Chapter Eighteen
“Okay, girls,” Linnea whispered. “Are you ready?”
Betsy stifled a giggle, but Elsie nodded seriously.
Linnea stepped back and regarded her eldest daughter, pride swelling through her. “Let me take a photo before you go to send to Grandad and Grandma in Milchester. Maybe we should invite them over next year, they would love to take part.”
“Can I be the Santa Lucia next year?” Betsy asked and Linnea nodded.
“I think you can take it in turns. It doesn’t seem fair if you never get a turn just because you weren’t born first.”
Both girls were dressed in long white dresses with green wreaths around their heads, but Elsie’s wreath was stuck through with candles. Traditionally real candles were used, but Linnea had no intention of allowing her small daughter to walk through the house with flames so close to her hair and so she had bought LED candles instead. They still looked very effective, blazing out in the dim predawn light.
“Okay, Elsie, can you manage the tray? Betsy how about this plate?”
Linnea had stayed up late the night before to make cinnamon rolls and decorate the tray with holly and other greenery, putting dainty cups and saucers and a milk jug out ready so all she had to do this morning was make the coffee, add the milk to the jug and heat the rolls. Traditionally lussekatter, raisin-filled saffron buns, were eaten on Santa Lucia’s day, but Linnea was far more confident with her cinnamon roll making skills, consoling herself with the reflection that they were still traditional Swedish breakfast pastries.
Betsy took the plate of rolls carefully, her tongue poking out as she concentrated on holding it straight. Linnea picked up the tray and carefully placed it into Elsie’s hands. “Take it slowly.” She cautioned.
Carefully, the girls walked the hallway, up the wide front staircase and along the landing until they reached the master bedroom, pushing open the door. Linnea stood at the bottom of the stairs listening to her parents’ surprised—and then delighted—squeals as the girls wished them “Happy Santa Lucia’s day!”
“What a lovely surprise,” her mother said when Linnea joined them in the bedroom for an early breakfast. “What on earth made you think of it?”
“I heard Aunt Pernilla talking about being the Lucia when she was a girl and saying what a shame the custom had died out in the family so I decided to revive it. Tonight we’ve been invited to Crooked Corner for a procession along Bramble Lane followed by a Swedish style feast. I believe Patty Hathaway has asked Aunt Pernilla and the cousins as well.”
Vika Olsen stilled, her eyes fixed on Linnea. “At Crooked Corner? Why not here?”
Linnea concentrated on her coffee cup, disconcerted by the sharp interest in her mother’s gaze. “No real reason, I think the Hathaways were thrilled to have an opportunity to try out some Swedish recipes—which means you will get lussekatter after all, and made a lot more authentically than I could manage!”
“Will Nat be there?” Betsy asked, her words just about distinguishable, despite the amount of cinnamon roll in her mouth. “And Biscuit?”
“Nat, yes, Biscuit probably not. It’ll be too much excitement for him, but we can take him for a walk this weekend. He’s been cleared for a real walk, which is exciting isn’t it?”
Linnea managed to keep the conversation away from Nat or Crooked Corner for the rest of breakfast, but her mother cornered her in the kitchen while the girls were getting ready for school. “You and Nat seem very close.”
Linnea knew her mother had wanted the kind of daughter who confided in her, to be friends as well as parent and child, but she had never found it easy to open up, her need to make her mother proud always her priority, never wanting to admit to weakness or mistakes. She’d been working hard since Elsie’s birth to change that, but it wasn’t easy to overcome the habits of a lifetime.
Busying herself with rinsing the plates, she searched for the right words. “He’s been such an enormous help with the concert, both he and Lacey have. I was beginning to think I’d taken on too much. I don’t think I could have pulled it all together on my own.”
Vika was still watching her carefully. “It’s good for you to be making friends with people your own age. Nat Hathaway was in your year at school, wasn’t he?”
“He only came to Marietta High for senior year. His sister, Lacey, was a junior that year. I knew her a little, she was the committee and yearbook type too. I like her fiancé too, Zac. I don’t know if you’ll meet him this evening, he spends part of the week in San Francisco.”
But her mother wasn’t fooled by her diversion. “He was always charming, Nat. I got the impression back then that you liked him.”
“Mom, everyone liked Nat. He even flirted with the teachers. It’s the way he’s made.” She continued rinsing the plates even though they had been completely clean for nearly a minute.
Taking the plates out of Linnea’s hand, Vika set them down on the draining board and turned Linnea to face her. “Linnea. It’s nearly three years since Logan died. I know you have a lot on your plate. I know the girls need you. But you don’t have to close yourself off. You still have to live your life.”
“I know. And I am, Mom, truly. But Nat isn’t going to stay in town for long. It would be foolish of me to lose my heart to him.”
“We don’t always get to decide these things,” her mother said. “Are you dating him?”
“We’re seeing each other,” Linnea admitted. “Casually. Over the festive season.”
“And you’re okay with the casual part?”
Linnea bit her lip. Was she? She’d been telling herself she was. After all it was casual or nothing at all. “Nat isn’t the settling type. I knew that long before we started. I knew that ten years ago. And, actually, that makes him a safe person to start dating again with. I’m a little rusty after all.” She wasn’t being completely honest, not with her mother, not with herself. But she wasn’t quite ready to think about how lonely she would be when Nat packed his bags and hit the road once again.
Her mother picked up a photo off the memo board. It was an old one, a solemn-eyed toddler, her hair pulled back into two long bunches. “It feels like no time since you were this small. Are you sure this is what you want, Linnea? Living in Marietta, back here with your father and me? Running the orchard? We love you, Linnea. I know it’s been a lot to bear at times, an only child and we weren’t the youngest of parents. I know you felt a lot of pressure but, believe me, all we wanted, all we want is your happiness.”
Tears prickled Linnea’s eyes, her heart so full she could barely speak. “I think we both know that I am solely responsible for any pressure. I just wanted to make you proud…”
“You do, darling. You always have.”
“I want to be here.” Linnea reassured her mother. “I can’t wait to show Dad my plans for the orchard, to watch it evolve and grow, to see my daughters grow up here.”
“You’re a good mother, and a good daughter. Just make sure you make time for yourself. If dating Nat Hathaway is what you want to do then go for it. And thank you for arranging today, it’s a wonderful surprise.”
Linnea kissed her mother’s cheek. “I have to get the girls to school,” she said. She walked to the door then turned. “Thank you, Mom, for everything. I love you, I don’t tell you that enough. I should do it more often.” After all, she knew better than anyone how precious life was, how bitter words left unsaid.
*
Crooked Corner always seemed at its happiest filled with people. Patty and Priscilla were natural hostesses and had gone all out, creating a feast for the Santa Lucia party. The round crown cake stood in the middle of the table bearing seven candles to match those in Elsie’s wreath, and plates heaped with saffron buns and gingerbread cookies were placed either side while meatballs bubbled away on the stove. A pungent mulled wine simmered alongside along with a lingonberry juice for the children. All Nat’s family and a fair proportion of Linnea’s extended family had come to enjoy the festivities, several girls in white dresses, red sashes and wreaths running around the rooms. The boys were supposed to dress in similar costumes, but most had refused, opting for white shirts instead.
Somehow Nat had found himself appointed master of ceremonies. He hadn’t even protested that much, maybe Marietta was working a spell on him—or Linnea was.
“Okay,” he said when all the children were lined up, each holding a candle, Elsie at the front, self-important in her special candle-laden wreath. “Do you all remember the song?” He’d spent half an hour teaching them the tune and they all held a copy of the words, translated into English. Linnea’s doing of course.
All the adults crowded around on the Crooked Corner porch as the children lined up outside. “It’s freezing,” Vika Olsen said, shivering. “And they’re only in those flimsy dresses.”
“They won’t be out for long,” Linnea reassured her. “Just up the road as far as Bramble House and back again.”
Solemnly, Vika went from child to child, lighting the candles for the couple of older children, helping the smaller ones turn on their electrical ones and checking Elsie’s wreath was blazing out and then they were off, Elsie in the lead, the other girls behind her and the boys bringing up the rear.
“The night goes on weighty step,” they began and their voices a little wavery as they squinted at the still unknown lyrics, working out the unfamiliar tune.
The adults followed them down the driveway and watched as they carried walking up Bramble Lane, still singing and then turned and walked back toward Crooked Corner.
“It certainly looks very effective,” Nat’s father said. “The tune’s Italian, I think, and of course the words would usually be in Swedish. What’s the purpose, Linnea?”
“Like all these things it was once a pagan light festival,” Linnea said as they climbed the stairs back up to the welcome warmth of Crooked Corner. “Now it commemorates Santa Lucia who apparently used to bring food to Christians hiding in the catacombs, using a candle on her head to light the way so she could carry more in her hands. She was later martyred in some suitably gory way!”
“What a charming story,” Ted Hathaway said seriously and Nat suppressed a grin. He knew his father of old, and that he would be filing away the story, words, and tune for later. Every song he and Nat’s mother wrote was inspired by their experiences, by the world around them and they loved a good myth or legend.
“Oh, yes,” he agreed, coming to stand next to his father and Linnea, his hand aching to take hers. “Nothing as charming as a good martyr story, isn’t that right, Linnea?”
As soon as the children returned, they attacked the food, as if, Linnea remarked, they’d all been starved for a week, not fed their dinners just an hour or so earlier. The whole house was buzzing with conversation, with song, with happiness. Nat stood in a corner, watching the children running around, the adults exchanging news. It was like Marietta had been distilled down to its essence in this one house; community, family, love. And he, as ever, was an onlooker. There yet not really part of it. He slipped away. There was nothing lonelier than a crowd.
He sat on the old porch seat, staring up at the star-strewn sky until the creak of the wood heralded someone’s arrival.
Linnea sank onto the seat beside him. “You’ve been very elusive.”
“Have I? Not on purpose.” His grin came easily, but she didn’t respond, looking at him with searching eyes.
“Is everything okay?”
“As long as you’re not planning to cancel on me tomorrow night then yes.” It wasn’t exactly a lie. Nat wasn’t sure what this melancholy was. He was just glimpsing a world that he wasn’t a part of. What he didn’t understand was why it bothered him so much. It never had before.
“I’m not planning anything except being wined and dined. You set the bar high last week, Nat. I’m looking forward to seeing how you will top it. I just wanted to thank you for helping organize this. I need to get the girls home, they have school tomorrow.” She leaned in and kissed him, a brief, soft caress which made his blood heat and his body yearn for more. But before he could pull her down, ask her to stay a little longer, she was gone and he was alone with his thoughts once again.