I returned home today, not to parades or fanfare, but to her. My beloved beauty. She was standing at the edge of the snow-covered lane in the same wool coat she wore the day I left, though it hangs looser now, like time tried to take something from her too.
* * *
She didn’t cry. She didn’t speak. She just opened her arms—and I walked into them like a man starved for light. No one tells you how loud the silence is after war, but she quieted it in a single look.
* * *
Love isn’t just who you protect. It’s who waits and remembers your voice when even you have forgotten it. It’s the one you return to when the world has burned, and all you have left is the promise you made to the woman you love.
* * *
Tonight, we sleep beneath the same roof again. In the bed we built before the world split open. No medals. No songs. Just her hand on my chest and the rhythm of something sacred—her belief in me, still steady after all this time.”
Alex’s hand tightens around the journal, and I reach for him, threading my fingers through his. “Your grandfather’s words are beautiful. I love hearing you read.”
He huffs a quiet laugh, eyes still on the worn pages. “Magnolia… we both know a six-year-old reads better than I do.”
I hold his chin, forcing him to look at me. “Okay. Maybe a six-year-old could read it faster. But not one would read it the way you just did. You felt it, and so did I.”
He sets the journal aside and pulls me into his lap, arms wrapping around my waist. “I love I can share this side of myself with you without shame. No hiding.”
I press my forehead to his, my hand resting over his heart. “There’s nothing in you that needs to hide, Alex. Especially not from me. I love every part of you.”
Outside, the wind howls through the trees. The fire has burned low again, casting a sleepy orange halo over the cabin walls. The snowfall has slowed to a silent drift. Above us, the glass ceiling reveals a sky full of constellations I don’t know the names of, but I swear they’re watching us.
Alex lies behind me, his chest curved to my spine, one hand splayed warm and steady over my stomach, the other linked with mine just above my head.
We fall asleep that way—anchored in quiet, wrapped in breath and heartbeat, cradled beneath a sky that has seen everything.
Chapter 28
Magnolia Sebring
My world used to be so small.
Small like trailer walls and too-loud silence. Small like the way people in my hometown talked behind your back loud enough for it to land on your front porch. I believed big dreams belonged to other girls—girls who got picked up from school on time. Girls with daddies in the picture and mamas who didn’t forget their birthdays.
But now I understand what big dreams are.
Snow falling against a glass ceiling in the woods of Sweden, my husband’s hands warm against my skin as the sky turned violet overhead.
Standing on the edge of a cliff in the Scottish Highlands, wind in my hair, Alex behind me, his arms wrapped tightly around me.
Dancing in Paris with rosé on our tongues and Monet in our hearts.
Gelato kisses in Italy, sunlight on my shoulders, and laughter spilling down cobbled streets.
Alex gave me the perfect honeymoon. Every week was a revelation.
I’ve always wanted to travel, always dreamed of it, but I never imagined my first real taste of the world would come wrapped in four weeks of uninterrupted joy with him.
He didn’t give me a honeymoon. He gave me pieces of the world and pieces of himself.
But eventually, all honeymoons must come to an end.
Mornings in Sydney start early for us.
Alex leaves before the sun has even thought about showing up, rugby gear slung over his shoulder, hair still damp from the shower, a kiss pressed to my cheek before I’m fully awake. His schedule is brutal: strength training, strategy meetings, on-field drills that stretch from morning to afternoon. But he never complains. Not once.
