CHAPTER ONE
“A winter storm warning is now in effect for six counties,” the TV announcer said as he gave the current weather forecast. “This is a very large and dangerous storm that’s going to be dumping the white stuff on our area. Please, only go out if it’s an emergency. Otherwise, stay home where it’s warm and wait this one out. Back to you, Dave.”
Linc changed the channel now that the weather report was over. He’d seen everything he needed to know about the upcoming storm.
Snow had begun to fall outside and was growing heavier by the minute. What had started out as small flakes slowly drifting from the sky had turned into a torrent of huge clumps of falling snow. It was as if the individual snowflakes couldn’t fall fast enough, so they stuck together in order to fall even faster. Heavy clouds were hanging over Cottonwood Springs, reflecting the light from the streetlights, which caused an orange glow in the sky.
Inside Linc and Brigid’s home, the scent of warm chocolate filled the house. The winter storm outside had just begun to pick up. It was expected to last most of the night and was predicted to give them another deep layer of snow. It was particularly ironic, because during the day the sun had just melted the remnants from the last storm. It was proving to be a very cold and snowy winter, and they weren’t even halfway through it.
The wind howled against the kitchen windows and shook the house as Brigid stirred the cocoa she’d just poured into their mugs. She and Linc planned to curl up on the couch and watch old black and white movies while they waited for the blizzard to arrive. It was forecast to hit sometime later that evening, and they’d been eagerly anticipating watching the snow come down as hard as predicted.
It was the first heavy blizzard-like snow of the season, so after some preparation, they were both settled in and ready for it. The flakes began to fall before the weathermen had predicted, but they weren’t worried as they planned to watch television and stay comfy.
“Do you think they’re going to close things down tomorrow?” Brigid asked as she carried their mugs to the great room. She leaned over Linc and offered the larger mug to him.
“I don’t know. Maybe?” Linc said as he turned to take the mug from her. “I’m glad our B & B guests didn’t risk driving through the mountains to get here. They probably would have gotten stuck in the snow. I’d rather they stayed somewhere safe than have some problems with the storm.”
He held up his phone and showed Brigid the radar map on his weather app. It had blue and pink areas in various shades, the blue being the snow and the pink the ice that was supposed to come with it. There was nothing but heavy snow coming for a while.
“I miss the times when I was a kid, and it would snow so much school would be cancelled, stores would be closed, and everyone just stayed home or played in the streets,” Brigid said.
She sat down next to Linc and tugged on the throw blanket she’d been using. However, Jett, her big Newfoundland dog, had relocated himself so that he was laying on most of it, and she was barely able to get any of it. With one final solid tug she freed it from under his body and almost punched herself in the lip doing it. She frowned at him, but he was oblivious to her irritation.
“That sounds like a lot of fun, being a kid and having school cancelled,” Linc said with a smile as he reached out to touch her lovingly. “All that snow, and I bet there was even more back then. Everyone always says it doesn’t snow as much as it used to. Snowy days here in Cottonwood Springs would have been terrific.”
“They were,” Brigid said. “And I agree there used to be more snow, but even so, it always seemed like our school was the last one to cancel classes. Sometimes everyone else would be off, but we’d still have to go to school.
“I can’t tell you how many times I’d listen to the radio as I got ready for school, hoping to hear our school’s name read off when they updated the list of new school closures. And I can’t tell you how many old classic country songs I know the words to just because I’d be sitting there listening to the radio in hopes of hearing our school’s name announced between the songs they played.”
“And I bet you’d listen to the radio as long as you could, just hoping your school would be read off the next time around,” Linc said.
“You have no idea,” Brigid said with a sigh as she rolled her eyes. “Sometimes I’d even end up getting to school late, but I’d just blame it on the weather.”
She looked toward the window and could see the snow rapidly collecting outside. She imagined in other households throughout town there were children crossing their fingers that school would be canceled tomorrow. It was strange to think Holly wasn’t down the hall doing the same thing, but she was now living far away in Waco, Texas.
Brigid shook her head to bring herself back to the present. There was no way she was going to let her imagination and memories ruin her evening.
“Have we decided what we’re going to watch?” Recently, they’d been watching old classic movies on cold snowy nights. It had been Linc’s idea to have a black and white movie winter. Whenever there was a snowy evening, they’d curl up on their couch and watch something old and cuddle, usually with some hot cocoa.
There was nothing really special about the idea, but they’d had a lot of fun preparing for it each time they were going to get a decent amount of snow. Even when the snow fell during the day, they spent that evening with a black and white movie. So far, she’d been loving them.
“I was thinking we could watch ‘It Happened One Night’. It’s from 1934 and has Clarke Gable in it,” he said. “Or we could watch something else, if you’d like. I think I saw another one somewhere on cable.”
“Oh, Clarke Gable,” Brigid grinned. She remembered her mother had loved him when Brigid was a little girl. They would sit together and watch Clarke Gable movies when her father was off doing something. She’d probably watched it at one time with her mother, but she’d been too young to really understand what the movies were about at the time. “Let’s watch that one.”
“So it’s okay?” he asked, double checking. “I know you said sometimes Clarke Gable movies make you miss your mom. I’m not trying to put a damper on the evening.”
“No, you won’t be. I think it sounds perfect. I’m not sure if I remember this one or not.”
“Then it will be like we’re both seeing it for the first time,” he said easily as he pulled her closer.
Brigid smiled as she snuggled closer to Linc, and he started the movie.
*****
Later that night, Brigid woke up in bed with Linc’s arms still around her. The wind had stopped rattling the windows, but when she looked out the window, she could still see small flakes drifting slowly to the ground. She lay there for a moment, listening to the house and all its noises. The furnace clicked on, and warm air began to blow from the vents directly onto her face, so she shifted slightly. Her movement caused Linc to stir, and his arm slid away from her.
As she moved a little more, her bladder shifted and let her know she needed to use the bathroom. Moving as slowly as she could so as not to wake Linc, Brigid slipped out from under the warm blankets and to the edge of the bed. She slid some slippers on before reaching for her robe.
Once she was standing up, she wrapped it firmly around her before heading for the bathroom, grabbing her phone as she went so she could check the radar again.
When she’d finished washing her hands, she decided to head to the living room to see how the weather was doing. Tip-toeing to the window while Jett snored softly on his loveseat in the corner, she pushed a curtain to the side.
The streetlights showed a thick layer of picture-perfect snow blanketing the yard. She and Linc had pulled their vehicles into the garage, so the driveway was an untouched sheet of glittering whiteness. She could see there was still a little snow falling, but it was much lighter than it had been before. It looked like it was dying off and would completely stop pretty soon.
Letting the curtain drop, Brigid turned and headed for the kitchen. She’d put the leftover cocoa in the fridge, so she poured herself a mug and placed it in the microwave to warm up. When it was ready, she carried it to the kitchen table and pulled out her phone. With a few taps she confirmed that the snowstorm was almost through, as she’d expected.
Swiping out of the weather app after she’d looked at it, she went to her Facebook app and began to scroll through it. Without stopping to read them, she scrolled past the ads and the memes, searching instead for photos. Finally, she found images of her nephew, Fiona’s son, Aiden, playing in the snow earlier that night.
Other friends had posted pictures of birds in the snow or of grandchildren playing in it. She liked or hearted them as she went through them, occasionally leaving a comment when she felt drawn to it. She continued to scroll until a familiar bright smile and straight blonde hair caught her attention.
It was a picture of her daughter, Holly, smiling from behind the cash register at Read It Again, her sister Fiona’s second bookstore located in Waco, Texas, where Holly was the manager. Brigid could still remember the way the store smelled, and the way the light came through the front windows, making Holly’s eyes sparkle.
Holly had done an amazing job with the bookstore. She had been able to capture the look of the original bookstore here in Cottonwood Springs, but with a twist. Since she’d given the original bookstore a lot of her own flair over the years, it probably hadn’t been that hard for her to do.
Brigid’s fingers began to type a comment on the photo.
Beautiful store. Makes me want to go there when I’m in Waco.
Brigid knew how hard it was for a small business to get things going, so she was glad to do what she could to help. When she was Holly’s age, she’d been out sledding with her friends this time of year or maybe ice skating. Certainly not building her own business.
She smiled, closed her phone, and drank the last of her cocoa. She walked over to the sink and rinsed out her mug before heading back toward the bedroom. As she slipped under the covers, she reminisced about all the times it had snowed when she was young and how much fun it had been.
She drifted off to sleep remembering the bite of the wind and the sound her ice skates used to make on the frozen ponds in the winter.
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