Page 60 of A South Hill Christmas Keepsake
Aunt Winnie brought over four plastic champagne flutes filled with sparkling. “Don’t get excited. It’s just ginger ale, but I feel like we should toast.” She distributed them and lifted hers. “To clarity.”
“To second chances,” Birdie added.
Nate glanced at Hannah Leigh. “To staying,” he breathed the words more than spoke them.
She met his eyes over the rim of her flute. “To choosing.”
“That’s beautiful.” Birdie sniffed. “Well, that’s my pull-quote.” She snapped her fingers. “Oh, one more toast to keeping the city riffraff out of South Hill.”
“Amen!” they drank to that.
A knock at the front door made all three of them turn. It was Edna Sue, cheeks pink from the air, velvet hat perfectly centered. “I just got this,” she said. “I brought the engraving proof for the plaque that will go below the historical marker.” She held out a cardstock mockup. The simple script read:
Keep faith through winter,South Hill.
For All Who Wait.
Aunt Winnie pressed a hand to her heart. “Oh, that’ll do.”
“It will,” Hannah Leigh said, throat tight.
Birdie floated closer like a moth to a porch light. “May I?”
Edna Sue nodded, then looked at Nate and Hannah Leigh together. “I’m glad you two are staying busy.”
“We’re good at busy,” Nate said. “We’re getting better at the rest.”
Edna Sue smiled. “The rest is where the good happens.” She tucked her hands into her muff. “I’ll send the approval to the engraver. We’ll have it ready by New Year’s.”
“Thank you,” Hannah Leigh said. “For everything.”
Edna Sue left, and things were finally as they should be.
Aunt Winnie fanned a stack of recipe cards. “All right, lovebirds. I need two things before I release you to your lives. For tonight, anyway.” She snickered and turned to Nate first. “I need you, sir, to take down the Christmas Tidings Breakfast banner and rehang the welcome banner at Dogwood Hall. Hannah Leigh, I need a final headcount for the library fundraiser cocoa bar event.”
“On it,” they said, like a team who’d practiced the handoff.
They slid into their coats. At the door, Hannah Leigh paused, touching the frame, the worn paint smooth beneath her fingertips. “Thank you,” she said to Aunt Winnie, meaning more than errands.
Her aunt’s gaze softened. “You’re welcome. Now go do the next right thing and bring me back the story.”
“Birdie already called dibs,” Nate said.
“Birdie can share,” Winnie replied.
“I don’t know about that,” Nate said. “But if she does, I’d say there’s definitely Christmas magic involved.
Out on the sidewalk, the lights winked on one by one until the outline of every building on Main Street was lit. The square breathed, easy and bright. Nate took Hannah Leigh’s hand as naturally as if he’d never stopped.
“Just so we’re clear,” he said, half teasing, wholly earnest. “If some other fella shows up with macarons—”
“I’ll thank him kindly and point him to Bringleton’s,” she interrupted. “We have our own sweet things here.”
“Exactly.” He kissed her lightly on the cheek. “You’re my sweet thing.”
They walked toward Dogwood Hall, shoulders touching. Behind them, the little sign by the tree caught the light again like a promise.
Some offers dazzle, but the right one anchors. And Hannah Leigh felt anchored in all the best ways.
