Authors: Sheila Roberts
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yeah.”
I scowled at him. “Open the car door.”
“I just did, a minute ago when you got out.”
“Open it again. I’m getting in. I want to go home.”
“I can see you've changed,” he said as he jerked the door wide. “Same old Andie. When the going gets rough, run away.”
That last remark made me so steaming hot mad, the glare I leveled at him should have lasered him into oblivion. I plopped onto the seat and he gave the door a violent shove, probably wishing it was me. Then he stomped around and climbed back in behind the steering wheel, dropping the bag on the seat between us.
Part of me wanted to know what was in that bag, but of course I didn’t ask. I crossed my arms over my chest and started counting the minutes till we’d be back home and I could get out of this car and away from Gabe.
But instead of starting the car, he turned and looked at me. “What happened to us, anyway? How did we go from being crazy-in-love teenagers to bickering adults?”
“Do I need to draw you a map?”
It suddenly struck me how like my parents we were acting. No, I corrected myself, we were nothing like my parents. They’d been married. At least Gabe and I had never done that.
“Maybe you do need to draw me a map,” he said softly.
“Okay, fine,” I snapped. “We broke up.”
“You broke up,” he corrected.
“It was either break up or get knocked up.”
He looked wounded. “I would never have done that to you. I was always prepared.”
What a Boy Scout. “And always pushing. You knew I wasn’t ready, but you kept pushing anyway.”
He sighed and looked out the window. “I know. What can I say? I was young and dumb and bananas over you. I couldn’t get enough of you.”
“Which is why you went running off to the prom with Ashleigh Horne.”
He frowned. “I swear, Andie, there are elephants with shorter memories than you. How long ago did that happen? And, anyway, what was I supposed to do after you dumped me, go shoot myself? Sit around in sackcloth and ashes? Camp out on your front porch for months? Call you and beg you to take me back?”
“That last option would have been nice.”
“Would you have?”
I looked out the window. The snowdrops were flying into the windshield, knocking themselves out and doing a wet slide down the glass. “I don’t know,” I said truthfully. “Probably not. I was scared.”
“Of me?” He sounded incredulous. I don’t know how he looked because I wasn’t watching him. I was staring at those snowflakes, hurling themselves against the windshield.
“No. Of myself.” There was a moment of insight. “I was afraid if I stayed with you I’d blow it and wind up pregnant at eighteen.”
“If you did I would have married you. You had to know that.”
“Married or not, I didn’t want to risk having a kid that young. I didn’t want to ruin my life.”
I remembered the pile of little shoes in one of those houses we’d looked at. Would I have been so unhappy if my life had played out that way?
Gabe started the engine and moved the car into the street. “Well, you didn’t. Instead you just ruined mine.”
I felt like he’d slapped me. What a thing to say! And completely untrue. He’d gotten along just fine without me. Just fine. A sneaky little thought suggested maybe that had something to do with why I was so irritated with him now, but I pushed it away.
I looked at him, incensed. “That is such an unfair thing to say, especially since you dated half the women in Carol.”
“Yeah, I did,” he said. “But they weren’t you. And that’s why you’re here in my car right now. I tried to find a substitute for you. I can’t.” He took his eyes off the road long enough to give me a look filled with such honesty and yearning it melted my bones.
I blinked. What kind of a sneaky, underhanded, romantic thing was that to say? “Am I really supposed to believe that?” I said in disgust. I hoped not. I had just gotten a life. I wasn’t ready to tip it upside down, especially not for Gabe Knightly, the Casanova of Carol.
He shrugged. “Did you ever ask your sister why we broke up?”
“What’s the point? It’s all water under the bridge now.”
“Ask her,” he said. He turned on the radio and started surfing the channels.
Burl Ives came on. “Oh, no. Not him. I can’t take it anymore.” I reached over and turned it off.
So we drove home in silence. I looked out the window and asked myself what I was doing here in this car, in this town even. I had to have been insane to come back. The snow was already turning to drizzle, mocking my secret hope for a white Christmas. I don’t know what I’d been thinking, anyway, since it almost never snows in Caro l.
We pulled up in front of the house. “Stay put,” Gabe ordered. He grabbed the mystery bag, then went around and opened the passenger door.
I got out and he helped me pull my coat back on. Then he pressed the bag into my hand. “Merry Christmas,” he said softly, and before I could say anything, he grabbed me, pulled me to him, and kissed me. We stood there for a moment in the freezing rain, our lips superglued together and me zinging like crazy. I could almost hear bells.
Then he pulled away very slowly and looked down at me. “They say you can’t go back, but I don’t believe it. I think you
can
go back and make it better.”
I gave a cynical snort and stepped away. “Which one of us are you trying to fool?”
“We’re not seventeen anymore. People change. People grow up.”
“And they grow apart,” I added. Not that you would have noticed it with that kiss.
“Sometimes. Sometimes they’re closer than they think. People mature. Love can too.”
I thought of my parents bickering in the hospital. “Sometimes it simply dies.”
Gabe’s smile was mocking. “How dead did you feel just now?”
I didn’t answer the question. I was still vibrating from head to toe, and the mushy, sentimental part of me was urging me to go ahead, tell him that another kiss like that could convince me I wanted to come back home.
Instead I said, “Merry Christmas, Gabe.” Then I turned and ran for the house.
“You can run but you can’t hide,” he called after me, and that made me run all the faster.
Halfway across the lawn I slipped on the grass and went down in a very unsophisticated heap.
“Don’t break my present,” he called.
Ignoring him, I picked myself up and walked the rest of the way with as much dignity as I could manage.
By the time I got to the front door I realized the reason I had slipped. The Harrises’ schnauzer, Fritz, had obviously left a present (the poor dog wouldn’t dare do anything to wreck Mr. Harris’ perfect lawn) and I’d found it. Oh, that had to be symbolic.
I removed my shoes at the front porch, taking care not to look back to where I knew Gabe was still standing by his car, probably snickering. Then I went inside.
I met Mom as I was on the way to my bedroom. She was coming down the hall in her favorite pink sweats.
“Did you forget something?” she asked.
“Just my sanity,” I muttered.
She looked confused. “Where’s Gabe?”
“He had to go. It’s just us girls.”
“Another short date. This is becoming a very strange habit.” She saw my don’t-go-there expression and cleared her throat. “Well, then. I’ve got corn chowder all thawed and ready to heat. You hungry?”
It seemed like all I’d been doing since I came home was eat. But it was now well into lunch time, and corn chowder was one of my favorites. Mom had pulled out all the stops for my visit.
“Sure,” I said.
“Meet you in the kitchen,” she said and kept on going.
Curiosity was burning a hole in me. As soon as I was in my room, I opened the bag. Inside I found a white gift box wrapped with red ribbon. I took it out, pulled off the ribbon, and removed the lid.
A snow globe
. I love snow globes, always have. I lifted this one out and examined it. An angel stood inside it. She was holding a harp and her eyes were turned heavenward. I shook the globe, and a flurry of glittery snow swirled around her. It was also a music box. I turned the key and “Silent Night” began to play.
All is calm, all is bright
.
There was a tiny gift card inside the box, and on it Gabe had simply written “Think of Me.”
I sat on the bed holding the snow globe and did just that. And I found myself wishing we had gone into the bakery. People change, Gabe had said. He’d obviously become a deep thinker since our high school days.
Actually, he did seem different. Oh, he was still the same fun-loving, hunkalicious Gabe I’d known in high school, but I had to admit, he’d added some layers to his personality. So maybe he had changed. Maybe I was keeping him stuck like I remembered him in high school.
I looked at the little angel, forever frozen with her harp in her hand. Had I changed? For the better? I wasn’t sure I wanted to look too closely for an answer. I put the globe on my dresser then went to join Mom in the kitchen, hoping all the way she wouldn’t pump me about Gabe.
I hoped in vain. “What happened with you and Gabe?” she asked the minute my feet hit the vinyl.
I shrugged. “We changed our minds about going out.”
“Did we?”
Nothing like a nice bowl of corn chowder sprinkled with sarcasm.
“Mom,” I warned.
“Look, I know you were young when you broke up,” she said, “but now you’re older, maybe even wiser.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
I shouldn’t have asked. She proceeded to tell me. “Gabe’s the sweetest man in Carol. He’s president of the Carol Rotary—a sure sign of success—and he likes your family. That’s not always easy to find in a man,” she added pointing her wooden spoon at me for emphasis.
You could say that again
, I thought, especially in the case of my family.
“And he’s generous,” Mom continued. “I know of at least two occasions where he’s given up his real estate commission to help a struggling family get into a house.”
Saint Gabe. “Well, then. We should get back together. That way he can give up his commission and get Keira into her dream house,” I cracked.
Mom frowned at me. “You ought to give him a chance.”
“There are plenty of sweet men in New York too,” I told her.
He frown got bigger. “Do you really want to spend your whole life in New York, far from your family and friends?”
No, Timbuktu might be a wiser choice. Farther away. “He dated my sister, for crying out loud.”
“Not for long. The one he’s always wanted was you. Anyone can see that.”
“Mom, could we drop it? You’re going to spoil my appetite, and I love your corn chowder.”
Mom gave the chowder a stir and sighed heavily. It was her discouraged-mother sigh, one of many tricks in her arsenal of manipulation. “You’re making a big mistake.”
I came up next to her and sniffed the aroma from the pot. “I would think you’d tell me not to be in a hurry. Look at you and Dad.”
She stiffened. “That was different. We got married way too young.”
“Well, I’m too young too.”
“I didn’t say you had to get married tomorrow. I just said you should give Gabe a chance.” She began singing to the tune of her favorite John Lennon song, “All I am saying is give Gabe a chance.”
She finished with a playful nudge, and I rolled my eyes.
The front door opened. “I’m home,” Keira called.
“Mom, let’s drop it. Now,” I said.
She shrugged and turned her attention back to the chowder.
Keira came into the kitchen and sniffed. “Oh, yuck. Corn chowder. Is there anything else to eat?”
“Leftovers,” Mom said.
Keira made a face. “I think I’ll run away from home, then come back for a visit. Maybe I’ll get all my favorite food then.”
“Don’t be small, dear,” Mom said, not the least ruffled.
We had just settled in with our meal, Mom and me with our corn chowder, Keira with tomato soup, when the doorbell rang.
“I’ll get it,” Keira said and jumped up. “It’s probably Spencer.”
But it wasn’t Spencer. It was Mr. Winkler from across the street. “Just thought I’d see how you’re doing over here. Looks like they did a good job of replacing the window.”
“That was so sweet of you to drop by,” Mom told him. “Would you like some corn chowder?”
“It smells great. Don’t mind if I do.”
With Mr. Winkler at the table, we got a whole new dynamic. Keira sat smirking while Mom tried not to flirt in front of her. I sat there in disapproving silence. Here my father was lying in the hospital and Mom was flexing her flirting muscles with our bow-legged neighbor. Disgusting.
“Bill, I don’t know what we’d have done without you the other day,” Mom said.
He put on one of those fake modest looks. “Oh, it was nothing. Glad to help.” He pointed his spoon at his empty bowl. “That was darned good, Janelle.”
“Would you like some more?”
What was she thinking? Single men were like stray dogs. Once you fed them they never left.
“Don’t mind if I do,” said Mr. Winkler.
I normally don’t do things like this. I mean, I’m a middle child, a peacemaker. Stirring up trouble is not my specialty. But I felt overcome by a need to protect Mom from herself.
“It was good timing that you came over, Mr. Winkler,” I said. “Mom’s had a pretty upsetting day.”
I could almost see Mr. Winkler’s ears perk up at the thought of being able to ride to Mom’s rescue again. “Yeah?”
“Our dad’s in the hospital.”
She’s upset over my dad. Get the connection?
Mr. Winkler’s eyebrows shot up. “The hospital! What happened?”
“He tried to kill himself,” Keira said. “Could you pass me the French bread, please?”
Mr. Winkler gaped at her like she was nuts as he passed her the plate. He looked to Mom. “Depressed, was he?”
“No, he was stupid. He got drunk and drove his car into a tree.”
“Whoa, that’s not good,” said Mr. Winkler, the new king of understatement.
“He’s got a broken arm and a concussion,” Mom said. “He’ll be fine. And I’m not upset,” she added, glaring at me. My comment had gone right over Mr. Winkler’s head, but Mom had definitely gotten the connection.
“Well, it was pretty upsetting seeing him lying there in that hospital bed,” I said innocently.