Rei:EXPLAIN IMMEDIATELY
Rei:DID YOU KISS HIM???
Lucy typed back:Yes.
Rei:I NEED DETAILS
Lucy:Tomorrow. I promise. But right now I just want to sit with this feeling for a while.
Rei:what feeling?
Lucy:Happy. I feel happy.
Rei:good. you deserve it.
Rei:now go enjoy your day off for real. no work. no stress. just... be.
Lucy set down her phone and walked to the window. Outside, snow was still falling on Timber Falls, covering everything in white. The street was quiet, peaceful. Through the window of The Bread Basket below, she could see the closed sign she'd hung this morning.
For five years, closing the bakery had felt like abandonment. Like letting her grandmother down.
But today it felt like possibility.
Tomorrow, Jake would turn down Nashville. She would start researching what came next. They would have their first real date and see if this thing between them was as real as it felt.
Tomorrow, everything would change.
But today—today she was just going to sit in her apartment, maybe watch the snow fall, maybe call her mom's sister in California who she hadn't talked to in months. Maybe start making a list of places she wanted to travel, things she wanted to learn, dreams she'd put on hold.
Today, Lucy Chen was going to practice wanting things for herself.
It was terrifying.
It was also long overdue.
Jake walked home through the snow with butternut squash muffins in a container Lucy had insisted he take and a feeling in his chest he couldn't quite name. Light. That's what it was. For the first time in years, he felt light.
His apartment was exactly as he'd left it—messy, impersonal, temporary. But somehow it looked different now. Less like a place he was stuck and more like a place he was choosing.
Jake set the muffins on his kitchen counter next to the succulent (still alive, miraculously). Then he pulled out his phone and opened his contacts.
Three calls to make.
First, his mom.
She answered on the second ring. "Jake! I was hoping you'd call. How are you, honey?"
"I'm good, Mom. Really good."
"You sound different. What's going on?"
Jake sat down on his couch, looking around the studio apartment. "I got an offer. Nashville. Two-way contract, AHL with NHL call-ups."
His mom was silent for a long moment. "Jake, that's wonderful. Congratulations."
"I'm going to turn it down."
Another silence, longer this time. "Okay. Tell me why."
