Taylor began explaining everything that had happened since they'd arrived at my house, and April and I ventured nearer the door. I knocked lightly. "Mads, honey, it's your uncle. Can I help?"
The sobbing halted for a second, and then began again more quietly. Taylor was still giving Cormac a blow by blow of the activities that had led up to this crisis. "And then I told her that purple looks nicer with yellow."
"Right," Cormac said, his voice thinning in impatience. "And she went in the bathroom?"
"No," Taylor said. "Then we had a skipping contest."
Maddie's crying had grown softer inside the bathroom, and a loud hiccup came through the door, followed by an inquisitive, "Ape-will?"
I felt April stiffen at his side in surprise. "Yes, Maddie? I'm here," April said, shaking her head lightly.
"Can you come in?" Maddie asked.
April turned wide eyes on me and I released her hand, nodding that she should go in. April cracked the door and asked, "Okay. What's up, honey?" and disappeared inside.
Cormac turned to stare at the closed door and then met my eyes. We exchanged a confused look as murmuring could be heard from inside the bathroom. I didn’t know what to think—was I pushing April too far into my family by expecting her to help my niece in the bathroom? A few minutes later, there was a flush, the sink running, and then both girls emerged. Maddie held April's hand, and her little face was streaked with tears.
"Is everything okay?" Cormac asked, half to April, half to Maddie.
Maddie nodded, and April said, "Everything is fine. Just a bit of girl stuff is all."
Cormac's mouth dropped open slightly and he sighed. "I'm gonna just go finish that drink," he said, standing and heading back to the kitchen.
"That was phenomenal," I said to April as we followed him to the kitchen, little girls in tow. "What was going on?" I couldn’t pull his eyes from her face, which was flushed and glowing. I was impressed, and maybe just a little bit in awe at the easy way she’d handled whatever had just happened. A fleeting thought flew through his mind—April would be an amazing mother. I pushed it down as soon as I thought it. Too soon. Way too soon.
"Later," April promised.
A few minutes later, we all sat around the table in the dining room, spaghetti steaming on our plates as the smells of garlic and warm bread wafted through the house. The girls ate happily and Cormac did too, quietly interspersing bites with sips of the red wine I had opened.
"So," I said, wishing the atmosphere was just a little more relaxed. My brother did not seem to be in the mood for conversation, but I felt like I owed April a nice time. "Plans for the weekend, girls?"
"Ballet practice," Taylor informed me. "And Daddy's taking us to the ice castle."
I glanced at Cormac. "They have an ice castle here?" I had visited an ice hotel in Sweden—it had been over the top, with the reception desk, the bar, the beds, all carved from ice.
Cormac lifted a shoulder. "That's how it's advertised. I guess we'll see."
Maddie beamed at April across the table. "Ape-will will come."
"I will?" April had clearly not been informed of this agenda item.
"Tomow-woh." Maddie stuffed a big piece of garlic bread into her mouth then, defying any further clarification.
I glanced at April, feeling an anticipation I almost wished I didn't and also feeling simultaneously jealous that Maddie could so simply say what she wanted. I wanted April to say yes too. I wanted to spend time with her—as much as she'd allow. I wanted to tell her how much better I felt when she was nearby, laughing and smiling and exercising her intense hatred of the holidays in a way that was almost comical. I wanted to reach my hand toward her, capture her soft cool skin in my own and never let go.
But I didn't do any of that. I just watched her, smiling encouragingly, and celebrated inside when she shrugged and asked, "What's an ice castle?"
The evening wound down, both girls ending up tucked in with blankets in front of Frozen in the small den off the parlor while April, Cormac, and I sat in front of the fire in the living room.
"What was going on there in the bathroom?" Cormac asked April, and I looked at her, equally curious.
She sighed, and her eyes flitted from one of us to the other. "She was upset because Taylor had told her something." April paused, and then dropped her eyes, and I was suddenly worried. April didn't look eager to share. But it was far too early for real girl problems, wasn't it?
Cormac rubbed a hand over his face and leaned forward, dropping his forearms on his knees. "What was it this time? Something that would lead to an aneurysm, no doubt."
April's eyes widened as they flew to Cormac and stayed on his face. "Yes," she said, her voice showing her surprise.
"This isn't the first time," he said wearily, and my heart clenched with sympathy.
"I guess Taylor told her that if you … um, well, that if you go number one and number two at the same time …"
"It'll cause an aneurysm and you'll die like Linda did," Cormac finished for her.
I felt myself deflate, suddenly feeling ashamed that my own happiness had been keeping me from noticing how my family was struggling.
April nodded and looked guilty, as if she'd invented this bit of ridiculousness herself. "I assured her that wasn't true," April said.
"Taylor's been searching for a reason, I guess. Something that caused the burst that killed her mother." Cormac leaned back again. "I'm hoping it’s just a phase. Doesn't seem to matter how many times I tell her it wasn't a thing she did that caused it, that it isn't something that will happen to her."
"She's just trying to process it, I guess," I said. It made sense to me. I’d been trying to process my own injury—why it had been me, why it had happened at all.
"I just wish she'd stop terrifying Maddie in the process," Cormac said.
I sighed and leaned back, wishing there was something I could do to help my brother.
17
Enter the Wizard
Callan
It had been a long evening, one that had ended with me coaxing Maddie from the bathroom and then agreeing to go visit an ice castle—whatever that was—with Callan’s family.
It was hard to say no to a tiny girl with wild blond curls and garlic bread stuffed into her mouth. And while I wasn't sure what an ice castle was, or if spending all my free time with Callan's adorable family was the right thing to do, I wasn't about to let Maddie down.
And there was something in the way Callan was looking at me too. The light shining in those dark magnetic eyes matched Maddie's in a way—hopeful, eager. Or was I just imagining it?
I realized I probably needed to take a step back and do some thinking. I’d ridden the wave of impulse most of my life—in college relationships that had always moved too fast and gone horribly wrong, usually because I thought something was happening that definitely wasn't, and then later in my career. Impulse felt good, but I knew it was not my friend, even if its tiny curly-headed sidekick was adorable.
"An ice castle," Cormac had explained as we’d finished dinner, "is a tent in the park where everything inside is constructed of ice. It's a little like the ice hotels you read about in travel magazines—only on a much smaller scale." He shrugged. "This is Southern Maryland, after all."
I wasn't sure what the geographic caveat was about, but the ice castle sounded interesting. "So do they actually carve a castle from ice?"
"Sounds like it, right?" Cormac said, and the glint in his eyes and the wry twist of his mouth told me that this castle might be slightly less grand and royal than my imaginings. But I knew Cormac wouldn't dash his daughters' hopes.
"It sounds incredible," I said, putting extra emphasis into my words as I had grinned at Maddie and Taylor.
Taylor had lowered her fork and given me a frank look. "Practice is at ten. We'll go the ice castle afterwards. You guys can meet us at the studio." After this incredibly grown-up declaration of organized planning, Taylor had picked her fork up and continued
eating, leaving Callan and I to exchange glances.
"Are you free tomorrow?" Callan had asked.
"You guys really don't have to—" Cormac started.
"I'm coming either way," Callan assured him.
Warring emotions had whirled in my chest. Here was a real family doing real family things—something I hadn't gotten once my father had decided to play Santa's Helper for the rest of my childhood somewhere far away from me. But it also wasn't my family. It was like a movie I was watching, and I knew that there would be an end to the movie, and that it could be a sad one that would make me cry. But just like with Steel Magnolias, I couldn't stop watching even though I knew how it would end. I nodded. "I'm free," I said to Callan, swallowing hard.
A smile crept slowly across his full lips, lifting just the corners at first and then revealing the shining white teeth, as his dimples appeared in the stubble at the sides of his mouth and the mesmerizing eyes glowed. And in that second, I knew something else had just happened. I’d said yes to more than a ballet rehearsal and a tour through a tent full of ice cubes. I’d said yes to Callan Whitewood. Yes to whatever was possible here, for whatever amount of time. And damn the consequences.
I had pushed away the voice warning me about impulsivity, reminding me about every bad decision I’d ever made.
Callan's gleaming eyes were impossible to resist, and I lifted my wine glass to the amazing family around the table before me. "Tell me more about this castle," I said, and I allowed myself to settle into the warmth and happiness I felt, even knowing it might be fleeting.
* * *
I returned to the hotel after dinner, after a long kiss that turned into an extended make-out session at the front door that might or might not have turned into something else on the new area rug just beneath the soaring twinkling Christmas tree in the parlor.
"I'll pick you up at the hotel at nine-thirty," Callan promised as he said goodnight, and I had agreed, every part of me smiling.
Now, back in the half-decorated room at the inn, reality threatened to set in. The impersonal setting of my room, coupled with the bare tree in the corner and my suitcase on the stand next to the closet, reminded me that this wasn't my real life. This wasn't my home, and these people—warm though they might be—were not my family.
But I pushed that doubt away, too swaddled in the lingering warmth of Callan Whitewood's embrace, his kiss, his … everything, to let it affect me. I got into my pajamas, put on HGTV—I had to keep tabs on the competition, after all—and climbed onto my bed to call Lynn at home.
"Hey you!" Lynn picked up after the first couple rings.
"Hey," I said.
"It's been like a year since you've called. Your texts are so suspenseful! How’s Broken Tree? Have you won over the network yet?" Lynn's voice made me miss home, empty though it was in many ways. But the ache of missing the familiar was overshadowed by the pulsing bubble of happiness growing inside me.
"Well, I don't know about that. It's Singletree, by the way. Though they changed the name officially for the month."
"To what?"
"Er, to Christmas Tree."
"You. Are. Kidding!" Lynn laughed. "You are living in a town named for the thing you despise with the fire of a thousand burning suns?"
"Yes." I settled back into the pillows on my bed, waiting for my vehemence about all things Christmas to set in. It didn't arrive. "But I actually think maybe this has been good. I don't mind Christmas stuff so much after so much immersive exposure. The people here are really into the holidays."
"I guess that's why you're there," Lynn said, sounding pleased. "And the job is good? Things are staying on track?"
"They are actually."
"You sound so surprised," Lynn laughed.
"My work life does not historically go smoothly."
"This is true."
"But yeah, we filmed the first three houses. We've got the week to chill while all the film is reviewed, and then next week will be make it or break it time. Two more houses, including the big one."
"And is that Mr. Grumpy super-hot soccer star?"
I laughed. "Right. Yes."
"He's cool with you filming now?" Lynn sounded surprised and I realized how much had happened in the last week that I still hadn’t told her. I’d texted that we’d spent some time together, but that was it. Only Annabelle knew all the details.
"Yeah …" I wasn't sure how to begin. "He's actually a really nice guy." The word "nice" made me cringe. Callan was so much more than nice, and the mention of him had parts of my body remembering it and suggesting things that didn't even make sense and were certainly not nice.
"Nice, huh?" Lynn's skeptical tone said she knew exactly where I was headed with this. "What's going on?"
"I've been seeing him a little bit."
"Right. With a clipboard in your hand and a bunch of cameras behind you. It's your job." Lynn emphasized the last word and the way she did it made any actual reminders of my tendency to screw up jobs totally unnecessary.
"Maybe a little more privately, actually." When Lynn didn't immediately answer, my mouth started moving at a rapid pace, and I machine gunned out the details of the past week, from Santa's sleigh to the Half Cat Distillery to dinner at Callan's house with Cormac and the girls.
"Oh shit," Lynn breathed when I finally paused for breath.
"Like … 'oh shit, that's great and I'm really happy you're happy,' or …"
"Oh shit, April." Lynn ignored her question. "This is not going to end well. You can see that, right?"
I could not see that. Not exactly. "I don't know," I said, my voice wavering. "I mean …"
"What's the plan then? You come home and you guys have a long-distance thing that you keep totally secret from the only living relative you have besides your mom?" We both counted my father as dead since I hadn't seen him in years. He wasn't dead, actually, but the fact that he'd gone off and started a new family made him dead to me, even though he still insisted on sending me birthday cards.
"I hadn't really thought ahead that far," I said, the words sounding inadequate even to me.
"Rob will shit," Lynn said plainly. "And then you'll lose another job."
I sighed. My uncle would be angry, that was for sure. But part of me wondered if he would let it go if he realized this thing with Callan was real. Was it real? "But I think this might be something beyond just a fling," I suggested. "I really … like him." The word 'like' was inadequate to capture my feelings, but all other options were too much just yet.
"You do, huh?" Lynn's voice lightened. "Are you sure it isn't just the sex? Or his fancy big house? Or the fact that he's Callan fucking Whitewood of the enormous underwear billboard?"
"I mean, it is the sex … partly. He's just …" My mind whirled and I closed my eyes. "It's like magic when we're together, like he knows exactly what to do to me. It's like he's some kind of wizard or something."
"He's a dick wizard?"
Dick wizard? Who even says that? I laughed, and when I got hold of myself again, said, "Yeah, he's some kind of dick wizard I guess. But he's sweet, Lynn. And he's got this vulnerable side I'm getting glimpses of here and there, like even though he's been this famous soccer star, he's kind of lonely. It sounds like he hasn't had anyone to talk to in a long time. And his brother and nieces are great too. They've really included me, made me feel welcome."
"It's going to be hard to leave," Lynn warned.
"I think I'm ready for you to stop playing devil's advocate and just be my friend."
"Yeah? Okay. I can do that. I just want you to be happy, April. But for selfish reasons I don't want to lose you to some crazy little Maryland town that changes its name for every holiday."
"I don't think they do that. It sounds like this is the first time—"
"Really not the point."
"Right."
"Okay, girl. I'm happy for you. Just be careful, okay? And for God's sake, don't let your uncle find out you're banging the help again!"
A snort-laugh escaped me. "The help?"
"The cast, whatever. It just sounded better like that. Dramatic. You're in TV. You get dramatic. The dick wizard."
"He's not even going to appear. Just his house. I'm not banging his house."
"How would that even work? I'm getting a visual on that I'm not liking a lot. Quick, talk about something else."
"Chinchillas," I said quickly.
"Do not bang a chinchilla." Lynn's voice was serious and I giggled. "They're tiny. I don't know how that would work exactly. Maybe with like a tiny dildo or something … either way, you'd probably kill the poor thing, and—"
"Okay, thanks. I'm marking houses and chinchillas off my perv list."
"Yeah. Good idea."
"I miss you," I said.
"Me too. Keep me updated."
"I will. Love you."
"Love you too. Bye." Lynn hung up and I sat for a long time on my bed, thinking about Callan Whitewood (who I would now accidentally call "dick wizard" in my head for all of eternity), chinchillas, Christmas, and my uncle. Not necessarily in that order.
* * *
Spending the weekend with Callan and Cormac and two little girls who were enthusiastic about literally everything was like spending time in an alternate universe. I didn't talk to my uncle, and except for a brief meeting with the production team, I didn't really think about work.
Instead, for the first time in a long time, I just lived, taking in the world around me and actually enjoying it, draped though it was in red, and green, and candy-cane striped everything. The little girls' ballet rehearsal was an adorably chaotic event with music from The Nutcracker running through the background, and the "ice castle" was a tent filled with tables draped with white tablecloths and small ice sculptures on display.
"It's not quite a castle," I whispered at one point to Callan, who held my hand almost through the whole weekend, sending intermittent chills through my body as my traitorous mind chanted, "dick wizard, dick wizard."
Shaking the Sleigh: Seasons in Singletree Page 17