Christmas Eve at Friday Harbor (Friday Harbor 1)

“Maybe’s he’s using any excuse to spend time away from Darcy. If I didn’t already hate the idea of marriage so much, I sure would think twice about it after seeing Alex’s.”

“Obviously,” Mark said, “a Nolan should never marry anyone who’s too much like us.”

“I think a Nolan should never marry anyone who’d have us.”

Whatever the reason, Alex had continued to contribute to the restoration. As a result of their combined efforts, the house had begun to look better. Or at least like something normal people could live in.

“If you try to kick me out after all this,” Mark had informed Sam, “you’re going to end up buried in the backyard.”

They both knew, however, that there was no chance Sam would ever kick them out. Because Sam, perhaps to his own surprise more than anyone else’s, had taken to the child with instant devotion. Like Mark, he would have died for Holly if necessary. She got the best of everything they had.

At first cautious with her affection, Holly had quickly become attached to her uncles. Although they had gotten warnings from well-meaning outsiders not to spoil her, neither Sam nor Mark could see any evidence that their indulgence was doing any harm. In fact, both of them would have been happy to see a little more mischief from Holly. She was a good child, always doing what she was told.

When Holly wasn’t in school, she accompanied Mark to his coffee-roasting site at Friday Harbor, watching the massive drum roaster heat raw arabica beans until their pale yellow skins caramelized to deep-gleaming brown. Sometimes he bought her ice cream at a shop near the harbor dock, and they would go “boat-shopping,” browsing along rows of yachts, Nordic tugs, family cruisers, and crab boats with haystacked pots on the back decks.

Sam often took Holly out with him to tend the vines, or to hunt for starfish and sand dollars at low tide on False Bay. He wore pasta neckties she had made at school, and pinned her artwork on walls throughout the house.

“I had no idea what this was like,” Sam had said one evening, carrying Holly into the house when she’d fallen asleep in the car. They had spent the afternoon at English Camp, the site where the British had lodged during joint occupation of the island until it had been awarded to the Americans. The national park, with its two miles of shoreline, was the perfect place to have a picnic and throw Frisbees. They had indulged in acrobatics to make Holly giggle, leaping to catch the Frisbee. They had brought her little tackle box and fishing rod, and Mark had taught her to cast for sea perch along the shore.

“What what’s like?” Mark had opened the front door and flipped on the porch lights.

“Having a little kid around.” Somewhat sheepishly, Sam clarified, “Having a little kid love you.”

Holly’s presence in their lives offered a kind of grace neither of them had ever known before. A reminder of innocence. Something happened to you, they discovered, when you were given the unconditional love and trust of a child.

You wanted to try to deserve it.

Mark and Holly went into the house through the kitchen, setting the packages and the conch on the table in the old-fashioned corner breakfast nook with built-in benches. They found Sam in the parlor, a painfully bare room with uncovered Sheetrock walls and a fractured chimney temporarily encased in steel mesh.

Sam was at the fireplace, building a frame for a soon-to-be-poured cement slab to support a new hearthstone. “This is going to be a son of a gun to fix,” he said, in the middle of taking measurements. “I have to figure out how we can use the same chimney to vent two different fireplaces. This one leads directly to the upstairs bedroom, can you believe that?”

Leaning down, Mark murmured to Holly, “Go ask him what’s for dinner.”

The child obeyed, going to Sam’s side and putting her mouth close to his ear. She whispered something and retreated a few steps.

Mark saw Sam go very still.

“You’re talking,” Sam said, turning slowly to look at the little girl. A questioning note had tipped his husky voice.

Holly shook her head, looking grave.

“Yes, you are, you just said something.”

“No, I didn’t.” A titter escaped her as she saw Sam’s expression.

“You did it again, by God! Say my name. Say it.”

“Uncle Herbert.”

Sam let out a breathless laugh and grabbed her, pulling her against his chest. “Herbert? Oh, now it’s going to be chicken lips and lizard feet for dinner.” Still clasping Holly, he looked at Mark with a wondering shake of his head, his color high, his eyes containing a suspicious glitter. “How?” was all he could manage to ask.

“Later,” Mark said, and smiled.

“So what happened?” Sam asked, stirring a pot of spaghetti sauce on the stove. Holly was busy in the next room with her new puzzle. “How did you do it?”

Mark uncapped a beer and tilted the bottle back. “Wasn’t me,” he said after a biting-cold swallow. “We were in that toy shop on Spring Street, the new one, and there was this cute little redhead behind the counter. I’ve never seen her before—”

“I know who she is. Maggie something. Conner, Carter…”

“Conroy. You’ve met her?”

“No, but Scolari’s been trying to get me to go out with her.”

“He never mentioned her to me,” Mark said, instantly offended.

“You’re going out with Shelby.”

“Shelby and I aren’t exclusive.”

“Scolari thinks Maggie’s my type. We’re closer in age. So she’s cute? That’s good. I thought I’d check her out before committing to anything—”

“I’m only two years older than you,” Mark said in outrage.

Setting down the spoon, Sam picked up a glass of wine. “Did you ask her out?”

“No. Shelby was with me, and besides—”

“I call dibs.”

“You don’t get dibs on this one,” Mark said curtly.

Sam’s brows lifted. “You’ve already got a girlfriend. Dibs automatically go to the guy with the longest dry spell.”

Mark’s shoulders hitched in an irritable shrug.

“So what did Maggie do?” Sam pressed. “How did she get Holly to talk?”

Mark told him about the scene in the toy shop, about the magic shell, and how the suggestion of make-believe had worked a miracle.

“Amazing,” Sam said. “I never would have thought of trying something like that.”

“It was a matter of timing. Holly was finally ready to talk, and Maggie gave her a way to do it.”

“Yeah, but…is it possible Holly would have started talking weeks ago if you or I had just figured it out?”

“Who knows? What are you getting at?”

Sam kept his voice low. “Do you ever think about what it’s going to be like when she gets older? When she starts needing to talk to someone about girl stuff? I mean, who are we going to get to handle all that?”

“She’s only six, Sam. Let’s worry about it later.”

“I’m worried that later’s going to get here sooner than we think. I—” Sam broke off and rubbed his forehead as if to soothe away an oncoming headache. “I’ve got something to show you after Holly goes to bed.”

“What? Should I be worried about something?”

“I don’t know.”

“Damn it, tell me now.”

Sam kept his voice low. “Okay, I was going through Holly’s homework folder to make sure she’d finished that coloring page…and I found this.” He went to a stack of paper on the counter and pulled out a single page. “The teacher gave them a writing prompt in class this week,” he said. “A letter to Santa. And this is what Holly came up with.”

Mark gave him a blank look. “A letter to Santa? We’re still in the middle of September.”

“They’ve already started running holiday commercials. And when I was at the hardware store yesterday, Chuck mentioned they were going to put out Christmas trees by the end of the month.”

“Before Thanksgiving? Before Halloween?”

“Yes. All part of an evil worldwide corporate marketing plan. Don’t try to fight it.” Sam handed him the sheet of paper. “Take a look at this.”

Dear Santa

I want just one thing this year

A mom

Please dont forget I live in friday harbor now.

thank you

love

Holly

Mark was silent for a full half minute.

“A mom,” Sam said.

“Yeah, I get it.” Still staring at the letter, Mark muttered, “What a hell of a stocking stuffer.”

After dinner, Mark went out to the front porch with a beer and sat in a comfortably beat-up wooden chair. Sam was tucking Holly in and reading her a story from the book bought earlier that day.

It was still the time of year when sunsets were long and slow to fade, painting the sky over the bay in saturated pinks and oranges. Watching the shallows glitter between the brackets of deep-rooted madrone trees, Mark wondered bleakly what he was going to do about Holly.