26. Eden
26
EDEN
E den awoke early on Christmas Eve morning, and slipped out of bed to get ready for the day. Jack was most likely going to wake up feeling a little sad about not seeing his grandparents. And unless all of yesterday’s snow had miraculously melted, they certainly weren’t getting out of the house to distract themselves.
But Eden kept ten-year-olds busy all year long, so she was pretty sure she could find plenty of fun holiday projects for her snowed-in eight-year-old today.
She lifted the curtain slightly to peek outside. It was still snowing, but more gently now. Deep, untouched drifts covered the world in a thick blanket of white that made everything look smaller, and smoothed the modern shapes of the cars on the street into rounded lumps so that she could have been gazing out onto Rutgers Avenue today, or back in the late eighteen hundreds when all the houses were still new.
Jack would almost certainly sleep for a while longer, since Eden had let him stay up extra late to finish their movie after working on Axel’s gift. When he got up, she had a feeling that he would be excited to play outside in all that fresh snow.
She showered quickly and pulled on a fresh pair of flannel Christmas pajamas that she knew would make Jack smile. She normally wouldn’t go for the PJs as her outfit for the day, but with so much snow on the ground, it wasn’t like they would be seeing anyone today.
Eden grabbed her phone, just in case, but she figured Axel would probably sleep even later than Jack, after being up half the night plowing.
She tiptoed down the stairs, and curled up on the sofa to gaze at the Christmas tree. It was lovely, even without the lights plugged in.
A moment later, dawn light suddenly streamed in the front windows, setting the silvery ornaments glimmering like magic, and she nearly gasped at the way the little tree was suddenly sparkling.
It’s a sign, her grandmother whispered in her mind . The south wind is blowing now, bringing blessings our way.
The sound of an engine outside interrupted her thoughts.
But how could there be an engine running outside? Those streets were covered in massive drifts of snow. No one was going anywhere until the plows came through.
The plows…
She was on her feet instantly, pulling open the front door to see a big man standing out front next to a snowplow.
“Axel?” she murmured .
The sound of footsteps on the steps behind her alerted her that Jack was up after all. She turned to see him, still sleepy-eyed in his own pajamas.
“Coach?” he murmured, hurrying down the rest of the steps toward the door.
“Wait,” Eden said, catching him around the waist before he could dart onto the snow-covered porch in his bare feet.
When she straightened, Axel was climbing the porch steps with a big smile on his face.
“You’re up again so early,” Eden said softly.
“I was out all night,” he said, shaking his head. “This was my last run before heading home. But I had to ask Jack something first.”
“Well, come in,” Eden said. “Let’s get you warmed up.”
“I brought that special hot cocoa,” Axel said, handing her a little bag with a tin inside.
“Hi, Coach,” Jack said, smiling up at him.
Eden took the bag and hurried off to the kitchen to start the kettle. She put the radio on and hummed along with “Let it Snow” while she pulled down mugs and dug out a bag of marshmallows from the cupboard.
When she came back out, Axel’s coat was hung on the hook, his boots were by the door, and he was whispering something in Jack’s ear.
“Yes,” Jack said, an even bigger smile than before stretching his face. “Yeah, definitely.”
“You’re sure?” Axel asked, his eyes serious.
“Definitely,” Jack said again. “Very, very sure. ”
“Okay then,” Axel said. “That’s settled. I have a question for you now, Eden.”
Suddenly her heart was fluttering, and she knew what was coming, impossible as it was.
“I had to see you today, Eden,” Axel said softly, dropping to one knee. “Because there’s something important I have to ask you.”
She put her hand over her mouth, unable to believe what she was seeing.
“You know where my heart is,” Axel said. “You and Jack mean the world to me. I’m not here to make demands. I just want to love you. And I can’t bear the idea of missing another minute. Would you let me be your husband?”
Eden felt like she was floating, a thousand versions of yes trying to escape her chest and fly out of her mouth. But she glanced over at Jack, knowing she couldn’t say yes to this no matter what her heart told her.
“You have to say yes, ” Jack whispered to her loudly, “or you don’t get the present.”
“I don’t care about presents,” she told her boy as Axel chuckled softly. “I care about you. Do you want this?”
“Of course,” Jack said, nodding his head up and down. “I want Coach to be in our family. He already asked me for my… for my…”
“For your blessing , buddy,” Axel reminded him.
“Yes,” Jack said. “And if I wanted him to be in our family. And I already said yes. Now you have to.”
“Well, then,” Eden said, turning back to Axel with a smile. “The answer is yes.”
Then he was pulling something from his pocket and opening it for her to see. Three small diamonds winked on a slender golden band inside the little wooden box.
“Oh, Axel,” she breathed, watching him slide it onto her finger.
The next thing she knew, he was rising and lifting her into his arms, holding her close and pressing his lips to hers in a gentle kiss while Jack cheered them on.
The kettle began to whistle, ending the most wonderful kiss of Eden’s life, so far.
They all piled into the kitchen and enjoyed some hot cocoa, while making guesses on whether they could make it over to the Williams Homestead the next day for Christmas with the whole family. Jack exclaimed over the special drink Axel brought them, saying it was the best he’d ever tried, and Eden agreed with him, even though she was too excited to really taste anything.
“Maybe I’ll just keep the plow,” Axel teased. “Speaking of which, as the husband-to-be of this house, I’ve got a chore to do right away.”
“What chore?” Jack asked.
“The walk needs shoveling if we want your mom to come out and watch us build a snowman later,” Axel said. “I brought two shovels in case anyone wanted to help me.”
“ I do,” Jack said, hopping out of his chair and looking like he won the lottery. “ I want to help.”
“Great,” Axel told him. “Let’s go.”
“Get nice and bundled up, Jack,” Eden told him. “Put on your snow pants over those pajamas.”
“And my snow boots,” Jack said. “Be right back. ”
“You don’t have to do this,” Eden told Axel as Jack disappeared.
“Well, I wouldn’t mind a little payment,” Axel said, shrugging and then winking at her. “How about another kiss?”
She moved to him quickly, going up on her toes to steal one more quick kiss before they had company again. But he pulled her close, and her heart was hammering by the time he let her go, just in time for Jack to explode back into the room.
“I’ll just clean up in here while you two take care of the walk,” she told them.
“Then we’ll make cookies,” Jack told Axel. “Because it’s a snow day, and we like to make cookies on snow days.”
“Sounds amazing,” Axel said.
The two of them headed out, and Eden followed as far as the front window. She stayed longer than she meant to, watching them laughing and talking as they shoveled snow, occasionally stopping to throw a little at each other.
I guess the south wind was blowing after all, she thought to herself, looking down at the ring on her finger.
By the time Axel and Jack came in again with flushed cheeks and laughing eyes, they were hungry for some real breakfast.
Eden popped back in the kitchen to make muffins and cook up some bacon. She started the kettle again when the food was ready, grabbing their mugs from the drainboard and putting them on the tray again for tea .
But when she came out to the living room to let them know everything was just about ready, she had to smile.
Axel must have been exhausted after his overnight shift driving the plow. He had fallen fast asleep, leaning back against the sofa, his big body motionless except for the steady movement of his chest.
And Jack was curled up in the crook of one of Axel’s arms, looking smaller and cuter than ever. He must have been tired too, after his late movie night and all that hard work shoveling.
Eden watched them for a long time, wondering how these two sleepy people could so easily make her feel like all the signs in the world had been pointing her right here.