a few different types of fancy cheese and crackers. “Only the essentials,” he joked sheepishly.
It was only four-thirty, too early for dinner. But neither of them seemed keen on digging through more drawers, hunting for the heirloom. Not when they were so mesmerized with one another. Brad sliced some camembert and gouda, and Maya poured them small glasses of red. Wordlessly, they wandered to the back of the mansion, where an enclosed sunroom with a fireplace offered a gorgeous view of the snowfall. The windows were floor-to-ceiling, making it feel as though the rolling fields, woods, and mountains before them were part of a dynamic television display.
“I can’t believe it’s real,” Brad said as he piled wood into the fireplace.
As soon as the fire was roaring, Brad and Maya sat close to one another on the couch, clinked their glasses together, and sipped. The wine was woody with a slight hint of cherry, and Maya checked the label to see that it was from a local winery. She would have to write about it on her blog.
“Are you a wine snob?” Brad teased.
Maya laughed. “Not really. But I have a new angle on my food blog. I’m writing about all things upstate New York. For some reason, it’s already taking off.”
Brad was intrigued. He pulled up the blog on his phone and read the most recent article right in front of her, his eyes alight. Throughout, Maya thought she might faint with embarrassment. But when he finished, his eyes connected with hers, and he said, “This is extraordinary writing, Maya. I knew you were good, but I couldn’t have imagined this.”
Maya’s cheeks burned. The intensity of Brad’s gaze forced her eyes to the window, where snow was piling across the veranda. She imagined them here in the summertime, all the doors and windows wide open. They’d drink lemonade and read books together. Brad wouldn’t have school to go to, and they could spend long days side-by-side.
She was getting ahead of herself. She knew that. But she couldn’t stop.
