Page 24 of My Santa Mountain Man
One of his eyebrows raised up. “You’re not kidding then. Your dad really is an asshole.”
That made me laugh again. “Yeah. That’s an understatement. I typically don’t spend Christmas with him. I’ll go see him later this week and drop off a small gift. We don’t spend much time together. There’s not much point.”
Corbin’s eyes skated across me like puzzle pieces snapping into place. “So, Poppy Daniels.”
“Yup.” I nodded.
Everyone in town knew my dad. He was a drunk who was so bad off he’d been permanently banned from the Bear Den for causing mischief and mayhem. It took alotto get banned from that bar.
Now he mostly just drank on his front porch, looking miserable with a bottle of whiskey in his hand.
Corbin’s eyes darkened. “My dad used to like his bottle too. But he wasn’t a jerk about it. When my mom died, it justbrokehim. She was hiseverything, and he couldn’t keep it together without her.”
“It’s nice that your parents loved you. Even if they left this world too soon.”
He nodded, his voice rough with emotion. “Yeah. I spend so much time thinking about what I’ve lost. I hadn’t thought that other people might have it worse than me.”
I grinned at him. “You’re right about that. There’s always someone going through a hard time somewhere. I grew up in a series of single-wide trailers. I don’t have a family home to mourn like you. Not to downplay what you’ve gone through. But I’ve always dreamed of having that one place that’shome. I want deep roots underneath my feet. That’s what the farmhouse was supposed to be for me.”
Corbin surprised me as I saw one tiny tear slide down his cheek and disappear into his beard.
He wiped it away fast as though it had never existed. “I’m sorry I was such an ass to you when we first met. I’m not used to…people.”
My heart went out to him. “We’re not all so bad. But I can understand wanting to hide away from the world. I am glad to have met you, though. You want to go tour the old farmhouse now?”
He stood up, towering over me, looking like a mountain beast. “Yeah. Let’s go see the old place.”
Before we left, he went out to his shed and rummaged around for a while, pulling out a splitting maul and a wedge. I had the feeling he was going to spend the whole day trying to chop that tree up.
I wasn’t even sure that Corbin realized it was Christmas today. He hadn’t acknowledged it once.
Chapter 16
Corbin
I ran my hands along the porch railing. It was the same railing that had stood here when I was a kid.
I can still remember my mom and dad bickering over whether to paint it or stain it. My dad had sensibly insisted on stain, because painting was a pain in the ass when it inevitably peeled and flaked off again in a few years. With stain, there was no need to scrape the old paint off. You could just slap another coat on over and over again.
A tiny smile landed on my lips thinking about the fight they’d had.
My mom had won.
We’d painted the railings in bright, cheery white, and just like my dad had predicted, he’d had to come out and redo the damn things every few years.
The old paint was flaking off in large swaths now, and I itched to put down a fresh coat.
“You want to come in, Corbin?” Poppy asked.
She was standing with the door open, waiting for me.
“Yeah. I was just thinking about old times.”
I took my hand off the railing and followed her inside.
It was cold, and the power was still out. But I could instantly see that she’d been hard at work.
The place was rundown and shabby compared to when I’d lived in it. But there was a colorful Christmas tree in the corner of the living room right where my mom used to always put one.
