A Light at Winter’s End

by Julia London

  “Doesn’t he have a few friends?” Wyatt asked curiously. Gracie was a little social butterfly, always off on play dates.

  “I don’t know,” Holly said, and shrugged self-consciously. “I assume so, but my sister and I have drifted apart, and I don’t know nearly as much about Mason as I would like.” She didn’t look at Wyatt, but at her belt, fidgeting with the end of it.

  “It must have been a great shock to you,” he said quietly. “The way Mason came to you.”

  Holly snorted. “You have no idea. It knocked me off my feet.”

  Wyatt certainly empathized. “I know what that’s like.”

  “Really?” Holly asked, looking at him dubiously. “At first I thought it would be easy, you know? I mean, he’s a baby, and I figured, how hard could it be? But he was crying, and I didn’t know why, and I finally figured out it was his diaper.” She shook her head. “So dumb.”

  Wyatt smiled. “That’s nothing.”

  “No, I was clueless. You should have seen the poor kid’s rash.”

  “A few months ago, I had Grace for about three days. She was fussy, really unlike herself. I thought it was growing pains. I found out later she’d had an ear infection.”

  “Oh no,” Holly said, her eyes widening. “Did she have a fever?”

  “Hell if I know,” Wyatt said. “Not that I ever noticed. But the point is, these kids don’t come with manuals, yet it’s amazing how many babies and parents survive. So will you and Mason.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence,” she said with a grateful smile. “Here’s something else I didn’t fully appreciate—Mason requires a lot of attention.”

  Wyatt chuckled. He could hardly watch a football game when he had Grace. Or rather, he could, but he was always a little surprised by the carnage he found when the game was over. He never did figure out how she’d managed to pull the carpet up in the hotel where they were staying. “Yep. If you don’t keep an eye on ’em, it’s like turning your back on a hurricane.”

  “Exactly!” Holly said, laughing.

  “But you seem to be weathering the storm.”

  “Yes, shockingly, I am.” She looked across the yard to Mason and her smile deepened. “Funny how they can get under your skin, isn’t it? One happy gurgle, one smile, and I melt.”

  Wyatt knew the feeling. He had no doubt Gracie would have him completely wrapped around her finger when she grew up.

  “Mind if I ask what’s going to happen with Mason?” he asked curiously.

  “Happen?” She was sitting with her chin propped on the palm of her hand, her legs crossed, watching the kids.

  “I mean, are you going to keep him?”

  The question clearly flustered her. “Oh,” she said, and abruptly straightened up. “No. I mean … Hannah will be back. Sooner or later, she will be back.”

  “You don’t sound so certain of that,” he said.

  She blinked. She worried the end of her belt again, the frown still on her brow. “I honestly don’t know what is going to happen,” she said. “I still don’t know how my sister and I got to this point. It’s all so surreal.”

  “Was she always …” He tried to think of an inoffensive word. “Irresponsible?”

  “God, no, the opposite. Valedictorian. She was the one who has always taken care of everything. She was the one who took care of my mother when she was terminal. She was the last person who would dump her baby and drink herself into … rehab.” She glanced away, avoiding his gaze.

  That was a surprise. He’d guessed a flake, an affair. “Is that what happened?”

  Holly nodded. “Mason’s father told me, that she’s in rehab. And I …” Whatever she was going to say, she seemed to change her mind. She pushed her hair from her eyes and smiled at him. “And it looks like I brought all the family’s dirty laundry to air,” she said with a sheepish smile. “Do you have brothers or sisters?”

  “No,” he said, shaking his head. “I’m an only child.”

  “Ah,” she said. “Well … I never in my wildest dreams thought my sister could do something like this, and I am having a hard time accepting that she has. But in the meantime, I’m digging having the little guy around. And now that I’ve figured out how to squeeze work in, it’s much less stressful.”

  “What is your work?” he asked curiously.

  “Well … I’m a songwriter.”

  She said it almost as if she were apologizing for it. He’d always had a great appreciation for people with God-given talents, like writers and artists and musicians. He had nothing like that in him; in fact, he left most of the business writing to Linda Gail, having suffered through a period of inferiority after she told him one afternoon that he was using too many split infinitives. “Just do it yourself, then,” he’d said gruffly, rather than admit he didn’t know what the hell she was talking about.

  To Holly he said, “That’s a very cool occupation. Good for you.”

  “Thanks! Most people seem to think it’s an expensive hobby,” she said with a flick of her wrist.

  “A hobby? Do you make a living at it?”

  “Yes,” she said, sounding more confident. “I’m not making a huge living, obviously, but it’s enough for me, and it’s starting to get better.”

  “Then I’d say it’s more than a hobby.”

  Holly smiled gratefully at him, and it made Wyatt feel a little tingly inside. He took another swig of beer. He supposed he’d been out here on the ranch so long that he’d forgotten what it felt like to have an attractive woman smile at him. Macy didn’t count. He got a different kind of feeling when she smiled at him, and it wasn’t good. But Holly’s smile felt nice.

  “Right now I’m contracted to write three songs for Quincy Crowe. He’s an artist whose star is rising.”

  Wyatt’s beer froze halfway to his mouth. “Quincy Crowe?” He knew Quincy Crowe. They played his music on the one radio station he could pick up out here. “I know who that is.”

  Holly’s pretty green eyes widened with surprise. “You do?” She eagerly leaned over the arm of her chair. “Are you kidding? He’s just starting out, so not a lot of people know about him. You’ve heard him?”

  “Yeah—they play him on KASE. I like that kid. I like his style.”

  “Me too!” she exclaimed, as if they’d just discovered they were the only two people in Texas who liked brussels sprouts. “A music publisher in Austin thought we’d be a good fit and put the deal together. I’m co-writing three songs with him.”

  Wyatt’s curiosity was definitely piqued. “That sounds like a whole lot more than a hobby. And it sounds like a helluva a good time. How’s that going?”

  “It was going great,” Holly said, and looked at Mason.

  Wyatt did too. Mason had tipped the flowerpot over, and Gracie was putting rocks on top of it.

  “I love that kid to pieces,” she said, “but Mason makes it really hard to write. It is getting better, though, especially now that we are out here. Like I said, I’ve learned how to work around him.”

  “Play something,” Wyatt said.

  She laughed and blushed appealingly. “No way,” she said, and helped herself to a cookie. He watched her take a bite. “Ooh, these are my best yet,” she said with a wink, and offered him one.

  Wyatt took the cookie. “Come on,” he urged her. “I’d love to hear your music.”

  “Nope. I have a rule—I don’t share my work until the song is done. Or if I have one too many beers.” She laughed again and took another bite of the cookie. “Anyway, I’m a songwriter, not a singer. You should thank me, really, because my singing is painful.”

  “Well, then you leave me no other choice. I’ll have to go for too many beers.” He winked at her and took a bite of the cookie. Damn, but the woman made a good cookie.

  Holly laughingly waved him off. “Don’t even think of trying. I’m an old pro at dealing with men and beer,” she said. “You can’t write music and hang out in live-music venues and not be.”

 
Holly was a very attractive woman with a warm, inviting smile. That and a beer was all a guy needed. It was damn sure all he’d need. And look at that, he was holding a beer. “Do you know any other musicians in Austin?”

  “Quite a few. I sat in with Patty Griffin once,” she said, and proceeded to rattle off the names of some of the biggest names in country and folk music around Austin. She’d played with Patty Griffin. The Court Yard Hounds had bought and recorded one of her songs. She’d collaborated with Guy Clark, Bob Schneider, and Kelly Willis. She seemed very connected to the Austin music scene.

  “It must be hard to be out here and away from all that,” he remarked.

  “It is. But it’s been really nice having some time to myself and learning new things. Like how to make chocolate chip cookies. Is it just me, or are they really good?”

  “They’re really good,” he confirmed. “Do you ever hear your songs played?”

  “Yes,” she said proudly. “A couple of them.”

  Wyatt was fascinated by that. It was an experience so far beyond him. “Tell me,” he said. “Tell me how you write a song and then hear it performed. It must be a rush.”

  “Oh, wow, it is.” She sighed up to the sky. “It’s amazing. Incredible. For me, a song starts when I hear a phrase or a few words in my head that spark the idea. And then the melody follows,” she said, fluttering her fingers. “For a few days the pieces of the melody come to me, and it all kind of steeps. Then I start playing around on the piano or the guitar, trying different chords, different keys, different cadences, and sooner or later I have a song.” She looked at him. “But when I hear it performed by a band, it’s amazing. I hear all those parts, and little pieces come together, and I can almost feel it, because it’s part of me.” She smiled. “It’s magical. But it’s hard to explain.”

  Wyatt held her gaze. He could feel himself smiling too. “I think you explained it pretty well.” He was utterly beguiled. He hadn’t even realized how much time had passed until Mason interrupted them with a wail.

  Mason was on his bottom, and Gracie had the flowerpot. Holly jumped up from her seat and hurried over to Mason. By the time she reached him, Milo was there, too, licking the tears from his face, which only made him cry harder.

  “Dee-eeee!” Grace sang, and gave Holly a rock.

  “Thank you,” Holly said, and stuffed the rock into her jeans as she picked Mason up. She kissed his cheek, held him tightly, caressed his back. “Are you all right, buddy?” she cooed.

  “I’ve got something for Mason,” Wyatt said, and put down his beer. He went to his shed, returning with a rusted old toy lawn mower. He set it down before Mason, wrapped Mason’s hands around the handle, and gave him a push. Mason was off and walking around the yard, delighted with it. “Be be!” he cried as he went.

  Grace’s gaze was riveted on Mason. She began to run toward him. Wyatt intercepted her, catching her around the waist and lifting her up onto his shoulder. “Let Mason have it, sweetheart.” Grace was unhappy with the change in direction and cried. Wyatt picked up a few rocks. “Look here,” he said, and put one in Grace’s hand.

  Just like that, all was right in his baby’s world. She chattered as she handed him a rock. Then another. And another and another, and Wyatt was reminded again that there was nothing in the world that made him feel quite like Grace did. She was the one thing he’d gotten right in his life.

  They played with the kids like that for a while, Wyatt allowing Grace to push rocks into his pockets and Holly darting around to remove obstacles from Mason’s path before he plowed into them, until Holly announced that a diaper change was needed.

  “This way,” Wyatt said. He led her into the house and back to the room he and Milo shared. There wasn’t much there but windows on three walls, his bed, and a dog bed in the corner on the hardwood floor. He’d covered his bed with a quilt he’d found in the Arbolago Hills house that he thought had once belonged to his mother. There was a nightstand with a book of crossword puzzles and a lamp. He didn’t have an alarm clock; his body woke with the sun’s first light.

  Holly paused as she crossed the threshold with Mason and the diaper bag. “On the bed?” she asked, and at his nod she moved ahead and made quick work of changing his diaper.

  “You look like an old pro,” he said as he kept Grace from helping.

  Holly laughed. “Necessity is the mother of mothering.” She tickled Mason’s belly, and Wyatt felt a strange little twinge in his heart. He knew the emotion on Holly’s face, because it was the same thing he felt when he looked at Grace.

  “It takes a remarkable person to take in a child,” he said.

  “I’m not remarkable,” Holly replied as she buttoned Mason’s pants. “It’s not like I wanted him—I didn’t want him. I didn’t want to take care of him; I didn’t know how to take care of him. I was shocked, I was furious, and I felt trapped. No, it wasn’t remarkable, Wyatt. I just had no choice. I didn’t know how to get out of it.”

  “You had a choice,” Wyatt pointed out. “You could have handed him over to authorities or to another relative.”

  She shrugged. “I wasn’t going to send my nephew into foster care. And we don’t really have any other relatives. Believe me, I racked my brain trying to think of one. So, just like that, in the space of an hour, my whole life was turned on its head.” She looked at him. “I felt cheated, if you want to know the truth. I cried. I wanted out. I even went to Loren’s office—”

  “Loren?”

  “Mason’s father. I went to his office and made a huge scene,” she said, throwing her arms wide, and groaned to the ceiling. “I guess I thought histrionics would free me of the responsibility.”

  “Wait … you spoke to his father, and he didn’t take Mason?”

  Holly snorted. “No. He was on his way to Costa Rica. Can’t disrupt work for a little thing like his son.”

  Wyatt was astounded by that. He couldn’t imagine any circumstance in which his work would come before Grace.

  “I was trying to avoid the responsibility,” she said, as if it had been her responsibility to begin with. “I always do that. Like the homestead … Do you know that my mom has been gone six months, and I haven’t done anything about the will? But you know what? Sitting in that conference room, when I realized just how incredibly selfish Loren is, I couldn’t get Mason away from him fast enough. I had visions of Mason being totally neglected. But it wasn’t until that very moment that I could agree to even consider disrupting my life to save him.”

  “He wasn’t your responsibility to save, Holly. You shouldn’t have had to disrupt your life.”

  “Maybe,” she said, nodding. “But that baby was in crisis and I was thinking of me. So … don’t say I’m remarkable.” She self-consciously pushed her hair behind her ear.

  Wyatt smiled. He lifted his hands. “All right. You are officially unremarkable,” he declared, and Holly grinned.

  But that didn’t keep him from thinking it.

  They went back outside and fed the kids juice and grapes. When they were refueled, Wyatt brought out the big, round, brightly colored balls he’d bought for ninety-nine cents apiece at the dollar store in Cedar Springs and threw them out on the lawn. “There is nothing little kids like better,” he said, and like puppies to kibble, Mason and Grace exclaimed with delight and tottered after the balls.

  “Wow,” Holly said with a shake of her head as she watched Mason pick up a ball and fall with it. “What I don’t know about babies is astounding. I thought grapes would choke them. And these balls? Genius, Wyatt.”

  He chuckled. “It comes with time,” he said. “I had nine months to get ready for Grace’s arrival, and fourteen months to figure out what she likes. You’ll start to know these things too. You want another beer?”

  She looked up at a clear blue sky. “Yes … but I think we should go. It’s time for his nap.”

  “He can nap here,” Wyatt suggested quickly, surprising himself. He was having a great afternoon and he did not
want her to leave. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d enjoyed the company of a woman, just hanging out with a woman. Talking. He guessed the last time he’d been this comfortable was with Macy.

  “I don’t want to impose any more than I have,” Holly said. “I practically twisted your arm for this play date as it is.”

  “No you didn’t. The opportunity presented itself,” he lied. “We’ll put them down for a nap together.”

  Holly grinned. “You talked me into it.”

  Together they barricaded the kids with pillows on Wyatt’s bed, staying around long enough to assure themselves the kids would sleep. “I’ll grab a couple of beers,” Wyatt said softly as Holly pulled the door of his room partially closed.

  He fetched the two beers and put them on the counter, and through the window saw Holly standing on the patio, her weight on one hip, her reddish-blond hair glistening in the late-afternoon light. She was talking on her cell phone.

  She was pretty. Not just pretty, but really pretty. Of course, he’d noticed her good looks the first time he’d ever seen her, but today she was even more attractive to him. It was her smile, her mannerisms, her laugh, the shine in her eyes—full of warmth and genuine earnestness.

  Wyatt liked Holly Fisher. A lot. The thought gave him one of those strange little electric shivers that made him feel rusty. He hadn’t liked being around anyone—male or female—in a long time. He’d spent the last two years merely tolerating people and hadn’t wanted any complications in his life. He’d wanted to be left alone. He’d especially wanted women to leave him alone.

  Wyatt had been, as he liked to think of it, “off” women. Yes, there had been that afternoon with Samantha Delaney, the woman who ran Daisy’s Saddle-brew Coffee Shop. She’d been Macy’s best friend, and he guessed he and Sam had both wanted to hurt Macy for all that had happened that summer. That had been his first and last taste of revenge sex. It had been awful, too. Worst sex he’d ever had. He hadn’t felt avenged; he’d felt cheap and low when Macy had discovered them in bed together.

  After Sam there had been Adelita in Arizona. He’d met Adelita in a bar, of course, and had followed all the clichés down to the dotting of the i. He’d been a little wasted and a lot turned on by her shiny black hair and soulful brown eyes. Somehow they’d ended up in her dingy apartment under a window AC in her bed. Wyatt had spent a week there, feeding his body physically and emotionally. He’d even fantasized for a couple of days that he and Adelita would get an Airstream and head out, destination unknown. But he didn’t speak Spanish, and English wasn’t exactly her first language. And then, mid-week, he’d figured out the little girl who showed up with some woman was actually Adelita’s daughter. He’d finally awakened from that fantasy and moved on.