Page 181 of A Very Merry Enemy
She gets the hint that we don’t want to discuss this and drops the conversation. Or so we think.
“But just know that I’m not getting any younger, and I want to see my grandbabies settled down.”
The conversation shifts to other topics, but my heart is still racing.
Dinner stretches on for hours with too much food and too much laughter filling the house. After dessert, Mawmaw moves us all to the living room where she prepares to read’Twas the Night Before Christmas.
Mawmaw makes us all a glass of her famous, but dangerous, eggnog as we gather.
She pulls out a worn book with a red cover that’s been passed down through the generations. She settles into her rocking chair and opens it up. When we were kids, Mawmaw always insisted on reading this classic story with the dramatic pauses and inflections. Holiday’s hand finds mine and she squeezes. Colby stirs on the couch, and I realize he’s asleep. When Mawmaw finishes, she closes the book and looks around. “Now, time to get home and snuggle into bed before Santa arrives. Merry Christmas, my babies.”
“Merry Christmas, Mawmaw,” we all say in unison.
People start gathering their coats and heading toward the door around seven. The sun has set, and the Christmas lights on her house are twinkling.
Jake carries a still-sleeping Colby to the car while Claire follows with leftover pie. My parents hug us both and head out into the cold.
Holiday and I stay behind to help Mawmaw clean up the kitchen. She tells stories about past Christmases while we wash the dishes. It ranges from tales of me and my brothers fightingover toys, to Hudson eating all the cookies, to Jake knocking over the tree when he was five.
“You two better get home,” Mawmaw finally says, shooing us toward the door. She hugs us both. “Merry Christmas, my babies. See you tomorrow.”
The drive home is quiet, but we’re both smiling. I love having her with me at family events. Tomorrow we’re visiting her folks. My hand rests on Holiday’s thigh. When we pull into our driveway, I look at the house I built. It’s lit up with the lights my brothers strung when I was spiraling. So much has changed since November first. So much I never could’ve predicted.
Inside the house, the tree glows in the corner. I start a fire in the fireplace while Holiday makes hot chocolate in the kitchen. We settle on the couch together with her head resting on my shoulder.
“I can’t believe I’m spending Christmas with you,” she says. “When I initially showed up at the bakery, and you were so angry to see me, I just…I didn’t think we’d ever have a chance again.”
“I tried to fight it.” I kiss the top of her head while my heart races. “I lost.”
“Ready to exchange our sentimental gifts?” I ask. We’d agreed to share one special gift, something that money can’t really buy, on Christmas Eve, then open the other gifts in the morning, in our matching pajamas. I immediately agreed, because all season, I’ve been working on something for her.
“Sure.” She smiles at me. “You’llneverguess what I got you. But you’re gonna love it.”
I walk to the tree and pull out the box I wrapped last week. Holiday grabs something flat from behind the couch, where she must’ve hidden it earlier.
We sit facing each other by the fire.
“You should open yours first,” I say, wanting to see her reaction.
Holiday carefully tears the paper to reveal a hand-carvedwooden recipe box I made for her. She gasps out loud. Her fingers trace the carvings on the lid that illustrate rolling pins, whisks, and measuring spoons.
“Lucas,” she breathes out. “You made this?”
“Yeah. Anytime I thought about you over the season, I carved.” I watch her open the box. “I wanted you to have a special place to keep all the recipes we’re going to create.”
She pulls out the top card where I wrote our winning recipe in my messy handwriting. “You wrote it down.”
“I figured we should start the collection with the thing that helped bring you back to me.”
Holiday’s crying now as she looks at me. “This is the most beautiful thing anyone’s ever given me in my entire life.”
“Aw. I’m happy you like it,” I tell her.
She slides her lips across mine and then pulls back. “I love it so much. Now, please, open yours.”
I open the lid of the box, and inside is a diary. “What is this?”
A laugh releases from her. “Open it.”
