Page 144 of If Only In Our Dreams

I blew her a kiss, and she grinned.

Her girlfriend whispered something to her, and she made a frankly disgustingly squishy face down at her, all blatant affection. The crowd murmured in confusion when I didn’t step off the stage even though my set was finished.

And then it happened.

What I’d been plotting and planning.

The last part of my final goodbye.

The crowd quieted again, as my bandmates picked up their instruments one last time. Soft and soothing, the quiet croon of the first whispering notes filled the air.

Familiar notes.

Notes they’d all heard, year after year, when the nights were cold—and people sought home. When the streets were lined with fairy lights. When the world was just a little kinder, just a little more hopeful.

I pressed the microphone to my lips, listening to the loop of notes as I searched the crowd one final time.

This was it.

The moment I couldn’t take back.

It was growth, and it was scary, and it would hurt?—

But…

I was okay with that if it meant I got to keep Ben Montgomery.

“I’ll be home for Christmas,” I sang out, sweetly—the way I’d wanted for years. Into Nancy’s camera I sang, directing the words to the man who waited—probably asleep in bed, biding his time till his alarm went off so he could become Santa for my favorite kids in the world.

Nancy’s free hand covered her mouth, her eyes continuing to glisten.

The crowd was silent, reverent.

My heart was full.

“You can count on me.” The next line was choked and somehow even softer than the first.

I’d told Ben once that I wanted to sing love songs, and that’s what this felt like. It was a promise to him, just like the promises he always gave me. I hoped, even through the video, he’d be able to see in my eyes what this meant to me.

What he meant to me.

No one spoke the entire time, like they understood what this was without me even having to say it.

Peace settled over me as I murmured the last line of the song, my heart full and warm. “I’ll be home for Christmas.” I searched the crowd, briefly—when my eyes caught on the redheaded man I’d seen earlier. When I saw his face, I was so startled I nearly missed the last and most important line of the song.

He was a few rows closer than before.

The gray at his temples caught the light.

His eyes were honey.

They said,I missed you.

They said,I’m here.

They said,you’ll never spend another Christmas alone.

“If only—” at the last moment, I switched the words, my heart cracking right down the middle as Ben Montgomery smiled at me from the center of the crowd. “In our dreams.”

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