Page 43

Magic Tree House

Holland

M allory has her hands on her hips, and she’s staring up into the tree house Mack and I built with our dad.

“You really are trying to get me to break my neck tonight, aren’t you?”

“Come on. You’re one of the most athletic, coordinated people I know. You can easily get up there.”

She sets her jaw. “Alright. Where do I climb?”

“This is the best entry point.” I walk her around to the far side of the old tree house. “The stairs are a little rickety, but they still provide some decent foot holds.”

I shine the flashlight I brought on the best path for her to take, and she wedges her foot into a crevice and hoists herself up. I stand behind her as a spotter and watch as she deftly climbs the side of the tree. Mallory is all graceful lines and compact muscle.

“Holland, are you checking me out?” she calls over her shoulder.

“Umm…that depends on what you’ll do if I say yes.”

She huffs. “What are you afraid of?”

“Freaking you out,” I admit. “I’ve spent so long trying not to show you that I think you’re all around stunning.

Like, I’m a professional actor at this point.

I’m a little worried that if I tell you I’m checking you out and that I think you’re gorgeous, from every angle, it might make me seem like I’m coming on too strong.

I don’t want to do that. But I also don’t want to lie to you.

So yes, Mallory. I am definitely checking you out. ”

I hold my breath as she stares at me over her shoulder. Maybe that was too bold of me. Maybe a woman like her will think it’s uncouth that I’d admit to enjoying this view of her backside. Maybe—

“Well, if you’re going to be all sweet like that, you can keep looking.” She turns and scoots the rest of the way up the tree fort, disappearing inside.

I stand momentarily stunned. Did Mallory Walsh just give me permission to look at her? Like, look look? I think she might have, and my heart doesn’t know what to do with that information. It’s currently pinballing around my chest.

Mallory’s head reappears above me. She’s looking down at me, and her ponytail falls over her left shoulder. “The view up here is awesome. Are you coming?”

I stare up at her for an extra second, trying to memorize the sparkle I can make out in her eyes thanks to the moonlight and the glow of my flashlight.

It’s almost too much. If I don’t join her in the tree house right now, I might lose my nerve.

There’s no way I’m good enough for her, but I want to try to be.

That starts now—with being honest about my past wounds and why I am the way I am.

I toggle the flashlight to my right hand and use my left hand to scale the side of the tree fort.

When I join her inside, she’s kneeling in the center of the worn floor, surrounded by a bed of pillows.

If you would have told thirteen-year-old me that a woman like Mallory would be in my hideaway, willingly giving me a chance to be with her, I wouldn’t have believed you.

“You did all this?” Mallory points to the pillows. I’ve basically fashioned an old-school, homemade fort. I’ve got pillows of different sizes and fleece tie blankets folded up nearby in case we get cold. Not that I’d be opposed to using our body heat, but I didn’t want to be presumptuous.

“Told you I’d try to make things comfy for you.

” I duck under the two-by-four that frames the entrance wall to the tree fort and walk across the plank floor to where she’s kneeling.

I plop down and lie back, linking my fingers behind my head.

I probably look nonchalant right now. But I promise you, with the rate my heart is racing, I’m the opposite. I’m full of chalant. “How’d I do?”

She stares at me before easing herself down onto the pillows, our shoulders touching. “So far, so good.”

We don’t look at each other, just stare up at the stars.

“The one good thing to come of the horrifying bird incident is that I hacked off the roof of the tree house so it would never happen again, and now we have an unobstructed view of the sky.”

“It’s so peaceful. A nice change of pace from filming and golf practice.” Mallory hums contentedly. “Thanks for bringing me out here.”

“I wanted you to myself,” I admit. “I mostly wanted to talk.”

“So romantic.” She cuts me with a teasing look.

“Believe me. There are other things I want to do.” Our gazes lock, and I love that she doesn’t look away from me. I love that the spark in her eyes glows even brighter. It makes my heart tap, tap, tap out a beat that sounds like hope, hope, hope in my ear.

I need to focus. I’d love to kiss her right here, right now.

After what she said on the golf course this morning, I think she’d let me.

But I need to talk to her first. I don’t know how many more chances I’m going to have to get her alone, without cameras rolling, so I need to use my time wisely.

I shift slightly and pull my cell phone from my back pocket. “I want to show you something.”

She turns her head so she’s facing me, and I hold up a video I have saved.

She furrows her brow. “Is that me?”

I nod and click play.

The camera zooms in on Mallory’s face. She’s sitting perched on the edge of the couch in the hearth room of Daisy’s Inn. She’s chewing on her lip in the frame.

“What is this? Where did you get this?”

“Listen,” I tell her .

“I’m here for Holland. And you’re right. No one can say Holland isn’t hot. He’s also a good listener, and he’s attentive and thoughtful. He’s the whole package. His actions and who he is as a person combine to make him even more attractive to me.”

The video cuts off, and I set my phone down at my side.

“You said that.” I’m stating the obvious, I know. But I still can’t quite believe it.

Mallory nods slowly. “This morning,” she says quietly. “How did you… Did one of the producers… I didn’t know you’d see that—at least not until the show aired.”

“Daisy took a secret video and sent it to me,” I admit. “She said she thought I might appreciate it.”

“Oh.” Mallory searches my gaze. I’m sure she’s trying to figure out where I’m going with this.

“Daisy has always had my back—she and Candace Patchcab, actually.”

Mallory turns on her side and props herself up on her arm. “I don’t think Candace likes me.”

“She does.”

“How do you know? She scared the crap out of me the other day in Daisy’s garden.”

I chuckle. “That sounds like her.”

Mallory waits for me to continue, her gaze searching mine.

I mirror her pose but don’t meet her eye. Now that I’m about to tell her all this, I don’t know where to begin.

“There’s so much I want to say to you, Mallory. Bear with me.”

She nods for me to continue.

Here goes nothing.

“I have a speech impediment. A stutter.” All the blood rushes to my cheeks. I hate how much this all still affects me, but here we are.

Mallory’s gaze doesn’t waver. She keeps her focus on me and stays quiet .

“It didn’t affect the quality of my life when I was little. Lots of kids talk weird when you’re in grade school, and no one seemed to care very much about it. Also, I was a quiet kid in school, so I think a lot of people didn’t even realize I had a stutter. That all changed in seventh grade.”

I lie back again. It’s easier to say this all out loud without looking at her.

Mallory follows my lead, and then we’re lying side by side, arms touching from shoulders to wrists.

“What happened?” she whispers.

“My stutter got more pronounced. I was in the awkward, preteen stage. I had put on some weight, and I hadn’t gotten taller yet.

I was super self-conscious about everything.

My voice was changing, and my stutter got worse.

Every time I got called on by a teacher, I couldn’t get an answer out.

Some of the boys in my class started calling me Porky Pig, because of the stutter and my weight.

The teasing grew relentless. I felt like a verbal punching bag for them.

They called me Pork Chop. Porker. Porky.

Pork Boy. Pig Brains. They’d mock me and imitate my stutter, following me around and teasing me until I tried to talk back.

Then, of course, I couldn’t get words out without stuttering, so they’d roll with laughter. ”

Mallory grabs my hand and entwines our fingers, squeezing my palm softly. “Holland, that’s awful.”

I don’t look over at her. I nod up to the sky. “Nothing has ever felt worse than having my voice stolen from me, both by the speech impediment I was born with and because of those bullies.”

“I’m so sorry.”

I sigh. “Yeah. It wasn’t good. I stopped asking questions even though I was struggling with school work, so my grades slipped.

I stopped talking altogether. My parents freaked.

To that point, they knew about my speech impediment but thought I’d grow out of it.

But it was getting worse, so they got me in with a speech pathologist. She helped some, but the only place I’d talk was on the golf course or in front of Candace Patchcab and Daisy. ”

Mallory arches her eyebrows.

“I didn’t have to worry about impressing them.

I’d go visit them in their garden and read them their romance novels.

It was good practice for speech patterns and loosening up, without any stakes.

Those two, more than anyone else in town, have seen me at my worst and always had my back.

I owe them a lot for putting up with a petulant, terrified boy and not pitying him or treating him any differently than they treated anyone else.

Candace was all hard-nosed and gruff. Daisy was kind and hospitable.

Together, they listened to me struggle over words and blush over scenes, but they were there for me when no one else knew how to be. ”

“Wow,” Mallory whispered.

“I guess you could say I owe my current self to them, romance novels, and golf.”

“Quite the combination,” Mallory says with a smile. “Tell me about golf.”