Whispers of Willow Creek

The hills of Northern California swayed a tiny town named Willow Creek. Willow Creek was renowned for having friendly streets lined with giant oak trees and cozy coffeehouses, each more welcoming than the last one. Everyone knew everyone's name, their background, and even their little secrets.

It was here, in this small town, that Clara Lawson was summoned by a string of broken relationships in the city. Clara, a 30-year-old painter, was compelled to begin anew in a town where the world's pace would be slower, allowing her to heal and find herself again. The town appeared to offer healing on a whisper.

Clara entered the "Willow Grove Café," a warm minute café renowned for wicked lattes and oven-baked scones. Noah Callahan, café owner and budding writer, reserved the counter stool. His tousled brown locks, his warm smile, and his leaping bright green eyes that sparkled like the creek on a rainy morning gave him the presence of being the very essence of the town itself—unbridled, peaceful, and disarmingly irrepressible.

They made eye contact as Clara ordered her usual cappuccino. "First time in?" Noah inquired softly with an attitude about him that made her feel completely at ease.

"Yeah," Clara said, blushing to the cheeks. "I just moved in. I'm still getting used to the easy-going rhythm of the small town."

Well, this is home town, Noah said to her. He handed her the cappuccino and continued to smile, "And we've got the best coffee in a fifty-mile radius. You'll be addicted."

Clara returned the smile at his welcome. She had never thought anyone would be able to make her so comfortable so soon.

As the weeks merged into days, Clara was visiting the café more and more, sometimes to draw, sometimes just to sit and observe Noah work a shift, smiling by name at people he knew so easily and dispersing his effortless warmth. Something in him was becoming aware of Clara. Or maybe it was the way that he never ever seemed to have too little time to hear her, or the softness of his eyes which told of a man who had a thousand stories yet to be told.

One afternoon, Clara gathered the courage to ask Noah about his writing. He’d mentioned it in passing a few times, but she hadn’t really gotten a chance to ask him more. “I hear you’re a writer,” Clara said as she stirred her coffee, her heart beating a little faster.

Noah smiled, the low, grumble-like snarl. "I'd be a very unusual writer then. But I do have ideas roaming around in my head. I just need to get them onto paper."

Clara's eyes flashed with curiosity. "What kind of ideas?"

Noah rested against the counter, looking out the window over the creek. "The ones that make people believe in a second chance. At love. At that kind of magic in life, but you'll miss it if you're not careful enough to look for it."

Clara's heart racing. As if he were speaking to her directly. She couldn't help but smile. "Sounds lovely."

Followed by:

"I remember," Emily says.

No doubt," Noah repeated, looking at her gently. "It is just the way I feel about Willow Creek. There is something there. It heals you and you do not even know that it is healing you. People go there and they leave with some peace of mind.".

Noah's walls fell. He had arrived at Willow Creek convinced he could mend, but in Noah, he found something: maybe he didn't forget anything, but Noah's words made him believe he could.

It was the autumn evening, chilly, when leaves at the end of the trees start to turn color and turn yellow and red, Clara entered the café with some of her latest work. She'd worked on it for weeks, and she'd felt duty-bound to bring it now along. The dusk at the creek, the purple and amber of the water contained in her hands. She placed it on the counter, her fingers patting anxiously against the wood.

"I just completed it," she replied, restlessly. "I wanted to hear your thoughts."

Noah didn't shift, his gaze on the painting. He studied it slowly, drinking in the colors, the serenity that it radiated. Then he looked at Clara, his expression calm but intent. "It's lovely," he whispered. "It's all this town is about—serene, lovely, and full of hope."

Clara's heart grew full. She hadn't anticipated this kind of response. She hadn't anticipated her own response to him, either.

There was tension between them, but this time it wasn't charged. It was comfortable, the type of silence that accompanies two people who are attracted to something more than friendship.

Noah took a deep breath, then moved forward. "Clara… I've been wanting to say something to you for a very, very long time now. To you. And me. I don't want to remain silent."

Clara gazed up at him, her heart pounding in her chest. "What are you saying?"

Noah took another step closer, within reach where she could sense the warmth emitting from his body. "I believe we both are looking for something here. Something true. Something that will last."

Her heart skipped a beat. For the first time in some time, Clara wasn't anticipating the worst. She was prepared.

Without a word, Noah reached out, gently taking her hand. Clara felt the spark between them, the connection that had been growing over the past weeks. She smiled softly, her eyes meeting his. “I think I’ve been looking for that too.”

And in that moment, sitting in the yellow gold light of the café and the gentle touch of wind that caused Willow Creek's leaves to tremble, both Clara and Noah realized that they had found something truly extraordinary—something to be clung to, not only within this little town, but in their hearts as well.

They did not need big drama or a hero declaration. The magic existed, in the little they had, in the unspoken vow, and the vow of always with love, do-overs, and Willow Creek magic