Page 41 of A Love Like Christmas Time
“Listen, I’m sorry for surprising you like this,” my mother mumbles. I take one more breath and I lift my gaze, my eyes jumping to her. She swallows heavily, her hands trembling.
“You fucking should be.” I can see her recoil, my calm words piercing her sharp as knives, but I can’t find it in me to care. More than two decades ago, she didn’t.
“Did you really think you could turn up here after twenty-six years and I’d welcome you with open arms?” I cross my arms in front of my chest, pretending they’re an armor, protecting my heart from getting broken again.
The younger woman’s eyes are darting between me and my so-called mother, head bobbing as if she’s watching a tennis match. Only nobody will cheer by the end of this. Nobody will go out of here victorious.
Fuck, I knew everything was going too well. But did it have to be this curveball? I would have hoped for one with a little less Pompeii effect.
“I only wanted to—”
“Let me stop you right there, because your excuses are two fucking decades overdue. I don’t want to hear them.” Her face crumbles, and tears well up in her eyes, but I’m too busy talking myself into a rage to care. “When I said,get out, I meant it.” I point towards the door. “Who do you think you are, suddenlywaltzing in here after two and a half decades? For what?” I glare at her, putting all the rage I can muster, all the hurt into my eyes. “Youleft.” Her eyes overflow with tears when I almost scream the last word. The younger woman puts her hand on her back, whispering what I guess is reassurance.
“You fucking left me. No goodbyes. No warning.” My finger stabs through the air as I gesture wildly, keeping the table between me and my unwelcome guests. “I used to sit by the window from the moment I got home until bedtime, for months, hoping I’d see your headlights round the corner to our house. I didn’t give up hope that you’d be back. For a whole goddamn year, I stayed up until the early morning hours, hoping to catch your return, going to school with an aching back because I fell asleep waiting for you.” My voice is eerily calm, yet with every word that leaves my lips, she flinches.
But I can’t find it in me to care.
All that pain, all that anger, all that sadness comes rushing back into me at once, paralyzing my limbs, a weight on my shoulder that makes me gasp for breath like I’m drowning.
“At this point, I don’t care why you left. Every Mother’s Day, that exact question made me cry into my pillow. Every Christmas, it made me want to burn our tree down because there was an ornament with your picture on it. For years, every fucking day, that question tortured me. Andnowyou have the gall to come here and call me ‘Honey’ as if you didn’t fucking abandon me?”
A cold laugh escapes me at the absurdity of the situation.
“You’re being kind of unfair,” the nameless woman, who I assume shares the same genes as me in some capacity, says softly. All it manages to do is draw another cold laugh from me.
“Unfair?” She flinches under the glare I shoot her way. “Yeah, go back in time and tell the six-year-old child she left behind that it’sunfairto be angry about that. So fucking unfair.”
I bark back. The two of them flinch, though it can only be at the meaning of my words, because I’m calm. A fire might rage inside me, but I’ve had years to perfect my poker face.
“I’ve managed the past twenty-six years fine without you. I have no interest in sudden family reunions. Or any, for that matter. I haven’t needed you, and I damn sure don’t need you now. I will repeat myself only one more time:Out.” I point at the door.
The two women exchange a glance. Wordlessly, my mother tears her arm from the girl’s hold, and scurries outside.
“If you ever change your mind,” the young woman says, takes a card out of her pocket, holds it up between her index and middle fingers, then places it on the table. “Here’s my number.”
I watch her hurry outside. I wait until they’re out of view before I blindly reach for a chair and collapse onto it with a thud, burying my face in my hands as I try to make sense of the past five minutes.
Breathe, Caleb.
I lace my fingers behind my head, missing the familiar fabric of my cap under my fingertips, elbows tight, trying to keep myself from coming apart.
I’m not sure how much time passes until Lauren finds me like this.
Chapter 17
Lauren
“‘Tis the season to be jolly,”I softly sing under my breath as I walk the snowy streets of Wayward Hollow with a little spring in my step.
I’d love to hold on to one of those cute lampposts and do a cheerful twirl around it, as if I were in an old movie. Considering both of my hands are currently occupied, that would prove rather hard, though.
In my left hand, I’m holding a bag with a bunch of inspiration pictures I printed out after finding them in a late-night Pinterest-fueled haze and more coffee than I’d be comfortable admitting to. And yes, there are several vulgar ones among them. Little gingerbread men in black-icing harnesses or dominatrix gingerbread women. Explanations of how you can give your gingerbread people juicy butts.
So amazing what the internet can offer.
In my right hand, I’m holding two pizza boxes. They’re my attempt to appease Caleb and sell him on the idea of doing this Christmas market stand with me. Not that I’m leaving him much of a choice, but maybe some pizza goodness will warm his grumpy heart and soften his resting murder face.
I’m so excited about this. These gingerbread cookies are the perfect idea for the Christmas market. Not only are they super cute, the whole endeavor allows me to pick up one more hobby I’ve been dying to try out: piping frosting.
