With my resolve fortified, I was ready to charge into battle.

Except I couldn't.

We spent what little time we had before the ornament workshop attending to the trees. Then three sets of guests returned to make their ornaments and spent much of the afternoon sitting around the dining room table constructing their decorations and chatting the day away. Once they had all moved on, we cleaned up, grabbed a quick bite to eat for dinner, and then returned to the trees. Jordan had to run back to the shed to grab a work light before we began, since the sun had long since set behind the mountains. When that became a frustrating endeavor, we packed the boxes back up and placed them on the porch to get to another day. We had to stop anyway. Cookies needed to go in the oven for our nightly hot cocoa treat.

Once everyone headed to their rooms, I considered pulling Jordan aside and talking to him about my intentions, but he suggested we both get some much needed rest and I couldn't really find it in me to fight him on it. So up to bed I went, and I passed out before my head hit the pillow.

The following morning, I woke up on time since I had retrieved my phone from its drawer and turned it back on so that my alarm was once again functional. There were still messages waiting for my attention. In fact, there were several more than when I first chucked my phone into the desk the previous night. I had no interest in answering them. Mr. Myers and his company had a closing date. Anything else he needed from me, he could get through Saundra.

Jordan and I worked like a well-oiled machine that morning. I whipped up a batch of homemade cranberry scones shaped liked Christmas trees with a side of eggs made to order and a thick link of sausage. Jordan ran the food out to the guests, mingling and asking them about their plans for the week. Somewhere along the line, he grabbed a bite for himself and pestered me about only nibbling through half a scone. But there wasn't time, and I had much to do and a lot to think about. Putting my scone aside, I headed out to the sitting room to prepare the bills for the guests and help them move their luggage out to the drive.

Like with the previous week, all our guests checked out that morning and granted us one more night of freedom. A night that Jordan said would be the last until the new year, since people's Christmas vacations would start the coming week and Sundays would no longer be the definitive end for people's trips. I wanted to make the most of this precious quiet time and went straight to work on the rooms. With Jordan's help, we zipped through them with impressive efficiency and then we went out to the drive to finish the trees. At some point Jordan brought me a sandwich, but I let it sit on its paper plate untouched while I busied myself with completing our display.

By mid afternoon, Jordan and I were basking in the completion of our ode to Gina. It, however, wasn't enough to keep the glint of worry out of his eyes as he looked over at my sandwich, still sitting on the steps of the porch.

"It looks great Lyn," he said with a smile caught between joy and concern. "It really honors Georgina and the town will love seeing this previously undiscovered side of her."

"Thanks." I drank in the six glittering trees and tried to quiet the noise in my head long enough to appreciate it. However, I also knew there'd be time to revel once I had fixed what I had so royally screwed up. The display would mean nothing if the house she built was torn down in a matter of weeks. "I think I'll really get a feel for it once it's night and the lights are on. For now, I just... I need to go inside and work something out."

"Oh?" A note of trepidation resounded in that single syllable. "Would you like me to...?"

"Yes, but not now," I said, my words tripping over themselves. "I... I need to talk to you. But I need to know what to say first. I have to work a few things out so that..." I sighed, my heart racing and my fingers itching with nerves. I had kept myself moving as fast as I could to reach this point and now I didn't know what to do. I wanted to approach Jordan with an answer ready before him. I made this mess and though I wanted, and likely needed, his help to get out of it, it was still my mess. I couldn't tell him about the inn's coming demise without a course of action to follow it. However, that still didn't change the fact that I had no clue what to do.

"It's okay," said Jordan with a half smile, his hands raised to pause my stumbling chain of thought. "There's something I wanted to do today on my own, too. Why don't we do this? We'll go our separate ways for now, but let's promise to talk, and I mean really talk, tonight."

"I... Okay." My shoulders slouched, and I gave him a resigned nod of my head.

"Okay." He reached out and gave my arm a squeeze. "Don't beat yourself up too much Lyn, okay?"

I couldn't answer him honestly, so I just gave him a nod of acknowledgment. He then headed to his truck, and I watched him drive off towards town, leaving me to sort through my thoughts on my own.

It was unbelievably unproductive. No clear path stood before me and, out of frustration, I went to my room and took a break by flipping through the few remaining pages of Gina's diary.

Much of it was the same at that point. Her tone continued to be of perpetual hope and cheer, her stories delightful and full of contentment. Christmas displays came and went, renovations were made, and guests were entertained. It all seemed so abrupt when I finally reached those Christmas notes I had originally been searching for a few weeks prior. Nowhere in her words did she sense the coming end, the heart attack lingering just out of sight. She simply wrote about her excitement for her display telling the town's history. Then there was a begrudging note that she really needed to get to the craft store before all the good stuff was gone. Perhaps the only takeaway I could make from the end of the journal was though it was sudden, I truly believe she died happy.

My eyes stared at the blank pages for longer than I realized and the sun set while I wasn't looking. I didn't know how to close her journal, how to acknowledge that I'd finally reached the end of her story when there were still pages left to be written.

Then Jordan knocked on the door.

"Yes." I placed the journal face down on my night stand as if I needed to hold my page.

"Would you come down to join me for dinner?" he asked through the door.

"I..." I remembered our promise to discuss the cloud hanging over us, but I also made that promise thinking I'd come to the table with at least some semblance of a plan. "Maybe we could do it... like I don't know... tomorrow morning..."

"Dinner? Tomorrow morning?"

"Yes?"

"Did you eat lunch, Lyn?"

"No." I sighed and my stomach growled with appreciation as I considered what food may wait for me downstairs.

"Come on, at least come down to eat something."

"Al-alright," I answered with a sigh. I opened the door and found Jordan standing there, a nervous energy rendering him smaller than normal.

"So, let's go then," he said with a sheepish smile. Now that I caught the physical cues, my ears picked up the notes of uncertainty in his voice. My interest piqued, and I found it easier to urge my feet forward to follow him downstairs.

At first, I turned for the kitchen, but he directed me to follow him through the foyer and into the dining room. Once I turned the corner, I found the fire ablaze, candles lit, and a bottle of wine uncorked. A meal of roasted chicken, baked potato, and sauteed green beans sat on plates flanked by silverware.

"This... this is lovely Jordan." My lips hung in a loose gape as I tried to decipher what direction my night was turning.

"I... I just wanted to give you a nice dinner since I ruined our last one."

"By both of us," I corrected.

"Well, you know what I mean." His stance kept shifting, and every time his eyes found the courage to look over at me, I'd catch the glint of the fire burning within them, which sent a slight shiver rippling up my spine. "Anyway, I just wanted to have a nice dinner and afterward, I... Well, I got what I hope are the right ingredients to make gingerbread."

"You did what now?" My gape was no longer subtle and my eyes grew wide. Inside my chest, my heart swelled and my hand gripped my shirt as if tugging it away from my breast would somehow ease the sudden tension hiding behind it.

"I thought we could make a gingerbread house or something more adventurous," he said with an amused smile.

"Jordan, that's... Thank you." I tried to meet his eyes with my appreciation, but the sudden shift in our relationship had left me disoriented and I wasn't sure I could keep standing. "Why?" I finally asked. "Why would you do something so... so thoughtful for me?"

"I just wanted to apologize." He sighed and threw his hands up before pacing a few steps around the table. "I'm having trouble letting go. This has been my home for a little more than a decade and Gina was one of the best friends I've ever had. I've only been getting through this by burying myself in work and living under this fantasy that you would somehow just come in, slip into the hole Gina left behind, and everything would continue as normal."

He stopped pacing and grabbed the back of the chair so he could brace his weight against it as he hung his head. "That wasn't right, and I'm sorry. I know it doesn't seem like it, but I do realize that you have a life outside of here. That you've only spent a few weeks here while you've spent years in the city at your job and in your condo. My life has always been here, and it was hard for me to see around that, to imagine that the world continues to exist outside of it. But I do realize that this isn't your life, that you aren't Gina."

He sighed and looked up at me, watching me from the tops of his eyes. My heart pounded and my lungs tightened.

"Most everyone would do the same as you," he continued. "Sell the house as soon as they could and then go back to their life. If the tables were turned, if I had a relative in the city that named me in a will and had a condo waiting for me, I certainly wouldn't pack up everything and move right in. So it isn't right to expect that of you. I'm... I'm sorry I made your life so difficult and for just piling the guilt on to you. I just wasn't ready for change, but I'll get there in time."

He then stood up straight and took a deep breath. His smile shifted between resignation and regret, but he tried to look cheerful all the same. "I had hoped that if I kept you here long enough, that maybe I could convince you this house was worth staying for. I'm sorry my childish schemes put such a burden on you."

"But," I said, my throat tight and my words strained, "but it is, Jordan."

"What is?"

He moved around the table and stood before me once again. My point rolled around my tongue and I took a few breaths to find the strength needed to finally take that step forward and enter the great unknown.

"This... this house, this town, this... everything! It is all worth staying for!"