by Mara Jacobs
“Oh, do they have kids?” Phoebe didn’t remember hearing about that, or about them getting married, but she didn’t really keep tabs on the goings on in the Copper Country.
“No, not yet. Not even married or engaged, though Petey told me he’s asked a bunch of times. But I have a feeling they might be announcing that Al’s pregnant tonight.”
“Really?”
Lizzie shrugged, her wool coat bunching at the shoulders. “I don’t know. She’s been really jumpy about this party. That they’re even having this party doesn’t seem like them. They’re pretty low-key.” She smiled again, and her voice had a sing-song quality as she said, “I just think there might be some baby news tonight, that’s all.”
If Alison was pregnant, she sure wasn’t showing, Phoebe thought, as she and Lizzie were greeted by the hostess upon arriving.
“Come in, come in. Thanks so much for coming early to help. They just delivered all the food and it’s in the kitchen. I’m having everybody just put their boots and stuff in there,” Alison said, pointing to a large room off the garage entry that doubled as a laundry/coat room. “I need to figure out where everything will go once the party starts, but I need to keep some things in the oven, and…” She looked around distractedly while Lizzie and Phoebe took off their coats and boots.
“It’s okay, Al,” Lizzie said in a soothing voice, putting her arm around her friend. “We’ll come up with a plan. It’ll be easy. Besides, it’s just close friends, right? That’s what you said?” Alison nodded. “Then nobody’s going to care about stuff like that. You know us.”
Alison nodded again, then let out a large sigh, visibly relaxing into Lizzie’s hold around her. “You’re right, Lizard.” She took another deep breath and let it out. “It’s just a party of friends. So what that we’ve got pretty dresses on instead of swimsuits and cut-offs. These are my peeps.”
“Exactly,” Lizzie said, squeezing petite Alison’s shoulder. “And only one of us has on their pretty dress, so we’d better get moving.”
Lizzie’s dress was indeed pretty. A shiny blue wrap dress that accented her tall, curvy body and made her black hair stand out. It wasn’t any wonder that Finn wanted her to wake him when she got home.
Alison was in yoga pants and a sweater and Phoebe wore jeans and a sweatshirt, though they’d both done their hair and makeup already. Phoebe carried two pairs of heels, one black and one red, not knowing what dress choices she’d find.
“The red. Definitely,” Alison said to her, leading them to the kitchen. “I put a few choices in the guest room closet. Feel free to go on up. Petey’s out getting more ice, so you won’t bump into him.”
The kitchen looked like a tornado had hit. Dishes sat on the counters. Trays of food, some wrapped in foil, some in Saran wrap, were all over the table and every other spare space. At one end of the table, it looked like Alison had dumped all her silverware and linens.
“Um, yeah. I can choose and dress quickly. Why don’t I stay down here and help you guys first?” Phoebe said.
Lizzie was already diving in, moving things from here to there, organizing. “Yeah, let’s get this stuff sorted so I can see what all you did—Oh, my God, these countertops are gorgeous.”
Lizzie oohed and ahhed over the differences in the remodeled kitchen. Having never been there before, Phoebe just saw it as a beautiful kitchen in a huge house.
Phoebe could appreciate a house like this, but she didn’t need it. She’d be happy with just a home of her own. And a decent man to share it with.
She made herself busy at the end of the table organizing and setting up the silverware. When she got to the cloth napkins, she sat down and started folding them into an intricate design. She ran her hand over the completed ones, and a small smile crept across her face as she remembered the last time she’d folded napkins in such a way.
Chapter Four
Christmas, children, is not a date. It is a state of mind.
~ Mary Ellen Chase
The Friday night after Thanksgiving
Phoebe set the plastic busing tub full of clean linen napkins down on the table and scooted back into the booth across from Charlie. The only blinds she’d left open were ones at the booth behind him, and from where she sat, Phoebe could see the snow was falling in large, fluffy flakes. Buddy, the cook, had left an hour ago with her assurance that she was fine, Charlie was harmless, and she’d be perfectly safe in the closed diner with a man she’d just met.
Buddy had seemed skeptical, but had grudgingly left through the back after coming out front and giving Charlie the once-over. “Boy wouldn’t hurt a fly,” he’d said to Phoebe as he passed her on his way to the kitchen and the back door.
Phoebe agreed. Charlie seemed like the stereotypical boy next door. Sweet, nice, safe. And yet, when he’d said he’d stuck around because of her, the heat in his eyes had been anything but safe. That heat had made Phoebe bring him the pie and ask him to stay. The sweet, nice, safe, was what had her telling Buddy to go and leave them alone.
“Go on,” she said to Charlie now. “We were on this Deni girl whom you never made a move on.” She took one of the napkins from the bin and began folding it into an intricate design. They’d talked about all of their past romances. Phoebe wasn’t really sure how they even got on the topic. Something about why Charlie’s pals had wanted to cheer him up with a trip to a strip club.
Charlie waved a hand, then grabbed one of the napkins from the bin and tried to mimic her actions. “No, I think we were still on Carson.”
“Ugh. Please, no. What an idiot. Of course, I was the idiot who followed him, so I guess we were a good match.”
“But he got you to Port Huron, which got you to this diner.” He stopped folding and looked from her fingers to her eyes. “Which got us to tonight.” He held her gaze and she couldn’t help but smile at him. It was crazy, but she felt the same way. Not an immediate connection, because she’d thought he was just part of a group of yahoos stopping in between parties. But as soon as he’d spoken to her, she’d felt…something.
Which of course she didn’t trust, her judgment in men not being the best. But on some level, she’d known those guys from her past were no good for her, even though she’d forged ahead into disastrous relationships. And on some level, she knew Charlie was different.
What she was feeling as she sat across from him—keeping her hands busy with the napkins so she didn’t leap across the table and run her fingers through his adorable tousled, brown hair—was different. He was wearing a white, thermal long-sleeved tee that reminded her of home, and a comfy, navy sweater that made his eyes seem almost blue, though Phoebe thought they were probably more of a gray.
She guessed him to be about her age, though when he’d tried to do the last name, where ya from, how old are you, what do you do for a living thing, she’d stopped him cold. That’s how she’d gotten into trouble with men in the past—knowing everything about them. And yet, knowing nothing real about them until it was too late. If she only had this one night with Charlie—and he did get out that he was in town visiting his parents before she’d stopped him—then she wanted to know the real Charlie. And so they had talked about past loves, future dreams, words spilling out of both of them, a kind of giddiness at diving into real stuff and not just talking about what high school they went to.
“Yes. He got us to tonight. So, thank you Carson, wherever you are, you total dirt bag.” They both laughed. She liked his laugh, kind of throaty and yet natural, like he laughed a lot. “So,” she said, returning to folding napkins, though she’d have liked to stare at him longer because he was just so cute. “Back to Deni. You were crazy about her and never made a move. Why?”
He fumbled with the napkin, still trying to create just one, while she’d done several. She slowed down her movements so he could follow. “I don’t know,” he said. “At first, after she got together with Sawyer—that’s the guy she’s with—I thought I’d blown it by not making a move sooner. By being her frie
nd and secretly, silently, hoping for more. But now…” His fingers tangled with the napkin and he squashed the cloth in his hands. “Unbelievable. I’m an engineer. I design whole buildings. Why can’t I fold this scrap of material into a stupid flower?”
She laughed and put her completed linen rose into the bin, then took the napkin he’d been working on. She smoothed it out flat in the space on the table directly between them. “Look, it’s not that hard,” she said, taking his hands in hers. She laced her ring finger and pinkie with his on each hand, keeping their thumbs, pointer and middle fingers free. Slowly, she began the folds that her grandmother had taught her years ago, Charlie’s fingers working in tandem with hers. When Gran had taught her using this same method, Phoebe hadn’t been breathless like she was now, her hands entwined with Charlie’s, feeling the strength and heat in his movements.
They completed the flower and Charlie pushed it toward the bin, but continued to hold on to her hands, now lacing all their fingers together, their wrists resting on the table. His thumbs began to caress her palms, and she rested her elbows on the table, moving forward in her seat. Wanting to be closer to him, to feel more. His thumbs continued on, sliding back and forth across the pads of hers, then back to her palms, lightly following her life and love lines. Lines she just somehow knew this man would become a part of.
“But now,” he continued. Phoebe had to clear her head to remember where they’d been in the conversation. Oh, right, that girl he liked. “Now I think that I didn’t make a move on Deni for a reason. That I knew she wasn’t the one. That I love her, yes, but like a buddy, a dear, dear friend.” Phoebe closed her eyes, letting his soft voice, and softer touch melt over her, like the hot butterscotch she drizzled on the famed sundaes she served at the diner. “Because, when I saw her with Sawyer—how she looked at him—I knew that wasn’t how I felt about her. And I knew…I just knew…I’d look at somebody someday the way she looked at him.”
He tugged on her hands, and she opened her eyes. “And, Phee?” he said, a questioning tone in his voice, almost a confusion of sorts.
“Yes?” she said, her voice catching. She knew what he was going to say before he said it. Knew, because she was thinking the same thought.
“It’s the way I’m looking at you,” he whispered.
“I know,” she whispered back, as if the feeling, the emotion, was too fragile to speak too loudly, lest it be frightened away. “Me too.”
Chapter Five
Perhaps the best Yuletide decoration is being wreathed in smiles.
~ Unknown
Three weeks later
Charlie ran his finger along the folded napkins on Petey’s kitchen table. He’d never seen a napkin rose in his life, and now he’d seen one twice in a matter of weeks.
Damn, could he not shake the memory of her? It was driving him nuts.
He’d made the rounds of people in the living room when he’d first arrived, most he knew through Petey and Darío, or from having lived and worked in the Copper Country since he came to Tech at eighteen. It was a small party, an intimate group, and Charlie felt a little like the odd man out, knowing the hosting couple for probably the least amount of time. And of course, being single. So, he’d made his way to the kitchen, the one that he’d designed for Petey and Alison.
Designing kitchens—hell, designing houses—was something he hadn’t done since his first year with Summers and Beck. He, and the company, had grown into much larger projects. But he’d enjoyed doing the house plans for Petey.
He looked around the state-of-the-art room. It was cluttered up with stuff for the party, but it was still a gorgeous kitchen. He liked it. And Petey had told him that he and Alison spent an inordinate amount of time in the room in the short time since they’d moved in. Of course, Petey had said it with such a grin and drawl that Charlie imagined they weren’t doing much cooking. Especially since Petey had made it a point to tell Charlie there had to be room for a long, large, very sturdy table.
Moving away from said table, Charlie grabbed himself a beer from the washtub full of ice and bottles of beer and wine that sat in the sink. He leaned against the counter and slowly sipped from his bottle, looking around the room. He added the room to his never-ending list of rooms he would design for himself when he finally got around to building a place of his own.
He’d rented since he’d moved here, but had always planned to build. He’d just never gotten around to it. But now…he was ready. He wanted a home of his own. He wanted what all the couples at the party had.
But he wanted them with a woman he couldn’t find.
“I can just dump out the beer, fill it with water and drink from that. No one will be the wiser,” Katie Luna was quietly saying as she made her way through the swinging kitchen door, her husband Darío behind her. (Petey had also demanded a door be put in the kitchen instead of the open floor plan so many people desired these days. Charlie could only imagine what went on in this room that they didn’t want seen through the wall of windows in the great room.)
Katie’s look of dismay upon seeing Charlie in the room made him mentally backtrack and dissect what she’d been saying as she’d walked in. Darío, behind her, looked guilty. Charlie replayed her words in his head, but still wasn’t getting it. Probably a chick thing.
“So, you have heard about our secret,” Darío said. As the door swung closed behind him, he made his way toward Charlie and took two beers from the tub.
“Umm…” Charlie said, not sure what was going on, but guessing he should have figured it out. But his mind had been thinking about all that Petey and Alison were probably doing in this kitchen, which had morphed into what Charlie had done recently up against a different sink… “I’m not…ummm…”
“It’s just that we’re not ready to tell people yet,” Katie said, walking over and taking one of the bottles from Darío and emptying it in the sink. “I mean, there’s no reason not to, I suppose. It’s just that…well, we’re so stunned ourselves. Peaches isn’t even a year old yet. We certainly weren’t trying. I mean, we weren’t not trying, but, well, you know…” She rinsed the empty beer bottle out a few times and then proceeded to fill it with water. “And I always drink beer. Lizzie and Al know I’m not nursing anymore, so they’ll figure it out.” She reached out with her free hand and linked it through her husband’s arm. “I don’t know. Maybe we should just tell them?” she said to Darío.
“Oh, you’re pregnant,” Charlie said, finally getting it. The couple looked at him like he was the dunce he probably was.
“Sí. We just found out yesterday. And we were a bit…shocked, to put it mildly,” Darío said.
“Wow, you’re going to have your hands full,” he said, then wished he hadn’t.
Katie’s breathtakingly beautiful face squished up, and a few tears pooled in her eyes. “Oh, my God, I hadn’t even thought of that. There’s no way we’ll be able to travel with you now. It was hard enough with one baby, but with two?”
Darío put his arm around his wife and pulled her close to him. Katie buried her head into his shoulder. “We’ll figure it out, Gata. I don’t have to travel as much. I don’t even have to play at all, if we don’t want to leave the Copper Country. I know it’s a shock that it came so soon, but we’ve talked about having more.”
She pulled her head away from Darío and said, “I know, but not so soon. I can’t—” She suddenly stopped, and both Charlie and Darío looked to the door to see if someone had come in. But no, it was Katie’s thoughts that had stopped dead in their tracks. “Oh my God, I can’t believe I’m going to have another baby.” Her voice cracked and the squished-up look of disbelief was gone, replaced with a bright smile, lighting up her gorgeous face.
“Do you know how long I wanted a baby?” she said to Charlie who just held his hands up in a questioning motion. He was a guy. He knew to just stay quiet when a woman asked a question like that. She wasn’t really looking for an answer. “And now, to have two babies.” She looked away from Cha
rlie and to her husband.
Darío had always seemed like a cool customer to Charlie, usually showing very little emotion, certainly never falling into the Latin hothead stereotype. But the guy was now a total pile of mush as he looked at his wife and slowly placed his hand on her still-flat stomach.
Charlie was just about to give them the room when Lizzie Robbins came through the door from the great room. She stopped abruptly when she saw Darío and Katie’s tender embrace, her eyes zooming to Darío’s hand on Katie.
Charlie knew from Petey and Darío that Lizzie, Katie and Alison had been friends since grade school, and you could sure see it now—the simple, almost telepathic way the women had of communicating.
Lizzie’s eyes went wide. She looked pointedly at Katie. Katie gave just the tiniest of nods and placed her hand on top of Darío’s. Lizzie brought her hand to her chest and whispered, “Oh, Kat,” her eyes already filling with tears. Katie nodded again, her head bobbing wildly this time, her tears coming freely now as she smiled. Stepping away from Darío, Katie met Lizzie halfway, and they embraced. The tears continued even as both women pulled away, now laughing.
Darío and Charlie looked at each other and just shrugged, totally out of their element.
“Oh, Kat, this is so wonderful. Were you guys trying?”
“No. This is a complete shock.” She turned and smiled at Darío. “A good shock. A wonderful shock.” She reached a hand out to her husband while one hand still clutched Lizzie’s. Darío stepped forward and took his wife’s hand. “An awesome shock,” she added quietly, looking at her husband, who softly smiled and nodded his agreement.
“Holy wah, are you going to have your hands full,” Lizzie said. Charlie waited for the panic to cross Katie’s face, but no, she only grinned and nodded, then started laughing.