Winter Woods

Chapter 1 Staring at a blank screen on her laptop had resulted in next to nothing, even though Olivia Kensington had been doing so for nearly an hour, and despite attempting to eliminate every distraction possible, the words just wouldn’t come. With a sigh of frustration, she ran her hand through her long blonde hair and slammed her MacBook Air closed. Clearly, nothing was happening right now, no matter how hard she attempted to summon her muse. The noises from downstairs were certainly part of the problem. Even though her office was situated in the back corner of the second story, she could still hear laughter coming from the back of the house—likely her mother and sister in the kitchen, her nieces and maybe her brother’s girlfriend, too. Olivia had tried earbuds, but all those did was make her ears sore, and turning her favorite Pandora station up had only caused her to hum along to the tunes without writing a single word. With another sigh, she stood and crossed to the picture window that looked out on the back yard. A light snow had fallen earlier that morning, bringing the total for December to nearly three inches, though some of it had melted away when the sun peeked out from time to time. Still, the snowman her nieces, Ruby and Paisley, had made yesterday was still waving at her from just in front of her parents’ house, which had originally been intended to be a guest house, but they’d moved in when she purchased the place last year. She loved having them so nearby, but it also meant whenever real guests came to visit, they stayed in Olivia’s home with her. Normally, that wouldn’t bother her either, but with a deadline looming and only four chapters written in her novel, having her sister’s family and her younger brother and his girlfriend here meant extra noise—all the time--and she just wasn’t getting anything accomplished. Her house was large and sat on almost five acres. There were plenty of guest rooms, which had been one of her reasons for choosing it—that and the old Colonial had always spoken to her, even when she was a small child. She’d always said she’d buy it someday. That someday had come after the success of her first novel. Love in the Wind, the first book in her Virginia Sweethearts series, had done phenomenally well, making her a best-selling author and one of those “overnight” success stories people were always reading about in the papers. Of course, they didn’t see the stack of rejection letters the same book had received or the pile of manuscripts that never got picked up by an agent, or the files on her computer of novels that never quite got finished. If overnight meant six years of hard work, doubt, and nearly giving up more times than she could count, then, yes, Olivia was an overnight success. When she’d purchased the home, her friends had asked why she needed something so spacious, and she didn’t really have an answer. She’d just always wanted to live in this house. It worked out well that her parents were looking to sell their Greek Revival. It had gotten away from her dad, Roger, over the years. The house she grew up in was large and even older than this home. Her parents had moved into the guest house before they’d even sold her childhood home, but they were both happy when an architect moved into it during the summer, promising to restore it to its former glory. Now, her parents had a much more suitable residence, and they were right next door should she ever need them. Roger had retired from a local cable company recently, and her mother, Irene, who used to be a hospice nurse before her knees began to give out on her, was happy to have him home. They spent most of their time in the garden when weather permitted, but when they weren’t working outside, most days, they were at Olivia’s—just visiting a spell. That was usually fine, but now, it seemed like the entire population of Charles Town was downstairs, and Olivia knew she wasn’t going to meet her word count goal—again—today. The sun wasn’t quite beginning to set, and a glimpse at the clock on the wall told her it was just past 4:00. She’d been “working” through lunch, and a rumble in her stomach helped her to decide now was the time to try working outside of the home. Grabbing her laptop, she went down the hall to her bedroom and threw on a heavier sweater and some UGGs. She checked her hair in the mirror above her dresser and decided to run her hairbrush through it a few times before she headed down the stairs. Maybe a change in scenery would do her some good. By the time she reached the bottom of the stairs, she knew what all the noise was. The clanking of pots and pans from the kitchen told her that her mother was whipping up some concoction with the littles. She decided to peek her head in and see what was going on. Walking past her dad and her brother-in-law, Cliff, sitting on the couch watching a sporting event of some sort, she heard the roar of the crowd but couldn’t see the screen and didn’t care to stop and check it out. Olivia had never been that interested in college or professional sports. Stepping into her kitchen, she took a deep breath and held it. There seemed to be a coating of flour everywhere. Even the ceiling had something white and powdery on it in patches. A gooey liquid dripped from one corner of the new granite counter tops she’d had installed during the remodel—the perfect ones she’d had shipped from New Hampshire—and there was enough dirty bake ware in her sink to rival the bakery downtown on a busy day. “Mom, what’s going on?” she asked, attempting to keep her voice even and calm. “Did a cookie factory explode in here?” “Oh, Olivia, I’m so sorry,” Irene began, a smile spreading across her kind, bespectacled face. “I was just showing the girls how we can make our own gingerbread instead of buying one of those expensive kits from the store.” “I told mom we didn’t mind purchasing the one that already had everything,” Olivia’s sister, Fiona, said, shaking her head. Fiona was the oldest sibling, and she looked a lot like Olivia, though she was a bit curvier and at least two inches shorter at five-six. She had her father’s green eyes, too, whereas Olivia got Irene’s blue ones, as did their younger brother Brett. Fiona was a teacher, but she got a few weeks off during the holidays, and she and Cliff had driven down from Baltimore the night before in time for the Charles Town Christmas Parade. They planned on staying until after New Year’s, which would’ve been just fine—if it wasn’t for the book. “Aunt Olivia!” Ruby shouted, “come look!” Olivia hesitated to approach the island where the girls were stirring something that looked way too thin to ever turn into gingerbread. She was afraid it might splatter the sweater she’d just put on, but she loved the little girls, so she cautiously took a few steps forward. “Look!” Paisley, who was a kindergartner, and three years younger than her sister, also insisted. “You are both doing a fabulous job!” Olivia said with a smile. “You might need just a smidge more flour.” Irene looked over the rim of the two large bowls and nodded. “I think you might be right.” Olivia decided not to mention she was fairly certain adding more flour would not be the only thing they’d need to do. “Where are Brett and Kim?” she asked. Brett was a junior at Virginia Tech, and he’d brought his girlfriend Kim along with him this year because her parents were going to Hawaii. Olivia had agreed, only once her parents approved, since she had four spare bedrooms, which meant Kim would have a place to stay. She was a nice girl, but very quiet, and presently, that made her one of Olivia’s favorites. “They went into Winchester to do a little Christmas shopping,” Irene explained. She wiped her brow on her sleeve, making her graying hair dance around her crown a bit. “They promised to be back before dinner.” Olivia hadn’t even considered dinner. She’d likely be expected to feed all of these people. Her sister had only arrived the night before and had gone straight to the Christmas parade, so they’d eaten downtown. Her brother usually fended for himself. “Dinner… right,” she mumbled. “Don’t you worry. I’ve had a beef stew in the crockpot most of the afternoon,” Irene said with smile. “This might be your house, but it’s still my Christmas.” She gave her daughter a little wink, and Olivia instantly felt more relaxed. She knew her mother loved hosting a big family Christmas, and while that was fine with Olivia, it wasn’t her forte. She’d much rather leave that to her mom. “Good, thank you,” Olivia smiled. “I was actually going to go to Bishop’s for a while and see if I could get a little more work done.” “Oh, are we being too loud?” Fiona asked, wrapping her arms around her daughters’ shoulders as if that might create a cocoon of silence. “No, not at all,” Olivia lied. “I just… I need a change of scenery.” “Don’t you want to bake with us, Aunt Olivia?” Ruby asked, her green eyes beaming up at her aunt with the threat of dismal disappointment around the rims. It was tempting—not because Olivia liked to bake but because she really did want to spend time with her nieces while they were here. She didn’t get to see them nearly enough. Yet, she’d set a goal for herself to write at least 500 words today, which should’ve been achievable, and she really needed to do that first. “Maybe when I get back,” she said with a reassuring smile. “I don’t think it will take too long if I can just write this next scene.” “Well, I sure hope it’s a scene where Elliott and Margot finally get together,” Irene said, carrying a spatula over to the sink and dropping it in with a thunk. Olivia cringed, another reminder of why she normally didn’t let her mother use her kitchen. “Elliott?” Fiona questioned. “I think you mean Caleb.” “Caleb? Heavens, no,” Irene replied. “Elliott is the perfect man for Margot. Honestly, how can you choose Caleb over Elliott?” “Caleb is a natural leader. He gets the job done. Elliott is sweet and funny, I guess, but Caleb is the real man of the story.” Fiona crossed her arms against the bulky red sweater she wore, as if that would settle it once and for all. This was not an uncommon argument. It seemed everywhere she went, people felt compelled to tell her what should happen next in the series, and while Olivia was both flattered and humbled that so many people cared about the world she’d created, she couldn’t assure anyone of what might happen between Margot and the feuding gentlemen—because she didn’t know for sure herself. As her mother and sister continued to voice their opinions, she said, “I won’t be long,” and slowly backed toward the door that led to the garage, snatching her coat and purse off of the hook and her keys from the bowl on the little table next to the exit as she went. She was pretty sure that Paisley and Ruby were the only ones who noticed, and they both waved as she slipped out. A few moments later, Olivia backed her bright blue Cadillac ATS down the winding driveway. She waited for the gates she’d recently had installed to open and then checked to make sure no cars were coming before making her way onto the street, headed for downtown and Bishop’s Diner, where she was hopeful a different kind of noise would let her get some work done. It was a Saturday, and a lot had been going on downtown that day. She knew her sister had planned to take the girls to visit Santa Claus at the library, though she’d forgotten to ask how that went, and every time she’d wandered downtown in hopes of finding her muse recently, she’d noticed dozens more people than usual. She’d heard there was some sort of marketing campaign going on, possibly spearheaded by one of her friends from high school, Melody, a marketer who had recently moved back home from Chicago, but she couldn’t be sure. So, she expected a crowd when she neared the downtown area, and she found one. Even though most of the shops would be closing soon, tons of people were still milling about. It took her a few minutes to find a parking spot, and the one she pulled into was almost a block and a half away from Bishop’s. She only hoped there would be a corner booth in the back with her name on it.