Page 47 of The Holiday Grump
I’d come back another night, I decided. After I builtanother snowman and did some other good deeds. I had ideas.
“Come back next week!” Ida urged. “You’re making great progress. I think you’re ready to try your hand at the Santa hat. Take some red yarn.” She shoved a tightly coiled ball into my bag.
“Please do!” Erica echoed. “Hideaway holds the world record for the largest crowd caroling in Santa hats, and we’re determined to keep it. We need every hat we can get!”
“I’ll try my best,” I promised.
A soft buzz went through my body. Tonight had felt good, like finding something long lost. Maybe it was a dry-land thing, this sense of connection. Like things were more permanent and meaningful, not fleeting.
But you’re not here to stay. You’re the fleeting one.
“Thank you so much for inviting me,” I said. “You’ve made me feel… at home.” I wasn’t sure why I was suddenly fighting tears, but within seconds, I was at the receiving end of a barrage of hugs and kind words.
“I love your colorful style!” Astrid bellowed, tossing her rainbow scarf over her shoulder.
Erica’s hug was so warm and tight that it transported me back home. “Welcome to Hideaway Harbor! I hope you find your forever home.”
Kailee slipped the Grinch ornament into my mitten. “Sorry I took it.”
“It’s okay.” I spread my arms, and she jumped in for a hug, too.
Eileen held my face between her fluffy pink mittens for a weighted moment. “She’s as cute as a button! Fredrikwould be crazy not to take a chance. The same goes for Dr. Handsome, but my money is on the Grump.”
Felicity pulled me into an awkward side hug. “You want a man who knows how to finish… a sandwich.”
With my heart permanently lodged in my throat and their laughter still ringing in my ears, I walked across the square, all the way to the bookstore.
It was the strangest feeling, falling in love with a town. I’d seen so many gorgeous, breathtaking ports. So many that they blurred in my mind into a generic holiday montage. I’d always thought a place somewhere might hit me with its beauty, and I’d feel that tug to settle in and make a home.
But it wasn’t the snow-covered streets and Christmas lights that tugged at my heart. It was the people. It was the sense of meaning they derived from life around here, like it meant more than anything else that went on anywhere else.
How did they do it? How did they create this sense of meaning?
Maybe I hadn’t been ready for it until now. It was safer to keep moving, letting people pass by and new people take their place, like ever-changing weather.
I’d never meant to settle so close to Bangor. It was too close to the past I was desperate to avoid. I would have been better off falling in love with Reykjavík or Key West. Anywhere else, really.
This was a dangerous path.
I unlocked the bookstore and stepped in, inhaling the scent of dust and ancient knowledge mingling with cinnamon. Where had that come from?
I’d get over this crush. But first, I’d hang some Christmas lights and crochet a few Santa hats.
CHAPTER 16
Fredrik
Isaw the lights in broad daylight before I even parked my car. I was used to my store looking the way it did, a slice of sanity nestled within the obnoxious display of holiday cheer. A safe space for anyone who wanted to skip the season, like me.
And now it was ruined.
I’d noticed Noelle and Kailee whispering in the afternoons. They’d become very buddy-buddy since that crochet meeting. My niece had begun hanging out at Noelle’s store instead of mine. I wasn’t sure how Noelle had energy for her. I was watching a steady stream of customers pass my door on the way to hers all day long.
My store had seen a grand total of five customers since Monday, all looking for Christmas presents for people they didn’t seem to know at all, and mostly buying nothingbecause I didn’t have that one bestseller they thought was a safe bet.
On Friday morning, a day ahead of her usual schedule, Felicity had arrived for her weekly cleaning. She’d ordered another book for their book club titledHis Runaway Brideand asked me three times if I was being nice to Noelle.
She was concerned about the stranger I was allowing to live in my store, rent-free. How much nicer could I be?
