Dad faced me. “Deacon, are you okay with that? It’s okay if you’re not. Pretty sure your mom will be chatting a while.”
I appreciated my dad asking because this was not planned, but...
I wanted to.
“I’m okay with it,” I said. Then I turned to Winter, his eyes on mine. “You can drive me home?”
“Of course,” he said.
“Okay, have fun,” Dad said, then implanted himself into Mom’s conversation, leaving me and Winter.
He nodded up the hill. “Should we go . . . ?”
The flurries of snow were heavier already. “Yes.”
Winter waved goodbye to his group of friends, and they all waved back. Pretty sure they’d been watching us, if their smiles were anything to go by. I pretended that was fine and fell into step beside Winter as we headed up toward Short Street.
“A good opening day means more inventory,” I said. “Though I’m sure you’re aware.”
He grinned at me. “I am, yes. I’ve already placed another order. It’s incredible. This town is incredible, and the people, of course.” He stopped walking as we crossed the street and waved his gloved hand at Main Street. “Have you ever seen anything so pretty?”
I looked around, wary and concerned, uneasy. I wanted to grab his arm and urge him to safety but stopped myself. “It’s not sensible to stop on the street. This isn’t a pedestrian crossing and there are too many parked vehicles, which further impede visibility. The dark and snow make it even more dangerous.”
“Oh, yes,” he said, hurrying to the sidewalk. “You are quite correct. I shouldn’t stop in the middle of the street.” I thought he might have been annoyed by my little lecture on street safety, but he just smiled at me as if I’d done him a favor. Which I had, but probably not as patiently as I could have. “I was just so distracted by how picturesqueMain Street is,” he said, looking again up the street. “I was told the town goes all out on the Christmas decorations, and I thought I was prepared, but it stopped me in my tracks when I walked down here tonight. The little Christmas trees, the decorations. It’s just... it’s just so lovely.”
“It is,” I agreed. “Guess I’m just used to it.”
One of the kittens inside his coat moved and meowed, and he rubbed them gently. “Okay, okay. We’re going.” He began to walk again, slowly though, as though he wanted to prolong his time with me.
That’s what I liked to believe anyway.
He even seemed content to walk in companionable silence, or perhaps he thought that was what I wanted?
It made me nervous; trying to fill the void with small talk was not one of my strengths. “Have Bright and Merry taken to their new diet?” I asked.
“Oh yes,” he replied, his smile wide. “Very much. And they’re playing more now. They’re just so cute. Bright is still bigger and more adventurous, but Merry’s not far behind him. I think he’s just quieter by nature.”
“You’re still keeping their names, I take it.”
He laughed. “Yes! They suit them now; like they’re growing into them. It was a great suggestion.”
I don’t know why it made me so happy that he liked the names. “I’ve never named someone else’s pets before,” I said. “It’s a first for me.”
He grinned at me. “Well, I’m honored.”
We turned into the short road where his store was. It was all dark, save lights strung up in a zigzag between the roofs of the buildings.
“Ahh,” Winter said, putting his arms out and doing a spin. Then he put his hands to his face and looked at me. “It’s even prettier now. Look at it!”
Itwaspretty. The soft glow of the lights overhead, the falling snowflakes. Him.
Mostly him.
Definitely him.
His cuteness, his excitement, made me smile and feel a little embarrassed, but mostly I just felt... excited and happy. Maybe a touch nauseous, but that was just the giddiness. It was a good-tummy feeling, not a bad one.
“It is quite remarkable,” I said. If he took my comment to mean the lights were remarkable or thathewas remarkable, I wasn’t going to clarify.
