How had she been planning on working around that before he’d found out about this? Deciding he didn’t care, Bo said, “Well, three times a day was a little excessive, so…”
She winced. “Yeah. You’re probably right.” She waved at someone over Bo’s shoulder. Bo turned to look. “My friends,” she said.
A tall guy with dark skin and dreads down to his waist and a woman with a blonde pixie cut stood next to the entrance doors.
“Bo, I wanted to say…”
He turned back to find Laura’s gaze on him.
“Thank you,” she said, “for watching over Big Sky while I’m away. I know I don’t need to call three times a day. Believe it or not, I do trust you to run the place, otherwise I wouldn’t keep asking you to.” It was nice to hear, yet Bo had to wonder if it was too little too late. “Do you remember Schnee and PomPom? You had them in early June, I think? Anyway, Mr. Vines—their owner?—he emailed me to tell me you were great and that his daughter’s pets seemed happy and healthy after their stay with you. Doctor Rajan was impressed too. You’re doing a great job.”
“I could do an even better one had you not told your regular clients that you’d be away for the summer.”
She bit her lip. “Did a client tell you that?”
Bo shook his head. “I’m not an idiot, Laura.” He was tired again. Would talking with Laura always make him feel like this? Like an innocent kid defending himself against a jury that’d already found him guilty, yet also like a worn-out geriatric?
“No. No, you’re not. I’m sorry if I’ve made you feel like one.”
Bo nodded, acknowledging the apology—acknowledging all of the apologies that had fallen out of Laura’s mouth since last night—but not quite sure he was ready to forgive yet.
Laura kicked a pebble and sent it tumbling under the car. Bo followed its path, but then his eyes caught on Sam in the car. He’d turned around in the driver’s seat and was watching them out of the back window. Knowing Sam was looking out for him filled him with awe and a sense of belonging, turning his stomach all gooey and mushy.
“Do you think we’ll be okay?” Laura asked, fiddling with the handle of her suitcase. “I know I messed up, but…is it too late to fix it?”
Bo had messed up too by not speaking up sooner. Had he said something, maybe things would’ve been different. Hindsight was twenty-twenty and all that.
Maybe it wasn’t too little too late.
He shrugged. “I don’t know. Just…give me some time.”
Laura smiled tentatively, and Bo smiled back. She threw her arms around him. It was a bit of a shock to realize that she was an inch or two shorter than him, especially after he’d built her up as this larger-than-life character in his head.
“Take care of yourself, okay?” she said. “I’ll see you in a couple months.”
“Have fun.” Bo pulled out of the embrace. It felt a little weird to hug her after years of no physical contact between them. Good, but weird. “Sam and I will be here on September first to pick you up.”
“Thanks.” She squeezed his arm, grabbed her suitcase, and trotted up to her friends, blonde ponytail swinging behind her. She waved over her shoulder before entering the airport.
Bo rolled his shoulders to loosen them and got back into the car, not exactly confident about their relationship, but not pessimistic either. Sam’s eyes were whisky-warm when they met his. Bo’s stomach flipped at the way Sam looked at him as if he was the centre of his universe.
Taking Bo’s hand in his, Sam kissed his palm. “Home?”
“Home.”
OCTOBER
“Thank you, sweetheart.” Sam’s mom kissed his cheek. “Dinner was delicious.”
“You’re welcome. Thanks for cleaning up. You didn’t have to.”
His mom winked. “It was Laura’s idea.”
Sam looked over to where Bo was holding out Laura’s coat for her. Their relationship wasn’t perfect, but it was getting better every day even though Bo wasn’t putting himself fully out there with his sister. A part of him was hesitant to believe that she actually wanted to reconcile. It was hard to get over ten years of insecurity.
“We’ll see you Sunday for dinner?” his mom asked.
“Of course.”
She headed down the driveway to where his dad and sisters were already waiting in the car.
“Sam.”
He turned to Laura.
“Thank you for dinner. It was lovely.”
He accepted her hug. “Thanks for bringing the cranberry sauce. There would’ve been a riot without it.”
She laughed, said a last goodbye, and was out the door a second later.
Sam closed the door behind her, then leaned back against it and let out a tired sighed. “What do you think?” he asked Bo. “Should we host another holiday?”
Bo wrinkled his nose. “Maybe a non-important one, like… No, I take it back. No more hosting.”
“My parents?”
“At least they have the space.”
Their new place outside of Guelph was small, but the property was huge. Once Bo started classes at the university next fall, it would only take him fifteen minutes to get there. Sam’s parents’ house—and thus Bo’s job—was only fifteen minutes in the other direction. They couldn’t have chosen a better location.
They’d moved in a week ago. There were boxes everywhere, but they’d managed to unpack their bedroom and bathroom, as well as the kitchen and dining room. They didn’t even have a couch yet. Why they’d decided to host Thanksgiving dinner when they were barely moved in was anybody’s guess. Lesson learned.
Miraculously, they hadn’t had to move in with Sam’s parents before taking possession of the house. Bo had suggested that he get in touch with the Harrisons. Turned out they’d wanted to extend their stay in Vancouver to spend extra time with their daughter and her new baby and had been happy for Sam to stay in the house an extra few weeks.
Bo had moved in with him when Laura returned from her vacation. According to his boyfriend, it was “bad juju” to live in the same house as the person you were trying to reconcile with. Sam couldn’t argue; it would be stressful to say the least.
A couple of weeks ago, he and Bo had road tripped to Ottawa to pack up Bo’s apartment. Bo hadn’t wanted to keep any of his big stuff—“I want to start fresh,” he’d said—so they’d sold off his TV, kitchen table and chairs, couch, bed, and small appliances, and driven home with his books and clothes.
“Want to see what came in during dinner?” Sam asked Bo now. He pulled his phone from his pocket and brought up the email app. “The magazine that’s doing the write up on my garden sent the bio they wrote about me.”
He’d been sad to leave his garden behind at the Harrisons’, but as Bo had pointed out, he could plant one here that was three times as big.
“Already?” Bo came over to stand next to Sam. “Isn’t it for the spring issue?”
“I guess they’re getting a head start? I don’t know how magazine deadlines work. Here.” He handed the phone to Bo. “I’ll be right back.”