A few days before Christmas, David Weathers finds himself hopping a plane to his childhood home in Florida and doesn’t know why. His parents are gone, he has no siblings, yet something draws him on.<br><br>David can almost feel the magic in the air, but then he discovers Jared Acosta, the man who broke his heart twenty years earlier, has moved three doors away. Reluctantly David accepts Jared’s invitation to dinner, only to find that twenty years may not be enough for some wounds to heal.<br><br>Soon David seeks advice from his mother’s best friend Marisol, a vibrant, wise woman who believes in second chances. Can she convince David to take a chance on the man who is working so hard to be near him now? Will he be able to forgive a past that left both him and Jared unlucky in love?

Little Tree

“Yes! That’s definitely it,” David said, pulling into a parking spot directly in front of the restaurant.


A few minutes later they sat at a table with fried shrimp, hush puppies, and cole slaw.


“You definitely like the same things, don’t you?” Jared asked. “Not exactly a slave to monotony, but consistent.”


“And that’s a bad thing?” David asked.


“No, I rather like it,” Jared said. “I guess I’m just wondering if you feel this way about everything in your life, if you still like the same things you did twenty years ago.”


David was silent. The muscles in his face that had been relaxed seconds ago, were now on high alert.


“You’re wondering about us?” David asked.


Jared nodded, his own face now more serious, more aware of the stakes of the conversation.


Chapter 19