CHAPTER 37

WREN

Ellis and I end up sleeping for a full eight hours in a rest stop parking lot after we leave McArthur-Burney. We cover another hour’s distance under a star-speckled sky, then park, fold our seats back as much as they’ll allow, intertwining our hands on the middle between us—like otters trying not to drift away.

We wake up at the same time, groaning and each making a series of miserable noises. We raise our seats up and give each other sidelong looks. I feel stale and sticky and preemptively tired from the work I’ll have to do to tame my hair. Ellis’s hair is smashed down on one side, and half his face has an imprint on it from sleeping on his palm.

“Get us home, honey,” I say.

“Happily,” he replies. “Three more hours.”

We keep the music low, and by silent agreement, we don’t make any stops, intent on getting back to where we belong.

A little over two hours into it, Ellis pierces our quiet bubble. “How do you want to tell everyone?” he asks. “ What do you want to tell everyone?”

I cock my head thoughtfully. “What if we didn’t for a while? Just to make them a little crazy.” I pinch my fingers together. “We could say something annoyingly vague that they’d be forced to respond respectfully to. Something like, ‘We’re still figuring it out,’ or, ‘We’re taking it day by day.’”

His snort of laughter is adorable. The combination of it and his bedhead makes me feel like we stepped back in time somehow. “How long do you think we could drag that out?” he asks.

“A week, tops.”

He grins at me, all boyish happiness. “Then yeah, Byrd, I’ll sneak around with you.”

It’s not any of the beautiful declarations or gestures he’s made for me in the last five days, and yet the sight of him right now, rumpled and content, sends an implosive chain reaction through my chest. I feel every bit of it in this truck cab, all the memories of every version of his face I’ve known, all the times I’ve fallen in love with him in some new way. Him at six, alone in a classroom and studiously tracing the letters of the alphabet in pencil before any of the other kids had even arrived. Him in middle school, awkward and gangly and gentle and sad. Him in high school, filled out in his body but restless in his own skin, the friendship between us growing hungry with longing. Him, sitting in the passenger seat of my Wrangler when I told him I was pregnant. The way he jumped to apologize to me and the fear in his eyes, the way he immediately assumed responsibility, like it was somehow only his doing. The strength he showed when they told me I needed an emergency cesarean after thirty-six hours of laboring. At eighteen, he’d been more of a man than any of the ones I’d ever known. How, even as he went pale at the sight of them cutting into me, he kept talking me through it all, telling me he couldn’t believe what I could do. Telling me I was a miracle, that I was powerful, that he hoped our baby would be just like me. I’m grabbing his hand across the console when I remember how he’d rarely put Sam down in those early days. I’d had to playfully lecture him about tummy time and not wanting the kid to end up with a flat head from how often Ellis carried him tucked into his arm like the world’s cutest football. I remember the first time we slept together after having Sam, and how I’d started leaking breast milk and immediately bawled from mortification. He’d laughed warmly and licked me clean, milk and tears alike. He managed to make me feel womanly and sexy right then.

I remember when he taught Sam to ride a bike, the way he’d pumped the air with his fists and jumped up and down. I fell in love with him anew when he came back to the house with a sobbing, skinned-kneed Sam in one arm and a kid’s bicycle in the other. His mouth set in a grim line when he told me, “I got so focused on teaching him how to go that I forgot to teach him how to brake.”

I fell in love with him again when he told me he’d bought an industrial mixer for the bakery. We hadn’t even closed on our house and we were not supposed to be making any big purchases, but he didn’t care. He needed a new car more than I needed anything, but Savvy’s only had a few countertop mixers and a hodgepodge of equipment before then. He was adamant about supporting my dreams, about supporting me at every turn. He wanted me to make the place my own as much as I could.

And this? This love that I feel for him again is something brand new, like some charred marshmallow skin peeled away, exposing a fresh, gooey, unmarred center. I’d keep getting heart burnt for the rest of my life with him, knowing we can find a new layer underneath. Until every bit of us runs out.

For how many words we’ve used to help us through this to get here, from writing them to finally sharing all the ones we held back, they all fall short when it comes to what I feel right now.

“Hey,” I say. He turns away from the road to face me, eyes crinkling at the corners. “I love you.”

We beam at each other, his smile staying put when he has to look back at the road. It stays put even when he brings my hand up to his lips. “I love you, too.” We pass the sign welcoming us home to Spunes. “We made it,” he says.

We did.

We made it.

“Ellis?”

“Mmm?”

“I don’t want to wait,” I say. “We have to tell Sam, first, obviously. But I don’t want to wait to tell everyone. I don’t care about the pressure or any of it.” He’s mine again and I want everyone to know it. I want him to feel found and chosen by me, as much as I feel by him.

His eyes flick to me briefly again before he looks over his shoulder, flipping on the blinker and pulling the truck over so quickly I screech. We’re still recoiling from being thrown into Park when he takes my face in his hands and kisses me hard.

“Good. I don’t want to wait, either,” he says.

“Let’s call Sam.”

“Okay,” he says, laughing eagerly. “Do you want to talk about how we should tell him? Anything specific? What should we say?”

He’s still got my face in his palms when the words burst free. “Marry me.”

His expression softens in shock, and my mouth goes dry in panic. “What?” he asks.

“Or not, I don’t know. I just—”

“You can’t take it back!” he says defensively. He starts pecking kisses all over my face. “Haven’t you ever proposed before?”

“I’m”—peck—“out of”—peck—“practice.”

“You have to give the other person time to adequately freak out,” he informs me.

“I didn’t give myself time to adequately think about it before I asked!” I squeak.

“You didn’t ask, you demanded ,” he says. “I have no choice but to say yes now.”

“Really?” I say, even as he’s flipping up the center console and pulling himself closer to me, his stubble scratching at my cheek. “We don’t have to. We could just be together.”

“No. I want the whole thing this time. I want to make you my wife again. We deserve a celebration.”

“Good.” I laugh. “I want Sam to be there. I want you in a tie.”

“I want you to have a pretty bouquet. Not just a pen and a paper.” He pulls back from my neck to look into my eyes. “I want to write some vows.”

I kiss his chin. “I do, too.”