by Dani Collins
The air smelled fresh and the whooshing noise of the sleigh against the snow made it feel like they were flying. Atlas smiled as though he had a secret, which made Nicki grin even wider.
Quincy glanced at her and tucked his hand more securely around his son, his face relaxing.
Which was when Nicki knew she was in trouble. Not the kind of trouble that came from crushing on her handsome boss, either.
His gaze swept with interest to the rugged mountains, rolling fields, and the line of trees as they trotted down the perimeter of the farm. She caught her breath, wanting him to like it here. Feel at home.
She wanted him to be happy.
She wanted to make him happy.
*
Quincy hated meeting new people. Work mixers where he was supposed to make small talk with clients were his worst nightmare. One of the reasons he loved the city was its anonymity. It might be overrun with people, but it wasn’t necessary to talk to them beyond, “Excuse me,” and “Good morning.”
Sharing a sleigh with strangers made him stifle a sigh, especially when they started singing and Nicki joined in.
Atlas might have felt the same. When Nicki suggested he sing too, Atlas only shrank into Quincy like he was seeking protection.
The action caused a strange feeling to coil around Quincy’s heart. The constriction didn’t hurt. It felt weirdly good. Like a hug. Holding his son was like cradling the warm body of an oversized puppy. He felt protective, scared of hurting him, and privileged all at once. But holding a child, his child, was bizarrely profound. He could barely take it in.
When the sleigh came back to its starting point and halted, he realized he’d only been thinking about Atlas and his comfort. He’d stopped thinking about the work waiting for him at home or whether he was happy to be here or not.
It was disturbing. What was next? Falling on his back and making snow angels?
He waited for the other family to disembark, then set Atlas on his feet outside the sleigh. “Let’s get this tree picked.”
The boy didn’t move, only stared across to where the mini forest of trees was being invaded by a group of school-aged students. A field trip of some kind?
Before he thought it through, Quincy heard himself say, “Do you want me to carry you?”
He didn’t know why he said it. It was the lingering thoughts of puppies, protection, and places to get lost. The bigger children looked overexcited and liable to knock over a little boy without even seeing him, like bulls in a china shop.
Atlas turned and nodded, holding up his arms.
Quincy reached down, but then he wasn’t sure how to carry him. Lucy had clung to her mother’s hip like a monkey, but that seemed kind of girly. For both him and Atlas.
“Shoulders?” he suggested, and hoisted Atlas up.
Little hands clutched the top of his fisherman’s cap. Atlas made a noise that sounded—
Quincy shot a look at Nicki. “Did he just—?” Chuckle?
She nodded, a bright look in her eye as she took out her phone and snapped a photo.
The binding around Quincy’s heart gave another squeeze, like something was being anchored to it, the ties tightening. He swallowed and closed his hands firmly around his son’s skinny, denim-clad calves. Atlas’s boots dug into his chest.
“You like it up there, don’t you, Atlas?” Nicki said with a lilt of emotion in her voice. “It’s a good spot for seeing all the best trees.” Were her lips trembling? “That was a really good idea, Quincy.” She squeezed his arm.
It wasn’t throwaway praise. It was sincere. And even though he barely knew her and would swear on a stack of bibles that he didn’t care what she thought of him, it meant something to him that she smiled up at him as though he possessed heroic qualities.
He was actively trying not to like her. He’d been trying to freeze her out all morning. She was too chipper, too outgoing, and too splashy in her clash of red mittens and some kind of leggings with holly on them. She was too emotional, especially if she was going to take snapshots every time he acted like a decent human being.
He charged into the thick of the trees, reminding himself to watch for banners and other overhead objects so he didn’t brain his son.
Nicki was making him too aware of his own thoughts and feelings. Of her. He had long ago mastered the art of ignoring his attraction to beautiful women. Karen’s abrupt rejection had made him wary of dating again. Since then, he’d only done it intermittently, aware that relationships were complicated at the best of times. This was the worst. The last thing he needed right now was romance.
With his son’s nanny.
“Let’s get this done. I have work to finish at home.”
*
Nicki might not have been a successful actress, but she’d been a keen one. She’d taken a thousand workshops on character development and was still a student of human nature. She was also the type to believe the best in everyone around her.
So she didn’t take Quincy’s abrupt changes of mood personally. He didn’t like to show his softer side. That was obvious. It was also clear he possessed a caramel center and that Atlas was finding his way into that part of him.
She wondered what had made Quincy so reserved. Despite the cheerful crowd of families at the tree farm, or the recollection from an old timer about Quincy’s grandmother, it seemed like Quincy couldn’t wait to finish up and get home.
He’d been highly reluctant to get a potted tree. Too much commitment, she suspected, since she and the tree farm owner, Carson Scott, had convinced him to prepay for the next few years.
The tree had arrived home shortly after they did, but Quincy had already been back at his desk. He worked for the rest of the afternoon.
Just as she was starting to think he was too taciturn and really should lighten up, he swung the other way, taking her aback.
She helped Atlas into his pajamas and came back from draining the tub to find Quincy on the boy’s bed next to him, the borrowed library books on the mattress at Atlas’s feet, the first one already open.
Quincy stopped reading the moment she came in.
“Looks like I’ve been usurped.” Since she and Maury had both done a rotation through those books already today, she didn’t argue. “I’ll head home and see you in the morning. Goodnight.”
They both said goodnight, Atlas gave her a hug, and Quincy waited for her to finish picking up Atlas’s clothes and leave the room before he resumed reading.
She went downstairs to say goodnight to Maury.
He was opening the box of tree lights. “You’re working long days.” He glanced at the clock.
“It’s fun, not work. Today was, anyway. And Quincy is reading to Atlas, so I’m leaving now unless you have something you need me to do?”
“Oh, good. I’m glad he’s decided to work with him.”
Nicki paused in folding the sofa blanket. “Work?” she repeated.
“Oh.” Maury muttered something under his breath, adding, “Pardon my French.” He glanced toward the stairs. “Quincy might not like me saying anything, but he had a…” Maury waved a hand toward his own mouth. “He didn’t speak right when he was little. Sounded a lot like Atlas. Couldn’t say his Rs. My wife had trouble with it, too. I didn’t even know it was anything. I mean, I traveled so much and figured all little kids took some time to say their words properly. But Quincy was still missing his Rs and Ls when he went to school. I guess you’d call it an impediment. It certainly turned into one for him.” He looked toward the stairs again.
She had noticed Atlas still rounded his words, but she’d had the same mindset—that it would sort itself out in due time.
“Do you think Atlas is self-conscious? Is that why he doesn’t talk very much?” That had to be why Quincy was so close-mouthed, not that she would have guessed if Maury hadn’t told her.
Maury scratched the top of his head. “I couldn’t say. Quincy—and my wife, too—they’re a quiet breed to start with. Not like you and me,” he added ruefully
.
“Am I chatty?” Nicki said with mock surprise, then confided, “I sat alone in detention so many times for talking in class. It really was the worst punishment anyone could devise for me. If a teacher sat in to supervise, I wound up pulling her into conversation. I can’t help myself!”
Maury chuckled. “I’m much the same.” Then he shook his head, growing sober. “Quincy was pulled out of class, too. He wouldn’t talk at all. Or the teacher claimed she couldn’t understand him. He was sent for special help—the kiss of death for any child in those days. Then he acted out because he was being teased.” Maury sighed. “I should have done more, but I left it to my wife. Like I said, I traveled. I didn’t have a problem understanding him, and we were happy at home. It just didn’t seem like an issue to me. But it was. He had to change schools a few times. She tried to tell me, but I didn’t listen.”
Maury looked so dejected, so regretful.
This was the source of his desire for a do-over. He wanted to help Atlas before the little boy went through what Quincy had struggled to overcome.
“How did you meet your wife?” She moved to sit on the chair across from him.
“Work. She was the prettiest girl in the typing pool, but she wouldn’t talk to anyone. So I talked to her. Still do, if you want the truth.” He winked, but his eyes gleamed with old sorrow.
“I bet you do,” Nicki said wistfully, entranced by the idea of eternal love. “It’s too bad she didn’t meet Atlas.”
“It is,” Maury agreed with a somber nod. “But at least she showed me the way. And you’re here to help. We need your energy and excitement, you know. I could never drag Quincy out for a sleigh ride, but you managed it.” He nodded approval. “Keep doing what you’re doing.”
She leaned forward. “I was thinking of adding, ‘Take cookies to the neighbors’ to the calendar, as a way to, you know, help you introduce yourselves. But I’m afraid he’ll fire me.”
“He might.” Maury nodded, then smirked. “But I’ll rehire you. Do it.”
December 7th
Quincy didn’t know what was wrong with him. He’d spent an hour sitting on a child-sized chair earlier this week, painting peanut butter into the petals of a pinecone, then rolling it in birdseed, while his father and Nicki had gone to the health clinic. He’d been the only man in the room full of moms and tots, surrounded by the chaos of chatter and crying babies.
Atlas seemed to like standing at the window to watch the birds come and go, though, so Quincy was glad to know how to do it. They could make more all through winter, here in the kitchen, where he could hear himself think.
The snow globe workshop didn’t sound as practical, though, so when Nicki said she wanted to sign Atlas up to make one, Quincy opened his mouth to refuse.
Then he thought of Atlas trying to see the motor under the carousel. He had listened attentively when Quincy had pulled up some schematics and explained how it worked. He figured putting together a snow globe was a simple way to show him how something else was made, so he said, “Fine.”
Yesterday, Santa’s slave driver had given him pen and paper and asked him to sit with Atlas to write his letter to the man in red. Quincy had felt like a bit of a jerk, lying to a gullible boy about a stranger who would bring presents into the house while they slept, but Atlas was highly in favor of Rudolf landing on the roof, so Quincy felt compelled to go along with the ruse.
Atlas didn’t really understand the concept of a letter to Santa, taxing Quincy’s ability to explain the fine line between wishful dreaming and being greedy. Quincy had tried to encourage charitable thoughts, explaining Atlas could ask for Pops to get a new sweater or his other grandparents to have something they might like.
Atlas soon figured out that part. He wanted Santa to bring Lucy new crayons.
“That’s the spirit,” Quincy told him, then Quincy went directly to his computer and one-clicked everything his son had asked for.
He knew it was spoiling, especially since a box had arrived from Karen’s parents, and his father was also hiding parcels in a closet, but Quincy was making up for the Christmases he’d missed. That did not make him sentimental. Just a good provider.
Today was home décor day, he noted as he came into the kitchen, needing an afternoon coffee. Nicki had Atlas pasting strips of construction paper into circles, forming a chain. Chipped-up paper—possibly the most asymmetrical and, dare he say unrecognizable, snowflakes ever—were taped to the kitchen window.
“Show your dad,” Nicki prompted Atlas as she pulled cookie sheets from the oven.
The heady aroma of ginger and cinnamon filled the air. Quincy couldn’t help glancing hopefully toward the trays, but he saw they were big squares of baked, brown dough. Walls for the gingerbread house, he assumed. He snuck a shortbread from the tin while he watched Atlas stand on his chair and hold up his paper chain. The tails rustled and fell to puddle on the floor. It was easily ten feet long.
Quincy nodded. “That’s a lot of work.”
“If he doesn’t lose interest, that one is going on the stairs. We’ll make another for the tree.”
Clutter and random splashes of color went directly against Quincy’s base instinct for clean design and function over form. At the same time, Atlas wore such a look of pride, Quincy could only say, “Sounds great.”
He started a fresh pot of coffee, asking Nicki, “Are you having some?”
“No thanks, but on the topic of trees, Atlas said you showed him how to draw a tree with your computer. Can you finish making ours for the calendar?” She nodded at the clean sheet of cardboard that had been leaning behind the kitchen table for a week.
Could he dig deeper the pit of frivolity into which he was being pushed?
Who was he kidding? He was already there.
“Of course.” He met his son’s gaze. “Do you want to help?”
Atlas nodded. Nicki came around to close the glue stick while Quincy grabbed the cardboard. Atlas followed him into the dining room.
Pops still had the dining table he and Quincy’s mother had purchased when they married. It was currently being used as a catch all for Christmas decorations and wrapping paper, as well as whatever empty boxes accumulated as unpacking continued, plus any toys Nicki had picked up when she had run the vacuum yesterday.
Quincy settled Atlas on a chair and cleared off the table while he waited for the drawing they’d made yesterday to print onto single sheets of paper. Then he explained how they were going to cut out each piece, arrange them on the cardboard, and trace the bigger shape of the tree afterward.
“It’s a puzzoh,” Atlas said, remembering how Quincy had described it to him yesterday.
“A puzz-el. Yes.” He coached Atlas on how to place his tongue to make the sound.
“Puh-zawl,” Atlas mimicked carefully.
“Good job.”
The fact was, Quincy could draw a straight line and even some elegant parabolas. One of his old-school instructors had insisted all his students learn everything from proper grip on a pencil to precise lettering. Quincy often scratched out something rough and dirty on a scrap of paper before fine-tuning it on the computer. More than once, those sketches had made it into presentations and other meetings. He was confident he could have drawn a symmetrical tree freehand, but the exercise of showing his son how computer design translated to the real world had been an indulgence of his inner nerd.
Atlas had been curious enough to make it worth the effort, and the boy had a good eye. They’d run through a few options of tall, skinny trees and short, bushy ones. Atlas had chosen the same one Quincy would have picked.
While a voice in the back of his head urged Quincy to hurry the process, telling him he ought to be doing real work, there was something enormously satisfying in allowing Atlas the time to work through the process. Quincy hated to be rushed himself, so it felt good to treat his son the way he liked to be treated.
Now Quincy had time to cut out each bough while Atlas picked up the pieces of th
e tree and set them randomly on the cardboard.
“There’s a trick,” Quincy said. “See this one? That’s the picture we made on my computer yesterday. Remember I said the numbers would help us put the puzzle together? Do you know your numbers?”
Atlas knew up to ten. Soon, the paper tree filled the cardboard.
“You were gone so long I thought you’d gone back to the tree farm for a real one,” Nicki said, bringing in a cup of the coffee Quincy had made. It was already doctored with a splash of milk.
“Thanks.” He tried to think if a woman had ever brought him coffee before. It was only coffee. Why did it seem so significant? So nice?
“That,” she declared, “is the best Advent calendar tree I’ve ever seen.”
“Of all the one you’ve seen?” Quincy murmured into his coffee, trying to keep things light. Trying not to be overly proud of a kindergarten project.
“Shh.” She winked at him, giving him that little kick in his blood he was really trying not to feel.
At least she was only here for another sixteen days or so.
He sobered. Suddenly, the countdown to Christmas had a different connotation. Not anticipatory, but…
“What’s wrong?” Her smile faded.
“Nothing.”
“You were frowning. Not happy with the tree?”
He wasn’t. Was he? He’d noticed ‘ice skating’ among the sticky notes on the kitchen wall this morning. He’d taken to checking the wall while he ate his cereal of bunched oats and dry strawberries with Atlas. Skating didn’t sound too bad, but there was also ‘tea with Santa’ and a pageant. What sort of mingling with the natives did that involve?
“The tree is almost finished. I just have to trace it, then I’ll use a straight blade to cut it out. I’ll do that in the garage.”
“Then you can paint it,” she told Atlas. “How about something to eat while you wait? It’s time for Pops’ snack. I cut up some veggies and cheese. Will you go see if he’s still on the phone? If he’s finished talking to his friend, you can tell him it’s time to eat.”
Quincy glanced at his watch, not realizing how much time had flown by while he’d been working on the tree with Atlas.