Christmas in Bayberry

He stabbed at another kernel. It stayed on the thread, but barely. With care, he pulled it down the thread. “I don’t know.”

“Surely you have to have one. Come on. Share.”

He didn’t normally talk about his family holidays. Christmas had been different each year—different state, different city, different home. It was difficult to have traditions when you were always moving around. It was so different than Kate’s upbringing.

“What is it with you and Christmas?” Wes asked.

“What isn’t there to love about Christmas? There’s something magical in the air. Add a few snowflakes and it’s perfect.”

“Perfect, huh?” He knew that if her beloved company went under, Christmas might never have that magical element for her again, and that saddened him. He’d never known anyone to be this excited over a holiday. He didn’t want to be responsible for stealing away that twinkle of merriment in her beautiful eyes.

“Hey, you’re changing the subject. What’s your favorite Christmas memory?”

He didn’t have to think really hard to find the answer. “My favorite Christmas memory was when I was four or so. We’d gone to visit my grandmother in Michigan. There was a bad snowstorm that took out the power, and my father built a fire in the fireplace. I was so worried that Santa wouldn’t be able to reach us, because he couldn’t come down the chimney with a fire burning. So my grandmother took me out to the garage with her. We carried a tall wooden ladder to the back of the house and leaned it against the back door. She told me, that way Santa could get down from his sleigh on the roof. We even left the back door unlocked. It was the last year I believed in Santa and she made it great. And in the morning, there were footprints on the roof.”

“Aww…that’s a great memory.” Kate smiled.

“It was.” He hadn’t thought about that Christmas in a long time.

Back in those days, his parents had been happy. His father had been working a steady job in Ohio, and Wes had believed in happily-ever-afters. It wasn’t too long afterward, though, that Wes had learned what it was like to say goodbye to the only home he’d ever known. And from then on, he’d spent Christmas in a different city every year.

At last, he was settled. So why was he wishing for things he didn’t have? He should be thankful for the opportunities presented to him and not thinking about how things could be so much different. He didn’t know if it was the cozy atmosphere of Bayberry or being around Kate, but the life he’d carved out for himself in New York no longer seemed like enough. And he didn’t know what to do about it.

He finished the string of popcorn and then joined her at the tree. “It’s really coming together.”

“Isn’t it? But we haven’t even started on the ornaments. I have so many I inherited from my parents, and then a bunch I added to the collection. So each Christmas I’m able to do a different theme.”

There was something driving him to know her even better. “Kate, what happened to your parents?”

She paused and gazed at him. The pain of loss reflected in her eyes. She didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to. He immediately regretted his words.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have asked.”

“No. It’s okay.” Her voice was soft. “It’s not like I didn’t dig into your past.” She turned back to add the string of popcorn he’d just finished to the tree. “I was fifteen, and it was autumn. My parents were on their way home from an evening in Boston. There had been rain and a heavy fog. A…a truck coming in the opposite direction crossed the center line and my parents were hit head-on.”

Sympathy welled up in Wes. He remembered how hard it’d been when he lost his father, and he’d been an adult at the time. He couldn’t fathom the overwhelming pain of being a child and suddenly losing not one, but both parents.

“Kate, I’m so sorry. I can’t even imagine.”

“At least I had my aunt. She was there for me. She bundled me up and moved me to Bayberry.”

It was in this moment that he realized she’d moved to Bayberry the same year he had. As he replayed his memories of seeing her—of her not speaking to him—it gave him a different view. She had been grieving. And the kids who had crowded around her were giving her a shoulder to lean on, to help her through this difficult period in her life. Guilt assailed him as he realized he should have tried harder back then to be her friend—to learn what she’d been going through.

He cleared his throat. “So you came to Bayberry the same year I did.”

“Really?” She looked at him as though trying to picture him as a kid.

He nodded. “I remember you. Ninth grade, right?”

She stared at him. Her fine brows drew together as she pursed her lips. “You look familiar, but I can’t place you. I’m sorry. I wish I could.”

“It’s no big deal.” So then why did it feel important to him? “We were just kids.”

She gave him a funny look. “I can’t believe I would forget you.”

“I didn’t forget you.” Now why had he gone and said that?

Color filled her cheeks. “I don’t even want to know what you thought of me back then. I was shy and scared of life without my parents.”