“I was wrapping presents, for your information.” I grab a handful of chips from the bowl she’s refreshing for the minions.
“Do you have one for Sawyer?” She asks casually, but she is definitely fishing. I don’t want to talk about it, but I need advice. And she and Dad have been married for over twenty years. She knows what she’s talking about when it comes to making a relationship work.
“I don’t. I have no idea what to give him,” I say, slumping down at the table. Mom just laughs and goes to the cupboard, getting out a coffee mug and filling it with water and then putting it in the microwave. It’s instant coffee and chat time.
She gets the creamer out of the fridge. It’s eggnog flavored. Once the coffee is done and I stir in the creamer, she waits for me to start talking.
“I don’t know what to give him because I don’t know how I feel, and I don’t want to give him anything that’s romantic, or that makes him think romantic things. So I’m kind of screwed.”
“That is a dilemma, Ivy. That is a dilemma.” She sips her coffee and waits for me to ask for her advice. She won’t give it until I ask.
“Tell me what to do, I know you’re dying to,” I say and she beams and then leans in.
“Well, I don’t want to tell you what to do, but if I were you, I’d do something that you used to do. You know him inside and out. The best answer is sometimes the simplest. What did you used to get him?”
“But if I do something like that, he’s going to read something into it.”
She shrugs and I sip from my own cup. “Maybe he will and maybe he won’t. But if you don’t do anything, you’re going to feel like an a**hole, so suck it up and figure it out.” Sometimes my mom rivals Allison’s bubbe for her blunt advice. Shut your mouth and do it. Grow some lady balls.
Okay, I’ll just do that.
Where the hell do I start?
I go to my thinking spot and park my car. It’s too cold to sit on the hood, so I stay inside with the heater on and my blanket around me. The snow starts to spit again. It’s been doing that, not really committing to a full storm, just teasing us with the possibility of a white Christmas.
I’d like that, while I was here. Our house looks so pretty all covered in white, like’s it’s been frosted. Everything keeps running as usual when we have storms, except for school, if there’s a lot of snow. Everyone walks to each other’s houses and hangs out and watches movies and eats snacks in front of the woodstove. I’d done that a lot with Sawyer. So many times I lost count.
And suddenly, I have an idea.
Sawyer and I had a snow day ritual, and if the weather cooperates with me, it’s going to snow enough that it will be tricky driving. I just have to get a few things first.
Saltwater may not be an island, but it feels that way most of the time. To get to any sort of major town with more than a few thousand people you have to do a lot of driving. In some ways, being isolated keeps the world out, but it also keeps us in. Sheltered.
People use that an excuse to never go anywhere, seek anything else.
As I head out of town I think about how long I’m going to stay. My break goes past New Years. I have quite a few papers to write that are going to require research, but the tiny Saltwater library just outside of town has Wi-Fi and I don’t think they would mind if I snuck in a mug of coffee. And it would make mom happy.
And Sawyer. There’s always Sawyer.
Half an hour later I feel like I’m back in “civilization”. I hit the McDonald’s for a caffeine buzz, the pharmacy to get a new bottle of shampoo, and the grocery store to get the things for my present to Sawyer. I also stop at the small department store and buy an extra blanket. I always used to tease Sawyer about stealing mine, but he just said that he liked being wrapped in something that smelled like me.
Despite his career change, Sawyer still smells the same, and not like fish or bait at all. It’s so bizarre that he’s running his father’s business. It’s hard to think of him as an adult, making decisions like that. I’d kind of like to see it in action.
Mom calls me when I’m walking back to my car. The snow is supposed to get bad, so she wants me home ASAP. My car may be fashionable and sexy, but it’s not too good in the snow and slush. I’m screwed if another deer comes at me, too. Flipping wildlife.
“Oh, good, you’re back. I was getting worried.” Dad and Drew are tramping through the house, their arms full of wood for the woodstove. Our power goes out a lot in the winter. You put a lot of snow on tree limbs and those things are going to break and snag the lines and create all sorts of issues. We have a generator, but wood for the stove is cheaper, and heats the house better.
“The kids are with Stacy getting supplies. I can’t believe I forgot to get potatoes. Fingers crossed she can find some.” Mom is frazzled, her hair escaping its braid and curling everywhere. She’d gone prematurely grey, but she was still a gorgeous woman. Not to be critical, but a lot of the women around here have . . . um . . . a kind of masculine look about them. I blame it on the hard living. Tends to harden people on the outside. But get to know them and most of them have good hearts underneath it all.
“Oh, did you figure out what you were going to get Sawyer?”
“I did,” I say with a triumphant smile.
“Are you going to tell me?”
“Nope.” She swats at my shoulder and I head to my room to find my thick slippers. The floors are cold right now, but they’ll be warm as soon as Dad gets the fire going. I help Mom get dinner going. This is the pre-Christmas Eve dinner and it’s also a tradition. We make sandwiches and chips and iced tea and have a floor picnic. I used to think everyone did this when I was little, and then I asked a few people about it, but they gave me faces like I was crazy.
“Oh, I hope you don’t mind, but I invited Sawyer and Melanie over. They don’t have any family coming up this year, so I didn’t want them to be alone.” Usually, Sawyer and his parents had relatives that came up, but this just must be an off year or something. Hearing that makes my heart hurt for him. This is one time when I absolutely don’t mind her inviting him over for Christmas Eve-Eve dinner.
As soon as she says it, there’s a knock at the door and then Sawyer walks in, carrying a few grocery bags, followed by his mother, Melanie, with a dish of something.
“Melanie, it’s so good to see you,” Mom says, rushing over to take the dish and give her a huge hug. She is a shadow of the woman I used to know. For the wife of a man who owned a lobster pound, she was always dressed to the nines, whatever that means. She had her hair done and beautiful clothes and jewelry. She was the prettiest woman in Saltwater, and one of the smartest, having a master's degree in marketing. She ran the advertising and so forth for the business, and also did a lot of volunteer work that no one ever really knew about. One of those people who was always doing good for others, but who never wanted credit for it.
Now she looks tired, and broken down. Her hair has roots and hangs limp on either side of her pale un-made up face. I’ve never seen her without makeup before. She’s still beautiful.
Her eyes find me and she smiles.
“It’s so good to see you, Ivy. It’s been a long time.” I give her a hug and I can’t speak for a moment because I know I’ll start to cry if I do.
“I’m so sorry,” I choke out before I can get a grip. Sawyer’s fingers brush my back and I manage to keep it together.
“Thank you so much, Ivy. Clint was very fond of you and he asked me if I knew what you were doing the day he passed.” It is now a monumental effort to not cry. I don’t think it’s ever been harder in my life to stop myself. She seems to sense that as she squeezes my shoulder, and then goes to help my mother get everything set up in the kitchen as the minions run and scream. They seem to have only one volume right now.
“You okay?” Sawyer says in my ear. I shake my head and start walking to my room. I know I don’t have to ask him to follow. He does, and closes the door behind us.
I sit on my bed and take several deep breaths. The house smells like wood smoke now, one of my favorite scents in the world.
“That was rough,” I say, putting my hands on my knees. Sawyer crosses the short distance to the bed and sits down next to me. We’ve spent a hell of a lot of time in this room. Lots of things have happened in this room . . .
I look up at him and I wonder if he’s thinking about it too.
Memories flutter in my mind like butterflies, darting around, just out of my grasp. If I reach out, I could catch one and relive it again. Do I want to?
“It’s been a long time since I’ve been in this room,” he says in a low voice, as if he’s afraid to be too loud. The walls aren’t going to cave in.
“I know,” I say, just as quiet. The noise outside the door is like a storm raging around us. But it’s still and quiet here with Sawyer.
“I got you a present,” I say to stop the silence from stretching too long, and also to try to bat the memories away.
“You did? You know I hate presents.” He smiles and I know he’s joking.
“That’s such a lie. Everyone loves presents.” He used to tease me like that all the time. “Now the question is, did you get me anything?”
“I might have.” He did? Now I’m surprised.
“What is it?” He leans toward me and shakes his head.
“I can’t tell you what it is until I give it to you. That’s how this present thing works. You don’t get it until Christmas. Can’t break those rules.”
“Rules are meant to be broken,” I say as I move closer to him. His smell quickly fills the room and it’s bringing those memories forward without me even having to try.
They crash on me and I know they’re crashing on him too, judging by the look on his face.
“Same bed,” he says, nodding at the quilt.
“Same bed,” I echo.
“It seems smaller.” Yeah, it does. I remember when we both had to sleep in it, curled together so neither of us fell off the edge. Sawyer’s feet always dangled because he was so tall. I look into his blue eyes and he takes a shaky breath.
And the door bangs open.
“What are you doing?” Damn minions. Sawyer and I break apart as if we had been doing something illicit instead of just talking.
“Come on,” I say heading for the door. No privacy in this house. We hadn’t had much back then, either.
Everyone loads up their sandwiches and plates in the kitchen and gets their drinks as we head for the living room, which is strewn with pillows so everyone can sit. That’s the rule. You have to sit on the floor on Christmas Eve-Eve. No chairs allowed.
Of course there’s some shuffling and I end up with Sawyer on one side and my Dad on the other. Lovely. I feel like I’m under a microscope. Not that my Dad was ever very strict about me and Sawyer. Sometimes I thought my parents should have been more strict with us. They didn’t mind him spending the night, or me spending the night at his place, or us being alone. But they did put the fear of God in me if I got pregnant. Did they ever. Both my siblings had children by the time they hit nineteen, but they were determined that wasn’t going to be me.