Twenty
Kristmas
The cake was my favorite—Italian wedding. When Maggie carried it in, the cake plate balanced on her small, unsteady hands, Nan walking behind her, arms out to catch the cake if disaster struck, I‘d been prepared to clean up a mess. When she made it to the coffee table without dumping it on the carpet, she gave me a smile so wide, it nearly split my heart two.
It seems impossible that I love this little girl, that I’ve fallen for her so fast and hard but I have. She belongs to Mad and Mad belongs to me. I learned a long time ago that there’s no logic in love. No should or shouldn’t.
I shouldn’t love Mad but I do.
I should let him go but I can’t.
They sing me happy birthday and I blow out my candles while Maggie dances around, excitedly. As soon as their extinguished, she darts into the foyer and returns with the white box Mad had in his hands when I opened the door for them this afternoon. “The card on top is from me and the box is from Dad.” Maggie thrusts the box at me. “I told him that you’re going to like my card way more than whatever’s in that dumb old box.” Leaning into me, she gives me a knowing smile. “I saw him take it off the gift-wrapping table at the tree lot so it’s probably something dumb like bubble bath or a coffee mug.”
I take both from her and smile. “I happen to love coffee mugs and bubble bath,” I tell her, bouncing my gaze in Mad’s direction. He’s kept his distance since the kiss, planting himself in a chair by the fireplace. Observing the festivities without actually participating. I think it shook him more than he thought it would. That we’d grown and matured and moved past the shaky, desperate feeling we used to get when we were together for too long without touching.
I thought so too. Guess we were both wrong.
Setting the box aside, I focus on Maggie’s card, flipping it open to study the drawing inside. “That’s you and Dad,” Maggie says, plopping down on the couch next to me, pointing at the picture. “You’re making him say Terabithia.” The picture is of me, leaning out the treehouse window, looking down at Mad. There are letters carved into the trunk of the tree.
M+K
Forever
Next to the drawing she’s penned her name is careful, wide-spaced letters. Next to it she drew a heart. “Thank you, Maggie.” I tell her, having a hard time swallowing past the lump in my throat. “It’s beautiful.”
“Aren’t you going to open Dad’s dumb bubble bath?” she says when I tuck the card she gave me carefully under the red ribbon of the box.
“Nope.” I give her a head shake. “House rules: only one present on Christmas Eve. I chose yours.” I glance at Mad to gauge his reaction. He looks relieved. While Maggie beams with pride, I stand and pulls a pair of wrapped gifts from under the tree. “This is for you,” I tell her, handing her a flat, rectangular package. “And this is for you.” I hold out the gift bag to Mad and he takes it reluctantly, like whatever’s inside might have the power to do harm. “It’s just a—”
“Dad!” Maggie jumps up from her seat on the couch and shoves the book in her father’s face. “Look what Kris gave me.”
“I’ve had this book since I was ten years old.” I tell her, smoothing my hand over the cover. “Your dad bought it for me for my birthday. I’d worn my way through three paperbacks copies so he thought this might last longer. He was right.” I remember it like it was yesterday. My father had only been gone a few months and I was still so broken over the loss of him. When Mad showed up, paper-wrapped package clenched in his hand, I took it, carefully unwrapping it to reveal a hardback copy of Bridge to Terabithia.
On the inside, Mad wrote.
To: Kristmas Cavanagh
Love: Maddox McAllister
M+K
Forever
When I show her the inscription, Maggie’s eyes go wide. “And I can have it?”
I flip the page and show her the inscription I added in response.
To: Maggie McAllister
Love: Kristmas Cavanagh
Friends
Forever
She reads it slowly, sounding out the words until she gets them right. When she does, she throws her arms around me and I hug her back. Glancing at her father over the top of her head, I find him watching us.
“We better get a move on if we’re going to make the party,” he says, rising from the chair. “Put your boots on Magpie while I get your coat.”
“Aren’t you going to open your present?” Maggie looks up at him, a faint look of disappointment on her face.
He doesn’t want to, I can see it in the set of his jaw but he does it anyway because he doesn’t want to upset his daughter.
Reaching into the gift box, he pulls out a few rounds of tissue paper before he finds the gift inside.
“She made it herself,” Nan says from her seat on the couch. “Kind of boring if you ask me.”
I watch Mad turn the watch cap over in his hands, smoothing his fingers over its edge. Finally he looks at me. “Thanks,” he says, shifting his gaze to his daughter. “Get your boots on, Magpie—we’re going to be late.”