Page 54 of The Calendar of New Beginnings (Dare Valley #9)
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
W hen Andy pulled up to Merry Cottage, he was feeling more than antsy. Lucy had texted him the previous day to say she wanted to talk, but he hadn’t been ready. Correction. His plan hadn’t been ready, so he’d told her he would see her today for lunch.
Not that he could eat anything, mind you. He picked up his gift for her and exited his car. She was either going to get it or she wouldn’t, and there was nothing he could do to change that.
When she opened the door, the brilliant shades of her auburn hair and green eyes seemed all the more dear, all the more lustrous. There was worry between her brows, and when he leaned down to kiss her cheek, he felt like he was wading through raw honey to get close to her.
Things were weird between them again, and part of him wished he’d never opened his big mouth. But he knew better. A person got the kind of love they asked for, and he wasn’t going to keep hiding what he wanted from himself or her because it was more comfortable or convenient.
“I’m glad you’re here,” she said, putting her arms around him suddenly. “When you said you couldn’t see me yesterday, I got a little worried. I was the one who supposedly needed more time to think about things.”
He edged back and produced the gift he’d hidden behind his back. “One day didn’t seem like a lot of time, but I needed it to arrange this. I…” Crap. What should he say? “I hope you like it.”
She gave him a puzzled look, but stepped back to let him inside. He closed the door behind him.
“Why don’t we sit in your parlor?” he suggested. “You can open it there.”
“You didn’t have to get me anything,” she said, but she went ahead and sat down.
He sat down beside her, putting more space between them than usual to set her at ease.
She unwrapped the orange wrapping paper from the large white box he’d selected to disguise the shape of the gift. When she pulled back the purple tissue paper Moira had thrown into the box, she pressed a hand to her mouth.
But he heard the soft exclamation of air escape from her mouth.
He shifted on the couch. “I couldn’t reach you the other day, so I thought I’d try to speak your language. Don’t you always say, ‘a picture is worth a thousand words’?”
She turned and stared at him.
“Lucy, these photos are my words to you,” he told her, wanting to take her hand. “And Danny’s. He helped contribute too.”
The graceful line of her throat rippled with emotion. “You called it The Calendar of New Beginnings,” she said, tears filling her eyes.
He cleared his throat. “I thought it was a pretty great title, and since it’s only for you, I knew it would be okay if I used it. Our moms wouldn’t care.”
“But this is your house on the front!” she said, puzzlement washing over her face. “And you and Danny sitting on the front porch? How did you do this? When?”
“I asked Moira to help me. I had some photos, and she took the ones we were missing. There are plenty of online calendar makers in case you didn’t know. I couldn’t get it finished and printed yesterday, so that’s why it had to wait until this morning.”
“Oh.”
“I’m sorry I put you off, but I…needed to have this ready before we talked. Lucy, I want you to understand what I’m saying about the future.”
She touched the cover then and started flipping through the calendar. “I remember this photo of us,” she said, tracing the edges of the photo he’d selected for January.
Their teacher had caught them napping together in kindergarten.
“Mom had this one,” he said, remembering how moved she’d been by his request to go through the old albums for photos of him and Lucy.
“She said Mrs. Hanover thought it was the cutest thing she’d ever seen in all her years of teaching, the way we’d cuddle up together, forehead to forehead, holding hands while we napped on our colored mats. ”
Her head was nodding as she sniffed. “We really were the best of friends. Even then.”
“Yeah,” he said, trying to hold it together. They were only on January.
She finally flipped the page. February put the first brush of a smile on her lips. “I always was shoving you up a tree when we were kids. ”
“It’s a medical fact girls have more upper body strength than boys before puberty.”
There was a decided snort beside him. “Keep telling yourself that. I liked that you climbed trees with me.”
“You liked to, so I had to keep up. It’s what friends do.”
She sniffed again and turned the page. March showed them doing math homework on her bed when they were in sixth grade. “I think you spent more time with me in my room growing up than I did by myself.”
“That’s because we hated to be apart,” he said, nudging her with his shoulder.
“My mom took this picture,” she said, turning and narrowing her eyes at him.
Busted. “I had to go to your mother for some of the photos I had in mind, but I swear we didn’t speak. Neither of us wants to get into any more trouble with you.”
She leaned her head on his shoulder like she used to when they were kids together. “You’re not in trouble. I’m sorry you thought that. I just…had things to work out.”
He bit his tongue to keep from asking for more clarification. She turned the next page. April showed them hanging out at a high school football game.
“Personally, I don’t know what you were thinking with your hair,” he said dryly.
She made an aggrieved sound. “Is that a scrunchie?”
He had sisters. He knew what a scrunchie was. Peering closer, he said, “Yep, hot pink.”
“I was making a statement.”
“Sure you were,” he added, feeling the rhythm of their friendship returning.
When she turned the page to May, she said, “I don’t remember seeing this.”
“My mom did,” he said, feeling his ears burn. “She hid it from me. I found it when I was going through the albums.”
“But why? So, we danced at prom. All I remember is you stepping on my toes to ‘Candle in the Wind’ by Elton John.”
He still hated that song. “You don’t see it, do you? Look closer. There’s a reason my mother took the photo and didn’t show it to us.”
She lifted the calendar until it was a foot away from her face. “Oh!”
“Yeah,” he said, clearing his throat. “I might have had a moment. All I remember is dancing with you, and then suddenly all I could think about was how good you smelled, which turned into thinking about how pretty you looked. I lost the beat and stepped on your feet.”
“It wasn’t a fast song,” she said in a dry tone. “You liked me.”
“Yeah, in that moment,” he admitted. “I liked how soft you felt in my arms, and I had some pretty lusty thoughts for my age. It scared me. We were friends. I was sure you’d kill me if you realized what I was thinking.”
“I didn’t realize it at the moment. My toe was throbbing. Those were open-toed shoes!”
His frustration was rising, for both himself and the boy he’d been. “Would you forget about the shoes? I showed you this because I wanted you to see there was always the promise of something more between us. Now turn the page.”
When she looked at him, she blinked a few times. “You’re upset.”
He strove for patience—like he did when Danny asked for a drink of water for the fourth time at bedtime. “A touch. I’ll get over it. ”
She turned the next page. June showed them together with their respective families and Kim. They were all gathered together at Lucy’s parents’ house amidst an abundance of Christmas lights. She was sitting between him and Kim, and they were all laughing at one another’s holiday sweaters.
“I never fully told you how happy it made me that you and Kim got along so well,” he said, his throat thickening as he stared at the woman who had been his wife next to the woman he now hoped to spend the rest of his life with.
Choosing this picture had been the most difficult for him, but after changing his mind more than a few times, he’d decided to go with his gut.
“How could I not like the woman you’d fallen in love with?” she asked, and he wondered if it was his imagination, but she seemed to cuddle closer to his side. “Besides, she made you so happy.”
Tears popped into his eyes. “Yeah, she did, and I’ll always look on our time together with love and joy. But she’s not here now. You are.”
When she met his gaze, there were tears in her eyes too.