Love on the Air (14 page)

"Just a souvenir from outside." He shrugged.
"They're growing all over the place out there."

But he left it in his lapel for the rest of the night.

'Tis the season to...work like a dog.

Before I make up the schedule for Christmas
Eve and Christmas Day, I'm looking for fulltimers and part-timers willing to volunteer for
some of these hard-to-fill shifts. I'm hoping to fill
as many slots as possible on a volunteer basis
before I'm forced to do the dirty work of assigning them.

Those who volunteer will be rewarded, not
only in the next life, but also with a comp day
off. And I promise, I'll remember you when it's
time to make up the next holiday schedule.

Thanks in advance. And Merry Christmas.
Rick

Christie wondered if the "Merry Christmas" was
meant to be sincere or satirical. She also wondered if
she was trying to be a martyr when she signed up for
the Christmas Eve shift.

She stepped behind the counter in the on-air studio,
ready to trade sides with Rob the way they always did.
Tonight it felt different. "We're doing this at the
wrong time," she said. Rob had taken the afternoon
shift on Christmas Eve day, while Christie had signed
up for 6 P.M. to midnight.

Rob looked up at the ceiling. "Too bad there's no
mistletoe in here."

"In your dreams." If he only knew the trouble she'd
let herself get into, without any mistletoe.

"Oh, well. Merry Christmas." Rob started to move
past her as usual, then paused. "You're not sad, are
you?"

He wasn't as shallow as he looked. "A little," she
said. "Just trying not to feel pathetic."

He really wasn't so bad. In the course of their fiveminute nightly encounters, Christie had actually come
to like Rob quite a bit. If she'd ever taken him up on
one of his lighthearted passes, she still wasn't sure
what he'd do, but he never pushed it. It was more of
a running joke than anything else.

"I know how you feel," he said. "Sometime it's
tough being single at Christmas when you don't have
any family in town." He put his jacket on over a bright
red sweater.

"You're on your way to a party, aren't you?" she
said.

"Yeah, well. No point being miserable alone."

True to his word, Rick had added Bing Crosby's
"White Christmas" to the play list, along with a
healthy helping of traditional carols. And from 6 P.M.
on, Christmas music was all they were playing.

Christie took a few phone calls from people to see
how they were spending their Christmas Eve, but the
calls were sparse, and most of them were from people
who were alone. Those were too depressing to air. She
did have some fun doing something she'd always
wanted to do: broadcasting updates of Santa sightings
in the sky as he made his way toward California from the East Coast. But there was no denying that working
on Christmas Eve was a proposition ripe for self-pity.

She hadn't seen Rick since the party. She'd made
sure of it. It was easy enough to do, just by sticking
to her normal, assigned work schedule. She hadn't
seen him, but she'd had endless one-sided conversations with him in her mind. Sometimes she blamed
him for everything. Sometimes she admitted to her
part in the kiss, but before she knew it, she was admitting to a whole lot more, and they dissolved into
another heart-melting clinch. Telling him off was
safer, even if it wasn't any more realistic. But no matter what scenario she chose, Christie could never quite
imagine what Rick would say, aside from pointing out
that they hadn't killed anyone.

No matter what Rick said or didn't say in those
imaginary conversations, it didn't matter. The bottom
line was still the same. They had to go on as if none
of it had happened, because it could never happen
again. She'd known that going in. But now, in hindsight, it was a high price to pay for a few minutes.

A few incredible minutes.

A lush version of "Silent Night" ended with a flourish of strings. As the last chord faded, Christie thought
she heard the sound effect of sleigh bells. On "Silent
Night?" She frowned and started the next song. The
jingling persisted. Christie turned down the volume on
the monitor speakers.

It was coming from out in the hallway.

Before she could go out to investigate, the studio
door opened, and Rick walked in. Christie raised her
hands to her face, not quite believing what she was seeing. He was wearing a fuzzy red Santa hat and
shaking a two-foot string of Christmas bells. The hat
lopped over to one side; his grin was faintly embarrassed. She couldn't help but laugh.

"Special delivery," he said. Rick brought his other
hand from behind his back to set a fair-sized gift bag
on the countertop between them, next to the guest microphone.

She recovered from laughing and lowered her hands
from her face. The one thing she wasn't going to do
was fall all over him. But she had to admit, he'd
cheered her up.

"Merry Christmas," he said. He reached across the
counter and dropped the Santa hat onto her head. "This
looks better on you than it does me."

She stared at the bag on the counter, where cartoon
reindeer danced on a red and green background. "I
didn't get you-"

"And why should you? Here, I'll help you open it.
It wouldn't be a good idea to shake this package." He
lifted a shallow glass bowl out of the bag and set it
on the countertop.

Inside was a turtle, like the ones from Rick's apartment. Christie blinked, quickly. She knew he was going for just the right level of absurdity. She wasn't
going to get all gooey about it.

"It's sweet," she said. "Thanks."

"Very low maintenance, too. I thought about saddling you with a twenty-gallon tank of tropical fish,
but it was too heavy to carry."

She smiled, but she couldn't look at Rick. Instead,
she studied the little green turtle, marching resolutely on a wet rock at the bottom of the bowl with nowhere
to go.

"What's his name?" Rick asked her.

Christie hesitated for half a second. "Bing."

"I should have known." She could feel him watching her face.

Just in time, she realized her song was ending. Hurriedly, she cued the next one, grateful for the interruption. She had no idea what to say next.

"Nice job on the Santa reports," Rick said. "Your
news training is coming in handy."

"Thanks." That was safe to talk about. "That's why
I picked this shift."

"I was betting on either sainthood or masochism.
How are you spending your Christmas tomorrow?"

"Turkey dinner at my girlfriend Alicia's. The one
who rescued me the morning after my car broke
down." That seemed eons ago. "Aren't you going anywhere?" On the posted schedule, he'd put himself
down for the Christmas afternoon shift.

"I decided to wait for the weekend. My folks are
about five hours north of here. There'll be less traffic,
and this way I'm around if anything comes up at the
station." And, Rick admitted to himself, it gave him a
chance to deliver Christie's present. Now, he braced
himself for the hard part. "I haven't seen you around
the station lately."

"I had a lot of shopping to do."

"That's fine. No one expects you to put in all the
extra time you've been doing. I'd just hate to think
anything I did was keeping you away."

Christie looked up at him, and Rick could see her fighting to keep her expression guarded. She wasn't
very good at it. And darn it, she was biting the corner
of her lip. Rick tried to stay focused on her eyes.

He'd opened the subject. No going back now.
"Christie, about the other night." Rick took a deep
breath, leaned his palms on the counter, and prepared
to launch into the most elaborate set of half-truths he'd
ever come up with.

"Let's just forget about it," she said.

He nodded. "Okay. But first, I owe you an apology.
I got carried away, and I imagine I've made things
pretty uncomfortable for you." He gripped the counter
a little harder, glad it was there between them. In spite
of what he was saying, there was nothing he would
have liked better than to grab her again and kiss her,
right now, and he couldn't let her know that. Ever.

There were times when over ten years of experience
performing came in handy.

"Don't worry about it." Christie shrugged. "I guess
we both got a little carried away."

She was learning. Already, she was getting better at
her nonchalance. Rick was still pretty sure it was an
act. But so what if it wasn't? More power to her.

He could have quit while he was ahead. Instead, he
took another deep breath and drove a few more nails
into his coffin. He had to kill any interest on her side,
because he didn't trust himself. "There's an ugly truth
about men," he said. "We have a hard time remembering what `platonic' is." Sure. Blame it all on his
male programming. He knew better. "The thing is,
you're a valuable employee, and I wouldn't want anything to jeopardize that. I know what this job means to you, and I was way out of line. It won't happen
again."

"Fine," Christie's eyes were devoid of expression
now. "We're both grown-ups, right?"

"Right." He shouldn't have put the Santa hat on her.
The oversized cap hung almost over her eyebrows,
giving her a waifish look. She would have hated the
idea of being seen as a waif. If she only knew. Rick
could picture her under the Christmas tree-his Christmas tree-wearing that hat, wrapped up in a soft robe,
waiting to open their gifts. And that could never be.

"So," he said, "can we get back to where we were
before?"

"Sure," she said. But Rick knew the damage had
been done. He'd done more than start something they
couldn't possibly finish, or even mess up a working
relationship. He'd lost a friend.

He reached over one more time to tweak her Santa
cap. He caught a flash of hurt in her eyes, and knew
he had to leave it there. It was for her own good.

"Enough said." Christie made the gesture of turning
a key over her lips and tossing it away over her shoulder. An appropriate gesture in more ways than one.

On Christmas morning, Christie opened the presents
under the small tree in her living room. Most of them
were from her family in Colorado. A few days ago at
work, Yvonne had given her a funny little pin with
musical notes, decked with glitter and surrounded by
feathers. That made two people at work she owed
presents to.

She called her mother. Hearing the familiar voice, always full of love and concern, Christie almost broke
down and told her everything. She remembered calling
home from summer camp when she was ten years old,
crying because some of the other kids had gone swimming without her.

Today, instead, she said "I love you," thanked her
mother for the sweater she'd sent, and said everything
was fine. Christie knew Mom wasn't buying it, but
with true motherly wisdom, she didn't press. She'd
always been good about things like that.

Still, the call did her good. By the time Christie
hung up the phone, she'd made up her mind: It was
time to grow up.

What in the world was she doing, at twenty-six
years old, mooning over her boss? It was time to get
over Rick Fox and get back to what was important.
She didn't have time or energy for any relationship
right now, let alone an impossible relationship with
someone who could shake her off like someone's
homely kid sister. She was heading for a new year.
Time to make a new start.

With that decided, she fed Bing, got dressed, put on
her makeup and went to Christmas dinner at Alicia's.

"So, are you seeing anyone?"

The question came at a bad time. Rick nearly
choked on his apple cider.

He glared across the table at his brother, David.
"Not really." He kept his tone casual for the rest of
the family's benefit.

It didn't work. David's wife, Carol, leaned forward
beside him. "Oh? What does `really' mean?"

"It means what it says. Really." This time the irritation showed in his voice. More heads turned his way.
Drat. It was nice of them to hold off Christmas dinner
until he got there, but he hadn't figured on being the
main course. He glanced down at his plate. The dumplings were as good as ever, but he wasn't eating much.

His mother chimed in. "You know, just because
things didn't work out with Sylvia doesn't mean-"

"You're right. It doesn't." Rick restored his pleasant
tone. It worked with listeners. It had worked with
Christie, sort of. It could work with his family, too.
He reached for his sparkling cider again. "What's going on here, anyway? After five years I'm fair game?"
He nodded at his very pregnant sister-in-law. "Worried
about the family line dying out, just because David
couldn't produce a boy?" He winked at Carol to let
her know the shot wasn't aimed at her.

It didn't work. Carol sat up straighter. "I wanted a
girl!"

Oh, well. At least he'd changed the subject.