Reese laughed, that bubbly sound that used to warm Roan’s belly. Now, it shot a dart right through his heart. “Okay, you can stick here with Roan. But if the rest of you are interested, I can make time in the schedule for you to take class with me.”
“I’m kind of an ox right now, but I’d like to dance,” Julia said.
“Great. You guys come by after school tomorrow,” Roan said. “Can you be here by three?”
“Yeah. School lets out at two-thirty,” Emma said. “We can walk here from the high school.”
“How will we get home?” Julia asked.
“I’ll take anyone home who needs a ride,” Roan said.
“I still don’t get why you guys are being so nice to us,” Julia said. “But I’m in.”
The other kids nodded.
“All right, great,” Reese said. “We’ll see you tomorrow.”
Soon, they had packed up the leftover pizza, giving everyone leftovers to take home. Emma gave hers to Marcus.
A small gesture of kindness. One that made Roan’s eyes scratchy as he watched the kids file out of the room.
6
REESE
“That went better than I hoped,” Reese said to Roan as she put on her coat near the back entrance.
“I’m surprised they opened up like that. I thought Grace might be overly optimistic about getting the kids to talk to us.”
“I thought the same.” Reese located her scarf in her bag and wrapped it around her neck. “Okay, well, I’ll see you tomorrow, I guess.”
“What’s our plan for the kids?”
Reese hesitated. He was right. They should talk about how to structure their time with them. She couldn’t believe she was saying it, but she suggested they go up to The Moose for a drink. “We can nail down the details.”
For a moment, she thought he might decline. He was probably worried she’d ask him more about the past, which she had no intention of doing. The bomb he’d dropped the other night at Grace’s was still stuck in the back of her mind. She couldn’t dislodge it long enough to figure out if it were true or not. Should she just let it go? Leave the past where it belonged?
Seeing the crew tonight reminded her how young teenagers really were. Their bodies may look like adults, but their heartsand minds were not fully developed. Maybe that was the reason God had brought her into this project—to show her that Roan was a kid back then. This heartbreak and resentment she’d carried around all these years seemed kind of ridiculous when she looked at it in this light.
“Yeah, let’s get a drink,” Roan said finally. “I’ll buy.”
“Great.”
He got on his jacket and a minute later they were walking toward The Moose. The city center was alive with people enjoying the festive decorations. The tree in the middle of the town square had yet to be lit, but garlands hung from lanterns, lights twinkled from store windows, and the scents of popcorn and hot chocolate permeated the air. Shoppers carrying bags of whatever surprises lay within came in and out of the toy shop, bookstore, and Ivy’s home goods store.
“Sugarville has its Christmas on,” Roan said. “I forgot what it was like here.”
“They’ve ramped it up since we were kids,” Reese said. “The tree lighting’s still a big deal. That’s next week. Plus the snowball fight, which people go bananas for. The toy shop always offers up a really great prize for the winner.”
“I heard something about that,” Roan said.
They had reached The Moose by then, stopping by the sculpture of the bar’s namesake wearing a Santa hat on each of his ears.
“Have you ever seen a moose in Sugarville Grove?” Roan asked, reaching out to adjust one of the hats. “Because all the years I lived here, I never saw one.”
“One time. Recently, actually. Mauve and I were out on a walk in the fall and we came out of a wooded area into a meadow, and there he was.”
“What was he like?”
