by Amanda Tru
As if.
“I like what you said about learning from each other. No one wants to feel like an idiot just because something’s new or unfamiliar.”
She’d picked up a fat star shape, but she set it down again. After a second look at him, resignation settled over her like a winter throw blanket. Ronni strode from the room. A moment later, the garage door opened and closed. Unsure what else to do, Hank grabbed a fresh sheet of undecorated cookies and began adding blue and silver sprinkles to long, pointy stars. The points would break. They always did.
Two stars twinkled in the morning light as he shifted the cookie sheet to slide excess sugar away from them—two stars decorated before Ronni appeared with a book in hand and a confused expression on her face. Hank grew concerned. “Everything okay, Ronni?”
“Yes… and… well, no. I thought I wrote down that I didn’t want a big disparity in spiritual knowledge and experience, but it’s not what it says.”
“What’d you write?”
She thrust the book at him. “Number seven.”
Hank tried not to read anything of the first six, but several words leaped out and sucker-punched him. Intellectual. Disparity. Time.
“See?”
He read number seven aloud. “‘Spiritual equality—any man I date must be a Christian who doesn’t make me feel like a spiritual idiot.’ That’s a good one.”
But seven and the one below it—a revised three, it seemed—did have similar things to what she’d said. “I think you were recalling number three. That talks about disparity.”
Lips pursed, and a sigh escaped. “I still don’t know if that’s wise. I think so, but then I wonder.” She turned away and washed her hands before grabbing another cookie cutter. “I liked what you said about your wife, but I don’t know if I have her strength of character to keep going when the odds are against me.”
That’s all it took. Hank set down the sugar spoon and skirted the counter. Only after he’d hugged her and assured her that perhaps she hadn’t had that ability before, but with Jesus, she would, did he realize that he didn’t have that right. It had been so natural—what he would have done with anyone else, even—that it took the nearness of her looking up at him and saying, “I suppose, that’s true. I haven’t experienced that yet,” for him to become aware.
Awkwardness followed. Twice he caught her watching him. Even more often, she caught him. That awkwardness increased. It’s a good thing she’s not here long enough for me to get attached, because I think I pretty much blew it there, Lord.
The timer beeped, snapping Ronni from her reverie. Still, the moment she’d swapped out a hot cookie sheet for a fresh one, she went back to staring at the tree. It would be work, but… Her gaze slid over to Hank. He watched her again.
“What is it?”
“Well…” She might regret it, but Ronni couldn’t resist. With a single step, she sidled up to Hank and pointed to the tree. “So, you remember how much fun you said you had putting that up?”
He eyed her. Considering how close they now stood, she could feel those eyes… the heat radiating from his arm. An irrational thought went skittering down the slope of her mind. What would it feel like to have a man like him just hold you when you needed it?
“… should I be afraid?”
Ronni blinked at him. “What?”
“Stop flirting with me. I can’t give rational answers when you do that.”
I was flirting? Uh, oh. She decided to play it up as deliberate. “How else am I going to convince you to help me take down that tree?”
She got him. Hank stared first at her, then at the tree, and back at her. The more he stared, the more convinced she became that his eyes dropped to her lips more often than not. I refuse to wonder what it would be like to kiss him. I won’t do it. A moment later, her thoughts insisted on clarifying themselves
“You want to take down the tree.”
“Yes.”
He nodded his head in the direction of the yuletide object in question. “The one we just put up last night.”
“That’s the one.”
“And you’d want to be doing this because…”
That’s when Ronni knew she had him. The timer went off on the stove, giving her the perfect chance to look away before that wondering thing began. She pulled open the oven, and the magical scents of sugar and flour filled the room. “Because we could put it in your trailer,” she explained. “We could take it to the airport really early tomorrow morning and set it up while people are sleeping.” Hank didn’t even twitch at that. Not a good sign, she thought. “Christmas is going to be awful enough for them, but we could give it a bit of sparkle.”
While he continued to gape at her, a new idea occurred to her. She moved around him, into the living room, and over to the tree. “Do you think we could just take off the ornaments? Leave the rest like it is? Pack it in the trailer carefully?”
“We’re not taking down that tree.”
Ronni whirled at him, ready to do battle. “Then I’ll do it. I’ll put it in your trailer, and I’ll,” she continued over his attempt to argue, “ride that snowmobile down to the airport myself.”
“Are you two?”
That one nearly earned him a… She glanced around her. —Bible to the head. “Are you stupid or just selfish?”
“Neither.” She couldn’t prove it, but Ronni could have sworn that he muttered, “But I can’t say as much for you” under his breath.
“I can’t believe you!” A gentle reminder to control herself appeared somewhere in her spirit. She shoved it aside and barreled toward him. Inches from his face, she shouted, “These people are stranded here on the biggest holiday of the year. All I want to do is try to do what they used to call ‘make Christmas’ for them. If that involves a little inconvenience, who cares?” Her fingers may or may not—did, if truth be told—whack him as she gesticulated.
His gaze swept the enormous mess they’d created in the kitchen. So help her, if he even hinted that he was upset about something she’d said she’d do by herself, she would bean him with that Bible. Maybe it’d knock some of the words into his head!
“I certainly don’t.”
“That’s it! I’m—” Ronni dragged her gaze from that Bible. “Wait. You what?”
He winked at her. “I don’t. I think we should do it—well, part of it. I just don’t think we should tear up our hard work when I’ve got the church’s spare tree and decorations in the garage or the shed—one or the other. We’ll take it down tomorrow morning. Just like you said. Could even bring in my flat dolly. We’ll decorate it in that room you were in and then wheel it down when everyone wakes up.”
A squeal erupted before Ronni could stop herself. She bounced and hugged him without realizing she’d done it… until she had. Never had she felt more like a teenaged cheerleader—even back when she was one. “I could kiss you!”
“Not saying that I’d complain, but I’d rather you didn’t.”
That stopped her. “Not saying, I’m going to take that as a challenge or anything, but why, then?”
“I don’t kiss women for sport.”
Hiding the location of the church’s decorations… impossible. The moment she saw him bundle up, she dashed for Peg’s snowsuits—both of them. He trudged through the snow, breaking a path for Ronni as he went. The swish, swish of the snow pants told him she kept up well enough. The wind still blasted cold through them, but at least snow didn’t fall anymore.
Hank couldn’t help but feel like Hallmark producers would never approve. In one of those movies Peg loved, one of them would have thrown a snowball at the other, or at least they would have made snow angels. In twenty inches of snow, angels weren’t likely. At his age, they weren’t happening in six inches of packing peanuts in the living room, either. He glanced back to see her give him a thumbs up. Doubt she’d want to. That’s a relief.
The shed lock fought him. Once he’d managed to get the dumb key in and turned, the snow in front
of it made it impossible to open. Digging it out without a shovel—as impossible as hiding the location from Ronni. Hank had to traipse back to the garage for the snow shovel and return to dig it out. By that time, Ronni had the decency to apologize—and almost managed to do it without laughing.
For half a second, he considered shoving a handful of snow down the back of her snowsuit. Two things stopped him. First, she didn’t possess enough fat to warm her in time. She’d be an icicle before she got back to the house. Second, he’d wake up with a bowl full of snow in his face at two a.m. Of that, he had no doubt.
Sixteen-year-old him wouldn’t have thought of that. The idiots who dreamed of reliving high school glory days deserved what they got. He thanked the Lord for wisdom borne of experience.
That thought made Hank glance behind him in case Ronni hadn’t figured it out yet and was prepared to dump the snow down his back. No, the woman was scooping as much snow as she could with her ski-gloved hands. The snow he dumped there for her. Oops. Hank started throwing the stuff in front of him and taking the powder to the face with as good grace as he could muster.
Digging out the door enough to get it open proved almost the easy part. Digging through the mess of the shed… so much worse. “I kept putting off cleaning it out this summer—too hot. Then fall came, and I was on the road a lot, so when I was home, I wanted to be outdoors,” he shouted over the noise of the wind. “Thought I could do it over Christmas…”
Ronni didn’t say a word, but he heard her thoughts as if she’d shouted them. And how’s that working for you now?
“Don’t have to say it.”
She held out her arms for the box he dragged out from behind the pile of junk that took up most of the center floor. “I didn’t.”
Something made him look at her at just the right moment. The smile she gave him shouldn’t have felt like such a win, but it did. She wiggled the box a bit before turning. “I’m taking this back to the garage, and then I’m going into the house to thaw. I’ll keep the fire warm for you.”
“Be right there.”
Alone in the shed, awareness of the cold became a thing. To keep his mind off it as he shoved piles and boxes out of the way to wrestle the tree box from the bottom of the back corner, he prayed. Aloud. “So, if a guy wanted to date a woman at my age, what does that look like, Lord? I’m not asking her to go get ice cream with me after church on Sunday night. Out to dinner seems trite.” That it was probably what she was used to twisted a knot in his gut.
“I’m probably being unreasonable or something. The woman hasn’t been married before. Then again, she’s probably dated, so I wouldn’t be denying her that.” The memory of her list brought him up short. “But she lives almost four hundred miles away, and she has that dumb list. I don’t fit any of it.”
All through hauling the tree box out, relocking the shed, and hefting the tree back to the garage, Hank reminded himself of all the reasons that even considering any kind of relationship with Ronni Carlisle was futile, stupid, and illogical to boot. Living too far away and being committed to a person who only existed on paper made sense compared to the fact that he’d never been attracted to skinny women, he’d known her for a whopping twenty-four hours and hadn’t exactly had a good first impression, and as far as he knew, they didn’t have anything but Jesus in common.
And yet I can’t stop thinking about it, which just shows I’m stupid, illogical, and doomed to futility.
Standing in front of a roaring fire, her hands held out to thaw each finger, guilt heaped on Ronni and kept her chilled. Once again, her drive to do what she wanted had inconvenienced someone. This time, she’d manipulated a man who had been nothing but kind to her. Every time I think I’ve improved somewhat, I see I’m still messed up me. I thought I was supposed to be all new. A new person, they said. Well, the old Veronica Carlisle is still alive and wreaking havoc.
When the back door opened, Ronni raced to help Hank out of his coat. “I’m sorry I should have stayed to help.”
“It’s too cold out there for you, hu—onni.”
He started to say “hon…” or honey. Does he realize it ended up being honey anyway? What did it matter? It was obviously instinctive rather than personal. She’d examine why that almost bothered her… later.
Ronni’s hands wrapped around his—icy despite the thick gloves he’d worn. She rubbed at them. “Well, I should have tried. Or I shouldn’t have made such a big deal out of a stupid tree. I get these ideas…”
“Ronni?”
She tugged him toward the fire. “Hmm?”
“I wanted to do it, or I wouldn’t have.”
There she scoffed. “You don’t know how good I am at getting people to do things I want them to do. I was just grumbling to God about how I’m supposed to be this new person, but I’m still doing the same old things, only now I think they’re bad, when before I was proud of it.” She winced. “What a mess of an explanation.”
“Made perfect sense to me. And I repeat. I don’t do what I don’t want to do. You might be used to manipulating men into doing things, but I’m not one of your city boys.”
The poor guy believed it. Ronni nearly let him, too, but she couldn’t. It felt wrong somehow. “Hank, you told me you were attracted to me. I use that kind of thing. It’s unconscious half the time, but I do. I know you think—”
“I may be attracted to you, and I might not have your degrees and things, but I still have brains, and I think with them. I make decisions with them. And trust me. I knew getting that stuff out of the shed would be harder than just letting you haul that one out of here.” He pointed to the tree by the front window. Their tree.
“But—”
“I wanted that one to stay put, Ronni. You wanted it in the trailer. Who got his way?”
Who, indeed? She eyed him, curious and a little awed. “You… well, you have a point.”
He shrugged out of his coat and carried it back to the back door. Discussion over, apparently. Never had Ronni dealt with a man so very considerate of others while immovable about things at the same time. If she read the subtext right, it was a warning. You can push, but you can’t steamroll me. Now, if someone would only tell her why she liked it.
They’d moved into packing cookies into goodie bags before Hank actually spoke again. Oh, sure… he grunted and gave monosyllabic answers to things like, “Do you have green ribbon?”
But when she expressed a wish for passenger names and gift tags—more of a musing to herself than an actual request, in fact—he snapped out of whatever funk he’d gotten himself into and came alive again. “Would Peg’s punches work?”
“Punches?”
“The girls kept all Peg’s crafty stuff here so the kids would have a place to play and make stuff. It’s all in the craft room. I think she has hearts and stars and butterflies—probably a tree…”
Again, Ronni asked, “Punches?”
“For tags.” He held up his finger an inch or so high and stretched it a bit more. “About yay big, depending on the punch. She’s got Christmas paper in there, too.”
“Lead the way, Santa!”
At first, she thought she’d irritated him with that, but after a moment, Hank grabbed the hint of a gut he had and tried to jiggle it with a hearty, “Ho, ho, ho… hum.”
“Hum is right.”
That’s when he did it. He grabbed her hand and led her through the side of the house she hadn’t seen yet and into a crafter’s paradise. “Wow.” If he thought she meant the room instead of the fact that she’d never been so affected by holding a man’s hand before, well, that was just fine with her. Ronni felt his gaze on her and blurted out the first thing she could think of. “She must have really been into scrapbooking…” A shelf full of yarn bins prompted her to add, “And… knitting?”
That’s when she noticed another tub—acrylic paints. And one of those cutting machines. On another wall, she saw a sewing machine and tools that looked perfect for a petite, homemaking serial killer.
Didn’t know they made so many scary-looking sewing things.
Hank smoothed his hand over the large island that took up the middle of the room. “You’d think, wouldn’t you? Peg liked gardening and baking. She puttered in here, but most of this was the girls’ doing. A friend’s mom would take up something, she’d say how nice that sounded, they’d buy her all the things. She’d stow them away in here… I was glad when Amy Frankenmouth took up book reviews on Kindle.”
At her questioning gaze, he squeezed her hand. No doubt about it. The guy had no idea that he’d done it. And Ronni had no idea what she was supposed to do with heart thumps that belonged to a much younger version of herself. Get a grip, Veronica Marie! That prompted a smile she couldn’t prevent. I’m starting to think like Mom now.
“Two reasons. First, it fits on the shelf in the living room.” He dropped her hand to open a drawer. “Second, she liked romances.”
“That’s good?”
That wink—if he kept it up, she’d stay in teen Veronica mode and crush on it. “Yep. Did wonders for our relationship.”
“This, I must hear.”
He rummaged through the drawer, pulling out a few black things that looked pretty deadly in their own right. “She’d come in with a scene where a guy took the time to really look at a woman—to kiss her until my toes curled just reading it. She’d give me a look.” Hank’s voice broke on that word, and Ronni couldn’t help but rub his back a bit. “Learned to love that look. She’d say, ‘I bet that would be a fun one to test out—see if they know what they’re talkin’ about.’” Another wink. This time, her stomach tried a somersault and flopped. Felt just as goofy and good, too. “They did.”
“I’ve always been more of a thriller reader myself. Maybe I’ll have to give romances a shot. If I ever end up with a guy I’d like to try toe-curling kisses with, that is.”