“Yeah?”
“Remember, it’s Christmas. Kids love Christmas. Don’t ruin it by being a Grinch!”
I flipped him the bird, and his laughter faded as he climbed into the car.
Sliding behind the wheel, I sat there for a moment, waiting for it to warm up before carefully reversing out of the parking lot.
I took the long way home, which in reality, in a town like Evergreen Lake meant it took me six minutes to get home instead of the usual four. The town was deserted. The skating rink closed, the sign half buried in a snow drift. The festival looked sad—with all its lights off, decorations toppled over, and a snowman now in pieces.
With a disappointed shake of my head, I turned onto Main Street past the fire station where their lights blinked red and green. Slowing at the intersection, I found myself worryingabout how bad this was about to get. It was time to get home and bunker down for the next few days I suspected.
I slowed the truck to a crawl.
Up ahead was my shop.
In my apartment window above it was a Christmas tree with white lights. Even from here, I could see them. But it was the sign stuck to the glass saying ‘Merry Christmas’ that had me cursing. There was no avoiding it. Christmas had made it to my house this year and I could do nothing to stop it. Not unless I wanted to break a little girl's heart. And just because mine had been battered and bruised didn’t mean I was going to let her down. Noelle was getting the Christmas she deserved. Even if that meant I had to bury my hatred of the holiday and step into the jolly man’s suit.
seven
HOLLY
I was a schoolteacher.
I kept children engaged, entertained, and distracted every day.
I was responsible for molding the minds of the country's future leaders.
But do you think I could keep my own daughter’s attention for more than two minutes? Not a snowball’s chance in hell.
Noelle was on a sugar high like I’d never seen before, but she hadn’t had any sugar. Not really. Nothing abnormal anyway.
After we’d showered and dressed and with my father’s words still haunting me, we ventured into the living room to find the tree already set up just waiting to be brought to life.
Noelle was like a tornado. Ripping into boxes of ornaments, squealing with every new package she opened.
“Calm down. You don’t want to break it,” I reminded her as she picked up a strand of lights before dropping them.
Lights were my nemesis.
Every single year, I wished Nick was here to hang the lights. But he wasn’t here. And he wouldn’t be here again. Whichmeant usually, I downed a glass or two of wine before untangling the bastard things and winding them around the tree. Normally, I waited until Noelle was in bed before I attempted to wrangle them, then in the morning, she could decorate, but this year, since everything had been upended and we were quite literally decorating the tree on Christmas Eve I had to suck it up.
While I tried to untangle the knotted mess, Noelle sang and danced around, ornaments dangling from her fingers and tinsel draped around her neck like a boa. It took a while and more than a few arguments, but the tree was done. Well, pretty much anyway.
I opened a dusty box filled with ornaments and knew these weren’t from our shopping trip. These were Chris’s ornaments he’d pulled out for us. He was a good man, and he was making it hard to find fault with him. If I wasn’t careful, I’d end up heartbroken and crying into my pillow. It wouldn’t be the first time, but I barely survived Nick, I promised I’d never put myself in that position again. I couldn’t. And this time the stakes were higher. Now I had Noelle to consider, and I couldn’t afford to be reckless with her heart.
I shook my head, trying to force the ridiculous thoughts away. It didn’t matter anyway. I was getting ahead of myself. Chris didn’t think about me like that. Why would he? He was just a nice guy helping us out of a crappy situation. As soon as the roads cleared, we’d be on our way, and he’d forget about us before our tail lights even disappeared around the corner.
“Mom?”
“Yes, sweetie?” I replied, trying to keep myself in check. I was running out of patience, but it wasn't Noelle’s fault. It was no one’s fault, not really. I just had to remember that and take a breath before I snapped.
“What’s this?” she asked, holding up something I couldn’t quite figure out.
“Let me have a look.”
I sat on the edge of the couch and held out my hand. Carefully, Noelle stepped around the mess and brought it over to me.
“Oh.”
