Chapter Forty-One

I've packed cookies and breakfast pastries, with the intention of spending most of my time in the kitchen, drowning myself in sugar. Heddy said she will check on the Loxley shop for a few days. She can bring the excess amount of baked goods with her.

I pull into the driveway and notice that the trees are completely bare now. No more red and orange leaves shining in the sunlight. They're scattered on the grass and in the woods, ready to decompose, as if they never belonged to the big strong tree in the first place.

Then, I notice something else about the driveway: Heddy's Range Rover, my Jeep, and Francesca's van.

Something's going on.

I shut my car door and walk up the steps. The window curtain wiggles. When I open the back door, three faces jump out from behind it.

"Parent Trap!" Grayson and Heddy shout. Alice does her best. They're so smiley and excited, their hands flare out, the beginnings of a jazz troupe.

That's when I notice Francesca standing in the living looking annoyed. She says, "This will only work out if she owns a vineyard in Napa."

We meet eyes and behind her grumpy exterior I sense she may be ready to wave a white flag. She shifts her weight, remorse creating the downturn in her mouth.

I close the door and offer my empty hands and sigh, "Since we're both here, can we at least talk?"

"Oh!" Heddy guides me into the living room and grabs Francesca's wrist. We're both pushed to the couch. "I have all of your favorite things of the kitchen so you girls can sit here and chat, cry, whatever your heart's desire. You don't have to get up for anything."

I ask, "Do you have a pot to pee in?"

She says, "I could."

She walks off with the kids, and Francesca and I sit alone in the living room. Boxes of Christmas decorations sit in the corner. They've brought a Christmas tree stand.

"Are you guys staying here for Christmas?" I ask.

"Yes," she answers. "It's just easier with David's parents and the girls being up the road. I don't know why we haven't done it before." She stares at a red ribbon on the rug. "Probably because last Christmas we had decided to separate."

Heddy and her helpers come back into the room with snacks and drinks. The waitstaff would be quiet except for Alice who giggles to herself while handing me a cup of coffee. Grayson gives Francesca a cup of fizzy water.

Heddy says, "Carrots and hummus for Fran. Cheetos for Vienna."

We take our bowls, and they scamper back out of the room. I smile, looking at our specifically tailored snacks, knowing that Heddy didn't open any bag of chips or the food she thinks is our favorite, but we haven't eaten in ten years. She knows everything about the two of us. Not just us. She pays attention to everyone she loves.

A burning candle glows on the fireplace mantel.

"I waited for you to call," Francesca starts.

"I wanted for you to call," I say. "Fran, I have nothing left to say."

She holds her bowl with two hands that rattle on it nervously. "I'm sorry I freaked out about you and Adam. I'm sorry I ruined Thanksgiving."

My heart pains, looking at the Cheetos and listening to Heddy laugh with the kids in the kitchen. "You didn't. It was a joint effort by the three Roses, but I'd like to lay more of the blame on Dad."

"What did he do?" She wasn't in the house for the big blow up.

I respond simply, "Never show up." I watch the side of her face turn toward me.

"I always just thought of family as the two of us. And Heddy." She continues, "I'm so sorry I was a shitty sister."

I put my Cheetos on the coffee table. "That's not what I was saying."

"No, but it's the truth," she grumbles. "I have always relied on you, and I didn't even realize it. I had mom and then I had you. I had no idea I was putting so much pressure on you and didn't listen. Dave helped me look at the evidence."

She adds, "I thought I was doing so good with counseling and getting back on track with my marriage. I thought I was fixed! That all my bad relationship habits fell on him. I didn't realize it all started with you."

"I know that mom took extra care with you," I say. "She would tell me you were more sensitive, so I treated you the way she did. You would have had no reason to think you did anything wrong."

Francesca's eyes begin to water, and she turns her head toward me. "I hate knowing that you hated me."

"I don't hate you, Fran!" I move her bowl and hold her hands.

"I should have been a better big sister," she sniffles.

I shake my head. "It's not your job to take care of me just because you were born first."

We turn our heads at a sound in the doorway. David halts his movements. He frowns at me, looks at Francesca's crying face and the untouched snacks on the table. He assesses. He understands. He's backing away.

I laugh while she wipes her eyes with a napkin.

She says, "I wish you could have told me about Adam. I never meant to be so controlling about you not dating him."

I lift a shoulder and lean my head. "I actually liked keeping the secret. It wasn't about you, in the end."

"So why didn't you say anything for fourteen years?"

I grab a Cheeto and munch sadly. "Because he became Adam Kent . I became sad girl who bakes in her apartment that she can barely afford."

"Oh, shut up, that's stupid," she argues. "He's no better than you because he's famous. If he loved you, which he clearly does, it's because you're you ."

I moan, reaching for my bowl. "I don't know what to do about it anyways. He's gone."

Francesca casts her eyes around the living room. "I don't know what to do, either. I can work on myself, but I'm no good at relationship advice. My brain's tapped out right now. Hey, we were going to get a Christmas tree today, maybe the answer will come when we get some fresh air and get out in nature."

I laugh, "A Christmas tree lot is not nature."

"It's full of trees…"

My broken little heart turns to mush. I grumble, "Maybe Adam will turn out to own the Christmas tree farm and he'll convince me to leave the big city and that will be our beautiful, magical meet-cute."

"What are you talking about?" she snorts.

"I've been watching Hallmark movies."

Francesca shakes her head. She holds her bowl and bites a carrot in the quiet while I devour my cheesy orange snack. She finally looks at me and asks, "Do you forgive me, Vee?"

I answer, "Yes."

"I'm not going to all of a sudden be perfect now. I'm a work in progress."

I bump her shoulder. "Me too." I hold out a Cheeto and she raises a carrot to meet it, cheering on our new beginning.

We got the least wimpy Christmas tree left at the farm, pickings were slim, and Heddy makes homemade pizzas while we begin to decorate. Alice gets caught up in a table of beaded garland. Grayson drops ornaments on purpose every time Francesca tells him he's putting it in the wrong place.

Music plays at the same time that Christmas movie marathon covers the television, and the room smells like sage, evergreen and tomato sauce. The tree lights reflect off the window, making the cold bluish yard sparkle.

Grayson looks outside in the middle of decorating and gasps. "Dad, it's going to get dark soon, I have to climb the treehouse!"

David drops his slice of pizza. "Okay then, let's go."

They get coats on, and I ask Francesca, "What's that all about?"

"Part of me making amends." She shrugs. "Dave says I'm too overly protective. He's probably right. I told Grayson he could get into the treehouse."

"Which he has to do right now apparently," I laugh.

"He's been talking about it on and off all day. I'm glad he remembered, otherwise I'd be woken up at three in the morning to him screaming about how I promised, but he forgot and I'm the worst mom ever."

Heddy peeks her head in. "Vee Vee, what's for dessert?"

I hold a glass rocking horse ornament in my hand. I'm happy right now, decorating, anticipating snuggling up with Alice on the couch. I don't feel like hiding away from my family anymore. Baking and I might need a relationship adjustment.

"I'm not going to bake anything tonight. I have some cookies in the car."

"Chocolate peppermint?" Francesca asks hopefully.

I pretend, "Oh, no, I didn't make my favorite cookie this year…"

"Liar."

I hang the ornament and grab my keys. I find the bags in the backseat where I packed them carefully and listen to Grayson cheer himself on for making it to the top of the treehouse.

"It's not that high," he says.

"It feels more dangerous when you're thirty-seven," David answers.

"Dad, there's a mailbox in here."

I close my eyes and listen to that familiar, squeaky sound. The metal opening, me finding a note from Adam, the giddiness that followed.

Grayson calls out, "There's a paper in here."

"What is it?" David reaches his hand to the window of the treehouse, but Grayson snatches the paper out of his grasp.

Grayson folds it open. His eyes frown, his lips move, reading the words he knows quietly to himself. "It's for Auntie Vee."

Chapter Forty-Two

Vienna,

I'm in this treehouse right now hoping it doesn't collapse. I left after dinner yesterday because I was upset and needed to get away. I hate that I left like that. I'm not a kid anymore. It was fucked up – I'm sorry. I should have stayed and talked to you.

When I realized this, I turned around and booked it back here. I got in at about four am and figured I'd just stay awake until you got up at sunrise, but I'm not as young as I used to be. I fell asleep on the couch. When I woke up, you and everyone in the house had gone home.

I hope you see this letter. I hope you forgive me. If not, I'll give it until New Year's Eve and if the universe hasn't brought us back together, then I'll message you on Instagram like a loser.

I want you to know, if I could do anything different, I would do everything different. I would never have asked you to marry me. I realize now that I only did it because I wanted to keep you forever. I knew you would say yes. It was selfish. I was afraid to let you go off to college and ask you when we were older, because I didn't know who I'd be and how you would respond. It wasn't the right question, and it wasn't fair of me to make you answer it.

I knew you would have married me. We could have had a beautiful life. You may not see it, but you're the same girl I fell in love with fourteen years ago. I'm sorry for all the shit I gave you this week. I know you were true, and you would have never said you loved me if you didn't mean it fully. You're the truest human I've ever known and loving you has been a privilege.

I'm sorry I hurt you. I'm sorry I made you choose between our future and your relationship with your father. You made the right choice. If I was eighteen and could do it all over again, I would say:

I love you. You should go to college, and I'll go to Nashville. I want to talk to you on the phone every day and I'll visit you every chance I get. I love you. I want to hear all about your day at school, and work, what you bought at the grocery store, and what you learned about buying health insurance.

I love you.

I want to tell you when I think you're wrong and challenge you to be brave and always have your back. I love you. Fourteen years is a lifetime, but I still feel like a kid, staring at you for the first time, realizing that my soul can speak. And you answered it with that one life altering smile.

I've been talking to you for fourteen years, every time I pick up my guitar and every time I get on a stage. I'll be doing it for as long as I breathe.

I loved you then and I still do now.

Adam

"Oh my God," I sigh, falling into the couch.

Adam came back for me. He didn't leave like I did. He came back.

Francesca snatches the letter from my drooping hands, and David reads over her shoulder.

"I called it!" he says. "I told you he'd come back!"

Francesca murmurs, "This is the most romantic thing I've ever read." She passes the letter to Heddy.

David finds my phone from under a stack of knit stockings. He shoves it into my hands. "Call him!"

I think of the phone number scribbled on the bottom of the page. I could call him and say I love him, that I messed everything up, that I would never choose someone irrelevant over the chance to have a life with him.

Then, of course, I'd want to touch him. I'd want him to kiss me. I'd want to be swept up in his arms.

"Calling him would be so lame," I whine.

"How else are you going to talk to him?" David asks.

I say, "I don't know. That's not how it's done in the Hallmark movies."

Francesca rolls her eyes. "That's because the women in those movies are dating Santa and he doesn't have a phone."

I explain, "I need a big gesture. Magical. Something that knocks his socks off."

Francesca leans back into the couch pillow. Her eyes dart around, thinking. She asks, "Like one of those airplanes that flies a sign across the beach advertising half price bikinis at a creepy store on the corner?"

"No."

Heddy chimes in, "A billboard!" She swipes her hand in the air like a rainbow saying, " Vienna loves Adam, always and forever."

When her head comes back down from the clouds, I say, "I was hoping for a cheaper gesture."

"Hang on," David says. He stands and reaches for his phone in his back pocket. While he searches through it, he says, "Adam mentioned this little concert he does in Nashville every year around Christmas. He said it's the first place he ever played. He used to work there or something. So, he does this concert tradition every year." His eyes narrow, reading. "Aha!"

He spins his screen around and I read the information from his Instagram post.

Francesca says, "The twenty-first is –"

"Tomorrow," I finish.

David makes a face. "Tickets might not be cheap though, it looks like a small place."

Francesca groans, "No one cares about the ticket price, Dave, this is her big gesture, this is the moment she can see him in person . Vee, you have to go."

Heddy's face lights up. "Who's ready for a road trip?"

With the five-hour drive mapped out, including stops for lunch, potty breaks, and gas, all six of us pile into the van. It's midday morning. We should get to Nashville with time to spare.

"It says you have to buy tickets in person, at the box office," I read as we drive across the Tennessee border.

Francesca bites her lip. "Maybe this is a scam."

I stare at her in disbelief. "If it was a scam, they'd want us to use a credit card."

"Oh, that's right."

Heddy sits beside me in the backseat. She breaks her meditation to offer, "I'll bet it's just how the venue does business. Especially since it's a special concert. They probably just want to make it fair for everyone who wants to see him."

"We will be there in plenty of time," David says.

"You could stand outside the back door and wait for him to let you right in," Francesca replies. "And take your top off, that'll get his attention."

I say, "That'll get anyone's attention."

I feel suddenly nervous about this whole idea. I'm unfamiliar with the world of Adam Kent. I watched how differently he changed when Mackenzie's sister recognized him, how charming he was to the crowd at the inn. I don't belong in this part of his world. What if this is wrong? He might hate us showing up, making his work life awkward.

My stomach hurts. The stress of worry goes to my head, making me dizzy, and it's all I can think about until I David announces, "Be there in five."

I open my eyes and sit up. "Can we stop somewhere really quickly? I need to freshen up."

"We don't want to be late," Francesca says.

"I know." My voice shakes. "I just need a minute."

We pull over at a chicken shop, and Francesca gets in line to order the kids dinner while I go into the single stall bathroom. My shaky hands press into the sink.

This is me and Adam. Nothing to be nervous about.

Talking on the porch. Spending the time together at the inn. Holding hands in the grocery store. That's what I'm fighting for – a normal, easy relationship full of love and compassion with a man who I know will treat me with the utmost respect.

I catch a look at myself in the mirror. Fourteen years' worth of thinking I wasn't pretty or interesting enough might have stopped me making this gesture. Eighteen-year-old Vienna lived a little bit in every mirror I passed. I didn't smile at her, and I couldn't love her, because she taunted me with unfulfilled dreams. Fuck you, I would tell her.

Adam told me he didn't love me because I was beautiful, he loved me because I was me. When he saw me in the market that day and when he held my hand outside of the ice cream shop, I didn't feel beautiful. At that time, I felt like crap. I had very few kind things to say about myself, but in the years that followed, I made up a story about that girl. With every passing year, I treated her as the baseline of perfection. A quality I can't revert back to. I looked on that time with longing, and I'll probably do the same in ten years.

I wish I were thirty-two again. She had no idea how beautiful and youthful she was. How loved, for all of her flaws.

I tuck my hair behind my ears. Adam's letter crinkles in the pocket of my coat. My nose wrinkles, and my cheeks are pink. I don't care if Adam sees me in the crowd and I wow him with my beauty or if someone judges the quality of my jeans or the sleekness of my hair. I view my perfectly imperfect face and smudged mascara and feel a surge of love for myself.

"I'm sorry I was so mean to you," I whisper.

My green eyes and glistening lashes flutter, folding the skin at the corners. Every line on my thirty-two-year-old face exists because of eighteen-year-old Vienna.

She was courageous, intimate, bold, deep feeling, and scared. I blamed her, me , because I hadn't been strong enough to see into a blank future, and I realize now that my life isn't anyone's fault, least of all my own. If I'd chosen differently, who knows what life could have created? I may not have learned the courage to look myself in the eye and tell her:

"I forgive you."

I needed to see Adam to properly see myself and the girl that lived with him, who I'd abandoned, because I blamed her for everything I couldn't keep.

She smiles back at me. She forgives me.

For the first time in fourteen years, I know where I'm going when I step out this door. I'm not acting on autopilot. I'm going to tell Adam I love him, that I'm sorry, and I'm done hiding myself away.