The kids’ voices rose over the crowd, a jagged chorus of squeals and shouted numbers. Emma was hopping on the balls of her feet, hands clenched over her mouth, eyes bright and unblinking. Will’s voice was loud and clear, a little offbeat but perfectly earnest.
“One…”
The tree erupted in a cascade of colors that felt almost alive, twinkling and flickering faster than my eyes could track. Gasps rolled through the crowd, washing over me in a tide of delight. Sadie clapped her hands and ruffled my hair from above.
“I’m so happy you’re here with us, Maren,” she said.
Warmth pooled in my chest and I laughed, tipping my head to meet Miles’s gaze. He was smiling, sure, but it wasn’t the joking, teasing smile from earlier. There was weight there, an acknowledgment of the same awe I felt but had been trying to hide behind sarcasm and small talk.
“Me too,” he said, voice carrying just enough sincerity to make me pause. “I’m really happy you’re here.”
The words landed in the spaces between the music, the children’s laughter, the hissing of cocoa steam, and the soft crunch of boots on the gravel. I blinked at him, caught between wanting to say something clever and wanting to simply exist in the space we’d carved out together among the bundled, eager crowd.
The kids turned back to the tree, and I could only watch Miles watch me, warm light reflecting off his features, grounding me even as my chest still felt like it might explode at the tiniest touch.
It wasn’t words of apology, or confessions, or any of the messy stuff; it was simple, steady, sincere.
My fingers tightened around the mug without thinking. The lights of the tree glittered over the crowd, reflecting off the wet pavement and catching in the steam from cocoa and breath alike.
Around us, the city carried on. The Common felt vast and intimate at once, and for the first time since I’d stepped back into this world, I could breathe without the weight of “what if” pressing me sideways.
Sadie wiggled on Miles’s shoulders, her little boots tapping against his chest like she was urging a horse.
“The train! The train!” It had stopped a few feet ahead, the carriages hissing gently as kids clambered aboard. “Please can we go?”
“I’m sitting up front,” Will declared, practically pulling Emma toward the tiny engine.
“No fair. I want the front,” she protested, but laughed as he tugged her along.
Miles sighed, giving in to Sadie’s urging. “Easy, easy, you’ll fall off my shoulders before we even start.”
I was about to follow when gloved fingers wrapped around my wrist. I froze mid-step, and turned to find Ethan.
His gaze held mine with that quiet intensity that always managed to make me melt.
“Got a second?” he asked.
I nodded, heart in my throat, and let him lead me away from the bustling crowd.
“We haven’t had a chance to really talk,” he said, not looking at me.
I gave a hollow laugh. “You meant it when you said the holidays are crazy for you.”
The glow from the giant tree reflected off patches of wet cobblestone, splintering into sharp, glittering fragments under our feet. Holiday tents lined the edges of the Common, their canvas sides fluttering slightly in the cold wind. Somewhere a bell jingled through the air with a rhythm that felt both urgent and hesitant. The chatter of the crowd stretched behind us, diffused, distant, like a pulse you could feel in your chest rather than hear. Somehow it made me feel like my nerves were mirrored everywhere. Fractured, bright, and impossible to ignore.
Ethan’s eyes flicked up to mine, then away again, like he was weighing each syllable before letting it escape. There were things I hadn’t said to him, too, things that had been weighing on me since I got back.
We slowed, instinctively, and turned to face each other. Words tumbled out of us at the same time, overlapping, stopping mid-sentence when we realized it. The silence that followed was almost tangible, a shared pause that made me laugh softly, and then he did too.
“You first,” I said.
His shoulders sagged as he exhaled slowly. “I was going to say… You can’t know how sorry I am for the way I talked to you. I was a dick,” he added, almost mumbling, “as Miles continues to remind me.”
“Yeah. You kind of were.”
He blinked at me, surprise flashing in his eyes, and I felt my own lips twitch into a grin. Then he gave a low, easy laugh, the kind that let some of the tension escape. When I joined him, it was enough to thaw the crisp in the air between us.
We started walking again, shoulders brushing in that subtle way, the world rocking back into focus. “What about you?” he asked.
