by Bridget Snow
She reached and reached, attempting to pin a long strand of old green garland to the crown molding that ran the perimeter of the entry hall. The trouble was, the small ladder only had three steps and no matter how stridently she stretched, even her heels didn’t give her enough extra height.
Just as the prospects of accomplishing any real decorating started to dwindle, the purr of Mason’s engine grew louder outside. It sent a quiver through her body, just knowing he’d arrived. He came back, just like he said he would.
This was officially real.
She lifted one foot and tried harder to press a thumbtack into the molding and hold the garland in place, but it was still no good.
When Mason rang the bell, she called out, “It’s open!”
A gust of cold air blew in from the double doors as he entered, and the two exchanged a warm smile. He walked up to her, still on her stepladder, and put his hands on her hips.
“You just look better every time I see you,” he said. “I thought I’d come for breakfast, but maybe I need to run up an appetite first.”
“We have work to do, mister,” she said, though the idea of dropping everything and riding Mason right there on the hardwood floor had a certain appeal. “Work, then food. We can burn it all off again later.”
“Then let’s get this show on the road,” he said. With his hands still on her hips, he lifted her like a ballerina toward the ceiling. Now she was just the right height to pin up the garland.
“Red and green,” he said, her waist at his eye level as her pants shifted in his hands, revealing the waistband of her favorite yuletide thong. “Don’t make me wait ‘til Christmas to unwrap you.”
“I’m not sure I can make you wait five minutes,” she said. “Now carry me around the room so I can put up this garland. Then I have a treat for you.”
Amazingly, he did just that. Her body was a feather in his expert hands, caught in his iron grip and supported by muscles trained from outdoor work. Only twice did he dip her down low to rest his arms, and then she was up again, decorating the foyer in a fraction of the time it would have taken her alone.
“Now where’s my reward?” he asked, setting her down. When she turned to face him, he came in for a playful kiss, testing the waters to see what came next.
“Gingerbread pancakes,” she said, in her best sultry whisper. “With honey butter.”
“You had me at gingerbread,” he said, landing a quick kiss on her lips before leading her to the kitchen. “Come on.”
The way Mason ate his meal almost made Mel jealous. He was so focused on each bite, moaning with delight at every morsel, licking the tines of his fork afterward to savor the last few notes of flavor — she wondered whether he might leave her one day for a breakfast platter. Then she remembered he relished her with the same insatiable desire and couldn’t help but smile.
When he finished, he sat at the island counter staring at his plate like he missed his food now that it was gone.
“Not only is this kitchen immaculately clean,” he said, “especially considering yesterday, but this food is next level. Did you ever train as a chef?”
She laughed. “I have YouTube on my phone and a generous data plan.”
“No, you have a gift,” he said. “Everyone has YouTube, you do something more with it. Everything about you is delicious, and I’ve tasted you inside and out. I would know.”
Mel blushed at that, but accepted the compliment. The rest of the morning went quickly, setting up the tree in a stand Mel found in the basement and hanging ornaments until there wasn’t a naked branch left on the whole nine-foot tree.
The entry hall was officially Christmas-ified.
“I still can’t believe you inherited this house,” Mason said. “The Hansen House, and all the history it comes along with. Oldest building in Pine Corner.”
“I believe it,” she said. “It’s the only house I’ve seen here without aluminum siding.”
“And that means this Ruth M. Hansen lady was an ancestor of yours?” He pointed at one of the boxes she had dredged up from the basement. All around them sat boxes large and small, each one boasting that woman’s name.
“Maybe,” she said. “The name isn’t familiar. I admit, I’m not too clear on my family tree. Every time I asked Grandpa George about his childhood he would get this wistful look on his face and say it was a story for another time. He must have grown up here. Otherwise, how would he end up owning the house?”
“George Hansen,” Mason said.
“No. George Lane, like me.” She shrugged. “This Ruth person had great taste in ornaments though.”
“It’s a house of great taste then,” he said. “And as much as I’d like to indulge in some more delicious activities, I’m due at the Two Archers. It’s my turn to staff the lot where we sell off this year’s trees.”
Mel reached over to touch his knee and looked him in the eye. “Did you get any sleep last night?”
“No, I came here straight from my shift at Grover’s. I finished up the inventory, so he’s pleased. I’ll sleep tonight to make up for it.”
“You think I’ll let you get any sleep?” she asked.
“Maybe,” he said. “If I earn it.”
“Come back here when your shift ends,” she said. “I’ll pick something up at Grover’s and cook dinner.”
“You spoil me, woman,” he said, pulling on his coat. “I could get used to this.”
“That’s the idea,” she said. Mel let him out of the house and watched him walk to his truck. He had a manly swagger about him, a man with so much muscle on his body that he couldn’t help but sway from inertia with every step.
The second she was inside again, her phone rang.
“Miss me already?” she asked, answering the phone halfway through the first ring.
“Yes, Melody,” a man said on the other end. “I pretty much texted you exactly that. Why haven’t you called?”
“Craig,” she said, her heart suddenly sinking into her stomach. “I spoke to Lorna about the panettone shipment and the… Christmas crackers.”
“Don’t you even start with me,” he said. “That’s not why I’m calling. I’m commanding you to come home. You don’t belong in Minnesota—”
“—Montana—”
“Bumble-dick country,” he said. “Whatever it’s called. I want you to change your flight to December 24. That leaves us a week to finish the year’s financials if we start first thing Christmas morning.”
“You don’t get to decide when I come home,” she said. “I do. It’s my vacation time after all.”
“No, it’s not. I never approved this extended absence. You’ve only earned enough days to carry you through Christmas Eve, which means don’t even try to put in for Christmas off. Not gonna happen. You’re a salaried employee and we have work to do.”
“I spoke to HR,” she said.
“And you know damn well nothing happens in this company without my say-so. You tried to go around me, and you failed. By the time HR passed along their inclination to allow you to use un-accrued vacation time, you had already left, which is highly unprofessional and downright irresponsible. I might expect that from Lorna, but you, Melody? You actually have a halfway-working brain.”
“Right now,” she said, “that brain is telling me to hang up on you.”
“Change your flight, Melody,” he said. “And if you find anyone in Bumble-dick-land in the market for wholesale Christmas crackers—”
She hung up the phone and clenched it so hard in her hand she worried she might break the screen. It wouldn’t be the first Christmas Craig had made her work through, and she had accepted that in the past so Lorna could spend the day at home with her daughter, but if Craig thought he could take this Christmas away from her…
A new take on an old carol started playing in her head:
Let it nope, let it nope, let it nope.
Chapter Six
Melody
What Mel needed now was a ni
ce long walk, bundled in scarves and earmuffs and boots and mittens, with one goal: an immediate infusion of Pine Corner Christmas to banish all thoughts of Krampus Craig.
It was early afternoon when she walked out the door, down the stone path that led her past the weathered “Hansen House” sign that hung at the property’s edge, and onward to the town’s main commercial corridor.
First stop, Old Irma’s Café. A small bell rang just above the door jamb as the door bumped it on Mel’s way in. A middle-aged woman with a broad face and freckled cheeks pointed toward the open booths with the pen in her hand.
“Sit anywhere you like, hon,” she said.
There wasn’t a soul in the café but Mel and a lumpy older man seated at the counter. Mel started to unwrap herself and headed toward a window seat.
“I take it you’re Irma?” she asked.
“One day I’ll try not to take offense to that,” the woman said. Her apron read “Old Irma’s Café” in silver stitches, but her hair was a dark red without a touch of gray. “Old Irma was my mother. I guess that makes me the New Irma, but I prefer my actual name, Lucy. Say, are you the big shot taking over the Hansen House?”
“How did you—?”
“Grover wanders in here every morning when the store is slow,” she said. “A real gossip, that one. And a sucker for my reindeer pie.”
“Well now you’ve got me curious,” Mel said. “I’ll try a small piece and a large coffee, please.”
“One size,” Lucy said. “Coming right up.”
Mel watched out the window while Lucy slid her coffee and pie across the table toward her. Mel put some creamer in and stirred, then sipped as she caught sight of Jessie skipping down the street, right past the café.
When the coffee touched Mel’s lips, she nearly spat a violent spray of brown sludge all over that window pane. It was all she could do to keep her composure. This was, just maybe, the very worst coffee of her life.
Lucy, meanwhile, still hovered over Mel’s table.
“I’m gonna have to watch you eat that,” Lucy said. “And no, I’m not kidding.”
“Oh,” Mel said, her back stiffening at that odd declaration. This is it: City girl dies by poison pie in quiet Montana borough. Or maybe the headlines would be less kind. Ditzy brunette missed telltale arsenic smell in obviously deadly dessert.
“Go on,” Lucy said. “I know it’s a big ol’ piece, but don’t waste it now.”
Mel sank a fork into her reindeer pie and brought it toward her mouth. It was a pumpkin pie cheesecake, heavy on the spices, where the generous triangle of burnt-sienna dessert was meant as a face. Small dollops of whipped cream with dark chocolate morsels made the eyes and pupils, while chocolate-covered pretzel halves were added to the crust as antlers. It was a kitschy little gimmick — until it wasn’t.
“This is miraculous,” Mel said, her mouth still full. The pie was decadent and rich, its velvety texture a perfect disguise for its sharp, distinct flavors. “You should have a line out the door.”
Lucy’s smile was kind and warm. “Thanks, hon. That’s the reaction I live for, but no one’s coming to Pine Corner just for my pie. It’s too far away from Billings for a day trip, and there’s no place decent to put up for the night. We do okay though. Mostly trucker traffic here and there.”
The man at the counter lifted his mug toward Mel, and she lifted hers back in a distant cheers. She hesitated to sip at the mug though, for how thick and stale the coffee was. She was tired, still a little jet-lagged, and recovering from a whirlwind of emotions and over-exertion. She needed the caffeine, badly. There was just no way she could down Lucy’s bitter brew.
She could, however, eat twice as much pie as she anticipated. She paid the bill, accepted a surprise hug from Lucy, and wished silently that she had packed her French press.
Mel’s next stop was the toy store, Kid Kiddlers. It would be nice to pick something up for Lorna’s daughter and check that off her Christmas to-do list. Another door with a bell on it signaled her arrival, and it was her neighbor Jessie who greeted her just inside the shop.
“Ms. Melody!”
“Hi, Jessie.” Mel looked around the store. The shelves were spaced close together in the small shop, with dolls and other toys packed in tight. “Your parents know you’re here, don’t they?”
“We do,” a woman called from the back of the store.
Mel stalked past some wooden games and puzzles toward a workshop area that took up the rear of the building. A woman sat in a rocking chair with a half-crafted doll and a threaded needle. “Alice Kiddler,” she said, nodding a hello since her hands were full. “Tom’s in the back working on the trains. Jessie’s one of ours.”
“I’m Mel. Jessie and I met yesterday outside the Hansen House.”
“Oh, I know. She told me all about you. So pretty and tall, like a Barbie doll, right Jessie?”
The girl shied away, half hiding behind a shelf of wood-and-cloth puppets.
“That’s an overstatement,” Mel said, smiling all the same.
“Either way, the girl wants a Barbie for Christmas, so gee thanks for that.” Alice chuckled and set the doll down. “What about you, Mel, any little kiddos?”
“None of my own, but I’m shopping for a friend’s daughter. Casey. She loves to play dress-up, so if you have princess gowns, tiaras, any of that, I’ll take it all. I need to feel like I’m doing Christmas right this year.”
“I do all the sewing,” Alice said, “but it’s just doll clothes. Nothing flashy or trendy. I think our kiddo clientele appreciate a little back-to-basics mixed into their Christmas haul. And I know what you’re thinking: What clientele? It’s like Silent Night in here.
“See, we get a lot of online orders. The internet has revolutionized how we find customers, though we always thought we’d have a ton of kids fill this place up and happy parents pulling our toys right off the shelves. We like our crafting time though, and we get good reviews.”
“I can see why,” Mel said. “It’s very high quality, just not what Casey’s into this year.”
“I get it,” Alice said. “I’m sure if she looked through these dolls in person she’d fall in love, but no one comes through that door anymore. Town’s starting to dry up. Everyone wants to live in the city these days, heaven only knows why.”
“Thanks for your time, Alice,” Mel said. “It seems like we’re neighbors, so I’m sure I’ll see you soon.”
Alice nodded and sat back down to sew up a seam on the doll’s dress and Mel left, empty-handed.
The salon next door was closed, so she continued down the road and gave Grover a friendly wave hello through the store’s window. A few abandoned storefronts with “For Lease” signs in their windows separated Grover’s All-In-One from the last building on this side of the street before a large park took over.
It was a plain, unassuming building with a single level and a peaked roof. The sign read: Town Hall.
Mel expected it to look like a mayor’s office, but it was more like a small library, with an outward-facing shelf filled with old tomes and archives. A series of old metal filing cabinets sat along the back wall, and an empty chair to one side sat behind a desk with a policeman’s hat perched on a few papers.
She turned to leave again when a man poked out from the back room with long sideburns and a pointy chin. “Can I help you?”
“No, thanks, I was just looking around,” she said. Again, she made her way toward the door, but the man in the back was insistent.
“You new in town or just visiting? Both seem unlikely, but I’m not sure what other options there are.”
Mel turned back and smiled at the man. “I’ve inherited the Hansen House. I’m in town until I sell it.”
His smile faded. “That house was the heart of Pine Corner. There was a crew that came once a month to handle maintenance, but eventually they packed up and never returned.
“There was a trust,” he continued. “Money set aside to pay a maintenance crew
to come out here every few months to keep it decent. Pay the taxes, keep the pipes from freezing, that sort of thing.”
“Where’s that money now?” Mel asked.
“Must’ve run out. A sad day for Pine Corner. That house used to be half our charm right there.”
His gaze wandered toward the window and he trailed off. Mel wasn’t sure whether to tiptoe away or press on with a question about the town. She opted for the latter.
“Any idea how to get ahold of the salon down the block? The sign says ‘appointments only,’ but there was no number in the window.”
The man laughed. “That’s me. I cut everyone’s hair in town, but I’m no salon. Just a simple barber. Your style is a little more advanced than I’m used to, but I could take a whack at it.”
She reached up to touch her hair instinctively. Protectively.
“You manage the town hall building and cut hair?”
“It’s too small a town to be just one thing,” the man said.
“So where do women generally get their hair done, if you don’t mind my asking?”
“For normal? Me. For weddings and things? Probably Billings.”
“I’m getting tired of hearing how great Billings is,” she said. “Why is there nothing here in Pine Corner?”
“I wouldn’t say nothing,” the man said. “Life is just a little different here.”
“So it is.” Mel turned and left, letting the door swing itself closed as she stepped onto the front stair and wrapped her scarf around her neck and chin. It was time to give up on the ‘main’ street. If this was Christmas in Pine Corner, she had seen enough.
“Wait!” the man yelled, throwing the town hall doors wide open as Mel set down the sidewalk. “Take this with you.” He held out an old book.
“I don’t have a library card or anything.”
“It’s okay,” he said. “I trust you. Bring it back when you’re ready, just give it a look. It’s a history of this town, as told through the Hansen House.”