Page 214 of Across His Line

“Sit,” Mrs. Waleska says, behind me, and gives me a little push between the shoulder blades.

I sit.

It’s loud and slow and messy. Nobody passes out presents in order. Mr. Waleska sits in the armchair by the fire in a plaid robe with his reading glasses on, opening his things with a pocketknife like they might be wired, complaining that his wife used too much tape. Mrs. Waleska takes pictures of everything on her phone, including the tape. Rafe sits on the floor with his back against the couch, next to my feet, and opens his presents like he’s being paid by the hour to get through them, ripping the paper in one pull and dropping it on the floor in a pile.

His mom hands me one. It’s soft and wrapped in silver paper with a red bow.

I open it slowly. I can’t help it. I save the bow.

Inside, there are flannel pajamas. They’re dark green with tiny white stars on them, the softest flannel I’ve ever touched, the kind that’s been brushed on the inside so it feels like a blanket. And under them, a pair of thick wool socks. And under those, folded in tissue, a scarf, cream, long and soft, the same color as the sweater I wouldn’t take.

I look up at her.

They aren’t useful. That’s the thing. Nobody needs flannel pajamas with stars on them. Nobody needs a scarf the color of a sweater they already said no to. They aren’t for my business, or for school, or for anything. She didn’t buy them because I needed them. She just thought I’d like them.

“They’re beautiful,” I say. My voice does something in the middle.

“You’re going to wear the scarf,” she says, pointing at me with her coffee mug. “I don’t want to see it on a website.”

I laugh. It comes out wet. I put the scarf on right there over my pajamas and leave it on.

Mr. Waleska’s gift for me is flat and heavy and wrapped in brown paper with no bow. He hands it to me himself across the coffee table without getting up out of his chair.

It’s a book. Old, hardcover, with the dust jacket gone and the cloth cover worn through at the corners. Something about building a company, by somebody I’ve never heard of, published before I was born. There are notes in the margins, in pencil, in a cramped, upright hand. Underlines. A coffee ring on the back cover.

“I read that in the office over the dry cleaner,” he says. “The first year. When I didn’t know what I was doing.” He picks his newspaper back up. “Thought you might get something out of it.”

That’s all. He doesn’t make it a speech. He doesn’t look at me while I flip through it.

I hold it in both hands. It’s his. His actual copy, with his actual handwriting, from his actual first year.

“Thank you,” I say. “I’ll take care of it.”

“Write in it,” he says.

Mrs. Waleska looks at me across the room. She doesn’t say anything, but she smiles kindly, and something about that tiny smile makes my heart skip a beat. I look down at the book again. It’s thoughtful. This means something. So does the pajamas.

Rafe hands me something small. It’s in a little box wrapped badly with too much tape, and the paper torn on one corner where he must have tried to fix it.

I open it.

It’s a watch.

It’s old and gold. It’s small with a round face gone soft yellow with age and thin black hands and a band of tiny gold links. It’s ticking. I can hear it when I hold it up close. Somebody wound it.

I know what it is. I know immediately. I’ve seen watches like it. Never had one in my hands, but I’ve seen them on the estate listings, on the sold pages, late at night. I know what the little mark on the back of the case means without turning it over. And I turn it over anyway.

“Rafe,” I say.

He darts a look at me.

“How much—”

“Don’t.”

“But—”

“Don’t.”