His words filled my lungs. It was beautiful, really. Tragic, of course. But the intense devotion he had for Brooklyn only made him all the more equipped to share his love with somebody else one day, even if he couldn’t believe it yet.
Isaac dropped his chin and his hair shifted, covering his eyes from me. Instinctually, I reached up and pushed it back, so I could see him. So he could see me. “I think your capacity to loveis stunning, Isaac Kelly. And whoever is lucky enough to have you want to spend time with them is luckier than the kids who survived the Final Destination movies.” The words stung a little. I’d never been a jealous person, but I couldn’t imagine a future where Isaac was happy and content with someone else and he and I were still friends. Was that jealousy? The thought scared me.
On the bench between us, his fingers traced over my hand, and he turned to me. His other hand brushed up my shoulder and then my neck, his fingers dragging along my jawline.
I leaned toward him, wanting his lips on mine. To feel his warmth on my skin.
And then the sound of metal scraping against pavement startled us apart.
He shielded his eyes from the sun. “Fucking snowplow,” he said as the behemoth of machinery churned up the hill.
“We should go anyway,” I said. “I think I have frostbite on my ass.”
“Want me to check?” he asked with a devilish smirk.
“I think I’ll leave my medical care in the hands of licensed physicians.”
We walked down to where the truck was parked, and I had to resist the urge to loop my arm through his. Isaac deserved a muse. A big, heart-stopping love to prove to him that he could love again. The more we fooled around, the longer it would take for him to find the happiness he deserved.
Chapter Sixteen
Isaac
Carina Kelly texted just as the last of the Hope Channel crew cleared out for the night, and so while Sunny went to catch up on emails in the shower (the wonder of water-resistant phones), I gave Carina a call.
Restless without Sunny, I wandered up to the attic as the phone rang, scuffing my way up the stairs like the teenager I became when I talked to my mom.
“Scooter,” she said once she picked up, and I felt a warmth move through my chest at the sound of my baby nickname. I was still bracing for her to ask about work or hopping a flight to Aspen, but it was nice to hear her voice anyway. Nice enough that I abruptly missed her and Nanny, and could almost imagine myself going to Aspen to be with them.
A staggering idea, since I hadn’t wanted to intentionally spend time withanyone, no matter how fondly I felt about them, in years.
And I was pretty sure the reason for my un-Grinching was answering emails in the shower a floor below right now.
“Hey, Mom,” I said, flicking on the light and pacing past the old cradles and steamer trunks stuffed under the eaves. The renovation crew had come up here for mysterious electricity reasons, but I’d had them leave pretty much everything as it was, including the leftovers from the mansion’s tycoon era. Nanny had instilled a deep appreciation of antiques in me. “Everything okay?”
“Yes, of course,” she said, sounding mildly baffled that I’d even ask. I supposed there was rarely a possibility of Carina Kellynotbeing okay. “I was calling to check on you, actually. I know the day is coming soon, and we’ll be taking Donna’s sister out on the slopes, so I wanted to call you and tell you that I love you now.”
Right. The Day.
“Thank you for thinking of me,” I said. “I love you too.”
“You won’t . . . be alone again, will you?”
The Day—also known as the fifth anniversary of Brooklyn’s death—was in a week exactly.
“My roommate will be here. We’ll be making eggs and I’ll be fighting with her cat. It’ll be okay.”
There was a pause, which was strange. Carina Kelly usually paused only if a camera was pushing in on her Oscar-worthy face. “Something’s different.”
“It is?”
“Yes,” she said carefully. “You sound . . . lighter.”
I thought about this. “Yeah, I guess I do feel a little lighter. But it’s not like I—”
I stopped. I didn’t want to sound petulant, like I was looking to be misunderstood so I could pitch a fit about it.
But she was my mother and knew me irritatingly well. “I know it doesn’t make things less hard, Isaac. But also it doesn’t cheapen your grief to be happy once in a while.”
