by R. R. Banks
Cristina had already gone from the room by the time that I got out of the shower so now I was left with the awkward prospect of walking out of the room and into the rest of the house without even her there to buffer the reaction of her family. I mustered up my best casual look and opened the door, convincing myself that this was not what it felt like for women to do the walk of shame. I wasn't ashamed. Uncomfortable in a way that I couldn't quite put into words, yes, but not ashamed.
I could hear a cluster of voices drifting down the hallway toward me as I made my way back through the house. The smell of bacon frying lured me toward the kitchen and I found myself standing in the doorway staring in at Cristina, her four sisters, and an older woman I had to assume was her mother. The five younger women were sitting at the table engrossed in conversation while their mother stood at the stove, her hand on one ample hip as she wielded a spatula and looked for all the world like she should be the model for a syrup bottle. I stood there for a few seconds before Cristina glanced up and noticed me.
"Here he is," she said. "See? I told you he hopped in the shower after me, so I didn't get a chance to tell him that you were here."
"Good morning," I said.
The five other women stared at me, each of them with a slightly different thought process reflected on their faces. Finally, all returned the greeting to me in a low, cautious monotone.
"Josh is probably feeling a little tired this morning," Cristina said. "After we finished up at the office yesterday he had some amazing ideas, so he came here. We just worked and worked and didn't even realize what time it was getting to, so he ended up falling asleep here."
She had walked around to behind her sisters and was gesturing like she was holding a cup, bringing it to her lips several times. I narrowed my eyes slightly at her and she repeated the gesture, more insistently this time.
"Yeah," I said. "I passed right out. I was drunk."
The women gasped, and Cristina shook her head frantically. She swept the side of her hand across the front of her throat, and then pointed across the room in the direction of a side door.
"No," I said. "I wasn't drunk. Everybody else was drunk. So, I didn't want to drive."
She shook her head again, stopping sharply when all of her sisters and her mother turned to stare at her.
"He's kidding," she said with a forced laugh. "We were just joking last night that the Christmas creep happens faster and faster each year, and it's come so early this year that people are already guzzling the egg nog."
It made absolutely no sense, but the women seemed satisfied. When they turned back toward the table and the dough that I now noticed that they were kneading in front of them, Cristina rushed back across the room toward me, her jaw set and her eyes burning into mine.
"What's wrong with you?" I hissed.
"What's wrong with me? What's wrong with you? Why did you say that you were drunk?"
"You were doing the drinking gesture."
I mimicked the move she had been doing and Cristina let out a sigh.
"I was offering you coffee!"
"Who does that gesture behind people's backs when they are talking about coffee?"
"I don't know. I'm kind of in uncharted territory at this particular moment and --"
"Cristina?"
"Yes?" she said, turning to her mother.
"Does he eat bacon?"
Cristina glanced up at me.
"Do you eat bacon?"
"I do."
"He does."
"Good. Wash up. Breakfast will be ready in about ten minutes."
"We just got out of the shower." I looked down at her and saw her eyes widen. "Individually. We each individually got out of our individual showers individually." She pressed her palms together and then pulled them apart. "Separately."
Her mother glared at us and then turned slowly back to her bacon.
Ten minutes later we were crushed together at the table in the dining area passing platters of food around and trying to find our footing in a conversation that didn't underscore the discomfort of the whole situation. I had always felt a little smug that I had never had the experience of being caught with a girlfriend in high school, and this is how the universe smacked me down -- five suspicious women and a platter of French toast.
Cristina spent most of breakfast trying to nail down exactly why they had all swarmed the house first thing in the morning, but they were skillfully avoiding giving her a real answer. I had the distinct feeling that someone had somehow alerted them to my presence and they were on recognizance. By the time the meal finally dragged to an end there was no sign in sight that they were going to be leaving. The sisters had made their way back into the kitchen to continue working on the loaves of bread they had been kneading and their mother was gradually clearing the table and working on dishes. I gave Cristina a reluctant smile.
"I should probably go," I said.
She nodded.
"Thank you again for everything."
There was a hint of mischief in her voice and I smiled. I wanted to gather her up into my arms and kiss her, but there was nowhere in the front of the house where I thought I wouldn't feel their eyes scrutinizing us.
"Thank you," I said. "I appreciate all of your help. Maybe we can continue later?"
She hesitated, and I knew that questions were starting to form in her mind. As long as I was standing in the house, we could pretend that all of this was isolated. It didn't really exist in the real world or in the context of our lives. It was just this one night and one morning. When I left, though, both of us were going to have to come to terms with how this was all going to fit in with our current existence, and I could see that she was already worrying.
"Josh," she started. "What does this ---" her voice trailed off.
"I don't know," I told her. "But I do know that I can't stop thinking about you and I want to spend more time with you. Can we start by decorating the office?"
She laughed and nodded.
"Give me a call. I'm sure you know where to find my number."
I glanced at both doors leading into the room to make sure that we didn't have any visitors and then leaned down to kiss her. There was softness in her lips, the whisper of something starting, and I instantly craved more. I stepped back from her and walked out of the house to stop myself from scooping her up into my arms and carrying her back into the bedroom. I climbed into my car and let out a breath, unable to take the smile from my face. Pulling out of the driveway, I turned toward my house. I needed to change my clothes and get to the office. There were a few changes to the upcoming Christmas sales that I wanted to make so they had time to be released.
Chapter Fifteen
Cristina
"It's way too big."
"You weren't saying that before."
"I know, but I don't think I really realized just how big it actually is. Don't you think it's a little...wide? I don't think it's going to fit."
"Of course, it will. That space has handled this much before."
"It just seems so much bigger in the daylight."
"It's the same size that it was the last time you saw it."
"I just don't want it to get stuck."
"It won't get stuck, I promise."
"Mom, seriously. It's going to be fine. It's perfect."
I turned and looked at my son as he stood on the opposite side of the enormous Christmas tree from Josh. Snow was tumbling down around him and he was starting to look impatient. His hand was twitching on the handle of the axe that he held, and I knew that he was just itching to get hacking at the tree trunk. Josh and I had seen this tree several nights before as we drove along a small back road on our way back to my house. It was sitting in the starlight, no other trees around it to take away from its magnificence, and I knew that it was the one that belonged in my parlor. Now that I was looking at it again without the sparkly wonder of a winter night around it, I was noticing that it was huge and questioning if we would even be able to get it thr
ough the door, much less into the spot in the room that I had put aside for it.
"It just looks big now because it's the only one around," Josh said. "When we get it back to the house you'll see that it's going to look amazing."
I didn't really follow his logic, but both looked so excited that I knew I couldn't say no. I sighed and gave a hand wave of defeat. Matteo made a triumphant sound and turned to start cutting. I watched as Josh arranged himself so that his legs were out of the range of the axe and held onto the boughs to keep the tree steady as Matteo cut. I hadn't really intended on introducing the two of them so soon. I was fiercely protective of my son and hadn't ever introduced him to a man in my life. Not that the situation had really come up. The truth was the condoms in the drawer next to my bed were unopened because I had never had occasion to use them. I bought my first box of condoms as a show of defiance after my divorce, but then never opened them. When they got close to their expiration date, I replaced them, and then again.
Their continued presence in my nightstand was more out of tradition than anything. At least, until I met Josh. Our relationship was unexpected and intense, and though I found myself falling harder and deeper for him every time that I spent time with him, I had remained cautious about introducing him to Matteo. My sisters and mother were different. They were grown women and though they had chosen to continue to go along with the story that Josh and I were just working together, I knew that they were figuring out that there was more to it than that. No man just happens to get totally exhausted and need to crash as his employee's house every time that her son and others are out of the house. Life is simply not that convenient. Whatever they thought, though, they were adults and they could understand how relationships work -- even when those relationships were still being kept closely guarded because of the shaky work legality issues that would eventually need to be worked out.
Matteo, though, was different. He was still so young and had already been so hurt by the epic disaster that was my marriage to his father. I didn't know if he even remembered a time when our relationship was good. He was nearly a year old when we got married, and by the time that he was two we were already well on our way to divorce. It was a marriage that never should have happened, and the only good that had come out of it was the son who I adored. That didn't change, though, that he had been a constant witness to our arguments and the eventual collapse of our relationship. Now he was batted back and forth between us and I worried that he was suffering as a result of it.
Introducing a new man into his life was something that I had always planned on doing carefully. I wanted to give him a healthy view of relationships, but I also wanted to protect him. I didn't want him to build an attachment to someone and have it not work out. The plan had always been that I would introduce him to someone only after I knew that we were serious and had been together for six months or more. Of course, plans like that tend to get shot all to hell when you live with a mother whose hysteria about missing children is matched only by her obsession with women's network Christmas movies. The second that my son mentioned the fact that we still didn't have a Christmas tree, two weeks after Thanksgiving, Mama's eyes lit up and she suggested I call that "big strong beautiful man" I've been working with to help us find the perfect one.
No discreet conversation in another room to run it past me first.
No thoughts about whether that man would even be interested in getting a Christmas tree with us.
No cares about the fact that we had always had an artificial tree and it was sitting perfectly fine and ready in the garage just waiting to be unboxed, stuck together, and fluffed.
None of it. Just a sparkly-eyed suggestion and the distant look in her eye that told me she was already coming up with the title for our Christmas movie.
Of course, Matteo had immediately jumped on the idea and it snowballed from there. Now it was literally snowballing as I watched with my heart in my throat and snowflakes in my eyes while my barely teenaged son whacked at a tree trunk like he was channeling his inner Jack Torrance. I really didn't need to add a trip to the emergency room to my already busy holiday schedule, so I was incredibly relieved when Josh held up a hand to stop him.
"That should be enough. Good work. Now we just get out of the way and let her fall."
Why was it that everything men ever talked about was "her" or "she"? Not that I considered myself a rabid feminist or anything, but that was just strange.
I took a minute and thought about my stuffed animals and other toys when I was little and realized that with the exception of Barbie and very particularly lacy baby dolls, all of my toys were "he".
Well, good. Equality is alive and well. Twisted. Nonsensical. But alive and well.
I walked over to Josh and pulled Matteo behind us. Josh released the bough he was holding and gave the tree a push. It held its own for a few seconds and I worried that Matteo was going to go after it again, but then the trunk gave an ominous creak and started falling. It smashed to the ground with a glorious poof of fresh snow and I curled into Josh's arms to protect myself from any needles that might have become projectiles in the impact. He felt warm and strong and I took a moment to breathe in the smell of him, not wanting to give up the cozy cuddle. I knew I had to, though, and I reluctantly stepped away from him so that the two of them could pick up the tree by either end and start carrying it toward the small red hut we had seen as we were driving toward the tree and that we assumed was where we would pay the tree farmer.
As we approached the hut I noticed that we seemed to be walking toward the back rather than the front. We got closer and I saw that the bright lights we thought were just there to make the hut more welcoming were actually there to contain the rows and rows of precut Christmas trees that were propped on wooden frames. We all stilled, the same realization hitting us at the same time. Turning sharply, we scurried through the snow back toward the car.
And that, dear children, is the story of how we stole our first live Christmas tree.
Just as I had suspected, the tree was far too big for the room, but I was able to rearrange the furniture enough that we could shove it in. It stood far into the room and covered half of each of the two windows, but I told myself that that just meant that it was going to be even more impressive when seen from the outside at night. I stood with my back against the far wall so that I could watch as Matteo crawled around the base of the tree and Josh arranged the strand of lights across it in perfect swoops. I had been genuinely surprised to even find a strand of lights since we had always used a prelit tree. There it had been, though, curled up in the depths of one of the Christmas boxes; a single strand of multicolored lights.
My son emerged from under the tree with his hair in distinctly sticky spikes, but a smile on his face.
"Is it done?" he asked.
"I think so," Josh answered.
Matteo came and stood beside me while Josh went to the other side of the tree and found the plug. I wrapped my arm around my son's shoulders and immediately felt him wriggle away from me. My heart sank for a moment, but then I realized that he was scurrying toward the door and the light switch that controlled the electrical outlet. Josh clicked the lamp that we had moved across the room and sat on the floor to give enough light for the winding of the strand of bulbs. The room went dark and a second late Matteo threw the switch. The lights on the tree burst to life, creating a multicolored glow as though the tree had been covered with luminous sprinkles.
Even though the one tiny strand looked meager and the multicolored strand seemed a touch more suited for the back lot on the left, I couldn't help but gasp when I saw the tree light up. Josh stepped up beside me and wrapped his arm around me and Matteo came to my other side, leaning his head to rest it on my shoulder like he had when he was a little boy. I felt emotion catch in my throat.
"Should we put on some decorations?" Matteo asked a few moments later.
I nodded.
"I got all of the boxes from the garage. They're in the
dining room. Go grab a couple."
He started out of the room and I felt Josh pull me in, turning me around so that he could gather me in his arms. I looked up at him and he ducked his head down to kiss me. I sighed into the kiss, feeling a shimmer of holiday spirit and sugary romance flow through me. We parted just before Matteo came back in the room and then Josh followed him out of the parlor to get the rest of the boxes. We were unpacking the boxes when I heard the crunch of wheels pull up in front of the house and I glanced through the window to see a familiar dark car sliding into place. I let out a sigh.
"Matteo, open the door. Detective Jeremy is here."
"Detective Jeremy?" Josh asked as Matteo put down the tray of blown glass balls that he was holding and started for the front door.
"Remember I told you that my mother has her own personal detective?"
"Yes."
"Detective Jeremy."
"Detective Jeremy!" My mother cried from the back of the house and then ran past the door to the front room. I held out my hand toward her for emphasis just as she backed up to look into the room at me. "Cristina. You're here."
"Yes, Mama. I've been here."
"But you weren't."
"No. I told you that we were going to the Christmas tree lot to get our tree."
I failed to mention that we were apparently intending on tree larceny.
"But you didn't tell me that you got home safely."
"Mama, you live with me. We're in the same house. I assumed that you would hear us stomping around in here and know that we had gotten back. Or, you know, check the driveway for the car."
"I heard you, but I thought that the three of you had been abducted and the kidnappers were coming here to finish off the family."
"And by that you mean…"