The driveway was half-buried in snow, the porch light off, the windows dark. The wreath she’d made—crooked, glittering, hers—still hung on the door, its berries dulled by frost.
Her car was gone. She wasn’t home.
Tom killed the engine and sat for a long moment, watching his breath fog the windshield.
He stepped out, boots crunching on the frozen drive.
Unlike the houses he planned these days, he’d fought for pieces of himself in this one.
He’d stood in the drafting room while his father frowned at the plans.Too much glass, Tom.
But Tom had kept the floor-to-ceiling windows in the living room anyway, because Lauren had said she wanted natural light.
He’d added the window seat in their bedroom even though his father called it unnecessary. Because Lauren had once told him she’d always wanted one.
The wind cut against his neck as he looked up at the blank, snow-covered steps. They needed to be shoveled.
It was almost a relief—the simple, familiar awareness of something that needed doing.
Lauren wouldn’t come home to unshoveled snow. He wouldn’t leave it for her to handle.
The first scrape of metal against ice jarred through his arms.Scrape. Lift. Heave.Over and over, until the rhythm settled into him like breath, until sweat gathered beneath his collar despite the cold.
The work steadied him. Physical, simple. Something he could fix. Something he coulddo.
By the time he’d finished, his gloves were soaked through, his shoulders burning. He leaned on the shovel, breath clouding the air, and looked back at the house.
He’d given her a home she loved. That was something.
For a moment, pride flared—small and helpless but real.
Then he turned toward the street and saw them. A line of boxes sat by the curb, half-buried in snow. The lids bowed under a thin crust of ice.
He swept the snow from the top and opened the first box.
Hand-painted ornaments. Ribbons in red and gold.
A ceramic snowflake with a photo in the center.
He lifted it carefully, his gloved thumb tracing along its edge. Her smile was still bright. His was smaller, but real.
One ornament after another—exquisite, glittery, personal.
Tom’s knees were wet from the snow before he realized he’d sunk down next to the boxes.
Lauren loved these ornaments. She loved these bright, gaudy,wonderfulChristmas decorations.
This was what he’d thought he wanted—less chaos, less excess, less of her handmade Christmas taking over the house.
So why did seeing it all tossed out like trash make him feel like this?
He brushed aside a layer of tissue paper.
There, nestled among strands of tinsel, lay an ornament Lauren had made their first Christmas as husband and wife—a tiny white Elvis stage jumpsuit, hand-sewn with beaded detailing and a minuscule cape. She’d even stitched a glittering blue belt around the waist.
Every Christmas she’d hung that ornament front and center.
It represented their wedding. Their first dance.
