The Winter Games

by Sharp, Dr. Rebecca

  “She’s perfect,” I murmured, still in shock that I’d pushed this tiny human from my body in what would go down as one of the shortest labors in human history.

  “Just like her mom.” Wyatt’s lips came for mine and my already-mush body melted even further.

  “What! You’re joking. She couldn’t have had the baby already—”

  We broke apart with a chuckle, hearing Jessa and the commotion in the hallway for a second before there was a knock on the door.

  “Mrs. Olsen, you have—”

  “Family!” Ally exclaimed, pushing right through the nurse, followed by Jessa, Tammy, and Jac. “We’re all family.”

  Behind them, Kyle, Emmett, Nick, and my brother filtered in with a collection of the cutest children I’d ever seen.

  Well, except for mine.

  “I can’t believe you had her already!” Jessa exclaimed.

  Wyatt stepped back so everyone could filter in around the bed.

  “I’m not surprised,” Chance snickered.

  “I’d give you the finger if I could,” I told him sweetly.

  “You just always have to be the fastest.”

  “You’re just mad because I always beat you,” I told him as he bent down to see his new niece.

  “Never mad,” he rasped. “Always proud.”

  We both blinked back tears before Chance pressed a kiss to my head.

  Emmett, Nick, and Kyle followed next, peering down to see the newest addition to our Snowmass crew and offer their congratulations.

  “We have gifts,” Jessa said with a smile, taking a seat on the bed.

  “I have a guess,” I said wryly, my chuckle halting at the small mewl that escaped against my skin.

  “You’re going to need to hydrate. Having a baby is no joke,” she returned. “Although, you just had a baby in twenty minutes, so what am I saying?”

  We all laughed and Ally made her way to the head of the bed, tears already dripping down her cheeks.

  “She’s perfect, Channing,” she whispered thickly, carefully hugging me before cooing over my daughter. “Oh! We have something for you, too. Hold on.”

  While she disappeared from my side to the corner of the room, Jac slid over to me next. Even though she’d been the newest to the group, she fit in immediately. And with both of us being so driven and competitive, it seemed like it took only moments for us to go from friends to family.

  “I have a gift for you, too,” she said, pushing her short, black hair from her face. “And it’s already stocked in your fridge.”

  I smiled.

  Ever since Jac had opened her juice bar, I’d become a fiend. We’d had her open up a smaller location inside the school and while I justified it as a healthy snack for the kids, Wyatt knew when he agreed that it was all for me—charging me with always finding a way to make something a win-win.

  “Thank you,” I murmured, watching as she gently rubbed one of the baby’s feet.

  “Okay! I have it!” Ally returned, her smile exuberant as she pulled a wooden music box from behind her back.

  I didn’t even need to ask to know that Emmett had made it.

  I’d commented on the similar one he’d carved for Luke after he was born.

  “Oh, Ally…” I bit my lip, trying not to cry.

  The top of the box was painted with the mountain-scape we all woke to see every morning. Snow-capped peaks and white-dusted trees.

  She had no idea how perfect it was, but she would soon.

  And when she lifted the lid, it played ‘You are My Sunshine’—her favorite lullaby.

  “I’ll add her name to it, if—when you decide,” she said softly.

  “It’s so beautiful. Thank you both so much.”

  She hugged me again for a long minute, before she shook softly with tears.

  “Son of a biscuit,” I mumbled, her happiness causing my own to spill over. “You’re making me cry.”

  “Happy tears, Chan,” she insisted with a laugh. “Happy tears.”

  Pulling back, she wiped her face and then mine.

  “Okay, I guess I have to share you,” Ally grumbled and scooted to the side to let Tammy slide in.

  “She’s beautiful,” my kind-hearted friend gushed.

  “I have no idea what I’m doing,” I confessed with a choked laugh.

  I was the risk-taker. The adventurer. The outlier.

  As much as I loved Tammy, we were polar opposites and she was always what I pictured as the perfect mom—an image I’d become more and more afraid of failing as my due date approached.

  She waved me off with a shake of her head. “You’re already doing it,” she assured me. “And you’re doing great.”

  “I don’t know about that.” I looked down at my daughter, partially wondering what I’d gotten myself into and partially already knowing.

  “You are fearless and determined—you’d have to be to enter the X Games as Chance,” she began, reaching for my hand and giving it a squeeze. “You are thoughtful and flexible. When Wyatt retired, you came up with the idea for the school. You put it into motion and flowed with all the hurdles that came along with it.” I started to cry again. “And you have loved and nurtured not only every student who’s walked through your doors, but each and every one of our babies.”

  She bent down and hugged me, finishing with, “I know, for a fact, you’re going to be amazing at this.”

  With a wavering breath, she let me hold onto her for a long second and soak in her confidence—something I never thought I’d lacked.

  When I looked at my daughter, there was a fear I’d never felt before. But there was also an insurmountable love that promised it would all be okay.

  “So, tell us,” Tammy finally said with a small smile, drawing the rest of the group’s attention. “Have you decided on her name?”

  I looked down at the small sleeping form before letting my gaze rise to meet Wyatt’s.

  We’d gone back and forth for what seemed like all nine months, but today it hit me.

  Literally.

  We’d been driving into town to pick up a few things, having built a home on the outskirts—closer to the school and closer to the mountain. We’d just pulled up to the first stoplight, by the welcome sign, when my water broke.

  I didn’t even have to tell Wyatt. When I looked at him, he knew.

  This place. This mountain. These people.

  They were home.

  And now, she was a part of it, too.

  “We decided to name her Aspen.”

  Effen Good Martini

  Ingredients:

  Muddled cucumber slices

  2 oz. Effen Cucumber vodka

  1 oz. freshly-squeezed lime juice

  ½ oz. agave syrup

  5 leaves of fresh mint

  Preparation:

  Combine ingredients in shaker with ice.

  Shake well.

  Strain into martini glass.

  Garnish with a cucumber wedge.

  Enjoy.

  Dark ‘n’ Stormy

  Ingredients:

  2 oz. dark rum

  ½ oz. freshly-squeezed lime juice

  4 oz. ginger beer

  Preparation:

  Build the drink in a highball glass filled with ice.

  Add rum and ginger beer.

  Garnish with a wedge of lime.

  Enjoy.

  The jbird swizzle

  2 ounces jasmine-infused rum

  1 ounce freshly squeezed lime juice

  1/2 ounce orgeat

  1/2 ounce blueberry syrup

  1/2 ounce pineapple juice

  3/4 teaspoon vanilla simple syrup

  3/4 teaspoon St Elizabeth Allspice Dram

  Crushed ice

  Dash Peychaud’s bitters

  Basil sprig

  Instructions:

  Pour rum, lime juice, orgeat, blueberry syrup, pineapple juice, vanilla simple syrup, and allspice dram into a cocktail shaker and shake without ice.

  P
our into a chilled pilsner glass and fill with crushed ice. Vibrate crushed ice with a swizzle stick or cocktail spoon to dilute and chill the ingredients. Dash Peychaud’s bitters on top of drink and add more crushed ice to create a cone. Garnish with basil sprig.

  Ash

  Present

  Carmel Cove, California

  “HELLO. MY NAME IS ASH. I’m an alcoholic and it’s been one-hundred and forty-nine days since my last drink.”

  “Hello, Ash,” the rest of the Tuesday afternoon Alcoholics Anonymous group responded in unharmonized chorus from the circle where we sat inside Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church.

  This was my Tuesday lunch—and it had been for the past four or so months. I sent a tight smile over to Larry, my sponsor. My savior. He sat in front of the small table which served coffee from his coffee shop, Ocean Roasters. And next to him stood the proud banner that symbolized the battle cry of our congregation.

  Recovery is the gift you give yourself.

  There wasn’t a week that went by where I didn’t need the reminder. It was the first gift—the first thing—I’d given myself in a very, very long time.

  Larry Ocean was the unofficial king of Carmel Cove, a small town about two hours south of San Francisco, famous for its breathtaking cliffs, world-renown golfing, and, of course, Roaster’s rich and addicting coffee.

  But he wasn’t King like Caesar; he was King like Cincinnatus—the dictator who ruled Rome to save it from defeat and when the war ended, instead of keeping power for himself, went back to his farm and his normal life.

  Willing to stand up when needed. Knowing to step down when necessary.

  I kept speaking, choosing to tell my tale as though it were a weekly confessional.

  “I know a lot of you have heard my story, but I thought about having a drink last night, so I hope you don’t mind if I share again.”

  Here, I felt safe in my failures and my weakness. Here, I wasn’t alone because the rest of the people in the room saw me for more than my mistakes, just like I did for them.

  “Last night, my sister called to tell me she’s engaged. For those who don’t know, my alcoholism almost cost my sister her career and the love of her life.”

  My hands folded in my lap. It never got easier to speak about what I’d done. I hoped it never did.

  “Five months ago, I found out she and my best friend were in a relationship and had kept it from me. I drank so much… I got so drunk—which is saying a lot for an alcoholic.” There was a small rumble of laughter through the group. “Because of my addiction, it felt like the ultimate betrayal. Because of my addiction, my hurt became hate. And I drank so much that what should’ve been fixed with a conversation, instead awoke a monster of rage who lied and threatened to hurt them like they’d hurt me.”

  I paused and let my gaze scan the room, making sure I looked each and every person in the eyes because there was no hiding from this; there was no hiding from the truth.

  “I threatened to ruin my sister’s reputation—a reputation I’d given so much of my life to help her build—if my best friend didn’t break her heart.”

  Bile still rose in my throat every time I said those words because I didn’t recognize the man who’d done that and yet, that man was me.

  I felt like a real-life Jekyll and Hyde—only it was either the Alcoholic or Ash.

  “Five months ago, I realized my alcohol addiction turned me into a man I still don’t recognize, and that man did things I never would have imagined.”

  Guilt was a drug. One I took every day to mitigate the cancerous mistakes I’d made. But while it might be saving me, the fine print on the bottle said the side effect of regret might kill me in the process.

  And the longer I stayed sober, the more I realized how alcohol had affected me even when I wasn’t drinking—which wasn’t often.

  It shorted my fuse and grew the bomb. It made me distrust those around me. It made nothing I did good enough. And it made me unforgivably vengeful toward two people I loved. It made a situation that didn’t involve me become a personal attack, a breach of loyalty. Regardless of what I told Blake about my feelings—about why I did what I did—there was no true excuse for the asshole I’d become. There would never be.

  A man is no better than the pain he’s caused his loved ones.

  And I’d caused a lot of pain.

  Larry’s old, not-so-wrinkled eyes stared hard at me. I knew there was a cup of espresso to be had at his shop when this was over.

  Pushing eighty, Larry owned Ocean Roasters, the town’s only coffee shop. It had been in his family for four generations, and the legacy his family built for this town was the reason why he was its grumpy, stringent king. Beneath the rugged, no-nonsense exterior was a heart of gold; it was just heavily buried under strong cups of coffee, four glazed donuts, and a face which had weathered war, and far too many losses to tell.

  “I’m happy for her,” I went on. “But I almost cost her that happiness. And when she asked when I was coming home, that was when I thought about having a drink. It was just for a split second, because she doesn’t know; she doesn’t know just how much of a failure I was,” I confessed, my fingers thumbing over the rubbed-worn five-month chip I’d transformed into a bracelet. The thought had been fleeting—a shadow of the crutch I’d once relied on. But leaving it to the shadows is what would allow it to fester. “But, I didn’t. So, today, I’m grateful to have made it to one-forty-nine.”

  Everyone clapped for me. Everyone but Larry—the worsening arthritis in his hands made it hard, especially on rainy days like this. The group’s support filled the hole of inadequacy where I used to dump oceans of alcohol even though it never made a difference.

  After the hour was over, I waited outside the small community church until I felt a hand on my shoulder.

  “You going back?” Larry asked as he came up behind me, letting me steady him as we walked down the front steps and began the few-block trek down Ocean Avenue, the main drag in Carmel Cove, toward Roasters.

  My jaw ticked and then released with a sigh. “For the wedding, of course. But now?” I shook my head. “I don’t think so. I’m not ready.”

  Translation: I’m not good enough yet.

  Two weeks after the tour ended… two weeks after everything had worked out for Blake and Zach, I told everyone—family and friends—that I was heading out west for a change in scenery and a new job for a little while.

  Only there was no job. There was barely a destination. And there definitely wasn’t a choice.

  I didn’t tell anyone about my addiction because it wasn’t their problem to fix; it was mine. So, I left them with the impression I needed a change and some space after what happened on tour—that I needed a break, though the truth was that I was already broken.

  It was one more lie, but it was the only one I didn’t regret.

  Something happened to me the night I found out about the two of them. Something that I couldn’t explain—though ‘the beginning of the end’ had a poignant ring to it.

  I’d continued to fall after that night, only harder and faster. Reprehensible choices. Disgusting lies. But it was when I stood at Blake’s hotel door after my sister had ripped me a new one that my eyes met Taylor’s and the expectation held in those green spheres was both familiar and a slap to the face; she looked at me like she needed me to remember how to be a better man.

  Like she could still see that better man.

  I shuddered. The memory of it still unnerving for reasons I couldn’t explain.

  Funny how some people forget that rock bottom and the moment things begin to look up are one and the same.

  I didn’t stop drinking cold-turkey. Guilt wasn’t a magic pill for sobriety. But the more I tried not to touch any liquor over the next few weeks, the more I realized the life I lived and the industry I was involved in would make what was necessary, impossible. I didn’t know what I needed in order to get better, but I knew I wasn’t going to be able to find it there.

&
nbsp; “Your usual?” Larry asked over the steam of his still-manual espresso machine which had survived through every generation of Ocean since they opened.

  I nodded, waving to a few friendly faces already inside.

  “Hey, Larry,” Josie, the owner of the Carmel Bakery down the street, sing-songed as she strolled in for her afternoon coffee. Kind eyes and a round frame said she enjoyed sampling her pastries just as much as she enjoyed baking them—a fact she would cheerfully admit to.

  Ocean Roasters was a daily stop for most of the locals—and not just for coffee. Everyone knew Larry, and Larry knew everything. I hadn’t been here long, but it was long enough to learn coffee meant community in this town—and Larry was the heart of it.

  “Mornin’, Josie,” Larry greeted her with a weathered smile, shuffling about to make her usual large, half-decaf coffee. “You want to look at photos?”

  Larry had served in the war with Josie’s dad, only her father hadn’t come home. They’d been good friends, so Larry had looked out for Josie ever since. And one of their frequent pastimes when she stopped in for coffee was Larry would pull out an older-than-the-Bible photo album and they’d look at pictures of Josie’s dad from before and during the war while Larry recounted old tales. I was sure she’d heard the same stories hundreds of times by now.

  But a good memory of a loved one never grows old.

  “I can’t today.” She gave an apologetic smile. “I have to get back to Cam.”

  “How’s Cambria doing?” Larry immediately asked.

  Cambria was Josie’s daughter who’d just moved back home after finishing her massage program. I hadn’t met her yet, but I’d chalked it up to being too busy with my restaurant to do much else.

  “Good,” she replied, and a look passed between them that said there was more to discuss about her daughter later.