Page 79 of Back to December
twenty-eight
LAILA
We stay up longer talkingthan I wanted to.
Holden isn’t a stranger to me. Every time I came back for thatoneweekend, I let my guard down. For that one little snippet in time, he saw all of me, unbridled and free.
And that’s terrifying.
“I know you don’t want to talk,” he says quietly, “but I think I need to.”
His voice is soft, like the night we fell asleep, murmuring secrets and talking dreams in our honeymoon suite. It’s a memory I can’t shake, no matter how hard I try.
Across the room, the old Gumdrop plush he won for me at Peppermint Pines sits slouched in a chair, a little sugar-stained from the fairground and still loyal as ever. I brought him without thinking, the way you pack a piece of home you can’t bear to leave behind.
“I knew you were it for me from the first time I saw you at Autumn Enchantment.”
Okay, we’re doing this then.
I try to swallow around the lump in my throat, and before I can respond, he continues.
“You were off in a spot by yourself in the pumpkin patch—no Ella, no Bridget. Just quietly staring at something, the wind whipping your hair around. I knew in my heart that there was more to you than everyone else saw. And I was right, Laila. I just wish you believed in that more-than-enough version of you, too.”
Maybe it’s the proximity to him—or because I know I owe him more than he’s gotten—but I choose honesty instead of retreat.
“Ella kept talking about how magical the pumpkins were. It was always her place to escape, and I wanted a little of that magic for myself. She’d come back with dirt on her clothes from lying in the vines, and Mom would yell at her.” Shame heats my cheeks. “It’s not like she bought them for her. After her dad died, Ella paid for everything herself from Once Upon a Brew.”
The bed dips as Holden turns toward me. He’s respecting the pillow-wall boundary, but I honestly wish he’d ignore it and pull me close. He won’t, though. Not unless I ask him to.
“Ella wasn’t the same after we moved to Colorado,” I whisper. “She got quieter. Like a piece of her stayed here—the bright part. The one that loves loudly, but softly, if that makes sense.”
Part of me stayed here, too, but I don’t think I’ve ever fully realized it until now. Not until I went back to Colorado and packed up my life there.
He studies me for a long beat. “You’re like that, too.”
“No.” I shake my head. “Ella’s loveis selfless.”
“So is yours.” He exhales. “I know why you walked away in the fall.”
This ‘one bed’ situation just got a million times more uncomfortable. We haven’t talked about that night since it happened, and I’ve successfully evaded it all day.
“I told you?—”
“Sure. You told me a lot of things. But none of them was the whole truth. You didn’t want to risk getting tangled up with your mother. You thought if you left, if you hit pause, it would keep me safe.”
His voice softens. “But I wasn’t asking you to stay because I needed saving, Laila. I’d still be here—even if we had to follow every breadcrumb back home. “
The word breadcrumb sparks like static—the same shimmer I’ve felt since that first letter reached me. He remembers every piece of it—maybe even more clearly than I do.
But then again, he always remembers.
“You said you’d wait,” I whisper.
“I meant it.” His thumb traces my cheek, the touch gentle and sure. “You needed time to find your way home. I get it. I just never stopped leaving the door open.”
He reaches toward me gently, slower than usual. He needs permission now, which hurts, even though I’m the reason for it. I inch closer—just two tiny movements—and tilt my face toward him.
Thankfully, he understands and rests his hand on my cheek.
