“You don’t have to. That’s not why I did this.”
“Then why did you, Fletch?”
It’s my turn to look away. “I did it for you … and for me.”
“You mean for us?”
“Maybe not at first.”
She’s still, quiet.
“The truth is, you were onto something the other day. Being on injury leave has been hard for me. If I fill up every spare moment and make myself useful, I won’t have time to think about what happens after my career. It’s not that the broken jaw would keep me out of hockey, but eventually, retirement will come. This time off reminded me of that reality. It’s been hard, uh, to deal with, I guess.” My voice echoes back to me through the cavernous house.
“Fletch,” Bree says softly. “I had no idea. That’s difficult.”
“It is what it is.” I shrug, casting it off as I have almost every challenge in life. “I tend to stay in the present, which might be part of why it never occurred to me that I wouldn’t be a forty-year-old in the NHL.”
“Well, there was that one time you thought about the future,” she says.
My forehead furrows as I think back to what she references.
Eyes steady on me, each of Bree’s steps closer punctuatesher words—my words repeated back to me. “‘I’ll marry you someday.’”
We smile simultaneously and then comes light laughter as she slides her arms around me, presses her cheek to my chest, and says, “Thank you for this.”
Not realizing I’d been holding my breath, I let out a long and much-needed exhale.
I embrace her and it’s more definite and meaningful than the other times we’ve touched.
We stand there for a long time and I envision a future of forty-year-old me, of us, and I’m no longer scared.
We continue the tour and I say, “Just think, you could have your own home office here. Plus a home library. It’s perfect.”
“I can’t afford to live here, Fletch.”
“Is there a mortgage?”
She shakes her head. “No, it’s paid off, but the taxes, utilities, maintenance. Plus, I have debt and student loans …” Her voice trails off and she drops to the bottom step of the grand staircase, shoulders slumping. “Not unless my book does really well and I start making my deadlines.”
“You’re going to crush it.”
Bree, shaking her head, droops like a flower in the frost.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, sitting beside her.
“I’ve been so wrapped up in fictional characters’ lives that I guess I haven’t thought about my own future either. Where am I going to go after this?” Sadness fills her eyes when she peeks at me.
My stomach clenches and I wonder what the hug we just shared meant to her. “You mean after our thirty days are up?”
“We’re more than halfway through and I can’t live with Nina forever.”
I want to tell her she could stay with me, permanently. Thethought startles me with its intensity, like taking a stray puck to the chest.
After all, we’re married.
I need a distraction. I think she does, too. “What’s your favorite part of the house?”
She’s quiet for a long moment, but when she looks at me again, her eyes are brighter. “I’ll show you.”
