I pull them down and dust them off.
“What are you doing?” Holly asks.
I plug them in. They illuminate. No flicker or dead bulbs.
“You made the kitchen smell like Christmas,” I say. “Might as well look like it, too.”
Her face transforms. Pure joy. “Cole?—”
“It’s just lights.”
“It’s not just lights.”
No. It’s not.
It’s me choosing to remember Emma without drowning in grief. It’s me letting Holly in—just a little. And it’s me realizing the cabin doesn’t have to stay frozen. That I don’t have to either.
I drape the strand over the window frame. The bulbs cast warm light across the snow outside, reflecting back and filling the kitchen with a soft glow.
Holly crosses to the window and stares at them. Her breath fogs the glass.
“Emma would like this,” she says.
“Yeah. She would.”
Holly turns to me, eyes bright with unshed tears. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For trusting me with her memory. For letting me be part of… this.”
I clear my dry throat. “You hungry?”
“Starving.”
“I’ll make dinner.”
“I’ll help.”
This time, I don’t argue.
She chops vegetables. I stand at the stove making a stir-fry. Both of us orbit the lights as if they were the North Star.
Holly asks about Jesse and Wells. I tell her about the time Wells built an entire solar array by hand, and how Jesse nearly burned down his cabin trying to smoke venison.
She laughs, and the sound fills spaces I didn’t know were empty.
We eat at the table, the lights glowing behind us. The fire crackles. The generator hums. Outside, the sky darkens and fresh snow falls.
And for the first time in three years, Christmas doesn’t feel like a wound. It feels like a door I might be ready to open.
“I’m going to wash up,” she says.
“Help yourself to what you need.”
She retreats to the bathroom, and the cabin feels colder without her. I glance at the lights. They make me think of EmmaandHolly.
My phone buzzes on the counter. Another weather alert.
