Very Merry Married (Kringle Family Christmas)

“Dad—”

“Your mom left once. Did you ever know that?”

“What? When?”

“Right at the beginning. We’d just gotten here. We had friends and were thinking about starting a family, and I said something stupid to her about how I understood families better than her because I’d grown up in one and she’d grown up in the foster system.”

“Oh Dad,” I sighed.

“I know. So I had to realize what an idiot I was and then I had to convince her that I knew I was an idiot and I wouldn’t be an idiot like that anymore. Took some doing.” He looked at me pointedly. “What did you say to her?”

“Something idiotic.”

Dad chuckled. “Well, you better go fix it.”

“I can’t leave, Dad. It’s Christmas Eve. The whole freaking town is here. How do I leave—”

“Jesus,” he muttered. “You and this town. This farm. We’ll be okay without you, son. I promise. I’ve been telling that to all of you your whole dang lives, but you’re the only one who didn’t listen. But I’m telling you, you will not be okay without Lexie.”

That truth hit me like a gong so hard my head rang. I knew this when I met her and I was given a gift when she walked back into my life. I could not waste that gift. I could not let her go.

I was on my feet.

“I gotta go, Dad,” I said.

“Yeah, you do.”

“I don’t know when I’ll be back.”

“That’s fine.”

“I’m sorry—”

“Get the hell out of here before I drive you to the airport myself.”

I had my keys, my wallet, and my heart. And I had to hope it was enough.

Lexie

I left my car at the rental place at the Denver airport. I was going to send that mega-bill to Ethan. Let him pay it. And then I bought a ticket on Southwest and I cradled Baby Girl in my lap and let her lick away my tears.

“You all right?” The man sitting next to me asked. Baby Girl growled at him so I didn’t have to answer.

I told Mom I was coming home and she was at my house when I got there. Holding open the door and her arms so I could collapse into them.

“You were right,” I whispered, setting Baby Girl down to run around the house and reacquaint herself with all of her favorite things.

“I’m sorry. I wish I wasn’t,” Mom said. But she was lying. In so many ways this was what she wanted. Both of us bitter and heartbroken, trained to never reach for more. I sighed and pulled myself from her arms.

“You look so nice, honey,” she said. “Very festive. Those booties are fabulous.”

“You can have them,” I said and took them off. And once I started I couldn’t stop. My whole Christmas dress that I’d loved and had felt so pretty and Christmas-y in, I couldn’t wear it anymore. I went into my room, peeled every bit of it off and put on my favorite sweats and my Ivy Park hoodie that was cut at the waist.

I took off all my makeup at my makeup table, peeling off my lashes. Taking the holly out of my hair.

“You hungry?” Mom yelled, from the other room. “I ordered a pizza.”

“I’m sorry, what, now?” I asked, walking into the living room.

“I thought you might be hungry. And pizza sounded good.”

“When has pizza ever sounded good to you?” I asked her.

“Oh, well, it always sounds good but I’ve done this stupid thing,” she said, standing in my kitchen. The lighting in there did her no favors but she still looked half her age. “I’ve convinced myself to never take what I want. To not even try.”

Oh. I pulled in a breath.

“And then I did this even stupider thing. I convinced my beautiful daughter, who is magic in every way, to do exactly the same thing.”

“Mom, you didn’t—”

“I did,” she said with a sad smile. “I know it. You can say it.”

“Okay, you did. But it doesn’t matter. He doesn’t want me.”

She came around the counter and pulled me into her arms and I’d cried on the plane but it was dainty and discrete. What came out of me now was brutal and it hurt.

“Shhhh,” Mom said, walking me to my couch and cuddling me close to her the way I’d wished she would every Christmas of my childhood. “It’s okay. You’re going to be okay.”

“I loved him. I did. I loved him. He convinced me to love him and I did and then…then he said he wanted to fix me.”

“Fix you? That fucker. He said that?”

“He did. I made this huge mistake and he was trying to make it go away but he said that. He apologized right away.”

“Sorry doesn’t always cut it.”

“No,” I sighed. “It doesn’t.”

The pizza was delivered and we ate every bit of it. I fed Baby Girl little pieces of pepperoni.