“There are always bright lights waiting for you, Peyton. I know it.”

She looked at the photo as it started to develop. Seconds later, she saw that it was an image of the hotel. Callum handed it to her and she clutched it, knowing that, no matter what happened, she would always have The Spencer-Dayle and all the memories that had been created in it and around it.

“This is the brightest light that’s waiting for you. You don’t need any of them. You’re a survivor and you will be something great.”

Her heart throbbed at his belief. Peyton turned and saw the way that he looked at her. Love. It was love that filled his eyes. A love so beautiful and unattainable. A love she couldn’t keep.

“Want to go lie in the boats until I have to start work with Jenny?” she suggested once she stood up.

Callum chuckled and picked up the camera and the pictures they had taken on their way to the pier. “Like old times?”

She nodded her head. “Like old times.”

It didn’t take them long to walk off the pier and around the lake to the boathouse. Once they stepped onto the wooden boardwalk that wrapped around the building, they made their way to the posts. Then Callum got into the wooden boat first and held his hand out to her before he helped her in

They didn’t untie it from the post. Instead, they lay down and stared at the blue, cloudless sky above. It’s what they’d always done. They’d watch clouds and time pass them before she’d have to go home for dinner or get back to the hotel.

It was a bittersweet moment, lost in the past and the present. Both so similar, but this time, she was aware of the end. Last time she had been oblivious to it. Ignoring their impending end, Peyton took a deep breath and closed her eyes.

You were right, Mum and Dad. Forgive and forget. It’s time I let the past go, and soon—Callum too.

When the boat rocked slightly, she opened her eyes to see that Callum had moved closer to her. Feeling his gaze on her, Peyton tilted her head and was met with his saddened eyes. The smile she had developing stalled and instead her lips made a fine line.

Callum inhaled deeply before he blinked. Slowly, his hands reached up and brushed her cheek then it returned to the wood of the boat. The moment his touch left her, she had already missed the way it affected her heart.

His lips parted before he asked, “Do you know what a sometimes moment is, Peyton?”

We did it. We’re coming up to the ending.

Peyton swallowed the lump in her throat. She’d heard him whisper it as she’d fallen asleep the first time he slept in her bed. She was scared to hear him define what she was basing their time on. She was scared to hear him admit that it wasn’t forever. But the truth was that she had always known.

“It’s us,” she replied in a soft voice, knowing that he could hear the sadness lacing it.

Callum gave her a tight smile. “In a way, we are sometimes moments. What we have right now embodies it. Sometimes moments are the moments you’ll look back on later in life and smile. They were points in time that were occasional and brief. They are a reflection of a memory. They are moments that are looked upon fondly. They are what we live and breathe and know as now but look back on someday. They are not forever, Peyton. They are reflections. They are the times you think of when you’re married and have children. You’ll think of me and smile because we had something in that tiny period of time we had together. That, when you have your forever, you will look back at the moments we shared. Even if it’s rarely, they were ours. They were our sometimes moments.”

Sometimes doesn’t mean forever.

“And is this a sometimes moment, Callum?” she asked.

Callum nodded. “Every moment we’ve experienced since I returned to Daylesford has been a sometimes moment, Peyton. Memories that I hope you’ll look back on one day.”

She thought of the times they’d shared the past few weeks. Every kiss, every touch, every breath of air and ‘I love you.’ They were more than she could have believed she’d share with anyone. She hadn’t imagined being close to anyone after him. Peyton had believed that she’d live a lonely life, wondering what life’s pleasures were about. But he’d come back and restored her faith in a better, happier life—even with the pain.

Callum’s thumb brushed her tear away and he kissed her lips. “Thank you for our sometimes moments, Peyton. I will hold on to them for far longer than my last breath.” Then he pulled her into his arms.

She lay her head on his chest and looked up at the sky. The moments they had shared, although brief, were treasured. They were moments where she believed that he was hers and that she was loved.

She breathed him in and memorised the beats of his heart. She took in her surroundings and the man who held her. Then she closed her eyes and let every sound and movement Callum made sear themselves into her heart.

Life is a cluster of sometimes moments, more beautiful when more are grouped together. Our sometimes moments will be my forever moments. There is no one else after Callum Reid, the boy who kissed me under a cherry blossom tree and the man who gave me a forever in a sometimes.

“Y ou finally made it,” Callum said once Peyton had walked up the small hill.

She stood next to him and said, “I had to wait for my parents to leave, and Jenny’s covering for me.”

Callum wrapped his arms around her and kissed the top of her head. “I’m glad you’re here. I wanted you to be here when it happens.”

Peyton squinted up at him. “When what happens?” she asked, slightly suspicious.

He rolled his eyes before untangling himself from her. Then he picked up his SLR camera and adjusted the lens. “Look out at the lake, Pey.”

When she looked in the direction that he’d suggested, the view took her breath away. It was beautiful. The setting sun filled the sky with purples and reds, and the water sparkled before her eyes. She had never seen the lake look more beautiful than in this moment.

The sounds of the camera shutter had her turning her head. She watched the awed expression on Callum’s face transform as he looked at the photo on the screen. He saw the beauty. He saw the innocence of nature. And Peyton saw that in him. Her heart throbbed at the sight of him taking in the view. The way he appreciated life had her envious of his perspective on the world, and a slow smile developed on his face.

When he turned and his eyes met hers, the sparkle in them made her breathless. And it was in that moment that she knew what she had always known deep down.

I’m in love with Callum Reid.

“Pey, wake up.”

A nudge had Peyton groaning.

She hugged the blanket around her and said, “Callum, I don’t have your kind of stamina. I’m not an expert at lasting long when it comes to sex. Give me a couple of hours.”

He shook her this time, so she rolled on her back and opened her eyes.

“As much as I love the idea of sex right now, that’s not why I woke you up.”

Peyton sat up and rubbed her eyes. Before she could even ask him what was going on, Callum handed her the phone.

“It’s Jenny,” he said.

She looked at the clock on her bedside table to see that it was just after two a.m. She knew Jenny would never call her this late, especially with this week’s guests having already checked out. It had been four days since Callum had told her that their time was limited and four days since she had started operating the hotel to guests. The feedback that she’d received from her customers had been great, and it had given her the confidence boost that she’d needed. Now she could concentrate on Marissa’s wedding and the building of the lakeside dance floor.