Jace winces and clears his throat.
“Don’t you want my first show to look amazinggggg?” The emphasis on the end of the word makes Edgar and me laugh. Jace remains a statue.
“Ivy!” Grey’s voice carries over the crowd before she arrives to stand beside me, her cheeks flushed and her cat-eye glasses reflecting the lights around us. Her mittened hands are full of to-go cups of what I know is hot chocolate. Emmy’s eyes sparkle at the sight. There’s no way I can drink this in front of her without sharing. Something pulls toward her, and I know that I won’t enjoy it unless she’s enjoying some too.
“Oh, hello,” Grey says sweetly, her eyes tracking the semi-circle of people we’ve constructed, widening slightly when they move up to Jace. She clears her throat lightly and reveals a genuine smile. This is why she’s my best friend in the whole world. She knows me enough to understand that I’m slowly dying inside and need a sense of normalcy tonight. Hot chocolate and Grey being her friendly self is normal—comforting, even.
Edgar and Jace give her a nod, the similarity of their gestures uncanny. “Ja—is it okay?” I motion to Jace, unable to say hisname out loud again quite yet. I motion to my hot chocolate and down to Emmy. Grey has also bent lower to introduce herself, their conversation moving quickly between books and dance. Our favorite things. Jace glances at the cup and then at his daughter. His gaze meets mine again, its intensity pulsing through my fingers.
“Thank you,” he says preemptively.
I will myself to keep moving. “Emmy?” I ask. “Would you like some hot chocolate?”
Her face turns toward me so quickly that her little ponytail whips across her face. She laughs. “Yes!” Her fist lifts into the air, her smile turned to the stars.
There’s such a sense of joy mixed with abandon in her demeanor that it hits me in my core. When was the last time I did anything with that much excitement? I kneel on the ground, my knees registering the chill on the cobblestone street beneath us with zero regrets. Excitedly, Emmy stamps her feet, reaching for the cup. Her hands wrap around the middle while I support the bottom with my own as she sips. She hums when she tastes it, the sound bringing a smile to my face. This is who the hot chocolate was meant for all along, and I’m okay with tradition changing if it means more moments of absorbing her joy like this. She leans back, a line of chocolate on her top lip, then lunges at me and throws her arms around my neck.
“Thanks, Miss Ivy,” she says in the way only children can do when they’re trying to be quiet, but the whole town can still hear them.
“You’re welcome, sweets,” I say with a sad smile. I realize that I’ve been waiting for a little one to hold like this for a long time. And while Emmy isn’t my own, a feeling of protectiveness stirs within me. I want to say it’s because I care for my students, but catching Jace’s tilted brow as he stares at us tells me there’s more to all of this than being a good dance teacher. And inanother life, maybe someone like Emmy could’ve been mine. But such has not been my life. The thought of all that I haven’t obtained from life sobers me.
I stand, holding back the emotion and the phantom feeling of Emmy’s embrace still lingering around my neck like a scarf. “So Grey and I should get going. My parents saved a spot for us near the inn.” I’m inordinately proud of stringing a full sentence together after another awkward encounter with the mountain of a man in front of me.
“Right, well, thanks for making Emmy so happy,” Edgar says as I hand him the cup of hot chocolate that now belongs to his niece.
“Of course. Any—” I look up to meet Jace’s gaze. “Time.”
Time. Something I wish we had and know we don’t. As if in response, his left hand rises to run through his hair, the tattoo of that clock face now facing the night sky. The vines wrapping around it pull at my hesitation.
“Oh, Ivy, it’s the strangest thing . . .” Edgar continues, suddenly looking between Jace and me. “Doesn’t she look just like the Polaroid you had on your shelf all those years ago, Jace? The one in that little frame . . .”
His jaw clenches so hard I can almost hear it. He had our photo on a shelf? We took a photo at Four Leaf Cookies. The owner kept a camera handy for couples, featuring their photos on a wall in the shop. I don’t know how Jace got his hands on it.
He leans down to pick up Emmy; the only indication he’s heard his brother talking about a photo of us is the faint blush on his cheeks.
It seems Edgar isn’t done. “What did you call her . . . something with a star . . .?”
“Starlight!” Emmy yells.
I cough, the shock of inhaling the bitterly cold air so quickly impossible to keep down.
“We really should be going,” Grey intercepts, sliding her arm through mine and pulling us back toward the inn. The floats are starting to move on the street behind us, the local marching band playing through the air.
“Remember, if you need help,” Edgar calls after me, “Jace is your guy.”
I used to wish for that very thing to be true. I allow Grey to guide our steps toward the inn, staring at Ted on a float with some of his rescue pets and the ugliest Christmas sweater I’ve ever seen, my mind racing. The reality of the time Jace and I have been apart runs me over like the person in the middle of the line at a Black Friday sale. Little does anyone know just how much I used to wish for Jace with all of my heart.
Chapter Nine
Jace
Jace is your guy.
But am I?
My brother’s words to Ivy a few days ago simultaneously thrill and haunt me. There was a time when I wanted to consider myself a contender for Ivy’s heart. The fact that Mina knew about her isn’t lost on me. It makes me want to both fight for her heart and insist she leave me alone. When Ivy asked if I wanted to get reacquainted with each other, I refused. And I know refusing to be friends with Ivy isn’t solving anything. Not immediately agreeing to help her with her production isn’t looking good for me either.
I enrolled Emmy in kindergarten at Birch Borough Elementary until the holidays, and I take a walk around town while she is in school. It wasn’t easy to get her enrolled so quickly, but her principal took one look at Emmy and caved (thankfully). Moving to Florida seems more ominous the longer I’m here, though I did promise my parents I’d be there for Christmas morning. I walk to keep myself away from Ivy’s studio, needing to keep myself moving during breaks from the boxing classes I teach. Since I walked with Ivy around the Christmas Village, I’ve been trying to figure out how to keep my heart from hoping for more with her.
