As questionable as my choice in men might have been, I did know how to pick a good tree from a scant selection. Deep green and lush, its branches filled the living room window and tinged the room with a fresh pine scent. After Mom had Ed haul up every string of lights we could find in the basement, we looped them around the tree, and Mom handed Ed the cord to plug into the wall socket.

Moments after he crawled under the lower branches, the bulbs flickered on, illuminating the tree and reflecting smudges of colour against the deepening dark beyond the windowpane.

Vicky gasped and spread her hand against her chest. “Oh, it’s perfect. Don’t you think so, Ed?”

Scrambling out from under the tree, Ed sat back on his heels. “The angel looks nice,” he remarked, while flicking needles off the shoulders of his plaid flannel shirt.

Vicky beamed up at the figure perched on the top branch. Joined to the end of the light strand, the angel glowed a soft white from within the folds of her filmy white gown. Glittery golden filigree wings splayed out from her back.

“It does look lovely,” Mom agreed, cocking her head as she stood back to study it. “Thank you, Vicky. It was just what I needed after my tree topper broke last year.”

“That tacky old tinsel star didn’t break so much as fall apart,” I reminded her, while gathering a garland of silver tinsel from the couch. “Plastic tends to degrade after a number of decades. It was well past time for an upgrade.”

“I bought it the year you were born. But never mind. We can start a new tradition with this beautiful angel that Vicky picked out.”

Vicky’s cheeks pinked with pleasure at the compliment. “I can’t take all the credit. It was your daughter’s thoughtful suggestion.” She tossed me a friendly wink. “Are you coming caroling with us tonight, Carly?”

“I’d love to,” I fibbed, turning my back to her as I wound the garland around the tree, “but I have a friend’s party to go to later.” I couldn’t muster much enthusiasm for either option. Everything about the holidays felt weird this year. With my explosive secret weighing on my mind, and Ed the butcher-turned-roach-killer and his sister decorating my mother’s tree, this didn’t feel much like Christmas Eve at all.

“What time are you going to Brooke’s?” Mom asked.

“Around eight, I guess. I won’t stay long.”

“Better get a start on the ornaments.” She lifted an old cardboard box onto the coffee table. Opening the worn and bent flaps, she pulled out a box of red and blue glass balls. “Ed, will you hang these?”

He took the box of balls without comment, his gaze connecting with Mom’s and holding it a few beats longer than necessary, a warm glint in his eyes and a slight quirk to his lips. I couldn’t help staring for a moment, aware of my pulse in my throat.

Dragging my gaze back to the task at hand, I reached into the box and pushed aside a mound of shabby ornaments I’d made as a child in search of something attractive to add to the tree. When my hand fell on a small round box, my heart stumbled. I knew what was inside—the glass bird Rob and I had given Mom for Christmas last year.

Lifting out the box, I opened it and ran my hand over the etched feathers on the bird’s outstretched wings. A memory hovered in my mind—Rob and me perusing a craft sale, hands clasped, hunting for something Mom might like. He had spotted the little bird and said it reminded him of the finches he’d seen swooping for the feeder at his parents’ house. We’d bought one for his mother and one for mine, which had felt at the time like a unifying gesture between our families—the first glimmer of a future together that never materialized.

A couple of months ago, the sight of the little glass bird would have nettled me with sadness and regret. Now I felt only a tiny spark of emotion. My heart had shifted irrevocably; I couldn’t picture Rob and me together anymore. I could only imagine myself with Mitch—or the man I’d thought Mitch was, before I found out he was married. A man who, I supposed, didn’t really exist.

I remembered Mitch holding me, just briefly, at the tree lot when I’d slipped into his arms, and how safe and protected I’d felt. My eyes burned with tears that I blinked back. This Christmas could have been so different if he didn’t belong to someone else, but I couldn’t change reality, no matter how hard I wished.

The thought of it caused a painful pinch in my chest.

“How beautiful,” Vicky gushed, peering over my shoulder at the glass bird on my palm. “Are you going to put it on the tree?”

“Would you like to have the honours?” I held it out to her.

She took the bird from me and dangled it by its cord from her finger. “I’d be happy to.”

Rooting in the box, my mother pulled out a star I’d made as a child with beads and pipe cleaners. Most of the beads had fallen off over the decades, leaving the pipe cleaners nearly bare.

I frowned at the star as she admired it as though she’d just bought it from Tiffany’s. “Mom, that thing’s hideous. Just throw it out.”

“I can’t do that. You made this when you were six. I love it.” She cradled it gently in her palm, a wistful smile playing on her lips. “I can still see you at the kitchen table, so focused, carefully sliding the beads on one by one. I treasured every single one of your creations.”

“These are adorable,” Vicky said, rifling through the motley assortment of pinecone elves and fossilized marshmallow snowmen in the box. “How wonderful that you saved them all.”

I frowned, lifting out a tangled mass of red and white yarn on a string that was meant to be a stocking. “I never did learn to knit properly.”

Mom placed the battered star carefully on a tree branch. “Why don’t I teach you again? I haven’t knit in a long time, but I want to make something for Faith’s baby. She must be very excited. She’ll need more help at work once the baby comes.” Quirking an eyebrow, she cast me a conspiratorial half-smile. “A good opportunity for you to have more hours.”

My shoulders stiffening, I didn’t answer but turned away to tuck the stocking between a couple of low branches.

Why not tell her right now? Mom, you know that grandchild you’ve been bugging me to provide? Well guess what…

I couldn’t make myself utter the words. Not in front of Ed and Vicky, anyhow.

But part of me longed to pull my mother aside, cling to her and confess her how scared I was. That I needed her help. Within the year a brand new little life would be my sole responsibility, utterly dependent on me for food, shelter, love, guidance—something I still couldn’t quite grasp.

I wasn’t sure I was ready for motherhood, or ever would be. I barely had my own head on straight. Never mind that I couldn’t cook a Christmas turkey to save my life—

I’d be lucky to fry an egg without ruining it. I wasn’t even sure I could gaze with absurd affection at my kid’s scruffy old ornaments the way Mom did.

God help me, what if I couldn’t do this?