by Julia Kent
Caleb held his finger up over his lips in a shhhhh gesture.
Mike nodded.
“Maybe Zach is how you get over Caleb,” Lydia said, the words clear and bright.
Caleb's eyes damn near popped out of his head.
“Maybe,” Krysta said, sounding unconvinced. “I've dated other guys. None of them made me forget Caleb.”
“My stupid brother. Why won't he make a move?”
“Because he's not interested, Lydia. How many times have I told you this over the years?”
Years? Caleb mouthed, looking increasingly horrified.
Mike shot him a smug look that screamed, I told you so.
Caleb flipped him the bird in response, or at least that was Mike's guess. Hard to tell when you wore winter gloves as thick as a catcher's mitt.
“He's interested. I know my brother. Apparently, though, he lacks the balls to try with you.”
Caleb looked down at his crotch and frowned.
“I think I'm just too deep in friend territory.” Krysta sighed. “I spent all these years trying to be friendly. Helpful. Be in places where he was, drop in at Jeddy's and pitch in, all that. I thought he'd see me. Really see me. Guess I was wrong.”
Pain filled Caleb's face as he closed his eyes, body radiating regret and longing.
Poor guy, Mike thought to himself, though he didn't understand Caleb at all. Not even a tiny bit. When Mike wanted something, he went for it.
And when he wanted someone, he went for Lydia. And he damn well got her.
All of her.
And now, maybe more.
Eyes drifting to her belly, Mike half-listened, half-dreamed. A son? A daughter? What would life be like if they had kids together? Sandy and Pete would be thrilled to have a grandchild who lived at the campground. Already designed for families, in the summer and fall the place bustled with children's activities, crawling with kids nonstop, the energy positive and infectious.
Lydia slipped her arm into Krysta's elbow, and they went quiet, their bodies turning to the left and out of sight. He knew they were headed for their cabin.
Once they were out of earshot, Caleb walked over to Mike, looked him straight in the eye, and said, “You're right.”
“Of course I am.”
“Modest, too.”
“What's with all the modest comments?”
“Just because you're right doesn't mean you need to shove my face in it. Also, what're you doing out here?” Caleb looked down at Mike's feet, the cross-country skis strapped on.
“Running some tracks. You?”
“Took that bag of kindling to your cabin Jeremy asked for.”
“Thanks.”
“No problem.”
“Hey!”
Speak of the devil. Jeremy loped on over to them, long legs easily moving through the snow, hands stuffed in his parka pockets.
“Thanks for the kindling,” he called out to Caleb, who waved him over.
“What's up?” Jeremy asked, pinging between the two of them, clearly picking up on a subtext.
“Talking about how we overheard Krysta saying how she has a thing for Caleb but he lacks the balls to do anything about it.”
“HEY!” Caleb protested.
Jeremy just nodded and said, “Why don't you offer her a ride back to Boston? Ask her to help you with the tree at Jeddy's? Set it up, get some tips from her on arranging it. Maybe offer to do some holiday promo to benefit the autism foundation your sister helps with.”
Caleb grunted. “You think that could work?”
“I think you could toss the woman a piece of chocolate and call that a date and she'd jump at the chance. Are you really that clueless?” Mike ground out.
“What's that supposed to mean?”
“Ever since the first time I saw you and Krysta together, it was blazingly obvious she likes you. What are you two – twelve? Go for it. Sleep with her.”
“She's dating someone else!”
“Only because you spent years not dating her. A woman's got needs. She found someone else to fill them.”
“I heard her asking Lydia for threesome advice.”
Mike and Jeremy stopped cold.
“She... what?”
“Lydia said to her, and I quote, 'If you're curious about how threesomes work, just go watch some porn.'”
Jeremy pondered that for a second, then said, “She not wrong...”
Mike hit him, hard. “Nothing we do together is anything like those low-production-value films you insist on using as your personal spank bank.”
“HEY!” Caleb barked. “You're talking about my sister! Cut it out.”
“Sorry,” Jeremy muttered.
“You can interpret that threesome comment from Krysta in plenty of ways,” Mike scoffed, though his interest was certainly piqued. Changing the subject away from Lydia was critical, though. Caleb wasn't the only overprotective brother Lydia had.
“Has Krysta ever given any indication that she's a threesome kind of person?” Mike inquired, knowing damn well from Lydia that she wasn't.
“No,” Caleb admitted.
“Then go for it. Ask her out.”
“Worst case, you end up in a threesome,” Jeremy muttered, earning a glare from Mike and Caleb.
“No offense, guys,” Caleb shot back, palms in the air. “Not my thing.”
“No offense taken,” Mike replied. “And you still should ask Krysta out.”
“You make it sound simple.”
“Because it is, Caleb. You think you blew your shot. Maybe you did. But maybe you still have time. Don't be one of those guys who always wonders. Be the guy who knows.”
“What if all I know is that she rejects me?”
“Then you know. Then the uncertainty is gone. Then you move on.”
“I hate this.”
“Really?”
“Don't you?”
“Don't I what?”
“Hate rejection?”
“Why do you assume she'll reject you? And for the record, no. I don't hate rejection. Rejection is clarity. What I hate is confusion.”
“I'm nothing but confused.”
“And that's why you need to act.”
Shoulders dropping with a long sigh, Caleb stared out into the woods, blinking slowly. “You're right,” he said again.
“Of course I am.”
“Modest, too.”
“I see you and Lydia have been talking.”
Caleb's deep laughter left Mike on edge. “When I'm in the kitchen, I'm a rock. I know what I need to do and I do it. Women, though... they're nothing like the kitchen.”
“Sure they are. Touch the grill in the wrong place and you get burned. Mix the wrong ingredients and the meal is ruined. Time the courses wrong and the dinner's a fail.”
“Are we talking about food or sex?”
This time, it was Mike's dark laughter that dominated.
And soon Caleb joined him, the bright sky sending a new snow shower as witness.
8
Jeremy
“I refuse to be the elf,” he insisted as Lydia tossed the tights at his face, the silky green fabric catching on the inside of his lip.
“But you're tall! And wiry! Like that guy in the movie.”
Sputtering, he flung the cloth on the couch, one leg draped over the arm in a manner that reminded him of a brothel.
“I look nothing like the guy who played Elf,” he argued.
“With your hair all grown out like that and curly, you kind of do. You need to shave the salt and pepper beard, though.”
“I do not have salt in my beard!”
Lydia stroked the side of his cheek and laughed. “I didn't know you were in denial, too, Jeremy.”
He grunted, shoving his feet into his boots, but he couldn't stay grumpy for long as Lydia stood, adjusting her long, flowing red shawl. Today was the Camp Christmas Festival at Escape Shores Campground, and it was all hands on deck.
But Jeremy refused to be an elf hand.
“Miles can wear the damn tights.”
“Miles is on elf strike, too.”
“Can’t Pete and Sandy find some local kids to play the elves?”
“The little kids still believe in Santa.”
“Then find some teens to do it.”
“Too jaded. Plus, they're all busy with final exams and sports.”
“Get Ed and Madge up here. They can be elves.”
“Grandma did it for years. It's too cold, Jeremy. They can't be outside for hours like that.”
“I will not be guilted into this.”
Just then, the front door to their cabin creaked open, Mike entering the living room.
Wearing... a Santa suit.
“What the hell is that?” Jeremy called out with a laugh.
“You can't be Santa!” Lydia jumped to her feet, her colonial dress, a crimson that set off the cream-colored tunic under the laced-up bodice weighing her down. “Dad is always Santa!”
“I'm filling in. Pete woke up with a bum knee and said he can take the second half of the day.”
“Dad's never missed out on even a single moment of being Santa.”
“He said he's getting old. Time to start handing it off in fits and starts to other people.” Mike wore a fake beard, but his silver-white hair was perfect for the role. Long enough to curl around his ears, if he planned for it next year and didn't cut it at all, he could have quite a shiny mane going.
“I wonder why he didn't ask Dan or Adam. Caleb's too young, and Miles is too grumpy,” she elaborated, going through the catalog of possible substitutes in her mind. Turning to Jeremy, she pointed. “Or you.”
“I don't have any silver or gray hair.”
Her fingers touched his chin as if arguing.
Outside, the clear day beckoned, plenty of snow from two nights ago making the festive atmosphere super-charged with holiday cheer. Camp Christmas was a simple affair, designed to be casual and fun.
Miles would give rides on “Santa's Golf Cart” in a loop around the campground. About twenty local vendors sold their wares inside the rental cabins, now repurposed for the event – and heated, too. The lodge was a gathering place for people to get food, stay warm, socialize, and for children to make ornaments.
And, of course, Santa held court in a green velvet chair by the fire. Pictures were free if you brought your own camera.
Pete and Sandy didn't charge a penny for people who attended, breaking even on vendor rental fees. Even the food was free, with big “Donation Bins” strategically placed everywhere but zero pressure to contribute any cash for the food. The “entrance fee” was a canned good or a gently used coat, all donated to local social service agencies.
The goal of Camp Christmas wasn't to generate business or to use clever marketing techniques to turn a profit. It was a much homier purpose:
Connection to community.
“Remember Mom's rule?” Lydia said as they all stood, Jeremy adding a candy-cane hat to his head.
“No stress,” Mike and Jeremy said in unison.
Lydia jingled a set of bells on a leather strap. “That's right! If you two stress me out, you're getting the strap.”
“Is that a threat or a promise?” Mike quipped as he headed to the kitchen, pressing a button on the espresso machine to get a shot.
“Kinky Santa wasn't on my role-play list,” Jeremy said in a voice he didn't like, even if it did come from himself. “And if I wanted a Kinky Santa, it would be Lydia. Not you.”
“I would be a great Kinky Santa.” Mike put a finger beside his nose and winked.
“Kinky Santa wouldn't put the finger there,” Jeremy reminded him.
“While you two argue over how to be a depraved version of one of the most beloved figures in childhood, I'll be over here brain-bleaching myself and heading to the lodge to serve hot apple cider,” Lydia said, pulling her long hair back over her hood.
“What's your costume?” Mike asked Jeremy, who halted.
Because under his coat, he wore red ski pants. And on top...
“I'm a candy cane.”
Mike snickered as Lydia laughed her way out of the cabin.
“I thought Miles was the candy cane?”
“Miles is the Nutcracker this year.”
“Nutcracker?”
“Sandy had a uniform commissioned just for him.”
“But you guys are the same size.”
“He won rock paper scissors.”
“That's how you decided who wore what?”
“Don't judge me, man. You have a bowl full of jelly.”
Mike reached down and patted his padded midsection. “It's less fake than you think at the rate I'm going.”
“You have a rock-hard eight pack, Mike.”
“Tell me that to my face again in February.”
Christmas music began to blare outside, the loudspeaker adjusted by half abruptly. Working out the kinks for any event at Escape Shores Campground was an education in event planning and production, something Jeremy knew nothing about.
Other than arriving and drinking alcohol at charity events in Boston.
Over the years living here, he and Mike had become good helpers, but not experts. Neither of them had the interest or the fortitude to do it professionally, and besides:
They were billionaires. Neither needed the money.
Instead, they were unpaid laborers, here because they were stupid enough to fall in love with a woman from a big, loving family that owned the place.
In his next life, he was definitely falling in love with someone who lived closer to the Equator.
“Come on, Fat Boy,” Jeremy said to Mike as he was halfway through his espresso, the Santa beard pulled down around his neck, blue eyes hard and mocking.
“At least I'm not a piece of man candy whose sole purpose in life is to get licked and sucked.”
“Is that what I signed up for? Because I'd rather do that than drive around with the coffee tank on the back of the tractor, offering peppermint hot cocoa to everyone.”
“C'mon, Mr. Ambition. Let's do this Christmas thing.”
The first deep breath he took outside made Jeremy smile, looking to Mike for something he couldn't quite name. People were starting to stream in, all on foot, the road carefully sanded but still slick in spots. Sandy and Pete wouldn't use salt, but they were pragmatists, too.
Mid-December in Maine was a slippery affair.
“You know,” Mike said casually, but the words set Jeremy's teeth on edge, “this time next year, we could be like them.” He pointed to a couple with a baby in a backpack on the guy's back, every square inch of the child covered in warm clothing, a tiny moon of face poking out from where the head should be in the ski suit.
“Overdressed?”
“Bringing a baby to Santa.”
Jeremy felt gut punched. “First of all, Santa would be you or Pete, so the baby wouldn't need to stand in line during Camp Christmas just for a photo op with Old Mr. Ho Ho Ho. Second, what the hell, Mike? I thought we weren't talking about Lydia being pregnant.”
“Who said we weren't?”
“Your silence on the issue.”
“I wasn't being silent. I just didn't feel like talking about it until now.”
“Until you went all gooey at the sight of someone else's crotch fruit.”
“Crotch fruit?”
“Baby. Child. Human from the loins. You know.”
“Is Crotch the first name or the last name?”
“Quit deflecting. She could be pregnant. We still don't know.”
“Won't know until right around Christmas, based on her cycle.”
“Exactly. If she's pregnant, we're facing an August birth. Mmmm, August in Maine. It's like drinking mosquitoes.” Jeremy grimaced.
“We'd be busy during peak tourist season. Bad timing.”
“I can't believe we're talking about this,” Jeremy muttered as the baby in the backpack made eye contact, opened its mouth, and promptly drooled
a long, thick line of liquid onto its daddy's neck.
The dad shivered, reached up behind his head, and laughed, the woman – Mom? –reaching into their diaper bag, finding a cloth, and wiping it up.
“Our future,” Mike whispered.
“You're a terrible ghost. Why don't you turn into the Ghost of Christmas Past and remind me of that year in Budapest at that Eurotech nightclub where we explored fisting to its full spiritual potential?”
“Let's stick to ghosts of Christmas present,” Mike said, instantly grouchy. He pointed. “Speaking of which...”
A Nutcracker stood next to Jack Christmas from the The Nightmare Before Christmas, except the guy wearing the costume was as big and burly as Jack was willowy and slim.
“It's like Paul Bunyan decided to squeeze into a petite,” Mike murmured. “Is that Adam?”
“Yeah. Next to Miles.”
“Where's Dan?”
“Here.” They turned around to find Lydia's other brother – there was always another brother – in an old-fashioned caroler's costume, top hat and all.
Jeremy folded in half, laughing, candy cane hat tip almost touching the snow. “You look like the old man from those Thomas the Train videos.”
“I'm not that fat!”
Lydia patted her brother's stomach. “Getting there, old man.”
“I'm not old!”
“You're older than me,” she said smugly, the two sharing a look that Jeremy didn't quite understand because he'd never had a sibling. It plucked a heartstring in him he didn't know was there.
“Always will be older, sis. And wiser.”
“Hah! The former is true, the latter? Not so much.”
“You look very pious,” Dan said to her, doing his level best to stare his little sister down.
“Thank you.”
“Which means the disguise is complete.”
She bent down in the snow and began forming a snowball.
“Don't start something you can't finish,” Dan announced, mimicking his sister.
That's my line with her, Jeremy thought, but thankfully didn't say aloud. Living in a community setting with her four older brothers meant he and Mike walked a fine line. They were all adults, of course, so he and Mike weren't worried about a literally beat down.
And yet, somewhere in the deep recesses of his primitive brain stem, he was.