Page 80 of Ten Christmases Without You
“How’s your dad?” Charlotte asked.
“Really great. We talked the whole time.”
“Wow,” Uncle Stephen said. “He’ll be tired now, I’m sure. Maybe Uncle Brian should go next. He’s the quietest one of us all.”
They laughed.
With a mixture of emotions, Emmy left the hospital and stepped out into the cold air. The temperature was dropping. She tightened her scarf and braved the winter breeze all the way to her car, everything going around in her mind. Moments with Mitch floated in and out, as she tried to find similarities between the two of them. They once laughed because they’d both cut their fabric the same, holding the piece in a certain way while lifting the sheers in an odd looping pattern. She tried to tell herself that her mother must have taught her that skill; that it wasn’t somegenetic quirk. And they always selected the same design from each of the seasonal panels.
She got into her car and quickly started the engine, blowing on her hands while she waited for warmth.
When she arrived at Madison’s, her sister was putting away groceries, her head in the pantry. “Hey!” she said, distracted by an armful of potato chips.
“Is Charlie not back yet?”
Madison glanced over her shoulder. “No, I thought he was with you.”
“They said he had to pick up a few things.”
Madison shrugged. “He can’t need much. Did you see Dad?”
“Yeah.”
“How was he?”
“Good. He was chatty.”
“Oh wow, really?” Madison’s gaze popped over to her and back to the full grocery bags all over the floor.
“Yes, he was sitting up and everything.”
Madison put her hands on her cheeks in surprise. “I can’t wait to get over there to see him.”
Her excitement was definitely warranted, but Emmy held onto the conversation she’d had with her dad. The quiet house was a reprieve, given what she’d just learned. She went over to a bag of cold items and began stacking them in the refrigerator.
“With the upcoming snow, the store was a madhouse,” Madison said, “but I managed to get five pizzas, cold cuts and cheese for sandwiches, and a ton of snacks. I also got stuff to make a couple of casseroles and enough baking supplies to get us through an apocalypse.”
Emmy barely heard her as she piled fruit into a temperature-controlled drawer.
The rustling stopped and Emmy turned to find Madison facing her.
“You okay?” Madison asked.
“I don’t know.”
With a bunch of bananas in her arms, Emmy told Madison what her dad had heard in his dream, and then she laid out what she’d been thinking.
Madison stood, silent.
“I know,” Emmy said in response to nothing at all. Madison hadn’t had to say anything, but Emmy could guess all the things that were going through her sister’s mind.
“That’s ridiculous,” Madison said. “There’s no way…” But the way she trailed off as she looked at her suggested that the idea of Emmy being Mitch’s daughter might not seem so far-fetched.
“I’ve been going around and around with everything,” Emmy said. “Why am I the only one of all of us who likes mint chocolate chip ice cream? Does Mitch like it? I’m a night owl and everyone else in the family turns in early. I could keep going.”
“Those might just be your own traits, though, Em. You’ll drive yourself crazy. There’s no way you’re not one hundred percent my sister.”
“And if you’re wrong?”
