“Guess you’re a little too old for those Pageant Girl dolls,” Dad said, taking the seat beside me on the sofa, “but I saw it on eBay and couldn’t resist. That’s the kind you had when you were a kid, right? I remember you could draw on the overalls, then throw them in the washing machine and start over....”
His voice trailed, probably because I was showing no reaction to his gift other than a speechless stare.
“Well, anyway—don’t feel obligated to keep it. I’m not even sure if you kept your old one, I just knew from Danny all your stuff got wiped out in that fire, so...I don’t know.” He shrugged, our shoulders touching through our sweaters. “Just saw it and thought of you.”
There were millions of words I could have said in that moment. I knew the ones that would make him happiest, and complete this Rockwellian Christmas perfectly: I love you, I forgive you. I could have rambled on about how much I loved the gift, or how impressed I was that he’d remembered. Hell, I could have filled twenty minutes with some spirited discussion about eBay finds, if I really wanted to.
“Did you know,” I said, picking up the pink marker and removing the cap, “that I wanted to be an artist, when I was younger?”
Dad sat back a little, his smile subdued. “No, I didn’t know that.”
I nodded and smelled the marker, the almost sour scent of the ink just how I remembered, after all this time. He watched me doodle a heart in the center pocket of Kiki’s overalls. “I got into a special art program for middle school, but it was too expensive. So I just gave it up, I guess.” I paused, capped the marker, and tapped it on the edge of the box. “But it’s weird—it still kind of...followed me.”
“Yeah?” Dad took the purple marker and drew a dog next to my heart. “How so?”
“Like...like at work. My favorite thing about making drinks is inventing new ones, and obviously they have to taste good—but what I like best is getting them to look a specific way. The layering, the colors...they have to have a certain, like, aesthetic about them. I’m the same way with rooms and how furniture is placed. That’s what art was always about, for me: making things different, until they just...felt right.”
“Huh.” He handed the marker back and watched me swipe a series of stripes down one pant leg. “I used to help your grandpa paint the silo on our farm every year. Remember those pictures I showed you?”
I nodded. My grandfather’s farm was semi-famous in Indiana for its corn maze and hay bale obstacle course, open every autumn for tourists to try their skills. At the front of the property stood a silo, painted differently each year. The pictures I’d seen included an ear of corn, a rocket ship, and a stack of jack-o’-lanterns. “I didn’t know you helped him do that. I figured he’d hired someone.”
“Nope. All us. He’d wake me up at dawn, we’d sketch out our design...then we’d get our paint at the hardware store and get to work. He’d take the top half and rappel down while he worked, top to middle. I’d start at the bottom and use the ladder to reach as high as I could, until he’d come down and meet me the rest of the way.”
“Can’t believe you guys went to all that effort, every single year.”
“Didn’t feel like effort. That’s what it’s like, doing something you love. And like you said, it follows you—my favorite jobs were always painting houses, even though they didn’t pay as much. It just felt right.” Dad smiled and ran his hand over his beard. With his silver-white hair and whiskers, reading glasses on the end of his nose, he looked kind of like Santa. It made me laugh to myself.
“I think,” he went on, after a moment, “we can’t really lose those kind of things. Once you love something, truly love it...it keeps on finding you. One way or another.”
I looked back at Kiki. She already felt like mine, no different from the one I’d carried with me as a child.
“Yeah.” I fit the lid back into place and sat back. Our shoulders touched again. “I think you’re right.”
* * *
“Two minutes. You coming over here, or what?”
I sit up on the poncho and give Levi a withering look. “Do we have to stand so close to the edge?”
“Scared?” he smirks, pulling off both gloves again and stuffing them in his pocket. “Too late to back out now. You wanted to see the lighting ceremony without crowds. You wanted ‘good’ snow, instead of the sludge everyone’s walking through down there.” He holds out his arms, like he’s presenting me with some magnificent prize. “I delivered.”
“I’m not scared.” I kick the snow off my boots as I join him, thoughts of last Christmas continuing in my head. It’s hard to believe that was almost an entire year ago.
Dad and I still haven’t talked through everything, and there are days my anger flares all over again, just because it can. But I’ve made more dinners and visits than I’ve skipped. Mom still can’t feed herself or brush her own teeth—Dad’s original goals for her first anniversary out of the nursing home—but she can say short phrases and write slightly longer ones, enough to tell us when she needs water or doesn’t feel well. Enough to say she loves us.
From the outside, all of it probably doesn’t look like much, especially when you compare it to how far we still have to go.
But when you look at where we started, it looks impressive. It’s progress.
“Deep in thought?” Levi asks, elbowing me. “You look distracted.”
I blink and bring myself to this Christmas: him, the snow, the wind. “Just thinking about the holiday, I guess.” I pause. “Would you...I don’t know, want to come with me this time? To my dad’s?”
He looks kind of shocked, but pleased. “I’d love to. That’d be fun, spending a holiday with them. I mean, the normal visits and dinners are fun too, it’s just...it feels like a big step. You asking me.”
“It is,” I confess, laughing. I don’t know why I haven’t invited him to any holidays at my dad’s place until now, even though I’ve gone to Brooks and Fairfield celebrations with him for a while. I guess, for whatever reason, I just needed more time.
His watch beeps. “Fifteen seconds,” he tells me. “Here, stand on this spot. You can see everything from here.”
On the ground below, the crowds stares at the giant tree in the Acre’s courtyard, breaths held for the lights to ignite. Someone starts a countdown from ten. All those voices together, drifting up here from the snow and slush, makes me think of New Year’s Eve: that feeling of starting over, when anything is possible.
“...three...”
“Levi,” I whisper, waving my hand behind me, searching for his. “Come on, you’ll miss it!”
“...two...”
“Levi!” My head turns, but my eyes stay riveted on the tree. I don’t want to miss it, either.
“...one!”
Cheers erupt as the tree blinks to life. It’s a flash of warm, white light, illuminating every face at once. The wicker animals and smaller trees flash on, one-by-one around the courtyard. A new cheer goes up every time more lights appear.
Finally, the Acre itself is all that’s left. The crowd claps politely for it, but almost everyone is still distracted by the tree. It is the star of the show, after all. So it feels like I’m the only one watching when the lights along the face of the hotel blink on and steady themselves underneath us. For once, I’m not afraid to look down.
“You were right,” I call to Levi over the wind. The crowds shifts; some wander to the tree for selfies and family photos, while others trek into the Acre for free hot chocolate and warm air. “This is a million-dollar view.”
He doesn’t answer.
I turn, ready to shout his name across the rooftop—but he’s right in front of me.
Down on one knee.
“Oh, my God.” Instinctively, I back up. Levi lunges forward with his free hand and grabs my coat.
“Whoa, easy. We’re not exactly on the ground floor, remember?”
I look behind me and see the dizzying swirl of lights below, suddenly aware of how close
I am to the wall. “Shit,” I exhale, then shakily lower myself to the snow in front of him. When I turn back, he’s grinning.
“You good?”
I laugh, breathless. “Yeah.”
His fingers comb the snow between us. “I, uh...I kind of dropped it. Saving your life and all.”
“Sorry.” Tears are already on my lashes, feeling like ice crystals when I blink them away to help him look. “Wait, I think I found it.” I bite the fabric of my glove, pull it off, and brush the snow between his shoes.
“Levi....” My chest aches in the winter air; I can’t catch my breath. I turn the ring and study it.
“Black gold band,” he explains quietly, “and sapphires, in your favorite shade of blue. I thought the combination suited you pretty well. And it matches your leather jackets.” For a second, he gets serious. “Do you hate it? Juliet’s sisters helped me shop, and they both said you’d hate it. And Juliet was uselessly diplomatic.”
I laugh again and sniff. “I love it.”
“I can get you something else, if you want. Something more…traditional.”
“No.” I hold the ring a little higher, so the sapphires catch the moonlight. They’re the same color as the wind chimes, my mother’s old perfume bottles, and the front door of my father’s house.
As for the black gold—let’s be honest. It fits me like a glove.
Levi stretches out his palm. “May I?”
“Oh. Right.” I drop it into his hand. “You have to actually ask me.”
“Formalities.” With painstaking caution, he sets it up between his fingers and takes a breath, meeting my eyes.
“When I first met you…I couldn’t imagine I’d be in front of you three years later with a ring in my hand. To be honest, I didn’t think I’d ever buy another ring again, for anyone.”
He blinks hard and sniffs, which is enough to reprise my tears. I smile through it and wipe them away, determined to see his face.
I want this memory etched into my brain for the rest of my life: Levi Fairfield with the most punk engagement ring I’ve ever seen, close to tears on a snowy rooftop. It’s not the proposal most girls dream of, in their days of fairytale obsession and love of all things glittery. But it’s exactly what I wanted, from the second I saw it beginning in front of me.
“Everything I’ve done in my life,” he says, “I thought it wasn’t good enough, if it wasn’t perfect. The last few years have shown me that’s impossible.”
He wets his lips. They shine in the lights from the buildings around us.
“So I’m not going to promise you a perfect marriage, or a perfect life together. But I can promise you I’ll never stop trying to be the best husband that I can be. Because I already know you’ll be the best wife I could possibly have.” He pauses, eyes dancing between mine. “We aren’t perfect. But I think we’re perfect for each other.”
I clear my eyes again and nod, smile shaking as he takes my hand in his. For some reason, even though they were just numb down to the bone, my fingers feel every one of his.
“Mara...will you marry me?”
“Yes,” I whisper, before he’s even finished his question.
The ring glitters on my finger as he glides it into place and rights it, brushing the snow from the stones. “Glad it fits,” he says. “I stole about seven of your rings hoping I’d find the right size.”
“So that’s where they all went.”
We laugh as he pulls me in for a kiss. The brush of his lips, just as cold as mine, warms my skin until I can’t feel the cold at all. I forget about the snow and wind, the lights so far below us—even the ring on my finger. I’m only aware of this moment: this new memory forming right in front of me, ready to replace so many others.
“Sure you won’t mind waking up to this same old face every morning?” he asks, when the chill finally catches up to us and we’re shivering our way down the stairwell, hand in hand.
I halt and pull him back to me. My fingers comb the snow away from his hair, then push it back from his face. I can’t imagine waking up to anything else.
“Positive,” I tell him, before kissing him again.
Also by Piper Lennox
The Fairfields
Darling, All at Once
Honey, When It Ends
Baby, Be My Last (Coming Soon)
* * *
Love in Kona
Pull Me Under | Crash Around Me | When We Break
* * *
Standalones
All Mine | Teach Me | The Road to You
It’s Complicated: A Novella (Subscriber Exclusive)
* * *
Turn the page for a preview of Piper’s upcoming novel,
Baby, Be My Last
(The Fairfields, Book 3)
Sneak Peek
Baby, Be My Last
Here’s what I know about the Fairfields.
They’re the oldest money in our state. Maybe not the richest anymore; Timothy, Sr. didn’t exactly cotton to new technology, and trained his son to do the same. That’s probably why Monroe Street Station is one of the last family-owned train stations in America. Old Tim just can’t let the dinosaur die, apparently.
In addition to the train station, they own the famous Acre Hotel. Once again, it’s not the finest establishment you’ll find—just that combination of grand and old you can’t find anywhere else. Movie stars stay there in secret rooms. Or so I’ve been told.
Fairfield Industries is the parent company of twenty others, including my employer, Everyoung Ice Cream. It sounds like a cute old lady started it in her kitchen, right?
She didn’t. No old lady was involved at all. Everyoung is the brainchild of ad execs in the 1950s, including that wholesome logo that looks like something off a homemade jam label.
I know the Fairfields live at the Fairfield Estate, in the city right next to my hometown. Well, maybe not right next to it—an hour. Two, if you take the back roads and don’t hit any deer.
I know Caitlin-Anne Fairfield is a spoiled, entitled bitch. Her mom is that classic, WASP-y Old Virginian type. The kind of woman who says “bless your heart” before she tears down your neighborhood, but puts up a youth center in its place.
I know Timothy Fairfield, Jr., is my father.
The Fairfields are a legacy. If you have their blood anywhere in you, it’ll open doors you didn’t even know existed. Not as incredible as being a Kennedy, but better than being no one.
Growing up, I wanted to learn everything I could about the Fairfields. My ears pricked up for every rumor, every news story. I memorized Tim’s face in business magazines.
But that was it. I knew his face, I knew the rumors. I knew a few fuzzy memories I wasn’t even sure were real. But I didn’t know him.
“He abandoned us,” my mother spat, whenever I dared ask about him. “What more do you need to know?”
“I just...want to know what he was like.”
“He abandoned you.” She’d throw down whatever was in her hands. Usually a sponge into the sink, but sometimes a whole basket of laundry onto the floor, if she was feeling dramatic. “That doesn’t tell you what kind of man he was?”
Once I asked her, if she hated him so much, why she gave me his last name.
“Baby, listen.” The stench of her hairspray wrapped around me like a boa constrictor as she kneeled in front of me, hands on my shoulders. “I hate the Fairfields much as you do. But you’ve got that blue blood and I’d be a fool not to help you take advantage of it. Being a Fairfield…your life will be so much easier. Trust me.”
It didn’t make me feel better. I hated our names being different. I hated people asking if I was related to “the” Fairfields. If I said no, they ignored me like I’d suddenly turned into dust, right at their feet. If I said yes, they treated me like a liar: Fairfields didn’t live in the sticks.
When I turned fourteen, I started going by McIntyre, Mom’s maiden. Or I tried to, anyway.
My first job application was to the new s
ports equipment store in Hillford. It was a long drive, but I was sick of Filigree—tired of flat, brown farmland and everyone talking about corn and cows. Hillford was tiny, but at least it had a pulse.
They turned me down.
Then I tried something. Printed out a new application.
Wrote “Fairfield” in the box for my last name.
I got the job that same day, the minute I brought in my application to the hiring manager and shook his hand.
“Fairfield?” He looked from the application to me like comparing a police artist sketch to the real deal. “That family that owns the Acre Hotel?”
“Yes, sir.” I straightened my shoulders and reminded myself to be confident; that’s what the internet said was key to getting jobs. “Timothy Fairfield is my father.”
The guy’s laugh was coated in phlegm. “Your daddy’s Tim Fairfield. Okay.” He studied me a minute. “Why don’t you live in the city with him, then? In that great big mansion he’s got?”
I took a breath. “He abandoned me.”
Little by little, his face softened, or as much as a face tanned in sixty southern summers could. “That so.”
My throat was dry. I nodded.
“Well, that’s a shame.” His desk creaked like it might break when he leaned against it, my application crinkling as he folded his arms. “You know, I’ve heard rumors Tim had kids he kept secret. I suppose it’s not anything you’d want to lie about.”
Vehemently, I shook my head.
“Will say one thing for those Fairfields,” he added. “They work hard, what I can tell. You fit that category?”
“Yes—yes, I work really hard, sir. I can come in every day after school. I mean, it takes me a while, because I’m on my bike, but—”
“Five to eight on weeknights, noon to eight on Saturdays. We close Sundays.” Smoothly, his hand slid into the air between us. “Eight an hour.”
My breath caught in my throat. Eight an hour, twenty-three hours a week: back then, it sounded like a goldmine.
I shook his hand. “Thank you, sir. Thank you so much.”
Honey, When It Ends: The Fairfields | Book Two Page 23