His declaration still echoed in her head, louder than the tick of the baseboard heater and the snuffle sounds the puppy made when she put him into his cozy little crate.
On the bed, Jack’s suitcase gaped open, folded shirts packed neatly, next to a row of sweaters she’d seen him wear these past few weeks.
“Déjà vu,” she said softly, sinking to the edge of the bed. “Christmas, an open suitcase, and you flying out into the cold.”
He winced, then sat beside her, the mattress dipping in a familiar way for two people who’d shared a bed for twenty years.
“It isn’t the same, Cin.”
“No,” she said. “We’re not the same.”
They weren’t. Ten years had left tracks—a lighter silver at Jack’s temples that looked unfairly handsome, tiny lines fanning from her eyes that no cream could erase, and a steadiness in her that had been forged by holding life together with lists and grit and a smile.
They had learned how to live with the ache without letting divorce define them, she supposed. But being strong was not the same as being whole.
Jack sighed heavily. “I should have said those words ten years ago,” he murmured. “I should have said a lot of things.”
“Me, too,” she said. “We were both stubborn and stupid and…”
“Mostly stupid,” he finished. “At least I was. You wanted a husband who put family before work, and you were one hundred percent right.”
She just shook her head, really not wanting to use their last few minutes together to rehash a decision they’d made a decade ago.
Jack cleared his throat and turned to her. “I asked once and you…”
“Were rendered speechless,” she said. “If you took that as rejection, I’m sorry.”
His dark eyes flickered. “It wasn’t?”
She shook her head.
“Then I’ll ask again, Cin. Could there be a future?” He closed his eyes, clearly not happy with what he’d just said. “It sounds clumsy and cliché, which it is, but I don’t know how else to approach this. It’s not a movie—we can’t kiss and let the camera pan to the moon and a second happy ever after. We have lives to undo—but I would, Cindy.” He leaned closer. “I would like to try again. At least to talk about it and explore options.”
She had promised herself a thousand times that if this moment came, she’d be resolute. Hard line. All or nothing. No more half-promises and hopeful maybe’s that could blow away with the first strong wind.
But here he was, the father of her daughter, the man she had once loved with easy certainty, offering the only thing an honest person could—not a guarantee, but a beginning.
“Yes,” she whispered. “I think…we could…explore options.”
Whateverthatmeant.
He went very still, and then his hand found hers on the bedspread. His fingers were cold from the walk, his palmcallused from weeks of handling those reins. He’d given up nearly a month of his life to fix the problem in hers.
And she’d fallen right back in love with him.
“Why don’t we consider something after the holidays?” he said. “Maybe in spring. It’s quieter here. I’ll come back and we could…we could give it—giveus—the space we deserve. We’d take it slow, but it would be real.”
Maybe in spring. Maybe. The word echoed, gentle and maddening. Her heart had wanted now. Not a boy’s daydream, but a man’s decision.
But he was leaving. Because he’d promised his mother, because he was a good son, because life wasn’t a fairytale, and planes didn’t wait for better timing.
“Spring,” she said, trying to sound brave. “We can start there.”
His thumb moved over the ridge of her knuckles. He didn’t lean in. She didn’t either. The not-kiss hovered between them like a snowflake that never landed, beautiful and cold.
His phone chimed—a little digital bell that, absurdly, made the puppy lift his head. Jack glanced down. “My ride’s here.”
“Of course it is.” She stood first, because if she didn’t, she might ask him not to go, and that wouldn’t be fair to either of them.
