Page 12 of Snowed in With the Yeti
“I’m glad it was you. Who found me, I mean. I’m glad it was you.”
My heart did something complicated in my chest. “Me too.”
She smiled and disappeared down the hallway. I heard her door close, heard the bed creak as she settled back in.
I stood in the living room for a long time, holding a plate of cookies, feeling like my entire world had shifted on its axis.
Maya was here. In my cabin. Wearing my clothes. Smiling at me as if I were someone worth smiling at. Saying she was glad I’d found her.
And I had no idea what I was supposed to do with any of that.
I cleaned up the kitchen again, banked the fire, and checked the windows and doors. Normal cabin routine, except nothing felt normal anymore.
Back at my gaming setup, I stared at the monitors without seeing them. Tank’s words echoed in my head: ‘This is your chance.’
But a chance for what? To ruin the best friendship I’d ever had by admitting I wanted more? To scare her away by being too much, too intense, too other?
Or a chance to see if maybe, possibly, she might feel the same way?
I thought about the way she’d looked at me when I’d carried her inside. The way she’d made jokes about my username instead of being disgusted or afraid. The way she’d said my name, Geoff, like she was trying it out, seeing how it felt.
The way she’d touched my arm in the bathroom, her small hand on my fur, no hesitation at all.
Outside, the storm raged on, trapping us here together. Just us and the mountain and time enough to figure out what this was, what it could be.
I was terrified.
I was hopeful.
I was, as Tank had so eloquently put it, completely screwed.
But as I finally headed to my room, I couldn’t help smiling because Maya was here. She was safe and warm and sleeping down the hall. Tomorrow we’d wake up and have breakfast and probably game together, just like we’d done a hundred times before, except this time I’d get to see her face when she laughed.
Tomorrow could bring whatever it wanted.
Chapter 4
Geoff
Iwoketosilence.Not the normal silence of the cabin as I’d expected. I was used to the creaks of settling wood, the whisper of wind through the eaves, the occasional thump of snow sliding off the roof. This was the specific, heavy silence that came after a storm had finally blown itself out.
I lay in my custom-built king-sized bed that still barely contained me and stared at the ceiling. Dawn light was filtering through the curtains, pale and gray. The worst of the blizzard was over. We might get more snow, but nowhere near as much as yesterday.
The storm’s end meant Maya would leave soon. Maybe not today, the roads would need clearing first. But soon.
My chest tightened at the thought.
I’d lain awake for hours last night, replaying every moment since I found her in the snow. I’d never forget the shock in her eyes when she recognized my voice or the way she relaxed into my arms when I carried her. Her laughter at my terrible username was etched into my memory. The sound of her breathing from the guest room imprinted itself on my heart.
The problem was, now that I had her here, in my space, in my life, I had no idea how I was supposed to go back to having her go back to being a voice through a headset.
“Get it together, MacKay,” I muttered to myself. “She’s your friend. You’re not going to make this weird.”
Except it already was weird - at least to me. It had been weird from the moment she’d whispered my username in the snow. She might not harbor feelings for me, but I didn’t know how to pretend I didn’t harbor any for her. I wasn’t sure I could log back into our games and act as if everything was the same.
Because it wasn’t. Not for me. I’d seen her face, heard her laugh without the distortion of a microphone, watched her curl up on my couch like she belonged there. And the feelings I’d been trying to keep in a neat little box labeled “harmless online crush” had exploded into something much bigger and far more dangerous.
I heard Maya’s movements down the hall. She’d gotten up and ran water in the guest bathroom. I loved the soft padding of her footsteps in my home.
