EPILOGUE
STELLA Two Years Later
I SNEAK A peek at Luka over the edge of my book.
It’s a normal evening for us, squished together on the couch. I dropped my feet into his lap as soon as I shuffled over here, his hand immediately finding the curve of my knee, fingers spread wide. He’s got a crossword propped on his thigh and an abandoned mug of tea at his elbow. Normal, all of it. I sit with my book, and I watch him, and I can’t point to a single thing out of the ordinary.
But something feels off. Something just beyond my grasp.
He rearranged our tea collection four times this morning. He disappeared into his office for two hours and did god knows what with a series of spreadsheets.
Everything is exactly as it always is, and yet— “You’re being weird.”
“You’re being weird,” he fires back right away, pen caught between his teeth. He always uses a pen, even though he gets seventy-five percent of the answers wrong. He slips the pen from his mouth, scribbles something down, and then glances over at me. “You’re the one that’s been staring at me for the last fifteen minutes like a little creeper.”
“Because you’re being weird.” I nudge him with my foot and close my book. I set it to the side, right on top of the three other books I’ve started and abandoned this week.
Luka’s mouth hitches to the side. A half grin. His hair is still stuck up on the left side, like it never quite figured out how to approach the day. “I’m going to need you to elaborate.”
Maybe it was all that time back in his office. He doesn’t usually do that on the weekend. Or maybe it was the whispering phone conversation he pretended he didn’t have in our tiny hallway.
I don’t know. Something is off.
I fix him with a look. “I’ve known you a long time, Luka.”
The half grin spreads into a full one. He tosses his folded-up paper on top of my book and turns to face me, flopping his arm across the back of the couch. His eyes glow amber in the light of the fireplace, the sun just beginning to set outside the wide bay windows. From here, I can see pink and lilac cascading over the tips of the trees lining the fields. Winter finally beginning its slow crawl across the farm.
My favorite time of year.
“You have known me a long time,” he agrees, voice low. “You know me better than anyone. Which is why you should know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I am not being weird.”
I reach for my book again, eyes narrowed. I don’t believe him, but that’s fine. I’ll let him work whatever this is out of his system and maybe rearrange the spice cabinet by country of origin. That always seems to put him in a
better mood.
“All right.”
His smile hitches higher. I want to bite the creases it leaves in his cheeks.
“Okay.”
“Okay,” I respond.
A chuckle rumbles out of him. “All right.”
I go back to reading my book. Luka goes back to tracing his fingertips up and down my leg. I glance up and catch him looking at me, eyes soft. He’s wearing my favorite hunter green cable-knit sweater today. Socks with small embroidered silver bells.
I tuck my book against my chest. “What is it?”
He blinks twice and then swallows hard. It takes him a minute, face so serious I start to get worried. He clears his throat and sits up. “You want to go out and get a tree?”
I glance out the window. At the sun slowly sinking toward the horizon.
“Now?”
He nods.
“It’ll be dark before we get out to the fields.” I wiggle farther down into the couch. “We can go in the morning if you still want to.”
“Now is good too.”
My suspicion grows. It’s still two weeks until Thanksgiving, and usually I’m the one dragging him out for our tree. If we get one this early, it’ll likely be a dried husk by the time the actual holiday rolls around. Not that it matters to me. I’d keep it up year round if Luka didn’t get tired of sweeping up all of the pine needles.
I chew on my bottom lip and consider him. “Why?”
He fidgets, picking at a piece of imaginary lint on his knee. “Why what?”
“Why do you want to go get a tree right now?”
“Why do you have so many questions today?” he mutters, more to himself than me. He rolls his head to the side and meets my gaze, fond exasperation on every line of his handsome face. “I would like a tree right now, at this exact moment. And I’d like it very much if you came with me. Do I need a reason beyond that?”
I stare at him. Stare and stare and stare. “If you’re going to break up with me, I’d like it if you did it inside where it’s warm.”
I’m only a little bit serious. Luka and I have been together long enough now that the fear of losing everything we’ve built is typically contained to the darkest moments of night—when sleep feels far away and my fears lurk with the shadows in the corners of our room. When my hands can’t find him in the space next to me quick enough. When it takes him longer than usual to roll into me and press his face into my hair, arms tight around my waist.
He gives me a look that is entirely unamused. “And who will fold the laundry properly if I’m not here?” I note the clench in his jaw. “I’m not
breaking up with you.”
“Okay.”
“All right.”
“Fine.”
He heaves a sigh from the very depths of his soul. He’s going to need to rearrange the spice cabinet and the little drawer where we keep all of the hand towels. I worry for my haphazard shoe collection stuffed under the bed.
The last time we disagreed about something, our house looked like an IKEA showroom.
He leverages himself off the couch and stares down at me with his hands on his hips. It is . . . distracting . . . when he gets bossy. “Go put your jacket on.”
I have to adjust the collar of my flannel. “Okay.”
Luka disappears while I’m looking for my boots. I’ve only managed to find one when he’s suddenly there, holding the other in his hand. Prince Charming in winter gear. He’s completely bundled head to toe, a thick scarf tucked neatly under his chin. He hands me a paper cup of something steaming and bends onto his knee to help me wedge my other foot into my boot.
It’s something about the position, I think. Luka down on one knee. All of his weird behavior. The whispering and the insistence to get a tree now, when it’s dark and— “Oh my god,” I whisper. “Are you proposing?”
Luka doesn’t look up at me, still fighting with my foot and the boot. I’m wearing my thick inside socks today, the ones with the little grips on the bottom. I guess they make it difficult for sliding on boots. The only indication that he’s heard me at all is the subtle tightening of his shoulders and the rosy blush that lights up the back of his neck like a Christmas tree.
My heart drums out something that sounds like The Nutcracker in my chest. My palms start to sweat through my mittens. It’s a miracle I don’t drop this cup of tea all over Luka’s perpetual bedhead.
“Luka.”
“Please,” he sighs. “Please stop talking.”
There’s no heat in his words. Just a bemused sort of acknowledgment that this situation is not proceeding as planned. It’s the same way he sounds when I don’t bother separating out the laundry or when I only eat peppermint bark for breakfast. I roll my lips against a smile. “Can I—”
“You can’t.” He finally manages to get my foot in the boot. He pulls the strings too tight in the thrill of victory, and I go wobbling to the side. He steadies me with his other palm at my hip. When he stands up again, his cheeks are a bright flaming red, and he’s looking at me like I’ve eaten the very last slice of pie. Like I’ve snatched away his favorite toy.
“Did I ruin it?” I whisper.
He rolls his eyes to the ceiling. “I did say you know me better than anyone
else, didn’t I?”
“You did.”
“All right, well—” He shrugs, helpless. He turns me toward the door.
“Let’s go.”
“Wait, wait, wait.” I turn back toward him. He mumbles something under his breath. “I have something I want to ask you.”
His lips flatten into a line, but I can see amusement dancing in his coffee- brown eyes. Amusement and adoration and years and years of friendship and love twisting and twining together. Everything we’ve ever been to each other.
Everything we ever will be. “You’re not allowed to ask me anything for the next twenty minutes.”
“It will be my last question, I promise.”
“And then we can go outside?”
“Yes. Then we can go outside. Find a tree, or . . . whatever.”
“Whatever,” he says with a laugh, quiet and low. He grabs the paper cup out of my hands and takes a fortifying sip. I guess he put something else in there besides tea. “Let’s hear it.”
“Okay.” I slip both of my hands up his chest, rest one right against his heart. “Luka, will you marry—”
“Absolutely not.” He cuts me off before I can finish my question, dropping the tea on the end table we always put our keys on. He bends at the waist and tosses me over his shoulder before I can so much as squeak. His boots stomp down the porch steps like a man possessed, making his way toward the northern fields, where our oldest trees grow.
With me thrown over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.
I wheeze, scrambling to hold on to something so I don’t slip down his back and fall flat on my face. I grab two fistfuls of his puffy jacket. The one I bought for him as a joke, but he ended up loving it without an ounce of irony or sarcasm. He says it keeps him cozy. He sifted through my email and found the receipt so he could get Beckett a matching one. Sometimes I sit on my porch and watch them wandering the fields together, two green-and-blue specks.
I clear my throat. As much as I can do so while upside down anyway.
“Just so we’re clear, were you saying no to marrying me, or—”
“Stop. Talking.”
We walk in silence through the clusters of trees, branches catching on the arms of my jacket. He makes a swoosh sound every time he moves, and I try to match my breathing to it. I can’t see anything but his incredible ass, and while the view isn’t bad, I’m starting to get dizzy.
“Luka.”
He finally slows to a stop, and I catch the dim glow of lights over the edge of trees. He tilts me forward and drops me neatly on my feet, hands on my shoulders until he’s sure I won’t tip head over ass into a Douglas fir. He holds me there and gives me his Luka look. The one that makes me feel like I’m floating and falling at exactly the same time.
“This isn’t what I had planned,” he says.
“You didn’t plan on hoisting me into a fireman’s carry for an evening
walk?”
“Shockingly, no.”
I toy with the zipper of his coat. “I bet you had diagrams, didn’t you?”
Those lines by his eyes deepen. “I can neither confirm nor deny the
presence of diagrams.”
“Spreadsheets, at the very least.”
“Oh, certainly.” He glances over his shoulder, then back to me. It’s hard to tell through his amusement, but I can see it. I can always see it, every
shade of him.
Luka is nervous.
And in response, something in my chest settles. Eases.
I reach up and curl my hands around his wrists. I squeeze once.
“What was the plan?”
He lets out another deep, rattling sigh. His breath mists between us in a cloud of white, and his hands slip down my shoulders until they’re holding me just above my elbows. Down farther to my wrists. A nice and slow version of his usual one-two-three.
“That’s the thing. I couldn’t really decide.”
“Your plan?”
“Yeah.” He nods and takes one step backward, closer to that ethereal glow rising just above the trees. “At first, I wanted to go to the hardware store on a quiet afternoon. Make you go inside while I waited on the front step for you to come back out.”
The same way we met. “I probably would have gotten distracted by something. You might have been waiting for me for hours.”
“I’m no stranger to waiting, La La.” A grin curls his lips. “But you’re right. The entire town would have been involved too. The phone tree is pretty quick these days.”
“That’s true.” They’ve had a lot of practice in the busybody department over the last couple of years. I hum and follow him as he takes another step backward. “What else were you thinking?”
“Well, I thought maybe a romantic dinner would be nice. Something at home, just the two of us. Or maybe somewhere fancy. A place that needs reservations.”
“Are there any places like that in Inglewild?”
“There are not. As you can see, we are currently standing in a field of
trees.”
“Ah.”
“And so I thought maybe this might work.” He releases one of my hands to scrub his through his hair, coming to an abrupt, adorable stop right in front of a massive pine. “I don’t know. It’s a miracle I managed to plan at all. I’ve been—” He cuts off with a sigh. “Do you know how long I’ve been carrying this ring around with me?”
My heart ka-thumps all the way up to my throat. Tears unexpectedly press at the back of my eyes. “So, there is a ring.”
He ignores me completely. “I asked my mom for this ring two years ago.
The same day you told me you loved me. I’ve been keeping it with the casserole dishes because I know you don’t even bother with those.
Sometimes I carry it around with me in my pocket when we go out, just in case it feels right. But here’s the thing, Stella.” He blows out a deep breath.
“It’s always felt right.”
“What about now?” My voice warbles at the edges, and Luka tugs me into him until my chin is on his chest and my head is tilted back to meet his steady gaze. Stars like a halo above his head. His gloved hands smooth back my hair. “Does now feel right?”
He moves us forward until we’re finally in the space all that light is coming from. “Now feels extra right.”
A cluster of trees all twisted with red ribbon and vintage bulb lights. The ones I keep in a box in the back closet because they were my mom’s favorite and she liked the way they made everything glow. A table I recognize from Layla’s, set in the middle. A checkered red blanket used as a tablecloth. The one we use for picnics down by the pond when the weather is warm, Luka’s head in my lap and a book open on his chest.
A plate stacked with what I’m guessing is grilled cheese wrapped neatly
in foil against the cold night air.
“When did you do all this?”
He squints at something unknown in the distance. “I shimmied out the office window,” he says faintly. “Made the grilled cheese at Beckett’s place.”
I rub my fingertips against my lips. “Oh.”
“Yep.” He comes up behind me and wraps both of his arms around me, one across my collarbone and the other around my waist. He tugs me back into him until his lips are pressed in my hair, and I can feel every one of his inhales and exhales. “What do you say, La La? Want to marry me and keep ruining my best laid plans for the rest of our lives?”
I feel like one of the snow globes I keep on the very edge of my desk.
Like he’s just shaken me all up, and I’m twisting head over heels, glitter and
snowflakes rushing around me.
The rest of our lives. That sounds pretty damn good.
His nose nuzzles my hair and he drops his voice to a whisper. “I want to wake up next to you every morning. I want to trip over boxes on my way out of the bedroom. I want to dance with you in the kitchen, and I want—I want to keep holding your hand. Every day. I want to be your husband. Do you want to be my wife?”
The word sends a thrill through me. Wife.
But there’s another title that’s still my favorite. “Best friend, too?”
I feel him swallow behind me. His arms squeeze me even tighter. I cling back just as hard. His voice is rough when he says, “Always that.”
“I’ll want grilled cheese every day,” I manage. I spin in his arms until I can wrap myself around him. He drops his forehead down to mine, gloved hand at my cheek. “I’ll probably want Christmas music in July, and I don’t— I’d like to promise I won’t be disorganized, but I think I’ll always be a little bit messy.”
His smile makes my heart beat double time. “That’s how I like you best,” he tells me.
I press up on my toes so I can nudge my nose to his. I don’t know if he’s realized it, but he’s slowly started leading us into a dance. A gentle sway back and forth. I don’t know if he hears a song in his head or if he’s just turning us to the sound of the wind through the trees, but it’s—it’s perfect.
The very best moment. He couldn’t have planned it better.
I breathe him in with the nighttime air. I close my eyes and beg myself to remember this moment. The pounding of his heart against me and the shaky way he exhales. The glow of the Christmas lights and a red checkered blanket with a tear at the corner.
Luka and me right in the middle of it all. Together, like we’re supposed to
be.
“Yes,” I say. “I want to be your wife.”
He rocks us back and forth. His voice is rough and low. “Best friend,
too?”
I hiccup a laugh into his neck.
“Always that.”
