Chapter Twenty-Five - Charlotte
Christmas morning dawns bright and sunny, the water of the bay sparkling against the icy film that has covered the tree branches and railings all over town. It’s brisk and cold and the world feels like it’s shimmering, like everything has been painted a fresh coat of silver just in time for Christmas. Danny and I head out, walking slowly and carefully to Dad’s. I cling to Danny’s arm tight, sliding a little a few times on the slippery patches of ice on the sidewalks.
Danny’s been coming over to my place almost every night since the Naval Ball, and we thought it would be best just to head over to Dad’s together. I had dropped several presents off under Dad’s tree early in the week, and Danny is carrying the rest as well as his own in the arm I’m not balanced on. Dad greets us with a wide open smile and the smell of cinnamon rolls baking in the oven. The house looks great—the decorations are more simple than I remember growing up and they make me smile.
“Merry Christmas!” I exclaimed, hugging Dad tight while Danny puts down our stack of presents.
“Merry Christmas, kitten,” Dad mumbles into my hair, kissing me on the top of my head, and the mention of the childhood nickname makes me beam. “I’m so glad you’re home.”
“Me too,” I say, and I think it couldn’t be truer. I think I’ve maybe never been so glad to be anywhere as I am to be here this morning, celebrating this Christmas with Dad and Danny.
“Well, what are we waiting for?” Dad asks, clapping his hands. “Let’s eat.” He leads me and Danny to his small kitchen table where he’s laid out a breakfast for us all. I catch Danny’s eye and smile at him as we sit. Over breakfast, we update Dad on Michael and Amanda. He’s starting work for Danny’s friend after the New Year, and Amanda, and the baby has just had a health checkup. They’re having a little girl who should be born sometime in mid-January. I’ve been visiting them every few days, and I think I’ll probably keep doing so until after the baby is born.
After breakfast, we sit on the floor around the tree and pass out gifts. I think of Christmas when I was a kid and about how much better this one is. I can’t ever remember a happier, better Christmas than this simple one, holding Danny’s hand and watching Dad smile as he opens one of my gifts to him: a nice new case for the laptop he drags back and forth between the Dock’s End and his house every day.
“Oh, sweetheart, this is perfect,” Dad says, leaning over to hug me again, a little stiffer, tenser this time. “Thank you both for spending today with me. I’m sure you could have filled it up by yourselves.”
“I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else in the world,” I tell him. This morning, wrapped in Danny’s arms in my bed, we’d woken up together, kissing and wishing each other a Merry Christmas on a whisper. We could have stayed there all day, could have exchanged gifts in private, and I would have been thrilled, but this is so much better. This feels like family.
“Me either,” Danny says. “Thanks for having me here.”
“I hope this is the first of many Christmases just like this,” Dad says. “I know you two just started dating, but I have a good feeling about it.”
“Me too,” Danny says seriously, squeezing my hand like a promise.
“The best feeling,” I say, smiling at both of them. I still can’t quite believe that in Dad is so okay with me and Danny, that he’s so happy about it—but it some ways, I think it makes a lot of sense. Danny and I are probably the two people Dad is closest to in the world: the two people he cares about the most. Maybe he has to worry less about if we’re together. Maybe he likes it better that neither of us had fallen for a stranger. I’m sure Dad would have grown to care about anyone I did, would have loved anyone I did, eventually, but he doesn’t even have to try with Danny.
I think it would disappoint him if Danny and I didn’t work out. I know it’s foolish, that this is all brand new, but I have a strong feeling it will. I feel like Danny and I really will be sitting here for many Christmases to come.
I pass Danny a small box, watching excitedly as he opens the compass I had engraved with his initials the night after he took me out on his boat. It’s large and brass and its door is painted with a beautiful picture of the bay, with boats on the water. Danny’s own eyes get wide as he opens it, and he pulls me in for a quick kiss.
“Thank you,” he says, “it’s incredible.”
“I thought of you as soon as I saw it,” I say, smiling into the kiss. Danny hands me a bright blue envelope with my name on it. I’ve already opened a beautiful sweater from him and a tiny sparkling keychain in the shape of a stethoscope, both so thought I wasn’t expecting anything else.
I open the envelope and gasp at the certificate inside—it’s for sailing lessons, starting in the spring.
“You said you’d never been on a private boat, and I thought, since you live here again, you might want to learn to sail?” Danny says. His smile almost looks shy, unsure, like he’s not certain I’ll like it, or like he thinks he’s overstepped somehow. It’s such an unusual expression for Danny, so different from his normal calm and confident air that I feel my heart swell, and I slide my hand on his knee.
“This is perfect,” I say. “I’ve always wanted to do this.”
“She used to ask when she was a kid,” Dad chimes in and nods. “All the time. I would have said yes, had it been up to me.”
“I remember,” I say. “It’s perfect.”
I lean into to kiss Danny again, lightly and quickly and I feel my eyes start to water a little. It’s amazing that Danny already knows me so well to have guessed at something I haven’t even told him, to know something I’ve wanted for so long.
“You’re welcome,” Danny says, smoothing his hand over my face, an affectionate and intimate gesture that makes me feel even more emotional.
The rest of the day passes all too quickly. After gifts, we settle on the couch to watch old Christmas movies, and I snuggle under Danny’s arm on the couch as we watch and talk. At dinner, we stuff ourselves with ham and potatoes and pie. Danny says maybe he should have Dad cook for him more often, to change things up, and Dad sheepishly admits they’re Danny’s recipes. I laugh, thinking about Catherine’s family and wondering if they’re eating those famous mashed potatoes of hers, I hope they’re happy today, even without her. I wonder if they can feel her spirit still with them, the way I’m certain I can sometimes still feel her.
After dinner, we break out the wine and the Monopoly board, Danny and I protesting that Dad has an unfair advantage since he actually has property-buying experience. He has most of our money within a few hours, but I don’t mind. We talk as we play, chatting about the plans for the second location of the Dock’s End and planning scouting trips to look at potential properties and locations in the New Year. I promise I’ll come too and help them scout the neighborhoods to see if they’d be a good fit. I feel like I’m part of the team. Maybe Dad was right—maybe I do have a restaurant in my blood after all.
We talk and drink wine until it’s so late Dad says both Danny and I can just sleep in the den. We fall into the pullout couch, both happy from the wine and from Christmas.
“I don’t think I’ve ever enjoyed Christmas this much,” Danny says, kissing me softly.
“Me either,” I agree. If we still had our glasses, I’d toast too much more to come, but since we don’t, I kiss Danny for it instead, hoping the message is the same.