Page 8 of Daddy's Little Christmas

“I could go,” I said out loud.

The words surprised me enough that I looked around, half-expecting to see someone there. The living room was as empty as always.

I tried the thought on again, more carefully.

I could go.

Not move or uproot my entire life overnight. Just… spend a couple of weeks. See what it felt like to breathe in a place like that.

My heart did a strange, unsteady little skip.

I flipped back to the article and found a sidebar I’d skimmed past the first time: “Planning Your Visit to Winterhaven.” It wasn’ta travel brochure—Winterhaven wasn’t that kind of town—but someone had put together a list of local businesses.

An artisan bakery.

A small historical society.

The Hearthstone Inn—family-run since 1979.

Holly & Pine.

Maybe that was a specialty shop. Or a place that sold soaps and perfumes.

One of the tabs I opened was a town events page. Holiday markets. And something called the Winter Lantern Walk—scheduled for early January, long after the tourists cleared out.

A whole community walking the snowy streets with hand-lit lanterns. It looked… peaceful. Like the kind of quiet I hadn’t felt in years.

Photos showed a low, rambling building with a deep front porch and warm light spilling from the windows. Snow piled along the railings. Lanterns hanging from the beams.

Something in my chest clicked.

I closed the tab, stood up, paced my small living room, then went into the kitchen and got a soda from the fridge.

By the time I came back, the thought hadn’t gone away.

It had rooted itself, quiet and stubborn.

*****

I didn’t leave the next day.

Real life didn’t work like that, no matter how dramatic my heart wanted to be.

Instead, the next week became a series of small, practical decisions that stacked on top of each other until they looked suspiciously like a plan.

I checked my lease. Six more months, but nothing in it said I had to be there every night. My landlord just needed a way to reach me in case of an emergency. So, I would confirm my email, give him the inn’s number once I’d finally booked it, and try not to overthink how permanent that felt.

At night, I kept going back to the article. Re-reading pieces of Arthur and Henry’s story, staring too long at their photograph.

Two men who had no reason to believe the world would ever be gentle with them—and built something gentle anyway.

The more I read, the more a quiet, almost guilty longing took shape.

I wanted to stand in the place they chose. I wanted to know what it felt like to be somewhere that existed because two men once refused to be ashamed of loving each other.

Two weeks in Winterhaven, I told myself. I could work from there. I could leave earlier if I hated it.

I hit Confirm Booking on The Hearthstone Inn before I could talk myself out of it.