1. Alice Benette

The phone buzzes for the third time on the bed while I’m still trying—desperately—to decide if I should take two thick coats… or three. I stare at the half-open suitcase, clothes piled in chaotic little mountains, and sigh as if that alone could fix my whole life.

Of course, it can’t.

I grab the phone before my best friend decides to fly all the way here just to drag me by the hair.

“I’m answering, I’m answering!” I grumble, putting it on speaker while folding a sweater I’m not even sure I want to bring.

“Alice Bennett,” Chloe’s shrill voice explodes through the room, “for the love of everything holy about Christmas—explain this insanity to me again. You’re going to drive to Texas. While pregnant. Alone. Days before Christmas. Do you even understand what you’re doing?”

I roll my eyes, even though she can’t see it.

“Of course I do. I’m packing,” I say, trying to sound more confident than I feel.

“I’m talking about the trip, not the suitcase!”

“And I’m talking about both.” I inhale deeply, attempting to stay calm. “Chloe, my doctor cleared me. Three months isn’t nine. I’m not about to give birth on the highway.”

She lets out a dramatic groan—one she perfected back in theater school, before dropping out in her second semester.

“Are you really throwing that in my face? Your doctor cleared you to live, not to drive for hours alone to a middle-of-nowhere place filled with cows and hay!”

“It’s a ranch hotel, not the middle of nowhere,” I mutter, sorting through two pairs of gloves I probably won’t use but suddenly feel essential. “And honestly? After everything that happened, the way everything ended… I need this. I need to get out.”

There’s silence on the other end. Not the annoyed kind—no. It’s the kind she makes when she realizes I’m serious.

“Al…” Her voice softens. “You don’t have to prove you’re strong like this.”

“It’s not about proving anything,” I say quietly while staring at the suitcase as if it could defend me. “It’s about breathing.”

She sighs, and this time it’s not dramatic—it’s broken.

“Okay… but I still think you’re being crazy.”

A short laugh slips out of me.

“I’d rather be crazy than keep staring at these walls every single day.”

My eyes drift to the corner of my bedroom—the place where, until a week ago, the Christmas tree he put up used to stand. The same tree where I would’ve hung the baby’s first ornament, where I imagined taking pictures, starting traditions.

Now it’s packed inside a box I haven’t had the guts to open.

“You could come stay at my place,” Chloe insists, her voice cracking a little. “We can make hot chocolate, watch terrible movies, I’ll cook chocolate-chip pancakes… I’ll even let you pick the first movie we watch.”

“Chloe…” I close my eyes, a familiar ache squeezing my chest. “That would only delay what I need to do.”

“Which is… run away?”

I open the drawer and pull out a pack of thick socks.

“Which is… breathe,” I repeat. “Start over. I don’t know. Just… leave before I actually lose my mind.”

On the other end, she goes quiet for a few seconds before whispering:

“I just wish you weren’t this hurt.”

My throat tightens, and it has nothing to do with morning sickness.

“I wish that too,” I admit, voice unsteady. “But I am. And staying here, staring at all the promises that will never happen, doesn’t help.”

“He’s an idiot,” Chloe declares with the conviction of someone who would commit a crime in my honor if I let her. “The biggest idiot to ever walk the earth.”

I swallow hard.

“Yeah…” I whisper. “But he was the one I planned everything with, you know?”

I don’t need to say the rest. She knows.

The planned trips, the decorated house, the excitement for the first ultrasound together, the ring on my finger. Every detail that now feels ridiculous.

“I swear I’ll punch him in the face someday,” she mutters. “That bastard.”

“You’ll have to get in line,” I say, attempting a weak smile.

Silence.

She’s trying not to cry. Honestly… so am I.

“So you’re really going?” she asks.

“I am.”

“Right now?”

“Right now.”

Chloe inhales sharply, and when she speaks again her voice is shaky but determined:

“Okay. I love you, you stubborn woman. But you text me when you stop for gas. And when you arrive. And in the middle of the drive. And—”

“Chloe.”

“What?”

“I’ll text you,” I promise. “And I love you too, okay?”

“Okay. But I still think you’re insane.”

I smile.

“I know.”

I hang up before I fall apart. Before three simple words—stay here with me—make me change my mind.

I place the phone on the vanity and look at the bedroom that was mine and yet… never really was. At least not in the way I imagined.

I finish zipping the suitcase that threatens to burst open. I work better under pressure, apparently. I grab the smaller bag with documents, vitamins, ultrasound prints, and the only present I bought for the baby—a tiny pair of shoes, full of promises I don’t know if I can keep.

My chest aches.

I didn’t ask to do this alone.

Yet… here I am.

I roll the bags into the living room. The wheels echo across the floor, marking my goodbye. The room feels bigger, emptier, sadder without the Christmas tree I took down last night—crying silently as I packed each ornament without breaking any.

The house seems larger now. Or maybe it’s just the absence of him that makes everything feel so hollow.

I open the front door, and the cold breeze hits my face—the winter smell, the hint of Christmas, the ghost of everything I hoped to experience here but won’t.

I carry the bags to the garage and place them in the trunk, arranging them like my life depends on it.

Maybe, in a way, it does.

I close the trunk.

Take a deep breath.

And look at the house.

The house where I once walked in believing it would be my happily-ever-after. The house where I imagined painting a nursery, cooking dinners that were never appreciated, loving someone who, in the end, didn’t love me enough to stay.

The house I must leave behind.

My heart squeezes, but I don’t cry. I’ve cried enough.

“Goodbye…” I whisper.

One last look. One last sting. One last memory I leave behind with everything I thought my future would be.

I open the car door, get inside, and the lavender scent from the air freshener greets me like a weak hug. I fasten my seatbelt, turn on the engine, and for several seconds I just stare at the gate, waiting for… what?

A last-minute miracle?

A second chance?

A voice telling me “stay”?

None of that comes.

So I shift into drive.

I pull out slowly. Then turn the corner. And the house disappears in the rearview mirror as if it never belonged to me at all.

Deep down, I know it still hurts. I know it will continue hurting. I know I’m going to a ranch hotel in the middle of Texas to avoid breaking entirely.

But as the city fades behind me, as Christmas lights twinkle in neighbors’ windows, as the tiny life inside me reminds me—quiet and fragile—that I’m not as alone as I feel…

I do the only thing I can.

I move forward.

Toward Snowfall Creek Ranch.

Toward a different Christmas.

Toward a new beginning I’m not sure I want—

but desperately need.

And maybe, just maybe, toward a piece of peace I can’t even imagine finding yet.