Page 45 of Decking the Halls
No. I’m going to stay positive. It will be fine.
When the countdown nears, Wren leads me toward the edge of the rooftop. The wind whips at my hair, carrying the faint echo of distant surf.
“Beautiful,” I breathe, staring out at the water.
“You are,” she says simply, turning me toward her. “You know what my New Year’s resolution is?”
I shake my head.
“To make this official.” Her hand slips into her jacket pocket, and my heart stutters.
“Wren—”
“Not what you’re thinking,” she says quickly, though there’s a mischievous glint in her eyes. She pulls out a folded sheet of paper—a sketch, smudged with pencil lines.
It’s a small coastal lot, just north of the bay. A building drawn in her confident hand. It’s half garage and half… home?
“What’s this?”
“My next project,” she says. “A second shop. Maybe a place to live upstairs. Enough room for two.”
My throat tightens. “Two?”
She nods. “I’ve been thinking about the future. About what comes next. Expanding the business. Staying here. Building something. With you.”
“Wren…”
“By next New Year,” she says, “I want to call you my wife.”
The world tilts, and for a heartbeat, all I can hear is the faint crack of illegal fireworks down by the docks. Someone’s cheering. Champagne corks pop. But it all blurs into background noise.
“Too much?” she asks.
I shake my head, tears stinging my eyes. “No. Just… enough.”
She exhales, relief breaking into a grin. “Good. I was worried I’d have to bribe you with cake or something.”
“Cake helps,” I admit, laughing through the lump in my throat. “But this is better.”
We turn back toward the water just as the first explosion of color lights up the sky. Red and gold streaks reflect off the dark surface of the bay, shimmering like molten glass.
Wren wraps her arms around me from behind, her chin resting on my shoulder. “Look,” she whispers. “It’s our own illegal fireworks show.”
Another burst lights up the clouds, this time bright blue. “I love you.” My words are so certain that they don’t even feel like a confession. “I can’t wait to still be in love with you a year from now.”
Her grip tightens around me. “Good,” she says, lips brushing my temple. “Because I’ve loved you since you brought hot cocoa to my house with your parents and asked about the cool mountain bike I got.”
I remember. “You wouldn’t shut up about it.”
“Around you? Never.”
We stand there as the sky keeps lighting up over the water, the cold biting at our fingers. But I can’t imagine being anywhere else right now, thinking about the past, indulging in the present, and hoping for a beautiful future.
When the last spark fades and the crowd cheers, Wren turns me to face her. “So,” she says, brushing my hair from my face. “You’ll support my idea?”
“The second garage?”
“Buying a plot. Together.”
