Dinner was delicious, and the family passed Sage around the entire day, each giving him gifts that he actually played with, ignoring the boxes and paper. Basil narrowed his eyes playfully. “You ungrateful little meanie!”
As the time ticked down, Herb and Michelle exchanged looks over and over. She seemed as calm and chill as ever, which drove him a little nuts. He feared she wasn’t getting the importance of the evening, but then, she became his shero.
“Okay, well, this little boy is getting so tired, I think he should just stay here. Go on, daddies, and have a night alone for once. Literally for once.”
Basil opened his mouth to argue, but she cut him off. “Don’t argue with me, Basil! I’ll not be disrespected in my house on Christmas!”
His mouth shut hard. Herb wanted to dance, but he knew it wouldn’t last. “Basil, stay here long enough to watch him go to sleep. I’ll have your brother give me a ride home, okay?”
Basil glanced over at his mother, who had her hand on her hip like he’d done earlier. “Okay. Okay, I won’t be long.”
Once he got home, he rushed around to start their evening. After setting the present under the tree, he got up torush to the kitchen to start their light evening meal, but he didn’t realize that when he plugged the tree back in, he’d placed it around his ankle.
Of course, it didn’t simply unplug, which it did, but it also tripped him, and he landed hand on his knees and hands, jarring his entire body. “Wow, Herb, graceful much?”
Then, as he should have known it would happen, the tree toppled over on top of him, and the ornaments went everywhere.
Herb’s forehead hit the floor, and then he banged it a few more times there.
After he got out from under the tree and got to his feet, he stared at the tree, knowing he’d never get it back up and looking nice again in time. “Okay, you’re next. I have to cook,” he said to the tree, like it would listen or something.
Once in the kitchen, he uncorked the bottle of red, letting it breathe while he started the water for the pasta. Basil’s special pasta bowl was a thick clay, shallow bowl with cobalt blue petunias and yellow sunflowers. They’d found it on their honeymoon, and Basil adored it. He set it on the counter, ready to have the colorful vegetable pasta put into it once it was all cooked.
After the water was heating, he got chopping bell peppers and red onions, heated the pan and coated it with a swig of olive oil. “Light, tasty. Yes.”
While those were sauteing, he searched the cupboard for the box of pasta, which was behind a bunch of cans, and ended up dropping a big can of tomatoes onto the counter where he’d placed Basil’s favorite pasta bowl.
As he watched it shatter, his knees went out from under him, and he fell right on his ass to the floor. Sitting on the floor,he gave up. The trouble had caused more damage than he could handle. He might as well call Basil and have him bring their son home, and they’d fall into bed, tired and separate again.
Sitting there for at least ten full minutes, he was about to get up and grab his phone, but then he felt a hand on his shoulder. He jumped a little but saw his husband’s handsome face when he looked behind him.
Soon, Basil was sitting on the floor with him. “Are you okay?”
“I broke the tree, broke your favorite bowl. Do I look okay?”
Basil picked up a piece of the bowl and looked at it while he said, “I was about three minutes from bringing Sage home, and my mom had to tell me what was going on.”
“Well, I screwed it up.”
“You didn’t. I love you worked so hard to give this to me, to us. Herb, you…you have given me the world, and you’re still giving. Do you even know how wonderful that is?”
Herb turned to fully face him. Basil’s eyes were soft, and his mouth curved into a sweet smile that hit him in the center of his chest like a bullet. “But…but it’s a mess!”
“Sure. Just like our son when he’s left alone to eat rice cereal, it’s a beautiful mess.”
Herb pulled Basil close and kissed him softly. “You’re so good to me.”
“I think you have that backwards. I wasn’t the one running around trying to make this night for us to have alone.”
“I still screwed it up, but…”
Basil got up and turned off the stove, setting the newly burned vegetables into the sink and turning off the water for the pasta. “She sent dessert,” Basil said, “right after she ratted out your plan.”
“I have to buy the lady roses,” Herb said as he rose to his feet. “Dessert and wine?”
“And my husband? That sounds like heaven.”
Basil poured the wine while Herb set up the Bluetooth speaker and started his romantic playlist. The first song to play was not Spanish language, but it was a Mexican American singer that Basil’s entire family adored. In fact, Sabrina, Basil’s sister, had her picture up in the nursery, as if she were watching over her twins.
