A Light at Winter’s End

by Julia London

  Holly kept busy with work. Quincy was in the recording studio, and she was working on “A Light at Winter’s End.” It was different from the country swing tunes she usually penned, but Holly liked it. She talked to Quincy about meeting his manager, and Quincy was more than happy to facilitate that. Holly kept the plane ticket to Nashville on her dresser and looked at it every day.

  She kept busy, but every waking moment she thought about Wyatt. She wondered what he was doing, if he was sad, or if he was, in hindsight, relieved. She expected to hear his truck on the road, but he did not come. She wrote Wyatt a long letter explaining, as best she could, why she needed to take a little time. It sounded as lame on paper as it had when she’d said it aloud, and she didn’t send it.

  She kept that on her dresser too.

  On Thursday morning she heard the sound of a truck and caught her breath. She jumped up from the piano and ran out onto the porch. It was Wyatt’s old pickup barreling up the road, and Holly’s heart surged with relief. He was coming to be understanding once more. He was going to let her take her break and tell her that he would be waiting for her. He was going to forgive her and promise her everything was okay.

  But it was Jesse Wheeler who got out of the truck and made his way up the walk. “Hey, there, Hollyhocks,” he said cheerfully.

  “Hi, Jesse. You’re alone?” she asked, peering past him to the truck.

  “Yep. Just me and my good mood,” Jesse said. “Wyatt’s stomping around like an old bull this morning. I came to get a tiller. He said he left it over here in your barn.”

  “Oh. Sure.” Holly walked with Jesse to the barn.

  “World treating you right?” Jesse asked, throwing his arm around her shoulders and squeezing tight for a moment.

  “Yes. You?”

  “Lucky to be here,” he said, and opened the barn door. It had been used as storage for what seemed like centuries. There was the Oldsmobile her father had never wanted to part with. Junk had been piled on top of it—clothes and coffee cans that her mother had always saved, and boxes of papers and odds and ends. Beside the car were old dining room chairs that no one wanted, and plastic crates full of generations of a family’s belongings. Holly couldn’t imagine what they’d do with all this stuff when Wyatt bought the place. She’d asked Jillian to negotiate the sale.

  “Oooh, I’d be delighted.” Jillian had said. “I always did enjoy wrangling with Wyatt.”

  “There it is,” Jesse said, pointing to the tiller. He pulled it out, tipped it back on its wheels, and started pushing it to the truck.

  “So, what are you guys doing today?” Holly asked, skipping to keep up with Jesse.

  “You guys? You mean me and Attila the Hun? He’s going to till a garden and I’m going to go down and cut some brush from that hot spring on the west end.” He glanced at Holly. “Maybe you two can do some skinny-dipping after I’ve gone home. Or maybe we could all—”

  “Jesse.”

  He laughed. “So, are you and the Mason Jar coming over later?”

  Clearly, Jesse had no idea that she had pushed Wyatt away. That was just like Wyatt, to keep everything close. “Ah … not today,” she said, her step slowing. “My sister is here.”

  “Oh, yeah?” Is she as pretty as you?”

  “Prettier.” Holly watched him load the tiller into the truck.

  “Well, then, tell her I have a natural spring I’d like to show her.” He closed the tailgate and winked at Holly. “That is, if you’re going to stick with Sourpuss.”

  Holly smiled. “See you, Jesse.”

  “Later,” he said, and climbed in the truck, honking as he drove away.

  Nothing. Wyatt had said nothing. There was nothing.

  Holly turned back to the house and was surprised to see Hannah standing on the porch, watching. “Seriously, Holly, are you going to let him go?”

  Holly frowned and started up the steps. “I am doing him a favor.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Hannah said. “He’s a wonderful man and obviously crazy about you.”

  “He was crazy about the little family we had. He was crazy about a fantasy, Hannah. And he still has his baby!” she exclaimed, and gasped with painful surprise when she uttered the words. She hadn’t even realized it …

  “Holly—”

  “I really don’t want to talk about it,” Holly said, and hurried past her sister and went inside.

  The sooner she went to Nashville, the better. She was making herself crazy.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Wyatt, I am just worried sick about you,” Linda Gail said on the phone. “I haven’t seen you in town for two weeks. Are you alive?”

  “What do you need, Linda Gail?”

  “Well, besides the usual signature on my paycheck, I need to know you are okay.”

  “I’m fine. Jillian Harper is going to call you about a sale. We’ve agreed on price and need to get it to closing.”

  “Jillian? What piece of property is that?”

  Wyatt suppressed a sigh. “A ranch. She’ll fill you in. Is there anything else?”

  “Nothing that a few manners wouldn’t cure,” Linda Gail said crisply, and hung up.

  Wyatt didn’t worry about Linda Gail’s snit—he had been no less and no more rude to her than he normally was. But Linda Gail sensed something was up, and she did not like to run into brick walls when she was ferreting out gossip.

  Jesse was another matter. It had taken a week or so, but he’d finally figured out that Wyatt and Holly weren’t seeing each other anymore.

  “Oh no,” he’d said, marching into the kitchen one morning. “No, no. Don’t tell me you blew it.”

  Wyatt didn’t have to ask what he was talking about. “Would you please go back outside and work for the money I pay you?”

  “Good God, Wyatt, I feel like I need to follow you around and supervise.” He started marching toward the door, but he stopped and pointed at Wyatt. “And she was perfect for you, you stubborn jackass.”

  Wyatt wouldn’t argue with that. But apparently, he wasn’t perfect for her. No, he was too understanding. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t, and it hurt like hell. It kept him up at night, made him impossible to live with during the day. He was beginning to wonder where he could go to hide from his pain now; he was running out of real estate. When his groceries began to run low, he even thought about living off the land. Pecans and wild berries seemed preferable to going into town and seeing the looks.

  Oh, he knew he’d be getting looks. Macy wondered why he hadn’t taken Grace to the Baby Bowl. Jillian asked some sly questions, such as whether or not he and Holly had discussed a price or terms. No, he’d said. Huh, Jillian said.

  But what really galled Wyatt was that Holly’s sister kept calling him. “Wyatt, please call me. I need to speak to you.”

  Well, he didn’t need to speak to her.

  “Wyatt, this is Hannah Drake. I would really appreciate it if you would call me back.”

  He was not interested. The only person he wanted to call him was Holly, and when she had in fact called, he’d had that asinine moment when he had decided she could just leave a message and wonder where the hell he was, like he wondered about her with every breath. He had let it roll to voice mail.

  “Hi, it’s Holly,” she said in her message. “I just wanted you to know that I am going to Nashville. Well. Okay.”

  Well. Okay. That about sealed the deal, he figured. There had been no invitation for him to go along. There was no apology, no hint that she wanted to see him. Wyatt had lost the most important person in the world for a second time, and the only way he could cope was to cover himself up with hard, physical labor and burrow deeper into his little ranch.

  His routine returned to normal. Up with the sun, check the Word of the Day and the sports scores, go and saddle Toby to ride around and look for something hard and punishing to do. Avoid Jesse. Avoid Linda Gail. Avoid himself, if he could figure out just how to do that.

  Wyatt didn’
t like to think. He didn’t like to analyze why he kept falling for impossible women. He would much rather ruminate on the possibility of being alone all his life, a burden on Grace in his old age. That was cheerier.

  After a few days, Hannah stopped calling. He assumed that was the end of that little drama. But one afternoon, big, heavy rain clouds drove him back to the house, and there Hannah was on his drive. Mason was running around and she was just standing there beside her car.

  “Wy-wy!” Mason said. “Wy-wy!” He pointed at Wyatt.

  Wyatt hadn’t realized until that moment just how badly he’d missed that little kid. He hauled him up and held him high overhead. “Little Buckaroo,” he said, bouncing him and smiling at Mason’s giggling. He put Mason on his hip and looked at Hannah. “Usually, when someone doesn’t return your calls, it’s an indication you shouldn’t drive all the way out to see them.”

  “Usually. But in this case I won’t take no for an answer,” she said, and smiled.

  “I’m going to help you out here, Hannah. There is nothing you can say to me that’s going to change anything. And since that is the case, you might as well save your breath and go home.”

  “I thought you were in love with Holly.”

  “Hey,” Wyatt said, his voice full of warning. He wasn’t about to let her lecture him or remind him how he felt.

  “Well, I did. Do you know she is leaving for Nashville?”

  “Yep. She left me a message.”

  “And?”

  “And what? She’s going to Nashville.”

  Hannah groaned skyward. “I swear to God, I have never known two more recalcitrant, stubborn people.”

  He didn’t need her to tell him that, either. “What do you want? If you came to tell me she’s leaving, I already know it. Go home.”

  Hannah sighed. Her shoulders sagged. “May I just tell you one thing?”

  “No.”

  “Our mother would not have won any Mother of the Year awards,” Hannah said, undaunted.

  Wyatt got the sense that this was going to take a little longer than he liked, and reluctantly put Mason down.

  “She was awful in a lot of ways,” Hannah continued. “The way she was awful to Holly was to belittle her. She made Holly believe that she was lazy, that she’d never amount to anything, and that she didn’t deserve good things to happen—like you, Wyatt. Deep down, Holly doesn’t believe she deserves a guy like you.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Sounds like someone’s been in therapy.”

  “Please don’t do that,” she said softly, and Wyatt instantly felt contrite. “I am very serious. Holly is very much in love with you. But she is trying to piece things together and she has convinced herself that she has done you and Grace both a favor by cutting you lose, and now she is leaving for Nashville, and I am afraid that she will lose the best thing that ever happened to her. So I have come to beg you—beg you, Wyatt—to take the high road here and go to her. Give her the opportunity to ask your forgiveness. Because she will do it, I know she will.”

  “It’s great that you have found some compassion for your sister,” Wyatt said. “But you aren’t her. I know what she said. And I have to take her at face value. If she wanted to apologize to me, if she wanted to try and make amends, she’d be standing here instead of you.”

  Hannah’s face fell. “You are making a huge mistake. Holly is great. She’s fun and creative and she … she is so caring. Much more caring than I could ever hope to be. And when she loves, she loves completely. But your feelings are hurt, so …” She shrugged and picked Mason up.

  “It’s a little bit more than that,” Wyatt snapped.

  Hannah’s eyes narrowed. “Oh, I’m sure that it is,” she said. “Your hurt is so much grander than hers, right?”

  Wyatt’s pulse was starting to race. “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said tightly. “Holly is the one who ended things, not me.”

  “Yes, and that was a really dumb thing that she did. But we all do dumb things—all of us. And all of us could really use someone who can forgive the dumb things and still love us.” She dipped into her car to put Mason in his car seat.

  Mason started to cry. Hannah stood up and looked at Wyatt. “I was really hoping you were that for Holly. Good-bye, Wyatt.” She got in her car and revved the engine.

  Wyatt stood on the drive long after she’d gone, wanting so badly to forgive Holly. But he really needed Holly to do the asking.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Two months later

  Holly stared at herself in the full-length mirror in the condo she rented in Nashville. She hardly recognized herself. She was wearing a sleek lavender satin dress, the hem mid-thigh, the décolletage cut very low. Quincy’s record label executives had hooked her up with a stylist for tonight, and they’d dressed her and done her hair and applied her makeup. Holly looked like a star in this dress, like someone who had a right to be in Nashville.

  The car they were sending for her would be here in thirty minutes.

  Tonight was the launch of Quincy’s album. But the single released ahead of the album—“A Light at Winter’s End”—had done amazingly well, hitting the Billboard charts and getting some phenomenal play time on radios around the country. Holly had made the melody a little more melancholy than had been her initial instinct, and Quincy had added texture to the song that had awed her. It was a runaway hit, and now the album looked like it was going to launch Quincy into stardom. To celebrate, the record label was hosting a big launch bash, and some of the biggest stars in Nashville would be in attendance.

  Everything was working out as Holly had always dreamed it would. She’d been in Nashville two months now and, thanks to that song, she was in demand. Artists were calling to find out what else she had. Quincy had made good on his promise that she would meet his manager, who had not only signed her but landed her a contract. She had actual work, and for really good money for the first time in her life. This was the moment she’d been waiting for all her life.

  She should be happy, but Holly felt empty. So dull.

  Holly glanced outside: The clouds were thickening, and the temperature was dropping, but it was spring. Winter had finally ended.

  Mason loved the Montessori school. Hannah sent videos of Mason every week. He was growing so fast, and he seemed, from all outward appearances, to be thriving. Holly had been able to get back only once since she’d left, and she missed Mason so much. He was a constant presence in her thoughts, but there was something comforting in knowing he was happy.

  Mason wasn’t the source of her emptiness. That was a deeper, broader hole that Wyatt had left in her. Especially tonight. He was the one who had believed in her talent, had given her the ticket to Nashville, and here she stood on the threshold of something big without him.

  How had that happened? How had she lost not only Mason but also the one man she had ever truly loved beyond measure? She thought of him often, dreamed about him, wondered what he was doing. She’d written him a long letter two or three weeks ago. I hope you are well. I think of Grace all the time. I wonder if she misses me or Mason.

  Saying good-bye to Wyatt meant saying good-bye to that little girl, and Holly ached with regret.

  I am so sorry for ending things like I did. I still don’t understand why I did it. I guess I wasn’t in my right mind, I was just so blinded by what was happening with Mason. But I am so sorry, and Wyatt, I’ve been missing you so much. So I’m telling you I need you. I love you. You once told me if I needed you in Nashville, you’d come. I need you in Nashville. I need you everywhere. Can you ever forgive me?

  She’d checked the mail every day, hoping for a response—anything, even a letter asking her not to contact him again—because at least then she’d know, she wouldn’t be wondering if there was still a chance.

  He had not written her back.

  “Girl, you screwed that up,” Quincy had said over coffee one day when she told him what she’d done.

  “Tell me
about it,” Holly had moaned. “What do I do?”

  Quincy had mulled it over. “Send him a plane ticket and a pass to the launch party.”

  Holly had thought about Wyatt, how he hated those sorts of things. “That’s not his style,” she’d said.

  Quincy had shrugged. “That’s the best idea I’ve got,” he’d said, and smiled sympathetically. “Buck up, Holly. You’re about to be a star. There’s plenty of fish in the Nashville sea, especially for you.”

  But Holly didn’t want any other fish. She wanted Wyatt.

  She’d kept what Quincy said in the back of her mind, however, and just last week, in a moment of desperation, she’d taken his advice and sent Wyatt the launch party pass.

  Quincy’s label is hosting a big launch party for his album and my song. Please come. I’d love for you to come. I’d think I’d died and gone to heaven if you came. I would tell you how much I love you and how sorry I am and how I promise to never flake out on you again. Please say you will come.

  There was no response. Holly had told herself she had to face up to it: She’d loved. She’d lost. She’d thought she couldn’t continue in the world she and Wyatt had created, and she’d been a fool for thinking that.

  Quincy had tried to hook her up with his bass player for tonight, but Holly had politely refused. She was going to the launch alone.

  At half past six, her phone rang. “Car service, Miss Fisher,” the man said. Holly picked up her beaded bag that matched her shoes, checked her reflection once more, and went downstairs.

  “Good evening Miss Fisher,” the suited gentleman said, and held open her car door.

  “Hello. Thank you,” she said, and climbed into the backseat of the Lincoln.

  When they reached the venue, she could hear music pulsing out the open doors. There was a red carpet; several country-western stars were posing for pictures. The driver helped Holly out, and she began walking up the carpet. How she wished Wyatt was here to see this! How she wished he was standing next to her, his hand on the small of her back, reminding her in a whisper that she was the reason this party was happening.