Chapter 4

Adele maneuvered their rental car onto a snowy lane nestled in the mountains, revealing her childhood home, and Brighton had never seen anything so beautiful.

Well, aside from her own home on Lake Michigan, icy waves and frosty sand in the backyard instead of grass, her playground as a kid, and Christmas lights on every possible surface of her sage-green house. Every year, her parents' goal was to make their exterior decorations as over-the-top as possible, full National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation –style. The holiday wasn't the holiday without a call from the power company.

Brighton smiled to herself, letting her mind drift over the memories, aching to hear her mom yelling at her dad from the back porch, warning him to try to avoid falling into the bushes this year. Lola had always loved decorating, and she'd even climbed a ladder the year she turned seventeen to help secure icicle lights to the eaves.

Brighton cleared her throat, blinked Winter River, Colorado, back into focus, and checked her phone again.

No notifications.

Her parents had been in France for three days now, and she'd only talked to her mother once. She felt slightly ridiculous, like a little kid missing her mother even though she was nearly thirty years old, but it was Christmas, and she did miss her mother.

"What do you think?" Adele asked as she honked the horn.

Brighton looked up as the house loomed closer, all warm and glowing, the twilit clouds pink and orange and swirling across the Rockies behind it.

It was idyllic.

It was perfect.

It wasn't her home.

"It's lovely," she said, which was true. She did her best to swallow the lump in her throat, but she couldn't help the emotions swirling in her chest. Still, Adele had invited her here, and she was determined to be grateful.

She leaned forward, squinting through the slightly fogged windshield at all the people standing in the Berry family driveway. "Is your mom having a party?"

Adele laughed. "Not yet, god help us. That's my sister and her music group. I didn't tell you she was bringing the whole crew?"

Brighton shook her head, craning her neck to see better. She saw Adele's mom and a man in an olive-green bomber jacket, a person with short pink hair who wore a bright-yellow scarf, and a third person in a dark peacoat and a black beanie hat, a huge dog leaning against her legs. Brighton knew Adele's younger sister was a musician, some classically trained type who lived and worked in New York City.

"What does your sister play again?" she asked.

"Sloane plays violin."

Brighton nodded, but as they got closer, coming to a stop in front of the porch, Sloane and her friends came into clearer focus.

Crystal-clear, high-definition, familiar focus.

"Adele," she said, her heart creeping into her throat as her friend put the car in park. "Is…is Sloane in a string quartet?"

"Yeah," Adele said, turning off the car. "They're actually kind of a big deal, but god, don't tell her I said so. I don't get any of it, really."

Brighton didn't respond, her mouth suddenly dry. The woman who had to be Sloane—the woman Brighton had seen dozens of times on Instagram, warm-brown skin and soft curls around her face—ran around the car to Adele's side, all but hauling Adele out of the car and hugging her. Soon Adele was surrounded by her mom and sister, laughter and exclamations about new glasses and longer braids echoing in Brighton's ears.

She had to move.

She knew she did.

Or did she? She could simply stay in the car all season. Sounded plausible. Adele could bring her food and water and blankets. She'd just keep the engine running for heat, refill the gas tank in town every few days. It would be fine.

Totally possible.

She peeked out the window again, gauging where the person in the black hat had ended up. She spotted her by the front porch steps, quietly standing apart from the others with the dog still by her side.

Lola had always wanted a dog. Brighton's family had had cats—still did, Luna and Hazel—but as a kid, Lola had stopped to pet every dog they met on the sidewalks or on the beach. Her mom had never let her get one—too loud and needy and extroverted—and Brighton had always suspected Lola really wanted one for those very reasons.

A companion for when the nights got too long living with her mother, the days too quiet in her pristine lake house.

Lola.

Her Lola.

It couldn't be…

But it was. She was here, and Brighton had no clue what to do. It didn't seem like she'd noticed Brighton quite yet, but that would change the moment Brighton moved. The earth would tip on its axis, reverse orbit.

Adele shut the driver's-side door, then rapped on the window with her knuckle, urging Brighton out of the car. Brighton's fingers curled into the worn leather of her bag as she breathed…

And breathed…

And breathed…

Finally, she managed to move her fingers to the handle…pull it—the soft release of the door opening was a bomb exploding. She froze, glancing up at the woman in the black hat, still hoping she'd hallucinated the whole thing. But no, she— Lola— was watching Nina Berry flock around Adele and Sloane with a sort of wonder spilling across her expression.

Brighton stayed still, giving herself this moment to take in her former best friend.

Former girlfriend, former fiancée.

Former everything.

God, she was gorgeous. Always had been—that dark-and-silver hair, that full red mouth, eyes light-brown and always so perceptive, noticing things no one else ever did. Brighton felt her own eyes start to fill, the missing she hadn't let herself feel in years flooding back in like a river into a dry valley.

She shook her head. Had to get it together. Had to. It was either that or live in this rental, possibly becoming a headline in Winter River's local paper, and she'd rather not sully Nina Berry's good name.

One leg…then the next. She looped her bag around her body, clicked the car door shut as quietly as possible. Maybe she could make a run for it, duck her head and yell about a bathroom emergency, one that would keep her in her room for the next…week.

She was fucked.

She stood still, a statue—just wrap some Christmas lights around her and call it a day—and waited for the apocalypse. Seconds passed, whole lifetimes it felt like, until—

"Brighton!"

She squeezed her eyes shut, wincing.

"That's it—that's your name!" Ms. Berry called from over the car's roof.

Brighton opened her eyes to see Adele's mom beaming at her, heading around the front of the car with her arms held open.

"It…it is," Brighton said on a laugh. "How are you, Ms. Berry?"

"Oh my goodness, call me Nina."

Ms. Berry—Nina—drew Brighton into a hug so tight, Brighton was pretty sure she emitted a tiny squeak. And then it was like muscle memory took over, Brighton's gaze finding the person she'd spent ten years finding over and over again in every crowd, every Grand Haven middle and high school classroom, every busy Boston sidewalk when they were in college at Berklee, even across the kitchen in their small Manhattan apartment.

Their eyes locked.

Brighton stopped breathing.

The world stopped spinning, she was sure of it.

Nina released her, and Brighton still couldn't look away. Lola couldn't either, it seemed, and suddenly, they were twenty-three again, the day of their wedding, the last time Brighton had seen Lola in person.

"You ready for this?" Lola had asked. They were lying in Lola's bed, blankets soft and warm around them. The whole world ready for them, a million possibilities. Lola tangled their fingers together. "Ready for forever?"

And Brighton had said yes.

She'd said yes when she should've said…

Brighton's shoulders tensed, her throat aching. She took another step forward, slow and steady, like she was approaching a feral animal. Lola's eyes followed her, her face expressionless. Lola had always been good at that too—masking any and all emotion. Her chin lifted just slightly, her gaze going steely and vacant.

Brighton stopped in front of her. Took one more steadying breath, though she felt anything but solid right now. "Hi, Lo—"

"Hi," Lola said curtly, sticking out her gloved hand. "I'm Charlotte."

Brighton froze, her mouth still forming an o . Lola didn't budge. Didn't blink. Wasn't even breathing, as far as Brighton could tell. After a second, Brighton slid her hand against Lola's palm, and Lola gave her fingers a tight pump before releasing them like they were on fire.

Brighton managed to say her own name, though the two-syllable word sounded strange in her ears, which were roaring with blood and a rapid heartbeat.

"Nice to meet you," Lola said, then looked away and cleared her throat loudly. This seemed to grab Sloane's attention, who pulled Adele over for more introductions. Soon Brighton had met the entire Rosalind Quartet, faces she'd been staring at on Instagram for the better part of two years. She liked Manish and Elle immediately, though her head still swam with Lola's strange behavior.

"Okay, everyone, let's get inside!" Nina called. "It's freezing, and we're having chili and my homemade cornbread."

"Hell yes," Adele said. "God, I love coming home."

"Yeah, because you automatically forget how to clean a dish when we're here," Sloane said.

"Okay, Little Miss ‘Mom, Make Me Some Hot Chocolate with a Thousand Marshmallows While I Sit on the Couch and Watch The Holiday for the Billionth Time.'?"

"I can't help it if I know how to relax," Sloane said.

Nina just laughed and climbed up the porch steps, dragging Charlotte's rolling suitcase behind her. "Come on, Snickerdoodle."

The Berry sisters followed their dog up the stairs with their own bags. Manish and Elle went along as well, giant luggage and instrument cases in tow.

The noise faded, quiet closing around Brighton and Lola as they stood in the snowy drive. Lola wasn't looking at Brighton, her gaze on the front door.

"Lola," Brighton said quietly. Almost reverently.

Still no reaction. Lola simply bent down to pick up the same vintage leather violin case she'd had since she was twenty-one, turned on her heel, and walked up the porch steps without another word.