"It's always been you. No one else. I didn't want to admit to myself that building the school . . . well, as much as it's for the kids here, a way to give back to my hometown," she looked down and then back up into my eyes, "I wanted to be close to you again. Even though I knew it'd hurt. I couldn't let go of you. I never did—all that time, I never did. Even when I thought you'd betrayed me. Or maybe somewhere inside, I knew you couldn't have."
I leaned across the table and kissed her.
We drove to a craft fair a couple hours away across a covered bridge where Tenleigh took out her cell phone and snapped pictures of me, laughing when I offered up a tense, unnatural smile, finally making me laugh a genuine laugh with some ridiculous, goofy faces. She seemed pleased with the picture of me looking to the side, my teeth flashing in a grin, the bridge a quaint backdrop. She made it her screen saver. "You really want to look at that every time you turn on your phone?" I asked, even though it made me happy and I hoped she'd keep it there.
"Yup," she said. "I like to look at my handsome boyfriend, especially when he's not around."
I pulled her into me and kissed the top of her fragrant hair. Boyfriend. The word didn't seem big enough to describe the extent to which I belonged to her.
I bought her homemade ice cream churned by an old woman with rosy cheeks, who wore a brightly colored calico skirt. She looked at us and smiled a warm knowing smile as if she understood something we hadn't told her in words.
We walked hand in hand as Tenleigh looked at the arts and crafts made by local artisans, listening to their lyrical mountain speak—a language mixed with simplicity and poetry. I knew some of the local people on our mountain growing lavender had gone to one of these a few weeks before. Just seeing the many Appalachian entrepreneurs filled my lungs with pride.
We sat under a giant buckeye tree and listened to a bluegrass band, the music filling the air, every note singing home.
I leaned in to Tenleigh and whispered in her ear, "I'm going to marry you."
She leaned her head back and gazed at me. "I want babies," she said. "Lots and lots of them."
I laughed. "As many as you want. I'm going to make all your dreams come true. All my life."
Her eyes filled with tenderness. "And I'm going to make all your dreams come true. All my life."
I smiled, and leaned in to kiss her. You already have. You are my dream.
When the sun was setting over the mountains, we drove back to my house, hand in hand in the cab of my truck.
We ended the day making love under my open window, the floor familiar now, the fit of our bodies bringing the joy I'd lived without for too long. I drifted off to sleep, happy, content, and filled with peace.
EPILOGUE
Six Years Later
Kyland
My wife stood at the big picture window, gazing out at the golden, sunlit mountains—the view that would never cease to take my breath away. It was early, just past sunrise, but the air inside the house was already still and humid, the distant noise of the cicadas filling the trees outside. It was going to be another hot one. Tenleigh lifted her hair off the back of her neck and rolled it forward, as if she was working out the kinks.
I walked to her, wrapping my arms around her swollen middle, putting my palms against her belly where I could feel our baby moving inside. "Hey, beautiful," I said, my voice raspy with sleep. She gripped my hands at her waist as I laid my chin on her shoulder, breathing in her scent. "Baby keeping you awake?" I asked.
"Hmm," she hummed. "He's a strong little sucker." She massaged a spot on the lower side of her belly as if she'd been kicked. "I've been telling him to go to sleep since four a.m. He's as stubborn as they come."
I smiled against her skin, running my nose along it and letting my lips linger there. She shivered and pulled me closer. "He?" I asked. "Sounds like a she."
She turned her head, laughing softly, nuzzling her cheek against mine.
"I didn't want to wake you . . . or Silas."
"Silas will be asleep for a while. That kid played for hours at the creek yesterday." I had taken him fishing with me for his first lesson. My boy. I kissed Tenleigh's neck again. "Plumb tuckered himself out."
She grinned. "Careful with that kind of talk now. That's how this baby got in here." She rubbed her belly again.
I made a soft growling sound. "Come to bed, I'm fixin' to give you a back rub."
She smiled and then hummed a sound of contentment. After turning, she took my hand and I led her back to the queen-sized bed in our room.
Four years ago, we had moved into this old, drafty farmhouse on the outskirts of Dennville. When we'd first walked into it, we could clearly see it was a fixer upper, but when we'd entered the family room with the high, cedar-beamed ceilings and the huge window with the breathtaking view of our mountains beyond, we'd known it was exactly where we wanted to be. It was simple, but it was beautiful, and it was ours.
It was the place we worked tirelessly to make our own. It was the place where we began our life together. It was the place where I touched Tenleigh often and with love, never taking for granted that she was in my arms. It was the place where I brought my wife small grocery store cakes with perfect pink flowers on the edges instead of bouquets because I knew what brought her joy.
This was the home where I'd carried my bride over the threshold after she'd taken my name in a small, but beautiful wedding ceremony on the edge of our lavender field, our closest friends and family in attendance. It was where we'd brought our now three-year-old son, Silas, home, and where she'd told me she was expecting again. It was the home where Jamie visited, knowing he was welcomed with friendship and love, where Marlo and Sam along with their little boy, Elijah, and Tenleigh's mama, came to dinner every week, where we all sat at the impressive hand-carved table Buster had given us as a wedding gift—the one that needed to be covered with a tablecloth when children were present.