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“Oh, intriguing.” Susan leaned in closer to Maggie, her perceptive gaze looking her up and down. “You do look like a woman who hasn’t had much sleep, but isn’t particularly tired either.”
Maggie glanced around the table. Four pairs of eyes were fixed on her with absolute attention. Even Carol had set her spreadsheet down on the pine top, her dark brows lifted in obvious curiosity.
Maggie frowned. “Can’t I just spill the literal tea instead? That sounds more appealing.”
When nobody answered her ridiculous request, she let out a drawn-out breath, realizing there was no point in attempting a cover-up among women who had known her for such a long time.
“Fine. Ben and Theo took me to the diner for dinner,” Maggie confessed quietly. “He tried to make chowder, but the cream burned onto the cast iron pot. So we took Theo down to the diner for cranberry pancakes.”
“That sounds like a lovely night,” Vivian said with a smile.
“And after the diner?” Diane pressed, leaning forward on her elbows.
Maggie swallowed hard, her voice dropping into a murmur. “We took Theo back to the house and tucked him into bed…” She paused, but she knew there was no getting away with holding back. “Then Ben walked me to the front door…and he kissed me good night.”
Susan let out a delighted gasp, her hands folding over her heart. Carol smiled softly, nodding in obvious approval. Vivian’s content expression didn’t change, as if she wasn’t surprised by the news. And Diane let out a low, triumphant hum.
“It’s about time,” Diane said firmly.
“What do you mean?” Maggie asked. “We’ve only really been spending time together for a little over a week.”
Diane shook her head. “I’m not only talking about the kiss. I’m talking about the smiles and laughter coming from Ben each time we see him.” She gave Maggie an understanding look. “That man has been wandering around town like a solitary cactus all year. It took a proper push to get him out of his shop.”
Everyone nodded along in agreement, then Susan added, “But the kiss, too. You needed a good kiss after all this time.”
“It was very sweet,” Maggie admitted, looking down at her hands with a twitch of her lips. “Ben said his house hadn’t felt empty since I walked through the door.” She sighed sadly. “But when I got home last night, I sat in my living room for two hours feeling like I’d done something wrong. Every time I feel happy with Ben, a small voice inside asks if I’m forgetting or trying to replace what I had before.”
The lighthearted air around the table dimmed. Susan reached across the tabletop, placing her soft hand gently over Maggie’s. “That voice is very loud at first. I’ve heard it so many times. When I started singing in the choir again after my loss, I felt like I was betraying a memory every time I’d lose myself in a melody. It takes time to realize that joy isn’t a betrayal.”
“It has been two years, though,” Maggie said with a shrug. “Isn’t that too long to still feel this way?”
“Grief isn’t an accounting ledger with a deadline,” Carol said in her calm, analytical voice. “You don’t owe a quota of sadness to the past before you’re allowed to enjoy a Tuesday evening.”
At the head of the table, Vivian set her porcelain cup down onto its saucer with a delicate click. She looked at Maggie with deep, compassionate wisdom, her eyes holding decades of knowledge and experience.
“May I ask you something?” Vivian’s voice held a resonance that was easily heard in the open room.
Maggie’s head lifted up, and she met her friend’s gaze. “Of course.”
“When you spent all those years with Tom,” Vivian said, “did your love for each other make your world smaller, or did it teach you how much more love your heart could truly hold?”
The question hung in the warm kitchen air, both gentle and pointed.
Maggie felt a lump form in her throat as the words settled deep into her chest. “It made my world and capacity for love so much bigger,” she whispered, her voice trembling.
“Then honor that gift,” Vivian advised with a kind, reassuring smile. “Real love doesn’t ask you to lock yourself in a lonely cage forever. It teaches you how to open the door.”
Maggie picked up her teacup, taking a slow sip of warm Earl Grey tea to wet her dry throat. The quiet, compassionate ambience in the kitchen was comforting, but sitting at the end of the pine table as the sole topic of romantic conversation was making her clothing feel too tight.
She needed to shift the focus away from her Tuesday evening with the Foster boys, and she knew exactly which topic would capture the undivided attention of every woman in the room.
Maggie set her teacup down and leaned forward against the smooth wood of the table. “Speaking of opening doors,” she began, her voice smooth and curious, “what about the carved oak heart hanging in the square? If we’re reviewing the schedule for the pageant, we should probably talk about how the private wishes actually started forty years ago.”
Diane sat up straighter in her wooden chair, her eyes instantly shifting from Maggie to the founder of the Christmas Wish Society at the head of the table. “Now that’s a mystery worth investigating.”
Vivian sighed. “We already talked about this, ladies.”
“But we have so few details of how what we’ve heard and what you’ve told us coincide together,” Diane countered. “The town history book claims the Wish Tree started as an informal neighborhood food drive that prompted people to do good deeds at Christmas time. But we know now that the private wishes began before anyone even knew that Cranberry Cove had a resident ‘Santa.’”
