Winter Street (18 page)

S
he and Scott offer to do the dishes between dinner and dessert. Everyone else tops off their glasses and heads out to sit by the fire.

“I never really understood the term ‘family circus,’ ” Ava says, “until the past two days.”

“I like your family,” Scott says.

“You’re insane,” Ava says.

“Yeah,” Scott says. “I know.”

But actually, Scott is the sanest person Ava knows. And, in addition to having superhero shoulders, he has the biggest, sweetest heart. She remembers when Scott came into her classroom as she was trying to teach twenty-two fourth graders how to play “Annie’s Song” on the recorder. It was cacophony, to say the least. Scott interrupted the class,
pulling Ava aside to tell her that Claire Frye’s mother had been killed. Ava had stared at Scott in horror, willing herself not to cry. He squeezed her hand and said calmly, “I’m going to bring Claire to the office now. Her father is waiting.”

Ava watched Scott lead Claire from the classroom, his hand lightly on her back, his posture ramrod straight, his eyes showing nothing but kindness and some man-of-steel internal strength.

Later that day, Ava swung by Scott’s office. He was at his desk, holding his head in his hands. He didn’t move when Ava came in, and for a while she watched him, wondering if he’d had to witness the moment when Claire Frye learned her mother was dead.

Scott said, “God, I hope I never have to do anything like that ever, ever again.”

Only now does Ava remember how she had, in that moment, loved him with every cell in her body.

Now there is the other thing eating at her, the new sexual energy between them. The magnetic attraction. She still doesn’t understand how it just appeared out of nowhere. She held Scott’s hand under the table through a good part of dinner, and even the hand-holding was a turn-on.

She says, “I broke up with Nathaniel.”

“You did not.”

“I did. I called him and ended it.”

Scott swallows. “Not… because of me?”

“Not because of you, no. Because of me. I’m sick and tired of chasing after something that’s never going to happen.”

Scott nods once; she can see him trying to understand. “But you still have feelings for him.”

“Yes,” Ava says. “But that doesn’t matter. I’m finished.”

“Really?” Scott says.

“Really,” Ava says. She gives Scott’s tie a tug, and before she knows it, she and Scott are kissing up against the sink, next to the half-loaded dishwasher, and the water is running.

She stops him. “Let’s finish here,” she says, “and go to my bedroom.”

“Okay,” he says, breathless.

The dishes get done very, very quickly after that.

Ava leads Scott down the hallway, to her bedroom. She lies on the bed and pulls Scott on top of her. They make out like teenagers for what feels like an hour. Out in the main room, Ava hears her mother announce that dessert is ready—plum pudding with hard sauce. Ava
loves
plum pudding with hard sauce, and she knows her father will be making his famous Irish coffees—but nothing in the world right now is sweeter than being with Scott.

As he runs his hand up her sweater, her phone rings. She catches the display out of the corner of her eye.
NO,
it says.

Nathaniel.

Scott says, “Do you have to answer that?”

“No,” she says.

Ava stops Scott somewhere between second and third base. It’s not that she doesn’t want to keep going; it’s that she wants something to look forward to.

“Okay, right,” Scott says. He sounds like he’s trying to convince himself. “It will be better if we wait.”

“Just not too long,” she says.

After a while she tiptoes to the kitchen to snag two dishes of plum pudding for herself and Scott—she hopes there is some left—and she overhears her parents in the kitchen, talking.

Margaret says, “You don’t have to sell the inn. I could either lend you the money to keep it going, or I could buy it outright and you could run it.”

“Kevin wants to run it,” Kelley says. “Kevin and Isabelle.”

“Do they?” Margaret says. “Would that be a bad life for them?”

“I can’t let you buy the inn, Maggie,” Kelley says. “You’ve already done too much as it is.”

“What have I done?” Margaret asks. “I showed up, is all. And I was long overdue for that.”

Ava strolls into the kitchen. “Hello, parents,” she says. “So, are you two getting back together, or what?”

They both laugh. Ava gets two dishes of plum pudding and douses them with her mother’s luscious hard sauce. She asks Kelley to make two Irish coffees.

“This may come as a shock,” Ava says, “but since we’re all being honest, I’m entertaining a guest in my room.”

“Scott is lovely,” Margaret says.

“We just want you to be happy, sweetheart,” Kelley says.

Ava takes dessert back to her room on a tray, thinking,
Sell the inn?
Well, it’s time, probably, that she found her own place to live.

But still… sell the inn?

She and Scott gobble down dessert, and then they turn on the TV to watch
It’s a Wonderful Life
while drinking their Irish coffee.

Then they must have both fallen asleep, because Ava wakes up to someone knocking on her bedroom door.

“Ava!” It’s her mother. “Ava, are you in there?”

Ava stands up, collects herself, and opens the door. “Hi, what is it?”

Her mother mouths something, but Ava is too bleary-eyed to make out what it is.

“What?”

Margaret leans in and whispers, “Nathaniel is here.”

Ava blinks. “Here?”

Her mother nods vigorously.

Nathaniel is here.

Ava turns to look at Scott. He is passed out cold in her bed. Ava tiptoes out into the hallway, closing the door gently behind her.

Nathaniel is in the living room, chitchatting with Kevin, listening to Kevin and Isabelle’s big news, admiring Isabelle’s diamond ring.

“Wow, that’s great!” Nathaniel says. “I’m really psyched for you guys.”

“Thanks,” Kevin says.

Nathaniel sees Ava and breaks into that heart-stopping grin of his, the same one he gave her the day he met her.

“Hey, baby,” he says.

She will not succumb.

She says, “Let’s go to the kitchen.”

“Or your room?” he says.

“No.”

“Wow,” he says. “You really are mad.”

She strides into the kitchen but finds Kelley in there, cleaning up dessert and making fresh muffins for the morning.

“Hey, Ava,” he says. Funny look. “Hey, Nathaniel.”

“Mr. Quinn,” Nathaniel says. “Merry Christmas.”

“And to you,” Kelley says.

Ava can’t believe it is
still
Christmas. This is the Christmas that never ends.

She says, “Well, we can’t talk in the kitchen, so we’ll have to talk in the dining room.”

“Or your room,” he says.

“No,” Ava says.

“Or we can go to my place,” Nathaniel says.

“Negative,” Ava says.

“Wow,” Nathaniel says. “Where did you get that necklace? Did
Scott
give you that necklace?”

“None of your business,” Ava says.

“Did Scott give you the necklace, Ava? If he did, then this makes sense. I mean, one guy gives you rain boots, one guy gives you a diamond necklace…”

Ava sighs. “It’s from my mother.”

“Oh,” Nathaniel says.

“Let me be clear,” Ava says. “I’m not
mad
. I’m just finished.”

“You don’t love me?” he says.

“Whether or not I love you doesn’t matter,” Ava says. “It’s over. I’m tired of waiting around for you to treat me the way I want to be treated. Love me the way I want to be loved.”

“You want
what,
exactly?” Nathaniel says. “You want me to get down on one knee and propose? Fine, I will.” He sinks to the ground. “Ava Quinn, will you marry me?”

“You don’t mean it,” Ava says.

“I do so,” he says. “I love you. I am probably guilty of taking you for granted, but the flip side is that loving you is so easy. Being with you is comfortable. You’re normal and cool, there isn’t any drama, you don’t ask me for things, you let me be me. When I went to Seattle this fall, you didn’t bat an eye, you didn’t complain or call me selfish—and I
was
being selfish, and I was a jackass for not inviting you along, but I needed to get away,
alone,
and you got it. You get
me
. I love you, Ava. Now, will you marry me?”

Ava feels like she’s breaking in half. Nathaniel is saying all the right things, and it is true that she loves him. But something isn’t right. She doesn’t want to be comfortable, like a sweater or a dish of vanilla pudding. She wants something better than that.

“Ava,” Nathaniel says. “Please. I want you to be my wife.”

Ava teeters. She wobbles. This is her heart’s one desire for Christmas coming true. Coming true after all.

Suddenly, Scott appears in the doorway of the dining room. His hair is mussed, and his tie hangs loose. Ava thinks of how he came rushing out of the parking lot without a winter coat just to check on her. How he stopped by the Bar to take her home. How he looks at her and she feels like she is the most beautiful, desirable woman in the universe.

“No,” she says to Nathaniel.

“Oh, baby, come on!” Nathaniel says.

“No,” she says. “Now get up, please.”

“Ava,” he says, “I know you want this.”

“I don’t,” she says. “Please stand up.”

“Nathaniel,” Scott says, suddenly sounding like Assistant Principal Skyler, “stand up.”

Nathaniel’s head swivels around. He sees Scott, and recognition comes into his eyes. He gets to his feet.

“I’ll walk you to the door,” Scott says.

K
evin and Isabelle go to bed first. Isabelle looks utterly exhausted, the kind of exhausted only known to pregnant women in their first trimester. She kisses Margaret on both cheeks and thanks her for the wonderful dinner. It’s the first meal she’s managed to keep down in weeks, she says.

“I’ll take that as a sign that my future grandchild likes my cooking,” Margaret says.

Jennifer takes the kids upstairs to one of the rooms at the inn and puts them to bed. Patrick follows behind her, but first he stops to give Margaret a long hug.

“I’ll give you Hollis Chambers’s number in the morning,” Margaret says. “I’ve always got your back.”

“I know you do, Mom,” he says.

“You’re my golden boy,” she says.

“But not anymore,” he says.

“Oh, honey,” she says. “Yes, you are. Forever you are.”

Nathaniel leaves, and then a little while later, Scott bids everyone good-bye.

Margaret says to Ava, “Are you okay, honey?”

Ava sits down at the piano and starts to play “While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks by Night,” very softly. The fire crackles, the tree shimmers. Kelley is laid out lengthwise on the sofa, his feet in Margaret’s lap. She thinks she sees
snowflakes out the window. It would be a nice way to end Christmas, with a light, pretty snowfall. Maybe Margaret can take the kids sledding tomorrow.

She stands up and goes over to the window to check.

Yes, snow!

Ava says, “This one is for you, Daddy.” She starts to play “Silent Night.”

Margaret sings into the cold window; her breath fogs up the pane.

Kelley says to Margaret, “So, Maggie, how long do you think you’ll stay?”

Margaret pulls the paper angel out of her pocket and presses it to her chest. This time with Kelley has been magical. She has spent the last twenty-four hours in a state of delirious happiness, and they brought closure to certain issues—they are the best of friends, and they will always love each other. Who knows, they may even decide to be buried together. But when Margaret replays Ava’s question,
So, are you two getting back together, or what?—
Margaret thinks,
No. It will never work out.
The same thing will
happen. Margaret will become absorbed in her work, and Kelley will resent it.

Margaret’s phone buzzes, which startles her. She hasn’t had a text all day except for the marriage proposal from Drake.

Would it be so bad to marry a surgeon? she wonders.

She checks her phone. The text is from Darcy. It says:
Bart Quinn was on that convoy. He and the 44 other soldiers have been officially announced missing. I’m so sorry. You may already know this. Family is being notified presently.

Margaret stifles a cry just as a phone rings in the house.

Kelley says, “That’s weird. No one ever calls the landline. Maybe it’s Eddie Pancik with a buyer.” He stands up.

No. Nononononono!
Margaret thinks.
Not on Christmas!
Missing, not dead. But still… missing.
Missing!

Tears blur Margaret’s eyes, but she doesn’t want Kelley’s peace of mind shattered one second sooner than it needs to be. She intercepts him on his way to answer the phone. She gives him a kiss on the lips and looks straight into his blue eyes.

“I’ll stay as long as you need me to,” she says.

I’d like to thank my family, present and past.

My siblings: Eric Hilderbrand, Randall Osteen, Heather Osteen Thorpe, Douglas Hilderbrand. Also Lisa Hilderbrand and Todd Thorpe, Doug and Katharine Thurman, and Debra Thurman.

The gang: Robert, Patrick, Alexandra, Garrett, Parker, Spence, Tripp, and Anna.

My mother, Sally Hilderbrand, who is the undisputed Ornament Queen of Christmas, and my nutcracker go-to.

Judith and Duane Thurman, who have been like parents to me, and brought the Byers’ Choice carolers into my life.

Frank and Sue Cunningham, thank you for the Golden Dreams.

My grandparents: Bob and Bobbie Hilderbrand, and Clarence and Ruth Huling.

My aunts and uncles: Jan and Ruthann Hall, and Steve
and Ruth Huling, and Alice; Jane Greene and my cousins Debi and Wendy.

My elves, the stars on my trees, my (not always) angels: Maxwell, Dawson, and Shelby.

My last best Christmas was the Christmas of 1983. My father and Judy and my siblings and I went to Mass at St. David’s Episcopal, where there was a live menagerie and a choir of angels, the church at five p.m. lit only by candles. On the way home, we stopped by a friend’s house to drink hot chocolate made with milk, vanilla, and cinnamon, and admire their twenty-foot Christmas tree. Then we headed home to watch Michael Jackson’s new video “Thriller,” for the first time. We ordered pizza and cheesesteaks, wrote our letters to Santa, and crawled into bed. It was the last Christmas I spent at my father’s house while he was alive, and so the memories are burnished not because of the details above, but because he was the one who tucked us in.

Christmas is about people. And I am grateful for those who are, and have been, in my life, but especially for my father, Robert H. Hilderbrand Jr.