Page 70 of Holly and Ivar
He ran a hand through his hair again, the motion slower this time.“You realize how crazy this sounds?”
“I do.”She stepped closer, laying her hands on his chest, his heart.“But I also know you’ve felt it.The searching.The pull the day we found it.The cardinals.The poinsettia you healed.The perfect tree you created.”
“The sounds of the forest,” he continued.“The dreams.”Guardian, the wind had whispered.
He looked down at his hands, calloused from years of fieldwork and trail repair.Hands that built, fixed, held.Hands that, apparently, were meant toprotectsomething he didn’t understand.
California had felt like failure—walking away from a career he’d built, from a life he thought he wanted.The betrayal, the exhaustion, the noise of it all had stripped him bare.He’d come back here to disappear, not to be found.
He’d sought peace.Solitude.But the woods were never truly silent.There was always a hum beneath everything, the faint pulse of life under the snow.He’d always thought it was wind or water.
Now he wasn’t so sure.
That was a lie.Hewassure.
Maybe belief isn’t something you find, he thought.Maybe it’s something that finds you when you stop running from it.
And today was the day he stopped running.
He closed his eyes, sending his acceptance out into the forest.
The wind blew, rattling his windows and stirring up snow.Message received.He’d been acknowledged.Welcomed.
What exactly this all meant was still unclear, but with each passing second he became a little lighter, like he was moving toward something he hadn’t dared believe in for a long time—himself.
When he opened his eyes, Holly was waiting patiently, her expression steady.
He opened his arms, and she stepped into them.The embrace wasn’t just comfort—it was connection.Two lives, two callings, two halves of the same promise.
Two entwined branches in the shape of a heart.
He longed to kiss her as if to seal their destiny, but he knew,he knew, this was not their moment.
“What happens now, Kringle?”
“We finish the mission, Ranger.We protect the Yule Tree.”
***
He’d tried to sleep.He really had.However, the tree sketch and the word Guardian appeared whenever he shut his eyes.Even Al had tired of his tossing and turning and left for the living room with a heavy sigh.
He rolled over and reached for his phone.The one person who would understand.
Ivar: Can’t sleep.You?
Holly: Zzzzz.Joking.Don’t know why you’d have any problems sleeping.Just a regular old day.
Ivar: If weird days become more frequent than regular days, does that make regular days weird?
Holly: [mind-blowing emoji]
(pause)
Ivar: Thanks for being there for me tonight.
Holly: Always.We’re in this together.
Ivar: You’re just saying that because a magical tree zapped us with electricity.
