Page 92 of Merry Me
The night blurred into shrieks and laughter, snowflakes falling steadily as each new game topped the last—Human Curling, “Ice, Ice, Baby” Karaoke, and a snow angel competition that ended with Easton face-first in a drift and MeMaw yelling, “Suck it, Hollywood!” before flopping down beside him and leaving an angel with a suspiciously aggressive hip placement.
And through it all, he stayed by my side.
Every time I stumbled, he caught me. Every time I laughed until I cried, he laughed right with me.
By the end of the night, we were leaning against the side of the rink, breathless and red-cheeked, our gloves sticky with spiked cider, our knees weak from cold and too much laughter.
He leaned against the wall beside me, his shoulder pressed to mine. “Just like old times,” he said softly.
“Only colder. And wetter. And with more alcohol-fueled public shame.”
He smiled, slow and warm. “We were always good like this. Laughing. Messy. A little dangerous.”
“Speak for yourself. I was an angel.”
“You tried to race me down a hill in a sled and launched us both into a pine tree.”
“And you caught me before I broke my neck,” I said. “So really, that situation was super romantic.”
He didn’t say anything at first. Just looked at me with that quiet, heart-twisting expression that made everything else fade. “You know,” he said, his voice softer now, “you’re still my favorite person to fall with.”
My heart stuttered. Like a scratched record skipping back to the part that always hurt.
I looked away quickly, focusing very intently on the snow stuck to my glove. Because this had started as a game. As tradition. As fun.
Not in some obvious, cinematic way…but in that quiet, breathless way you feel when your heart suddenly realizes it’s not alone.
Easton wasn’t playing, though. He never had been.
And deep down, I’d always known that.
Every time he caught me before I fell, every look that lingered longer than it should have, every soft laugh we shared like a secret—I felt it. That this wasn’t temporary. That this wasn’t just a chapter we’d already written.
It was something else. Something still unfolding.
And even though I didn’t know where it would lead…I knew I didn’t want to walk away from it. Not this time.
CHAPTER 18
NATALIE
The fire crackled, popping softly as flames licked the edges of the logs, bathing their faces in firelight that flickered like a heartbeat. The whole wedding party was scattered around in a circle, some wrapped in blankets, others holding long sticks over the fire with marshmallows slowly melting into gooey perfection.
Someone passed me a chocolate bar and a graham cracker. I took them absently, still half listening to Paige’s dramatic retelling of her skiing disaster from two years ago, complete with hand motions, ski pole miming, and a questionable imitation of a snowplow.
I sat close to Easton, our knees brushing now and then. It was the kind of gentle, unspoken closeness that made my chest ache in that quiet, hollowed-out kind of way.
The kind I’d been missing since the moment I walked away.
His arm rested behind me on the back of the bench we were sharing—not touching me exactly, but so close I could feel his warmth along my shoulder.
The stars were out, clear and sharp and painfully pretty above us, and a speaker sat near the woodpile, someone’s phone feeding it a soft stream of acoustic Christmas covers, each onemore whispery and nostalgic than the last. It gave the whole night this strange, dreamlike hum, like we were inside a snow globe that hadn’t been shaken yet.
“You need help with that?” Easton asked, nodding at my assembled but unroasted s’mores ingredients.
I raised an eyebrow. “I can toast a marshmallow, thank you very much.”
He gave me a skeptical look that was entirely unwarranted. “I seem to remember someone lighting hers on fire four separate times that year at the cabin.”
