A Carol Christmas (14 page)

“So, are you girls going to get together?” Mom asked.

“Probably not this trip,” I said. “There’s already a lot on the calendar.”

Mom’s smile soured a little. “Yes, and less time to do it all now that you’re leaving early.”

“I thought you were staying through New Year’s.” Ben sounded shocked.

“Oh, yeah. The meeting,” Gabe said.

“Business emergency,” I reminded him.

“I still don’t see why you have to go back early,” Keira said in disgust. “It’s not like you’re a doctor. Who’s going to die if you stay with us a little longer?”

“My career,” I said as I pulled a golden ball out of the ornament box.

“Your career sounds like a pain in the butt,” said Ben. “Whoa, look at that snow coming down now.” He nodded to the whitening scenery outside the window. “It’s got to be at least three inches.”

He was right. The grass had gotten buried under a fat carpet of white, and the tree boughs and bushes wore lacy coats.

Mom stopped her decorating to gaze out the window. “It’s gorgeous.”

“You know what this means,” Keira said to Ben.

He exchanged grins with Gabe. “I suppose you want to do something dumb like boys against girls.”

“We can take you easy,” she taunted.

That was it. War had been declared. Within the hour I knew we’d all be outside hurling snowballs at each other.

Unless Mom prevailed. “Bennett Hartwell, you’ve already gotten hurt once this season.”

“I think I can manage to throw a snowball without killing myself,” he retorted.

“You’ll break open your stitches.”

“Mom, I only had three.”

“Three is enough.”

He just smiled and shook his head, brushing off her concern like snowflakes from a jacket. “I’ll be fine.”

She frowned in disapproval, but Ben cheerfully ignored her.

The tree still seemed unbalanced to me, and it wobbled a little when Keira leaned into it to hang a little plastic snowman.

“Are you sure this thing is steady?” I asked Ben.

“Sure it is,” he assured me.

“We could wire it to the wall,” Mom suggested. “We still have that little nail in the comer from three years ago.”

“Nah,” said Ben. “It’ll be fine. Trust me. I know what I’m doing.”

“Your father used to say that.” Mom bit her lower lip and studied the tree.

I was with Mom and said so. A tree this big, if it fell into the window …

“Guys, give it a rest. This thing is perfectly balanced,” Ben said. He reached through the bows, grabbed the trunk in a one handed stranglehold, and gave the tree a shake. It jiggled back and forth, making the ornaments swing and tinkle. I could almost hear it choke.

Mom held out a hand, ready to catch it. “Okay. I believe you. Stop already.”

I noticed Ben was very careful taking his hand away. If this tipped and broke any of my childhood ornaments, I was going to get a stranglehold on him.

Another few minutes, and we were done. “There,” said Keira as she hung a final red ball. “That’s the last of them.” Mom was already stuffing tissue back in the big cardboard boxes. “I guess you guys better go pulverize each other with snowballs then.”

It was all the permission we needed. We forgot to be responsible adults and help clean up the post-trimming mess. Instead, we scattered to find coats and mittens.

“Take some mittens out of the winter clothes box in the craft room, Andie,” Mom called after me. Then I could hear her asking, “Gabe, do you need some gloves?”

“I’ll be fine,” he assured her.

You've been fine since the seventh grade
. Where had that thought come from? I had no idea, but I hoped it didn’t have any siblings ready to pop out unexpectedly at me.

I followed the others outside. A quiet, winter stillness hung over the night. Somewhere down the street, a child whooped in excitement. The snow was coming down fast and furious now, and the lawn stretched out in white perfection, like a mountain meadow in winter.

I hated to step on it. A front yard thick with snow and unpolluted with footprints is one of life’s small, often unappreciated beauties.

Any more philosophical reflection was aborted by a handful of snow down my back, followed by an uproar of laughter from my brother. “That’ll teach you to bail out on us early.”

Forgetting the snowy meadow thing, I took off after him.

We tore up the yard, screeching and hurling snowballs at each other, intermittently switching from the winter version of dodgeball to football, where the guys would come after us and take us down in a tackle.

Gabe was an expert tackier, and, covered in snow, looking up into his smiling eyes, I remembered the last winter it snowed like this. A similar snowball fight had found us both side by side on the ground, sharing a kiss that should have melted every flake within a ten mile radius.

He remembered it too. I could tell by the way his expression changed from teasing to serious. “Andie.”

“Get off me,” I growled. “I’m freezing.” What a big fat lie, I thought as I scrambled to my feet. I was burning up.

“Hey, you women need help?” called Kenny Mason, a neighbor from down the street.

Kenny had grown since I last saw him. He was tall and wore a parka that made his chest look like Arnold Schwarzenegger’s. Under it protruded long, skinny legs wrapped in jeans that were sopped at the cuff. His feet were probably already wet in those tennis shoes, but he didn’t seem to care. He had a friend with him who was almost as skinny, and they were armed with snowballs.

“Take ’em out,” I said, nodding at Gabe.

Then the war began in earnest. Next thing I knew, Mom was out there too.

“Hey, Mrs. H!” Gabe called approvingly.

“You boys need help,” she informed him.

We tore all over the neighborhood, jumping over neighbor’s juniper bushes, scraping snow off car hoods and roofs, sneaking around house corners.

Just when Gabe looked like his fingers were getting frostbitten, Mom declared a truce and insisted everyone come in and begin the peace process over hot cocoa.

“Good idea,” said Gabe, who was now standing next to me. “My hands are getting cold.” He plunged them inside my collar, making me screech.

Everyone laughed, and as we trooped inside I felt like I’d gotten into a time machine and traveled back to my senior year in high school.
You can’t go back
, I told myself firmly.

“Just dump your coats in the entryway,” Mom instructed as she headed for the kitchen. “Kenny, why don’t you call your mom and tell her we’ve kidnapped you for a game of Spoons.”

Spoons was a family favorite involving a mad sorting through cards for the right combination that would entitle the holder to start a group dive for a spoon from a pile of several. With one less spoon at the table than there were players, this game always got wild. People lost fingernails, got gouged, and sprained wrists, all in an effort to come out with a trophy utensil. But that never stopped anyone from coming back for more. We’d introduced Kenny to the game when he was twelve.

He was already grinning in anticipation. “Your family is so cool,” he said to me.

My family as cool. Now, there was an unusual concept, and one I knew was completely erroneous. Okay, so we could have fun. What did that mean, really?

I thought of my torturous afternoon with Dad and The Girlfriend. Oh, yeah. That had been cool. Kenny should walk a day in my snowshoes. He’d change his mind in a hurry.

Chapter Ten

Kenny’s mom finally called, insisting her son and his sidekick had been in our hair long enough and that they be sent back out into the cold. Gabe too decided he’d better slide on home.

As I stood by the front door watching our drop-in guests shrug on their coats, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror that hung on the entryway wall. I was smiling.

And I wasn’t faking it. I’d had fun. I still couldn’t go as far as Kenny and say my family was cool, but they knew how to have a good time. I guess somewhere on the road to adulthood I had lost sight of that. Even looking at Gabe, who was grinning at me, I felt a dab of sentiment do a sticky drip over my heart. We’d had some good times. Maybe a dark, snowy night was a good time to bury the hatchet.

Of course, that didn’t mean love would spring up where you buried it. I’d have to make sure Gabe understood that.

It went without saying there would be no burial service for that proverbial hatchet until I found out why he and Keira had broken up. Obviously, my sister wasn’t going to volunteer the information, and I wasn’t going to let her think it was all that important to me to know. (Because it wasn’t, really.) But I’d find a way to get the dirt before I left for New York.

“So, are we going house hunting tomorrow?” Gabe asked Keira while looking at me.

“I really want that one in Fairhaven,” she said. Now she too looked at me. “But it wouldn’t hurt to have a Plan B.”

“You two go ahead,” I said. “I’ll be out with Mom and Aunt Chloe tomorrow.”

“We won’t be gone all day. You could go after we get back,” Mom suggested. Good old Mom, Santa’s helper.

But I was going to spend the afternoon getting ready for my big date. “That’s okay,” I said to Keira and Gabe. “You two go.”

Gabe didn’t look quite so interested in making a sale now, and Keira shrugged.

“We can do it the day after,” she said.

“That’s getting pretty close to Christmas,” I said. “Maybe Gabe has plans.”

“No plans,” he said cheerfully.

I didn’t have any either. At least not yet. I was hoping that would change after my date with James. “I’ll let you know,” I told them.

I said it nicely, but Gabe looked like I’d turned him down for a date. There were still plenty of women left in Carol. I was sure he could find a way to console himself somehow.

All the men finally trooped out into the night, leaving just us girls.

“Well,” Mom said. “That was fun. In fact, that was the most fun I’ve had in a long time.”

How sad, I thought, then realized it was the most fun I’d had in a long time too.

That was ridiculous. I was tired. My mind wasn’t functioning well.

“I need to go to bed,” I decided. A good night’s sleep would bring a more balanced perspective.

“Oh, come on. Not yet. Let’s watch a chick flick,” Keira begged.

“Great idea,” Mom said. “
Charade
with Audrey Hepburn.”

“No,
Thirteen Going on Thirty
.”

The story of my sister’s life as a grownup.

"Or
The Longest Ride
," Keira tried again.

“How about one of those old Jane Austen movies?” I suggested. Mom would like that.

“Okay.
Emma
," said Keira. “I’ll start the popcorn.”

So we sat in the family room curled up in blankets and watched Gwyneth Paltrow look beautiful and talk elegantly.

“Isn’t it weird how the perfect man can be right under your nose and you don’t even see it?” Keira said as the ending credits started to roll.

“I’m going to bed now,” I announced, and left before my sister could hit me over the head with any more subtle remarks.

As I slipped under the covers I tried to decide which would be worse: being snowed in with my sister the matchmaker or having to do lunch with Gram the Inquisitor. I decided I preferred being snowed in with Keira. I could tell her to shut up.

I got into bed hoping that the snow would stick. But only until the afternoon. I didn’t want to miss my date with James, which was looking like it would be the highlight of my visit.

I see you have time in your schedule for making new friends. Maybe you could fit in dinner with an old one
. Gabe’s words from the night of the concert had sneaked up on me out of nowhere.

I burrowed deeper under the covers. Why was he trying so hard? Why was he being so nice?
Who cared?
I told myself. It was a mystery I had no desire to solve.

By 10 the next morning, the tree boughs were dripping and the snow on the lawn was turning to a slushy mess. The street was almost clear. I was doomed to a day of torture. At least I had my date to look forward to.

Mom and I drove to Grandma’s house on slushy streets, past white lawns with torn patches revealing lawn beneath. In some yards, lopsided snowmen stood sentinel over their melting kingdom, a reminder of winter fun enjoyed the evening before. I wished the snow had stayed longer, wished we could have gotten out and made a snowman and snow angels like we’d done when we were kids. Sometimes going back and being a kid again sounded really good. No bills to pay, no ignored e-mails (I’d sent off six that morning), no job to stress over, no one asking about your love life.

My mind jumped ahead to the ordeal before me. I knew my grandmother would give me the third degree on who I was dating. And if Mom had already told her I was leaving early, I was bound to get the inquisition on that too.

Maybe I could get Grandma talking about the decay of American society. That was one of her all-time favorite topics, and if I could steer her there I could avoid getting put under the grandmotherly microscope. I practiced my opening gambits.
Say, Grandma, what do you think of the fashions in the store this season?
I looked down at my jeans. Were they too tight? Would Gram have something to say about them? Maybe that wasn’t the topic I wanted to use to distract her.

“Oh, I almost forgot, we need to stop at the store,” Mom said. “Your grandmother wanted me to pick up some whipping cream for dessert.”

Prune Whip, of course. Gram was a firm believer that whatever was good for her was good for the rest of the world.

“Let me pay for the whipping cream,” I offered as Mom and I walked into the grocery store.

“Oh, you don’t need to do that.”

“I know, but I want to. Is there anything else you need while we’re here?”

“We could use some bread,” Mom said.

Bread. Why couldn’t she have said milk or eggs? Prunes, even. What was happening back at Image Makers? I should be there.

I grabbed a loaf at random and said, “Let’s get this,” then started marching for the checkout. “We’d better hurry or we’ll be late.”

I got her out of the store in record time, but I didn’t succeed in getting away from wondering what was coming unglued back at the office while I was home, bonding with my family.