Author: Kristan Higgins

I’d hated the guy, his easy affability with his stepson and younger child, either ignoring Nick altogether or asking him awkward questions that revealed just how little he knew his firstborn. He’d reminisce fondly about Nick’s soccer days when Nick had in fact played baseball. He referred to Nick’s days at UConn when Nick had gone to UMass. Once he mentioned their fishing trip to Maine, as if he’d ever taken Nick anywhere…Jason had been the son on that trip.

Inexplicably, Nick held no rancor toward him; instead, he’d watched his father with hopeful eyes, waiting for something more than a slap on the back and a “Hey, sport, how you doing?” Whatever Nick had waited for never came. At least, not in the time we were together.

I guessed now it never would.

Nick was staring at me.

Oh. I was holding his hand with both of mine, my thumbs stroking his knuckles. I jerked my hands back, then gave his an awkward pat. Took a sip of my cosmo. Note to self: don’t touch Nick. The buzz was quite unsettling, and it wasn’t caused by alcohol.

“So. A divorce attorney.” His hands busied themselves with the napkin. A structure was appearing, Nick’s own brand of origami. Sugar packets, toothpicks, asparagus spears—whatever was at hand, Nick would turn into a building, incapable of keeping his hands still.

“That’s right,” I said coolly. God knows I’d heard every joke in the book.

“Why that field?” he asked.

“Well, as you may remember, Nick, divorcing someone you once loved can be difficult, and it’s easy to make a mistake. So I help people get the best result. Hold their hands and shepherd them through a sad time.”

Nick raised an eyebrow.

“What?”

“I just find it…fitting.”

“I know you’re hoping to insult me, but you’re not. I help people accept in their hearts what their heads already know.” For some reason, my motto sounded hollow tonight.

“Wow. That’s some line.” The napkin had become a tiny house, complete with roof and folded door. Nick set it aside, then angled it to face the lake, ensuring that it had a water view.

“It’s not a line, Nick,” I sighed. “If we’d done that, we might’ve stood a chance or avoided a disaster.”

“That’s how you think of us? A disaster?” The gypsy eyes flashed.

“Well,” I answered thoughtfully, “sitting here with you in this beautiful place, all these years having passed, talking with you again…yes. Disaster covers it pretty well.”

“And here I still think of you as the woman I loved more than I’ve ever loved anyone.”

The words had the intended wallop, and my heart shuddered. Don’t be such a weenie, I told said organ. He’s not trying to soften you up…it’s an accusation. Leaning back in my chair, I gave a half nod. “The past tense is duly noted, Your Honor, as is the soap-opera melodrama. That being said, a simple recounting of the facts would show that you were practically invisible during our brief and unhappy marriage.”

“You certainly made me that way, didn’t you?” His voice was mild.

This was going nowhere. This was, in fact, where negotiations tended to break down. “Okay, Nick, let’s drop it. Ancient history, right?”

“It doesn’t feel that ancient, Harper.”

I took another sip of cosmo to cover my shiver, but he noticed anyway. “Cold?” he asked, instantly shrugging out of his jacket and offering it to me. “I mean, I know your heart is cold, but how about the rest of you?”

“No, I’m fine,” I said. We looked at each other for a minute, twelve years churning between us. I was the first to blink.

“Nick, look. Let’s not fight. We’re here to talk about our siblings, yes?” He nodded, and I continued. “You and I…we were both obviously hurt by our own bad decisions. We were too young and foolish, we didn’t know what to expect, yadda yadda ad infinitum.” His eyes were unreadable. “But this is exactly my point. While Willa and Christopher are in fact older than we were, they’re still basically kids. Well, certainly Willa is. What does Christopher do for work, by the way?”

“He’s…” Nick paused. “He works for me on and off. Well, for my subcontractors, mostly. Finish carpentry, trim, stuff like that.”

My lawyerly instinct told me there was more. “And on the off times, what does he do, Nick?”

Nick gave a little wince. Here it comes, I thought. “He’s…he’s an inventor.”

I nodded sagely. “An inventor. Anything good? And by good, I’m envisioning Google, just as an example.”

Nick sighed. “Well, he does have a patent on a couple things.” He hesitated. “The Thumbie.”

“And what is the Thumbie?” I asked. My cosmo was gone. Too bad, since it appeared I’d be needing another.

“The Thumbie is a plastic tip you put over your thumb.”

“To what end?” I asked.

“To scrape gunk that you can’t get up with a sponge.”

I paused. “You’re not really serious, are you, Nick?”

He sighed. “Chris says you always end up using your thumbnail to—okay, so it’s stupid. But maybe no more stupid than the ShamWow.”

“The Sham-what?”

“Never mind. At least he’s trying.”

I took a slow, steadying breath. “And Willa, having quit beauty school, a paralegal course and a stonemasonry apprenticeship, is going to be the breadwinner in this family?”

Nick rubbed his forehead. “I don’t know, Harper. It’s not for us to decide. Can’t you just have some faith in the two of them? Let them make their own mistakes, find their own way, trust that they actually love each other?”

I snorted. “Right. Or maybe—just thinking out loud here—we can actually consider the facts and apply a little loving pressure so our siblings don’t end up in the same miserable stew you and I were in.”

“There’s more to a marriage than the facts.”

“Ignoring the facts of a relationship is the reason I have a job, Nick.”

“Well, you know what?” he said, an edge in his voice. “I think they’ll be really happy together.”

“Ah. So I can count on you to pick up the tab for Christopher’s divorce attorney?”

He squinted at me, almost smiling. “Wow. I forgot how stunted you are when it comes to matters of the heart.”

“Stop, I’m blushing.” My voice was calm, though I could feel my heart armoring itself for battle. “I’m not stunted, Nicky dear. I’m a realist.”

“A realist, huh. Or we could call it…stunted. Yep, that works.” He winked at me and leaned back in his chair.

“Well, I’ll tell you this, babe,” I said softly, leaning forward with a little smile and lowering my voice. His eyes dropped to my cl**vage (gotcha, you dopey man, you), then came instantly back to my face. “At least I haven’t had my heart stomped on since you and I broke up.”

Nick tipped his head and smiled. “I wasn’t aware you had a heart, sweetums.”

Oh, he was such a pain in the ass. My expression may have been—hopefully was—pleasant, but my heart was racing in white-hot fury. That’s how it always had been with Nick—zero to sixty in a nanosecond. Before I did something rash like, I don’t know, kick him in the nuts, I stood up to leave.

“Well, this has been about as productive as I imagined,” I said. “But just for the record, Nick, I do have a heart, you broke it, it mended, the end. Always lovely to see you. Sleep tight.”

“Hold on, Harper,” he said, standing abruptly. “I broke your heart? See, this is the same problem as it ever was. You never could acknowledge what you did back then.”

“And you never could acknowledge that you played a part, Nick.” My voice was fast and quiet…and furious.

He jammed his hands in his pockets. “You just won’t admit that you were wrong, and it’s really too bad.”

“But I wasn’t wrong,” I said. “We were too young, we were not equipped to be playing grown-up, and shockingly, love—or whatever you want to call it—just wasn’t enough, was it? I was right, and that’s what drives you crazy.”

With that, I turned and left before he could see that my hands were shaking.

Okay. So that was not productive. I should’ve known it wouldn’t be, should’ve heeded my own advice to avoid being alone with my ex. Striding through the lobby, I spied a pacifier on the floor. Perfect. My random act of kindness for the day, take that, Father Bruce! Picked it up, spotted a mother/child duo and trotted over. “I think this may be yours,” I said sweetly, hoping Nick was watching.

“Oh, thank you!” the mother cried. “Destiny would never have fallen asleep without it.”

“My pleasure,” I cooed. “And she’s just gorgeous.” I started to give the child a pat on the head, remembered something about soft spots, withdrew my hand and gave the mother an awkward smile. Then I went outside to the cool and soothing night.

So. Where did one go to walk off some steam out here in the middle of God’s country? I strode down the road, away from the warm lights of the lodge and the murmur of people, and tried to breathe deeply, hoping to loosen the vise that seemed to be squeezing my heart.

A few yards off, there was a rock with a relatively flat surface. Perfect. I tiptoed over—not easy to walk in heels out here—and sat down, adjusted my skirt, took three calming breaths and flipped open my phone. Thank God, there was a signal.

He answered on the first ring. “Father Bruce here,” he sang.

“Father B., it’s Harper.”

“Ah! How are things?”

“Pretty rotten, Padre.” I swallowed hard.

“Go on, my child.”

“You just love saying that, don’t you?”

“I really do,” he admitted. “But go on. My child.”

“Well, I’ve seen my sister, but she won’t listen to me. I just want her to wait a little bit. That’s all. To be sure. I don’t want her to end up like—” My voice broke off abruptly. “Like you?”

When I answered, my voice was little more than a whisper. “Yes.”

Father Bruce didn’t say anything for a minute or two. “You’re not so bad, my dear.”

“Do I seem stunted to you?”

He laughed. “Well, I’ve never thought of it exactly like that, no. Ah, shall we say ‘guarded’? I like that better.”

“See, I just think I’m a realist. I also think there really should be a law requiring some kind of premarriage boot camp. You guys do it, don’t you?”

“Pre-Cana counseling,” he confirmed.

“Because this is the whole problem. No one thinks anymore. They just assume, hey, I’m in love, everything is sunshine and roses, let’s run to Vegas or Montana or wherever and get married and we’ll deal with reality later on, and then bam, they’re in my office, heartbroken and…stunted.” I swallowed again.

“You have a point, dear,” he said patiently. “A good point. But what if your sister doesn’t get a divorce? What if they make it? Live a long and happy life together?”

“The odds are against them, Father.”

“No, dear. The odds are actually in their favor. One in three might divorce, but that means two in three don’t.”

“Have you run the stats on how many marriages last when the bride and groom have known each other for a month? I bet they’re higher than one in three.”

“I’m trying to reassure you, Harper. You don’t make it easy.”