Alistair smiled back as she zipped up her bag and headedtoward the door where he was pulling on his jacket. “Lochland, come, boy,” he called to the dog who was sleeping lazily on the sofa curled up in a little black ball. Lochland perked his ears up at the sound of his newfound name and jumped down, springing over to Alistair’s side.
“See? What did I tell you?” Nora said, smiling at the two.
“Ya, ya,” he retorted, giving the dog a good scratch behind his ears and smiling down at him. “You all set?” he asked, picking up their bags and opening the door.
“I think so.”
Nora stood for a moment after Alistair and Lochland walked out and took in the cottage one last time. Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes, saving the image to her memory. When she opened them, she could have sworn she saw an outline of a woman standing near the windows, but she blinked, and she was gone. She smiled and said softly under her breath, “It’s over, thanks to those letters you hid. Thank you.” She wondered if Marjorie had known all along that she would visit here and would be the one to find the letters. The Darrow women were known for their second sight, after all. A moment later the sun broke through the thick cloud cover, and the room lit up with the mid-morning sun as if Marjorie were smiling down at her, answering her question.
Nora scanned the cottage one last time before she turned and walked out the door, closing it gently behind her.
Chapter Sixty-Five
Goodbye
After a long, nauseating bus ride through the winding Highlands, they arrived in Edinburgh in the late afternoon. As they stepped out into the bus station, reality came crashing down around them in the form of shouts, train whistles, and a barrage of unwelcome smells that assaulted their noses. After spending the week in the country with no power, the city overwhelmed their senses. Not accustomed to city life, Lochland cowered at Alistair’s feet as people pushed past them in a hurry to their next destinations.
“I have to run if I am going to catch my flight. I only have an hour and a half to get there and check in,” Nora said, a sadness filling her words as she spoke them.
“Yeah, I think I need to drop this guy off at my flat and then go grovel for my job back,” Alistair said.
Nora nodded, trying to find the right words to say to him. Their souls were now free, and with that freedom came a choice—to go find love elsewhere, to be free, to be themselves without the other. She loved him and wanted to be with him, but with that love came the memory of so much pain and suffering. They shared a love transcended through time, deeper than most people would ever experience, but now they both had a choice, and she was unsure whether Alistair would choose to be with her or if she truly wanted to be with him.
They had very much been unfortunate travelers, like the book, moving in and out of this earth for hundreds of years, and now that journey had come to an end. She was free yet even more confused than before. She had no clue what the next step was, but she knew she had the strength to walk that path alone if she had to.
“I’ll catch up with you later then. Send you an email or something,” she said, immediately regretting the words for sounding so cliched, cold, and not at all how she felt.
“Sounds good, Nora. Be seeing you,” he said as he stepped forward and pulled her into an awkward embrace. She breathed in his scent one last time and then broke away from him before her emotions broke free. She bent down and pulled Lochland into a big hug, kissing the top of his head. “Be a good boy, Lochland, and keep this guy in line,” she said to the dog as she ruffled his ears and stood back up.
Alistair dropped his bag and quickly stepped forward, pulling her into a kiss that surprised her. She melted into him, rising to her tiptoes as if she couldn’t get enough of him. He pulled her in closer, and she dropped her bag and ran her fingers through his silky hair, not wanting to let go. The sounds of the city faded, and for a moment it was just them. Nora felt her magic surge insideher and then the sun broke free of the clouds, lighting up the tiny snowflakes that fell around them, like sparks of magic. The sounds of the city returned, and the sun slipped back behind the bank of clouds as he broke their kiss and pulled away. Alistair wrapped the MacDonald tartan scarf around her neck and lifted the sweetheart brooch up to look at it one final time.
“Will you come back to visit us?” he asked, looking down at Lochland, who was staring up at them with his big brown eyes. She tried to speak, but the words caught in her throat, coming out in a broken burst tinged with sadness. “Of course I will.”
She wanted to tell him she loved him, that she didn’t want to leave him, but she also knew she needed to have some space from him, to make sure it wasn’t just the remnants of the curse and their past loves influencing her. And she knew he needed that as well.
He smiled and let the brooch fall through his fingers and back onto her chest, then leaned forward, quickly kissing her one last time.
“I really hope you do, Nora,” he said with forced optimism in his voice.
She smiled at him and grabbed her bag off the sidewalk. Leaving him felt like it might break her, but she had to return to Vermont. She had come here to find herself, to figure out what she wanted to do with her life, and she did. Still, she didn’t feel any better about her life’s trajectory. She felt even more lost than before.
Smiling at him one final time, she waved, then turned and walked down the street. She didn’t dare look back at him for fear that if she did, she might not ever be able to leave. Instead, she walked on, tears falling and streaking her cheeks.
Dusk had fallen, and all the Christmas lights in the city wereon and filling the world around her with a joyful glow. She had almost forgotten it was Christmastime. As she walked through the festive cheer, it did not light up her heart the way it used to; instead, she felt emptier than ever. She decided to keep her eyes on her feet and press forward, and that is exactly what she did until she disembarked off the plane in Boston International and got onto the bus back to Vermont.
Chapter Sixty-Six
Home
Nora arrived back at her apartment early that morning and in a daze. She had told her parents she wouldn’t be in until later in the day, giving herself a bit of breathing space before their barrage of questions about the trip. She knew she was ready to talk about the bakery, but she was still trying to sort out how to break the news to her father about Colin.
She set her luggage by the kitchen table and mindlessly pulled a Tupperware container out of the fridge with a note attached that readWelcome Home! Love, Mom. She peeked inside to find her mom’s homemade mac-n-cheese, complete with Ritz cracker topping, and stuck it into the microwave. As she waited for her food to heat up, she turned on the TV and sat down on the couch.
She found herself falling right back into her old routine as if nothing had changed. Scrolling mindlessly through Hallmarkmovies, she only stopped when she heard the beep of the microwave. Getting up to grab the food and a fork, she then headed back to the couch.
Taking a fork full of cheesy macaroni and shoving it in her mouth, she stopped for a moment and looked down at what she had just eaten. Her mind had been so consumed with thoughts of all she had been through in the past week that she hadn’t realized it was jalapeño mac-n-cheese until her tongue started burning.
Setting the container of food on the coffee table, she rested back against the large cushions and stared at the pinewood ceiling. What the hell was she doing? She looked around at the place she had once thought of as home, but now it felt stark and empty. Nothing felt right. Everything was misaligned, as if she had walked back into someone else’s life, not her own. She looked back at the TV, and her heart sank at the movie onscreen in front of her:Christmas inScotland. She swallowed hard, trying to push down the emotions that were threatening to spill forth, but Alistair’s smile kept playing in her head on repeat like a broken record.
