“I don’t think so,” Gracie replied.
MJ bit her lip and looked out the window.
“I really don’t,” Gracie reiterated. “Dad only ever wanted you to be happy. And it’s been six years. You’re in your early sixties, vibrant and full of energy and optimism. You should have a wonderful partner in your life.”
Each word pressed on her heart. “I had a wonderful partner,” she said. “But he was taken too soon.”
Gracie’s eyes shuttered. “That he was.”
“And we never expected him to die, so we never talked about…what-ifs.”
“Well, what if the situation were reversed?” Gracie asked. “What if you’d left us far too soon? Would you want him to be alone?”
MJ shook her head, having already given this question a lot of thought. “He had a lot of love to give and if the right woman came along—assuming she didn’t outcook or outbake me—then, sure, of course I’d want him to spend his golden years with…someone.”
The words caught in her throat.
“It’s not easy to think about,” Gracie agreed, reaching over to add a gentle touch. “But your answer is the same as his would have been. He wants you to be happy and Matt’s a great guy.”
MJ sighed again, this time with a soft groan. “I know.”
“Then why the pain in your voice, Mom?”
“Because Matt’s so great, he’s…” She shifted in her seat, an emotion eating at her with the same voraciousness that attacked her at three in the morning. “I feel guilty,” she whispered, finally getting to what really bothered her. “I feel so incredibly guilty.”
“For possibly loving someone else?” Gracie asked. “Why?”
“Because I could love him…a lot. Not that I do yet—well, maybe I do. But I could love Matt in a way that…” She swallowed. “He could be…”
She tamped down the rest because did Gracie need to hear that the new man in her mother’s life might actually be…better…than the first one? The one who’d given Gracie life? It was unthinkable.
And yet, MJ thought it…a lot.
“He could be what?” Gracie pressed.
“Very special,” MJ managed to say.
Gracie was quiet as they neared the lodge, staring at the red light at the intersection, pensive.
“See?” MJ finally scoffed when Gracie didn’t say a word even after the light changed and she turned left.
“See what?”
“It’s a problem for you, too.”
“It’s not a problem, Mom. I think it’s amazing that you’ve met someone so spectacular.”
“But what do I do when I get to heaven?” MJ almost wailed, the heart of her question rising up. “Which one will be my husband?”
Gracie slipped her lip under her front tooth, visibly trying not to laugh.
“I’m serious, Gracie!”
“I know you are, but people do get married for a second time and you deserve love and I don’t think you’ll be punished in the afterlife if you love them both.”
MJ dropped her head back and closed her eyes. “And none of this is explaining what he’s trying to tell me every single night at three a.m.”
Gracie pulled into the lodge’s drive and took the van past the ski shed and up the narrow road that wound around all the cabins and past the woods.
