Snowbound With The Best Man. Allie Pleiter

as expensive and frivolous incidentals, useless details that wilted days after the ceremony? “Every wedding should have beauty and traditions. Since the times of the Greeks and Romans, brides and grooms have worn flowers to symbolize hope and new life.”

      “Fine, if you say so. I just don’t get why I’m stuck with choosing this. I mean, Carly could do a better job at this than I could.”

      Grant me patience, Lord. “Well, then, let’s ask her. Carly, Lulu, come tell us what you think.”

      They gushed over the images on the tablet, of course, because the designs Kelly had created for this event were unique, just like the wedding itself. Samantha Douglas would gush, too, if Kelly had her way. With the girls’ help, the boutonnieres were quickly selected.

      “All that matters here is that Darren and Tina love the way the ceremony looks and feels,” Kelly explained, directing her words at Lulu and Carly since Bruce clearly couldn’t care less. “Every detail is a part of that, even the boutonnieres.” She turned off the tablet. “That’s how Matrimony Valley works. It’s why we do what we do.”

      * * *

      Bruce looked at the florist with a foggy sort of awe. How did this Kelly woman pull it off? Here he was, two years out from losing his wife, and he still couldn’t manage to feel like much more than the walking wounded. A man in some sort of invisible zombie state, lurching through life, looking alive but feeling half-dead and irreparably damaged every waking moment.

      He did want to heal. The desire to come back to life still existed somewhere under the mountain of grief. He just didn’t know how to crawl his way out of this thing that only looked like living. The whole point of taking this time before Darren’s wedding was to find a way to snap himself out of this hamster wheel of busy emptiness.

      But how? He wanted to be there, really be there for Carly, not just running through the parenting paces. He wanted to enjoy this wedding, to be happy for his friend and relish Carly’s role in it. Only, in lots of ways he could never admit, the whole thing just bugged him. It hurt. It reminded him of everything he no longer had. Made him so bristly that he took it out on innocent people like this florist, who was only trying to do her job well.

      And just to make things worse, this woman seemed to sense the storm of thoughts that had pulled him away from the conversation. “Hey,” she said softly. “It gets better.”

      He merely grunted in reply.

      “Not right away,” Kelly went on, “and not nearly fast enough, but one day you wake up and you don’t feel quite so much like the walking wounded anymore.”

      It was a shocking sort of comfort that she’d used the very same words that were in his head. “Yeah, everyone keeps saying that.”

      “Because it’s true,” she replied. “But you do have to choose it, you know. Walk toward it. Crawl, if you have to.”

      He ran a hand over his chin. “Not doing so good at that, actually.” He wasn’t so sure he liked how this woman he didn’t really know pulled such huge things out of him. She was prying open boxes. Private boxes he didn’t want to open for a very long time, if ever. She looked pushy, too, like the kind of woman who didn’t stop when she met resistance.

      Kelly straightened, putting her tablet back into the tote bag with a matter-of-fact air. “So, what are your plans for while you’re here in the valley?”

      “Oh, I’ve got a lot of things planned. Hikes, trips into Asheville, exploring the falls, looking for wildlife, maybe some sledding if we get any snow. I definitely plan for us to stay busy.”

      “Busy,” she said. He didn’t like the way she said it.

      “Hey, busy’s good. Little girls need to stay busy, right?”

      “Sure,” she said, but again with a tone that he couldn’t quite call agreement. “There’s happy, too, you know.”

      Happy? Come on, happy wasn’t really on the table for him at the moment. And he certainly wasn’t interested in discussing happiness or its lack in his life with this pushy florist he’d known for fifteen minutes. “Yeah, not so much, lately, if you know what I mean.” She did know what he meant, right? She’d been through it.

      “So there’s nothing that makes you happy?”

      My wife is dead. What do you think? “Carly.” When she leveled a look at him, he added, “Not much else.” Granted, it was a pouty answer, but Bruce wasn’t volunteering to become anyone’s healing project, not on vacation, or ever.

      “Okay,” she said slowly in a “so that’s how you want to play it” tone. “What makes Carly happy?”

      “Unicorns.”

      Bruce was just the tiniest bit pleased to have surprised her with the answer. “Unicorns?” she asked.

      “Long story I’m not going to tell you.”

      “Okay,” she replied in the same tone as before. “Unicorns and...?” She whirled her hand, as if cuing a list from him.

      “Well, based on our day so far, not hikes or wildlife or waterfalls or sledding or anything outdoors.” In fact, she’d shut down nearly every suggestion he’d had since they arrived. Except for going for ice cream, and look where that had gotten him.

      “So what does Carly like?”

      She enunciated the words as if he hadn’t heard the question the first time. His urge to up and leave was squelched only by the gleeful conversation Carly was having over at the counter with Lulu. He couldn’t afford to annoy Lulu’s mom if Carly was having so much fun with her daughter, could he? “Pink,” he replied, tamping down his irritation. “Spumoni ice cream. Stickers and coloring books. Kittens. Artsy stuff like beads and those rubber loopy bracelet things.”

      Kelly actually nodded after each of those, so maybe Carly’s favorite things were normal despite how foreign girlie arts and crafts felt to him. “And hopscotch,” he went on. It was a wonder he hadn’t listed hopscotch first—the game had saved his life so many dreary afternoons. It was mindless motion. You didn’t have to think or talk playing hopscotch. Bruce had a roll of painter’s tape in his suitcase just so they could put a hopscotch outline on their hotel room carpet if they felt like it.

      “Mom?” Kelly’s daughter called from the counter.

      “Yes, honey?”

      “Can Carly come over and play tomorrow after church?”

      Kelly actually smiled as if she’d seen that coming a mile off when it had never occurred to him until this moment that Carly could have playdates while on vacation. “Hey, Lulu,” Kelly said, raising one knowing eyebrow to him, “you know how to play hopscotch, don’t you?”

      Lulu spun around on the stool and rolled her eyes. “Of course. Everybody knows how to play hopscotch.”

      “I love hopscotch,” Carly gushed. He was cornered now, and he could tell Kelly knew it.

      “Pleeeeaaassseee?” both girls pleaded in a singsong chorus Bruce knew wouldn’t let up until he agreed.

      “I’d never hear the end of it if I said no,” he admitted. “So sure, why not?”

      “Hey, can Carly and her dad come to church with us? We’re frosting Valentine’s cookies at activity time. Miss Yvonne told me.”

      “Sometimes being friends with the town baker gets you inside information,” Kelly remarked with a grin. “Are you and Carly a churchgoing family?”

      Though he found the question a bit intrusive, Bruce appreciated that she referred to Carly and him as a family. They still were, if barely, but he’d noticed that people stopped using the noun once Sandy had passed, and that always bugged him. “We used to be.”

      She didn’t reply, but gave him the politely disappointed