Rachel decided it was such a lovely cold night that she’d have a fire. And then maybe she’d look around for the Christmas decorations. She remembered seeing them during her furious cleaning, and she was going to be in town another ten days or so. It wouldn’t hurt to have a little Christmas spirit, would it?
She could hardly wait to get home from wrapping gifts at the local mall the next day to see if he’d left her anything, and she was, therefore, stunningly disappointed when there was nothing lying at her back door. In fact, she was so disappointed that she stood there shivering, staring at the steps to make sure she hadn’t missed something, a little something. Anything! But there was nothing. Nothing.
Rachel dragged herself up the steps, opened the door, and went inside.
There, on the breakfast bar, was a large silver box wrapped in red ribbon. Next to it, a note from Dagne. Found this outside. Call me!
Rachel pushed the note aside, quickly undid the package. In the box was a beautiful cashmere shawl, the color of a rich mahogany, thick and absolutely gorgeous. With a squeal of delight, she threw the shawl around her shoulders and reached for the card.
My favorite fabric: Cashmere. The texture of Rachel’s hair.
She laughed, brought the shawl to her face, feeling it, smelling it, and walked to the dining room, where her Christmas decorations were strewn about the table. Wrapping the shawl more tightly around her, she walked to the door and opened it . . . and stumbled backward in surprise.
There was a Christmas tree on her porch! A bare Christmas tree, seven feet tall, just standing there. “What the hell?” she murmured, and gasped with delight as a small white card emerged through the boughs of the tree.
Rachel snatched the card and quickly opened it. My favorite pastime: Being with Rachel, for when I am with her I feel quite like a tree—a thousand feet tall and ageless.
“Oh Flynn,” she said aloud.
“Oh Tannenbaum,” a disembodied but distinctly British voice said from behind the tree.
Rachel laughed. “A talking tree, how weird!”
“We trees make excellent emissaries of peace.”
Rachel leaned against the doorjamb and folded her arms across her chest, the note against her heart. “Oh. You’re an emissary.”
“I’ve come on behalf of a bloke who is not altogether very bright, and he has, on occasion, done things that would lead some to believe he has shit for brains, but really, his heart is in the right place, and he wants nothing more than to apologize for his abominable behavior, and perhaps explain how, exactly, things got so far off course.”
“I see,” she said, nodding. “Well, maybe you should go back and tell this stupid bloke that I’m not so angry anymore, and that he really doesn’t have to send a tree. I’m actually ready to talk about what happened,” she said, pushing away from the doorjamb. She reached into the tree and pushed it aside, revealing a very wary-looking Flynn behind it. “Because I still love him.”
Flynn grinned broadly at that. “There’s an excellent start.”
“And I’d like to ask him in,” she said, reaching for his tie, “to thank him properly for the gifts he’s left me, but I have to ask . . . is everything okay?”
Flynn smiled as he reached out and touched her chin, his fingers skimming her jaw. “Everything is okay,” he said softly. “There is no one but you in my thoughts and my heart, Rachel, and there hasn’t been since almost the moment I laid eyes on you. Honestly, if I had it to do all over again, there are so many things I might have done quite differently. Unfortunately, we never choose who we will fall in love with or when we fall, and it’s not very tidy.”
“It’s devastating,” she said, and tugged at his tie.
“Devastating and with lots of pieces and parts that come together, but don’t really fit with one another, eh? Yet at the core of it, there is that abiding sort of love that two people have for each other, and that is what holds those pieces and parts together, to be used or discarded as time goes on. So I am here to say that I love you, Rachel Lear, in pieces and parts. I love you long and short, round and flat, big and small. I love you left and right and north and south and in any other untidy way you might imagine.”
“Oh Flynn,” she said, and grabbed his hand and kissed his palm. “How did you get to be so poetic?”
“How did you get to be so beautiful?”
“You want to come in?”
“Only if my friend can come, too,” he said.
“Sure! We might need him later, who knows? Because I want to know it all, no matter how painful it might be. I want to put it out there so we can smash it to pieces and go on.”
“Thank God,” Flynn said, and shoved a hand through his hair. “Thank God.”
Rachel stepped back, held the door open for him so he could carry the tree inside. Once he was inside, she let the door close and walked to the edge of the porch and looked up at the sky.
It was a full moon and love had hopped back into her life.
“I owe you, Dagne,” she whispered, and turned around, walked inside, to Flynn’s open arms.
Subject: Merry Christmas!
From: <[email protected]>
To: Dad <[email protected]>