Page 11 of A Christmas Harbor

“I walked. I’m staying at a B&B up by the State House.” The thought of stumbling back to that sad little room alone, then waking hungover on Christmas morning, made him want to curl up under the bar. “How about you? You didn’t sail here, I hope.”

“My houseboat’s nearby, over in Eastport.” He motioned toward the harbor.

“Is that another town?”

“Technically it’s a neighborhood, but we’ve got this underdog grudge against the rest of Annapolis, so we call ourselves the Maritime Republic of Eastport. Anyway, it’s a fifteen-minute walk. Ten if we hur—I mean, if I hurry. If one hurries.”

Paul pressed his lips together to stifle a grin.Ten if we hurry.If they left this bar together—if he didn’t blow it between now and then—they would definitely hurry.

Over at the piano, Martin went straight from decking the dreary halls to playing the Carpenters’ “Merry Christmas, Darling.”

Oh.

Oh shit.

Paul swallowed hard to banish the sudden tightness in his throat. Wham!’s “Last Christmas” was not, in fact, the last song he needed to hear. It was this one, the favorite ofhim, the song he’d sung to Paul every December morning last year to rouse him from bed. Paul had feigned annoyance, but sometimes even when he was wide awake he’d stay under the covers just to get that serenade.

He’d driven halfway across the country to forget that man—after begging for the same visiting faculty position he’d turned down last year—and now the son of a bitch was haunting him through a fucking Carpenters song and ruining this moment with David.

“You okay?” David asked.

Paul blinked himself back to the present. “Yeah. Yeah, I just…” He rubbed the side of his jaw. “I just lost Carpenters-ageddon.”

“Uh-oh.”

“It’s not an internet thing, it’s just a me thing.”

“Sorry to hear that.” David’s tone was sincere. It was only a matter of time before he asked the sort of question Paul couldn’t face answering.

“Thanks. Hey, we need to get Martin out of this sad groove.” He threw back the rest of his bourbon. “What was your favorite carol when you were a kid?”

“Good question.” David ran a hand backward, then forward over his short hair, which left it looking exactly the same. “Probably the one with the animals and birds.”

“Sorry, I draw the line at ‘The Twelve Days of Christmas.’”

“No, the one in the stable where Jesus was born.”

“Oh! I know this. Um. Um. Ummmm…” Paul pressed the heels of his hands to his temples while he muttered the first few lines. “Jesus our something, strong and good, humbly born in something something, and the friendly beasts around him stood—”

“‘The Friendly Beasts’!” David slapped the bar railing with both palms. “My nana used to sing that to us. She’d do all the voices of the different animals.”

“Was this the ‘go big or go fuck yourself’ grandma?”

“No, the other one.”

“Come on.” Paul stood up, which made his head swim a little from that final swig. “Let’s go talk to Martin.”

As they sauntered toward the piano, Paul realized it was the first time they’d been on their feet together. David was only a few inches shorter but had none of Paul’s tall-guy gangliness. He must have been a formidable-looking XO, stomping down those submarine corridors, ready to kick slackers’ asses into next week.

Martin was still playing and singing as they approached. A glass goldfish bowl sat atop the piano’s lid, serving as a tip jar. At the bottom of the bowl lay a plastic aquarium treasure chest. A limp dollar bill lay partly draped over the chest, surrounded by the jetsam of scattered coins.

This was a crime in progress. Martin, for all his gloomy song choices, had way too much talent to be working at a place like this.

At the bar, the McSaltys had returned to stony silence, their glasses emptied. The gin-and-tonic gentleman was staring drowsily at the floor, each blink heavier and longer than the last.

As if this somber tableau weren’t bad enough, Paul’s left foot was still wet.

Finally the song ended, and Martin gave them his full attention, nodding to David in an acquaintance-type way. “You guys have a request, or are you just stopping to say goodbye?”

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