I let out a cry so loud Mary must’ve heard it, because she screamed, “What? What is it?”

We all laughed.

Blake pulled out his phone and tapped a few times.

A second later, cheers were so loud they vibrated the walls of the office. And then . . . a trumpet . . . the Duke Blue Devils fight song.

My eyes went wide as I turned to Blake. “A marching band!”

His hands went up in surrender. “I didn’t do that.” He laughed through his tears.

Dr. James just shook her head. “You’ve got a lot of supporters.” After a pause, she said, “I got you guys an early wedding present.”

She pointed to a shoebox on the corner of her desk. “Go ahead.” She smiled. “Open it.”

Blake laughed. “You open it, babe, you deserve it.”

A lifetime supply of red pens.

I laughed.

I cried.

And then I did it all over again.

Dr. James stood up and made her way to the door. The cheers outside were still going strong.

“It looks like it’s time to celebrate. Go plan that wedding. Go have enough babies to make that basketball team.”

So that was what we did. Minus the basketball team of babies.

We were married two months later. In the spot where it all had started. On a running track, in the park where Blake had first saved me. My wedding gift from him—a plaque in front of the bush where I had randomly appeared. To My Wife: My Unexpectedly Phenomenal.

We had the reception at the abandoned half-court, which was no longer abandoned. Josh and Dean had teamed up and created a league of skateballers.

Of course, no wedding could be planned to take place in two months, unless it was planned by Celia Hunter. That woman could make anything happen. Blake had invited his dad, but he hadn’t shown, which was probably a good thing, because Celia’s boyfriend was a six-foot-eight ex-pro-baller. They’d met at one of Blake’s awards nights. I had been too sick to attend, so I’d asked her to go in my place. I guess it had been fate. His name was Jimmy. Blake always laughed about it—it was the name of his favorite character in Hoosiers. The one that made the shot right before he’d said “Marry me?”. Jimmy had asked Celia on a number of occasions to marry him. She’d said she had a man. His name was Blake, and she didn’t have room for much else.

Dean and Mary had adopted Amy and Sammy and now had all three kids permanently. They’d stopped fostering once they’d been approved for Sammy. Three kids are enough, Mary had said. Dean—he wanted enough to make his own skateball team.

As for me—I hadn’t told anyone, but I’d enrolled in some community-college classes for next semester. I didn’t know what I wanted to do yet. And since The Road had been my life plan, I’d never thought about it. So I was going to take a little bit of everything until I worked it out. But like they say, it’s not the years in your life that count, it’s the life in your years. And I sure as hell was going to make my life count.

Oh yeah, my wedding dress—it was red.

EPILOGUE

Blake

Nine years later

Flowers and gifts surrounded her headstone. It didn’t surprise me; she made an impact on a lot of people in her lifetime. I stood tall in front of the shrine. It had been three years since she had passed, and each year got easier without her. My eyes trailed over the letters, her name printed in bright-red ink: C. A. Hunter, just above the large pink ribbon.

Small hands gripped my fingers. “Dad?”

I smiled down at our son. His little five-year-old face was scrunched as he tried to block the sun from his eyes. I jerked my head toward the headstone. “Say hello, Clayton.”

His gazed moved to the shrine, his head dropping as the words left his mouth. “Hi, Grandma.”

Then Chloe was next to me. Her hand on the crook of my elbow, the other arm carrying our youngest son, Jordan. “Wow,” she said, her brown hair whipping all over her face. “Look at all the stuff people have left.”

I took Jordan from her and set him down on his wobbly feet. “This is your Grandma, buddy. It’s a shame you didn’t get to meet her. She was kind of amazing.”

We stayed for a few minutes as a family before Chloe took our boys for a walk. She thought I needed some alone time, and she was right.

Mom had passed quickly and unexpectedly. Unlike Chloe, she’d had absolutely no idea that death was coming. Seven months. Seven months was all it had taken. She’d fought, every day, until her last. And when it had been time, she’d left in peace.

The last book she’d written became her most successful. Chloe had helped her write it. It was about a boy who went for a run in the middle of the night and the girl who was there to save him . . .

To my beautiful girl, Chloe,

I hope there never comes a time when you have to read this, but if you are, then that must mean you’re scared. And I’m here to tell you that that’s okay. Not that it’s okay in the sense that things will be okay, but it’s okay to be scared. It’s okay to be afraid of the things ahead you. I am. I’m scared. But I have the support of the people around me, who will help me get through this, who will help me when I need them the most, because they love me, even when I don’t deserve it.

You’re too young to remember, but I used to tell you this story. A story about red-letter days. A girl in my sorority, Celia, used to tell it to us. She used to come up with these fascinating stories of love and life. We all told her she should be a writer, but she said it was a pipe dream.