Page 56 of Back to December
“Home,” he says simply. “Belief usually follows.”
And just like that, he’s gone—off to find something else about this town with his notebook and hisdry humor, leaving me with the one thing I didn’t want: too much to think about.
I watch Henry weave through the café crowd, stopping twice. Once to jot something down in his notebook, once to greet the barista who already knows his order. He belongs here in that quietly unassuming way Henry always does. The world just seems to make space for him.
His words linger long after he’s gone.
Home.
It shouldn’t sting. But it does, because I don’t even know what that means anymore.
Enchanted Hollow feels like a fairytale I keep rewriting. My influencer persona feels like a performance I can’t take off. And Holden—Holden feels like the one constant I can’t look at without everything else unraveling.
I press my fingers around my mug, drawing warmth that doesn’t quite reach my chest. Through the window, the snow keeps falling in soft, lazy spirals, like the world is reminding me that some things can land gently even after a long drop.
There’s a bridge at the edge of Sweetheart Springs that locals say was built by fate itself. If two people kiss there, their souls are meant to find each other again, no matter how lost they get.
I kissed Holden on that bridge once. Not for a crowd or a photo or a story. Just because I believed it.
And maybe that’s what scares me now. Because I still do.
I just don’t know how to turn belief into a happily ever after.
Outside, a couple walks hand in hand through the falling snow, their laughter echoing faintly through thewindowpane. It looks exactly like something out of one of my videos, a perfect moment framed in lights and magic.
Only this time, I’m not the storyteller.
I’m the one standing behind the glass, trying to remember what it felt like to be in the picture.
Before I can talk myself out of it, I grab my coat, toss a tip on the table, and step back into the cold. My feet move before my brain can catch up—past the cute little downtown area, past the bridge that still feels like a promise I can’t quite keep.
I need to talk to someone who’s been through the messy part of love and made it out the other side. Icouldtalk to Luke and Ella, but they haven’t quite weathered it all yet. But there’s one couple that has.
By the time I make it to Dreamy Pines Farm, dusk is settling over the mountains. The air smells like cinnamon and pine, and the lights strung between the trees glow like tiny stars. Warm light flickers in the bakery windows, and for the first time all day, I let myself breathe.
Miles meets me at the door, a dish towel shoved in his pocket, eyebrows raised.
“Em, we’ve got a stray,” he calls, ushering me inside.
“There’s a pan of gingerbread coming out of the oven right now,” she answers back. “Tell Laila I’ll be out with them soon.”
He just grins at me as I blink.
“How?”
“Henry texted.” He shrugs. “Said you looked like you needed proof that hope exists.”
I don’t say anything as I cross the bakery and tuck myself into the corner of the furthest booth. Without hesitation, I grab a blanket that’s in the seat and pull it tight around myself, and glance out the window. Rows of trees. Golden light. And for a moment, the noise in my head finally quiets.
I see what Henry means now about feeling like home without expectations.
“That’s always Emma’s favorite place to sit when she needs to think,” he says, sliding into the booth across from me once we’re settled inside. “She says it reminds her of her mom. This was her favorite place, too. We’ve had a lot of important discussions in this booth.”
My eyes find his, and I’m a little surprised at the empathy waiting there.
“Can you add one more to the list?” I whisper.
He nods. “I don’t know what you’re looking for, Laila, but you sound like you could use someone who’s sort of done the whole martyr thing for love.”
