Page 66 of Spicy or Sweet
She doesn’t seem to hear me approach, lost in her own world.
“Hey,” I murmur, and she looks up, a little startled. “You want some company?”
I half expect her to decline, to push me away—not because she doesn’t want me around, but because she doesn’t want to put any of her worries on me. But a soft smile appears on her face, and I take the first deep breath I’ve taken since we got out of the building.
“From you? Forever,” she says, her voice scratchy.
She holds her arm out so I can sit beside her, then pulls the blanket around us both. I loop my arms around her waist, and she rests her chin on the top of my head.
“I’m so sorry,” I say, tightening my hold on her as we watch the firefighters doing whatever it is they do when they put a fire out. Quinn had what looked like a checklist when I last saw him.
“Thank you,” she replies. “But it’s okay.”
She sounds… oddly fine. I pull back enough to search her face, and there’s a lot less stress than I expected.
Laughing at my scrutiny, Noelle shrugs. “I know it sounds stupid, but it is okay. I promise.”
“But you worked so hard to make this place what it was.”
“I did, and my hard work paid off, even if just for a little while. My whole life, I’ve always known exactly what I wantedmy future to look like, and I made that happen after busting my ass for years. And then it only took an hour for the universe to more or less wipe the slate clean. For the first time ever, I have absolutely no idea what I’m going to do.” Her smile grows wider and brighter with every word, light shining in her eyes, despite the dark night.
“And that’s a good thing?” I ask, because it shouldn’t sound like one, but it does, how she says it.
“It’s a great thing, sweetheart,” she confirms. “You know, if this had happened a couple of months ago, I probably would’ve been catatonic. But I guess somewhere between our first kiss in the kitchen and watching you beat my whole family at Monopoly last night, I figured out there was more to life than a damn bakery.” She taps my nose with her finger, then gently cups my chin. “Thank you. Both for getting me out of the fire and reminding me of how good it feels to actually live my life, instead of just existing.”
“That’s funny,” I reply, blinking as tears threaten my eyes. “That sounds a lot like what you’ve done for me, too.”
“Well, that must mean we’re meant to be.”
“Obviously.”
Our happy smiles should feel out of place among the wreckage, but outside of Noelle and me, I’m not paying attention to anything else.
Noelle hops down from the truck and folds the blanket into a rough pile. “I know we have a lot to talk about tomorrow—whatever that intense conversation you and Nico were having was about, what caused the fire, what comes next… but right now, I just want to cuddle in your bed with Croissant, and shut it all out for a few hours.”
I take her offered hand—the jump down is further for me—and plant a kiss on her cheek when my feet are flat on the ground again.
“Then let’s go home, baby.”
33
NOELLE
Ismell winter in the air. It’s only mid-October, but Wintermore favors its namesake, and fall always feels like it’s gone in a flash. Barely three weeks have passed since Shay and I came to the reservoir for our picnic, but the day couldn’t be more different: the sky is a cloudy, icy white, and it’s cold enough that I pulled a thick sweater from the bin of winter clothes I keep in my parents’ garage.
Though there are no structural issues with my apartment, Quinn recommended I give it a few days to air out before moving back in. He got a bunch of stuff out from a list I gave him and politely didn’t mention my strap-on wall art or my butt plug Christmas tree.
Wintermore isn’t the only thing that’s changed as the last of the leaves has fallen from the trees. I feel like a completely different person. Last year, opening the bakery changed me in ways I could never have predicted—I’ve been impatient, exhausted, uncompromising, and all around unhappy.
“They’ve lost their tinsel,” Mamaw Whitten used to say, instead of “lost their spark.”
And that’s exactly what I did. I lost my damn tinsel.
It’s been happening for longer than I realized, I think. The longer I stayed at the toy store, doing a job I never signed up for, a job I never wanted. I probably would have stuck it out longer if I hadn’t watched Rora make all of her dreams come true as a photographer last year; I was happy for her, but I was so jealous. It was the jealousy that pushed me to say enough was enough. I refused to resent Rora for living her dream, and I refused to let Felix hold me back from mine. The bakery became available, and I told him plainly he could either step up or give up the toy store, but either way, I was leaving.
Of course, Rora was pretty miserable living her dream, jetting all over the world, when all she wanted was to be with my uncle Henry. And I was miserable by day three of owning the bakery.
Felix is thriving. Naturally.
