“I am only happy for him. For them,” I reiterate for what feels like the hundredth time. I even find myself liking my best friend’s wife—God, Jonah has a wife! He’s married!—more and more with each encounter, despite our differences in lifestyle and personality.
“I know you are. Because you’re a decent human being and a good friend.” Cory adds more softly, “But you are human, Marie, and you don’t always have to be so composed and understanding. It’s also okay to admit that it hurts. You were in love with him for years, and that’s not a tap you can just turn off. You’re not a kitchen faucet.”
I snort at her analogy. “Yeah, well, the time for that hurt is long gone. Jonah’s married, and he’s too important to me to let it ever get in the way again. I’ve accepted that.” A part of me recognized it long ago, in those months after Wren passed away and Calla left for Toronto, when I watched him drowning in misery. I could have attempted to fill the cavernous void in his heart with myself, with what I wanted for us. I can’t lie—I considered taking advantage of his despair, tried convincing myself it could work, that I could be a suitable replacement.
But that voice in my head, the one that reminded me I would never be his first choice, was louder.
So, with a gnawing ache in my chest, I sent him a booking page for the next commercial flight to Toronto and told him he was an idiot if he let Calla get away without a fight. I had secretly hoped she would reject him, or that she wouldn’t but what they had would fizzle, that Jonah’s interest would wane, his goals in life pulling him in another direction. In my direction.
He ran to her and hasn’t looked back since.
And aside from one moment of weakness that I still deeply regret, when Calla seemed miserable in Alaska and their priorities seemed too vastly different to find a path forward together, I have never considered telling Jonah how I truly feel about him again.
No, that door is closed forever. It’s time for me to move on.
If I could only figure out how.
“Just know if you ever need a nonjudgmental ear, I’m here for you. And, you know, I’m also more than willing to set you up with one of Joe’s friends.”
My head falls back with an exasperated groan.
“I’m serious! He has a few cute, single ones. Are they the smartest? No. Are they relationship material? Also, no. But you’ll have a good time.”
My laughter drowns out the singsong lilt of her words. “Aren’t they all his age?” Younger than Cory by two years.
“So?” She shrugs. “You’re a youthful thirty-seven-year-old.”
“I’ll be thirty-eight next month,” I remind her. “And I don’t want a twenty-six-year-old boy. Even for that.” Joe is a sweet guy, but Cory is the mature one in that relationship. Just being around him makes me feel old.
Knuckles rapping on the door makes us both jump.
Harry Hatchett and his mother Bonnie are huddled outside, a blonde husky dangling from Harry’s arms.
“Speaking of annoying boys,” Cory whispers. “He doesn’t have an appointment.”
“No, and I usually head out there.” To the Hatchett property, halfway between Meadow Lakes and Fishhook, to their kennel of seventy-five sled dogs. That Harry showed up here now, carrying one of them, means something must be very wrong.
I move swiftly to unlock the door and get them out of the polar vortex that has gripped the entire Mat-Su region this past week.
“We were hoping we’d catch you,” Harry says. He’s a lean man who matches my height, with a trimmed beard that complements the mop of blond hair hiding beneath his winter cap. His baby-blue eyes and trademark playful grin have won plenty of female attention; the latter is noticeably absent.
I’ve known Harry for years, since I was fifteen and tagging along on clinic runs with my dad, and Harry was a rambunctious toddler, clambering onto his father Earl’s sled to yell “Ready!” at an empty gangline. It’s no surprise he grew up to become a competitive musher. He’s a second-generation racer in the Iditarod, the historic thousand-mile dogsled race across two mountain ranges. It’s in his blood. And while he hasn’t won the Iditarod yet, he’s determined to beat his father’s record of five first place finishes.
It was always assumed that Earl and Harry would be lining up trophies next to each other for years to come. But three years ago, Earl suffered a massive heart attack while out training on their property. Their lead dogs brought the sled back without guidance, and without him. He’d collapsed on the trail.
By the time Harry and Bonnie found him, it was too late.
And Harry, only twenty-two, and an immature twenty-two at that, was left to take over the family operation.