Page 45 of Wren's Winter

A few minutes later, I heard the front door opening and then the starting of the car before it drove away. Adrian walked around the porch, finding me gazing out onto the snow-covered yard.

“They’re the worst. I’m sorry they were rude to you.”

I shook my head. “I don’t care about that. They don’t know me. They’re going to make assumptions. It was what they said about you that bothered me.”

“Me?” He furrowed his brow.

Pushing off from the railing, I turned to face him. “Your parents are supposed to be your biggest supporters. I’m sorry they’re hard on you for doing what you obviously love.”

“I do.” He sighed heavily. “I went into teaching because of my grandparents. They were so proud of me. I can’t give it up, even if the pay is crap.”

Palm to palm, our fingers laced together. “You shouldn’t have to.”

Our lips met, and this time, I put all the emotions I couldn’t quite say into my kiss. His arms wrapped around my waist, pulling me closer. When he pulled away, there was a heaviness in his eyes, as if he wanted to say something serious. His thumb traced over my bottom lip, and I gently kissed the pad of his thumb. “I…”

In the back of my head, the alarm bells were ringing.

You’re leaving in two days. What do you expect this man to do?

Covering his hand with my own, I stared up at him, willing him to ask me to stay longer, to be more.

Blinking several times, his eyes cleared. “We should get going. We’re wasting good daylight.”

Adrian

Truly, I couldn’t help but wonder how I ever sprang from my parents. Once the embarrassment of them bursting into my place and almost catching Wren and I was over, all I felt was annoyed. It was the same conversations we always had: lost potential, wayward priorities, and a dash of condescension.

But the way they spoke to Wren was too much. Ordinarily, I would have let them ramble on, saying whatever it took to get them out, but for them to talk to Wren as if she was some random woman I brought home and not… Well, I hadn’t quite figured out what Wren was to me. All I knew was she was more. And to have my parents with their crisp suits and disdainful glances was a hurdle I hadn’t foreseen.

As we ascended the old logging road up the mountain, I closed up the box in my head where my parent’s words echoed around.

“You’re not serious about anything, almost thirty, and can’t even settle down. Do you even know how to be in a relationship?”

I didn’t. All my life, I’d seen examples of what being part of a couple would be, but had I ever put these theories into practice? No. And my parents, of course, cut to the quick to name all my flaws. I didn’t need them to tell me I was stunted in this area. To conflate my lack of relationships with what they considered my meandering existence.

Locked up tight in the box in my brain, I made the left turn at the fork that would lead us to the top. The truck bumped along the gravel switchback road up the mountain. At one point, I glanced over to see Wren gripping what my friends and I always called the “oh-shit handle” and grimacing at each bump.

“I’ve been driving this road since I was sixteen. It’s safe, I promise.”

Her eyes darted to me and then quickly back to the road. “Are you sure?”

I reached over, setting a hand on my leg and squeezing it. “I am.”

“Both hands on the wheel!” she barked.

Dutifully, I complied, chuckling at her response.

We passed the sledding hill, where children in puffy snowsuits were dragging brightly colored plastic sleds up the small hill. Their parents crowded around a small fire with mugs in their hands.

She leaned forward, watching as the kids squeezed into the sleds, their limbs piled on top of each other before they slid down the hill with shrieks and laughter.

Sticking my hand out the window, I waved to the parents, who waved back.

“Do you know them?” Wren asked.

Shaking my head, I pushed the button on the dashboard to switch my truck to four-high. “No.”

“But you waved at them.”

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