A Fantastic Holiday Season: The Gift of Stories (6 page)

He had heard this fantasy before. Today it was louder and sharper.

“Dad,” said Riley.

“Riley.” He turned to his son as Kaylee wandered farther away.

“I have to talk.”

“Let’s sit down.” They walked to a bench against the wall and sat where he could keep an eye on Kaylee.

“Dad, I’ve been wanting to I’ve been waiting to—Dad—”

Leo waited. They both sat, staring toward Kaylee. Leo had just the lightest connection to Riley. He wondered whether he should boost it to find out what Riley was trying to tell him. He used to do that all the time. Lately, he’d been wondering if that was such a good idea.

“Dad, I think I’m gay.”

Leo stared at the floor. Dismay swamped him, and a storm of thoughts he wanted to edit out as they swarmed through his mind—so there’s my legacy gone to a dead end, people will hate my son and hurt him because he’s different, he’s not the same to me anymore either, what do I do now? How could this happen? Whose fault is it? Why Riley, why me?—

He touched his sternum and listened to what Riley hadn’t said aloud. Riley had been sitting on a volcano, and now he was swallowed up in a cloud of dark gray fear and despair.

Leo took Riley’s hand. He leaned back, holding his son’s hand, and let his mind relax, let the whirling thoughts fade. When he felt calm, he said, “Okay.”

“I wish I wasn’t. I’ve been trying to make it change, but it doesn’t. I thought if I didn’t ever say it out loud, it would go away, but it didn’t.”

“How long have you been struggling with this?”

Riley looked away. Leo waited.

“About two years,” Riley said at last. “There’s a guy at school, we’ve been in the same classes for a couple years, and I had a crush on him, kinda, but I knew he’d hate me if I did anything about it, and—and the other guys are all talking about girls, but—I don’t feel—I—”

Leo squeezed his hand. “It’s all right, Riley. It’s okay. It’s—it’s natural, and you’re not alone.” Two years? Two years, and Leo had been living in the same house with him for one and a half of those years, connected through family magic, and hadn’t noticed this dark cloud wrapping around his son. Maybe he was losing his magic, too, the way his brother Rick had.

Riley sighed. They sat side by side, Leo holding Riley’s hand, until Kaylee was through looking at bird nests. “Let’s go to the hall of minerals,” she said.

Leo stood up and tugged Riley to his feet. His son was almost as tall as he was. Fear and guilt still thrummed through the boy. Leo pulled his son into a hug. “Hey. You’re a fine kid. Nothing wrong with you. Got it?”

“No,” said Riley, muffled, speaking to Leo’s shoulder, his arms tight around his father. Then he laughed.

“We can work on that.” Leo thumped him on the back and let go. They could work on it … when Leo had visits with the kids. Or if he moved home. Or, he supposed, on the phone, if it came down to it. He needed to get online and do some research, find out what Riley was likely to need and how to help him. “Call me anytime if you need help. Does your mom know?”

“I didn’t tell her, but I think she—sometimes she—I don’t know.”

Leo felt a glow at the thought that Riley had told him first, then tried to tamp it down. “We can worry about that later. Right now, we’ve got some rocks to visit.”

“Yeah. Okay.” Riley rubbed his eyes with his fists. Leo patted his back again, and they followed Kaylee to the hall of minerals.

Riley was calmer, smiling, when Leo dropped him and Kaylee off at the house later that afternoon.

The locked box inside of Kaylee was jiggling and jumping. The lid rattled as if something inside was trying to scratch its way out.

Wednesday was Christmas Day. At eight a.m., Leo parked in front of the house. The front lawn was still frosty with last night’s freeze, and his breath puffed out of him, little clouds that spun and vanished. The trees were bare-branched black. He grabbed the shopping bags of presents and headed up the walk to the front door. If this Christmas was like others, the kids would have been up at least two hours already.

He’d missed the big Christmas Eve dinner. In the past, Melissa had spent the whole day preparing and cooking for it, and his parents had come; it was the only time of the year they would be civil and not try to take over his family from him, because Melissa made everything perfect, from the turkey to the holiday centerpiece. This year, he’d spent Christmas Eve with his parents in their padded house, eating boneless turkey breast and soggy sweet potato casserole, his father’s favorites. He wondered if Melissa had invited any of her new friends over for Christmas Eve.

He hadn’t helped Melissa with the tree this year, or the do stockings. Every year, they decorated the tree on Christmas Eve, after the children went to sleep, so the kids would be surprised when they came downstairs the next morning. Every year, Leo had been the one to sneak into the kids’ rooms and lay the stockings at the foots of their beds.

Melissa opened the door to his ring and offered him an unguarded smile, the bright, wide smile she used to give him when he came home after a long day at work, the smile of someone happy to see him. Heat bloomed in his chest, and his family magic unfurled, reaching out to her and the kids without his even willing it. He so wanted to hug her right into his heart.

Her smile faded and she stepped back without a word, leaving the way open.

He closed his eyes and retracted his magic. When he looked again, Melissa smiled faintly. “Come in.”

“Thanks.” He edged past her. Something strange had just happened. She knew. She knew when he connected to her, and when he disconnected. Maybe that was why she never came to the door when he stopped by to pick up the kids.

“Breakfast?” he asked.

“Already over.”

He smiled and headed for the living room.

The tree was big, with dense green needles. It scented the room with pine. Pale, pearly glass balls and tinsel shone, flashing in the flickering white lights that nestled in the branches. The tree was loaded with candy canes and gilded pinecones. It looked like something in a magazine. A fire blazed in the fireplace, and the stacks of presents around the tree were wrapped with Melissa’s usual flair. She was a master of ribbon bows and invisible tape.

Last year they had laughed together and shushed each other while they decorated the tree. The tree had looked more like a collaboration, maybe a drunken one. And they had had multicolored lights, his favorite; Melissa always wanted white lights.

Riley, Piper, and Kaylee sat on the couch, looking at him. He hesitated, wondering if anybody would hug him. No one got up. After all, he’d seen them only a couple days ago. He smiled at them. “Hey, guys. How about if I’m Santa this year?”

Each year, one of the family was the designated Santa, handing out gifts to everyone. It had started with him and Melissa when the kids were small, but last year Riley had done it, and the year before, Piper. One gift for each person, and a pause while everybody opened the presents and showed them to each other, and then Santa handed out another round of gifts.

“Okay, Daddy,” said Kaylee.

Leo let the thinnest tendrils touch the children. They were all excited and a little worried. Kaylee, especially, was agitated, and that box inside her was jumpy. Nobody was mad he was usurping the Santa role. He glanced at Melissa, his head cocked.

She smiled and nodded.

“Okay. Let’s see what we have.” He unloaded his presents from the cloth shopping bags he’d brought them in, one gift for each of the children and a big present for Melissa. He’d save those for Round Two. He picked a present for each person from Melissa’s perfect pile and handed them around. He had wondered if there would be gifts for him, as awkward and strange as the separation had been. But there were.

Kaylee ripped paper off her present. An iPod, with headphones. She crowed with delight.

Riley untaped his gift carefully and folded the green foil paper before seeing what he got—three classical music CDs.

Piper opened one end of her parcel and slid the inside out: a knit hat in black with white skull and crossbones. She pulled it onto her head until it covered her from the eyebrows up and said, “Thanks, Mom!”

Melissa sat with her present in her lap. It was one of a few under the tree wrapped sloppily, hidden behind Melissa’s showcase presents. He’d had to hunt to find a present for her. It was from Kaylee.

Melissa unwrapped Kaylee’s crumpled purple tissue paper and held up a small clay dragon.

“I made it in material arts class,” Kaylee said.

“I love it!” Melissa said.

Leo’s present was small, wrapped in gold foil. A gift from Melissa. He opened it. A utilitarian pair of steel handcuffs. Confused, he stared down at them and wondered why he felt cold. Then he wondered if Melissa had new ideas about sex she wanted to share. He looked up at her, and she flushed and stared at the floor. Sex? He reached out. He had to know.

His tendril touched her and she hunched her shoulders, then stared up at him, her gaze intense.

So, she wasn’t looking for bondage games. She was sending a message.

She saw him as handcuffs. Somehow, she knew about family magic.

He pulled back, chilled.

“Gah, Mom, what is that about?” Piper asked, staring at the handcuffs. “Maybe I don’t want to know.”

Riley and Kaylee looked up from their presents. Leo slid the handcuffs into a back pocket, out of sight. He rose, smiling. “Next round.”

He handed around the presents he had brought. His chest felt tight. Six months since he’d spent more than a few hours a week with them, and everybody had changed. His understanding of them had changed, too; now he felt like he didn’t know any of them very well. What if he’d gotten everything wrong?

For himself, he got a lumpy, purple-tissue-wrapped present from Kaylee. He set it in his lap and sat, his fingers digging into his knees, as he waited for verdicts. Light, light touch on the children, just so he’d know what they really thought.

“Gee,” said Riley, “I have absolutely no idea what this is.” He ripped paper off the basketball and held it like a globe in front of him, staring at it as though he’d never touched a basketball before.

When Riley was ten, he and Leo spent a lot of time after Leo got off work shooting baskets through a rim Leo had attached above the garage. One day the ball had deflated. Leo had patched it, but it didn’t hold air anymore, and somehow he’d let it go, and lost the close connection to Riley. Maybe that was why he hadn’t known Riley was having such a tough time.

“So, what, you want me to be a jock now?” Riley said, his voice monotonal. Despair and bitter disappointment flowed along Leo’s connection to him.

“No! No. I just thought maybe we could get back to playing horse.” Of course, that would be hard if he wasn’t living here.

Riley’s eyes narrowed. He bounced the ball once and set it on the couch next to him.

“Daaaaad,” Piper said, holding up the necklace he had bought for her. The pendant was a pink enamel heart with a Swarovski crystal in the center.

She likes skulls and black corduroy, he thought. Another big mistake. “I’m sorry. I saved the receipt. You can trade it in.”

Her eyes narrowed and her mouth flattened. She tucked the necklace into her jeans pocket, though it had come in a nice velvet case. Leo felt hollow.

Kaylee pulled paper from her odd-shaped gift, frowning. “What is this?” she asked, and held up the wire frames with glittering, lacy yellow cloth stretched across them.

“Fairy wings,” he said.

“What? You think I’m still six years old?”

“I think you’re magic,” he said, and then the box inside her leaped and dropped and the lid popped open and a cable shot from her into his chest, and he gasped as it hooked into him.

HOW DID YOU KNOW? Kaylee’s voice roared inside him.

“Oh, Kaylee,” he said, his voice coming out high and twisted.

She pulled on her cable and he slid from the couch to the floor. He clapped a hand to his breastbone, trying to break the connection before it strangled him.

HOW DID THAT WORK? I NEVER DID THAT BEFORE. HOW DO I STOP IT?

“Come here, honey,” he whispered, and she came and knelt next to him. “You talk to it, ask it to let go and come home to you.”

GET BACK HERE, she thought furiously.

The tugging in his chest lifted him a couple inches off the ground. He coughed, and said, “Not like that. First you have to relax. Then ask nicely. Take a deep breath, let it out, take another, let it out. Okay, honey?”

“Leo, what are you doing?” Melissa asked.

“Uh—” He stared up at his daughter, who was staring back, her eyes wide, looking through him as she drew in deep breaths and let them out. LET GO, she thought. OKAY, LET GO OF DAD AND—COME BACK.

Her connection unhooked and pulled back into her. Leo thunked to the ground as Kaylee heaved a huge sigh. Then she threw herself on him and started crying. “I’m sorry, Daddy. I’m sorry.”

He stroked her back and said, “It’s okay. It’s okay. It’ll be all right, honey. I can help you with this.” So Kaylee ended up with the family magic. He wondered if Riley or Piper had, too. It didn’t always transfer, and Kaylee was pretty young to manifest. She had manifested more strongly than anybody he’d ever known.

She would need his help dealing with this. He needed to start training her right away.

Or maybe after they finished opening presents.

“Leo!” Melissa said.

Piper was staring at him, her face expressionless. Riley hugged the basketball and gazed at the ceiling.

Leo pushed Kaylee back gently and sat up. “Sorry, Melly. We had a moment.”

“That’s not good enough. What just happened?”

Leo looked down into Kaylee’s face. Her eyes were bright with tears. “I think we need to talk about that,” he said slowly. Kaylee was going to have to learn to handle what she had, and that didn’t happen overnight. Melissa would need information. Leo needed to tell her, maybe everything. “Could we do it later?”

Melissa looked at Piper and Riley, then at Leo. “You’re going to explain?” she asked.

“Yes. I want to tell you.”

“I want to know.” She sounded fierce. “Later.” She nodded. “Tonight.”