Page 1 of Stay this Christmas
ONE
harper
They sayyou can’t go home again. Wish someone would have told my ex-boyfriend.
Sam Donnelly had been off exploring the world for eleven years—long enough for me to assume he had no intention of ever coming back to sleepy little Magnolia Ridge to stay. Not that I wanted him to come back, or thought about what that might be like.
I didn’t. He could have stayed in New Zealand or Colorado, or wherever his latest impulse had taken him, for all I cared.
But he’d turned up here about a month ago, and not long after, started volunteering at the retirement community where I work. In a room separated from me and my physical therapy patients by a glass wall. Where he encouraged groups of seniors into yoga positions he also demonstrated in painstaking detail.
Twice a week, I played theIgnore Sam Donnellygame.
I lost every time.
“Let’s do one last set of the calf stretches.” I stood beside my current patient, Diana, as she lowered into a partial lunge, her fingers lightly touching the back of a chair to steady herself. Most of my patients at Fiesta Village knew the move designed to help with mobility, and I liked to finish up routines with it when I could. I tailored every session to each person’s particular needs, but some conditions became pretty universal with age. “We’re almost done.”
She counted under her breath before straightening again and switching legs. “You spoiled my view.”
“What view?”
Looking at me over her shoulder, she revealed a cheeky grin. “Don’t think it slipped my notice we’re facing the wall with these awful inspirational posters on it, and not the exercise room. I like watching hot yoga every Friday afternoon.”
The inspirational posters were awful? I’d picked them out myself. What other aspects of the PT room weren’t quite doing it for my patients?
Nope, let that go.
“I think hot yoga is when they turn the temperature up so you sweat.”
Her smile grew wider. “Oh, Sam gets it pretty hot in there.”
I swallowed down a sarcastic retort. Nobody here knew Sam and I had dated an age ago, and I wasn’t about to release that particular cat from its bag. I’d learned early on that in a group of people living in a relatively contained community, gossip swept through like a river in a flash flood. Every resident would know our history in under five minutes flat, and I would drown in embarrassment.
“The class is a distraction.” For my patientsandme. Hard to focus on PT with Sam doing sun salutations twenty feet away.
Not that I was looking, but he drew the eye. Him and his skintight shirts.
“Mmhmm.” Diana sounded like she had the same image in her head. “Keeps it interesting, though.”
Shutting my own imagination up, I tried to steer the conversation a new direction.
“I’d better change your sessions if you’d rather watch other people do yoga,” I said around a laugh. “We can always crank it up a notch if I’m going too easy on you.”
She turned her head again, her mouth pulled in an exaggerated scowl. “Don’t you dare. You’re wearing me out as it is.”
“You’re doing great. I’m impressed at how much better you’re walking lately.”
“Well. I do have an excellent physical therapist.”
That compliment swirled around in my chest, puffing me up. I’d pursued PT to help people improve the quality of their lives and loved seeing just how much I truly could. My patients’ progress made all the hours I spent here—and the hours doing paperwork at home—worth it.
“I might even be able to keep up with my grandsons when I visit them in Hawai’i for Christmas.”
“I’m sure you’ll have a great trip.”
“I expect so.” She counted out another slow stretch. “Do you have holiday plans?”
“My parents are hosting a big family get-together. My sisters and all my cousins will be there.” Most prized among them, baby Maisie, my cousin Wade’s littlest. I couldn’t wait to get that cute bundle of pudge in my arms again.
