Chapter 2
Two
I t used to be that we—me, my daughter Kate, Scout and Cole—would eat Christmas Eve dinner here at home. Just the four of us. And since, when we were first married, Scout didn’t cook, I was always in charge of producing the feast. Scout had claimed she lacked the experience, the interest or the aptitude for the task. As it turns out, however, only the first of those claims was true. But more about that later.
Then on Christmas Day (as with most holidays) we would all make the trek across town to Lucy’s house, and eat dinner there.
But things have changed in the last few years. Our extended “family” has expanded and grown. Eventually, we all came to the realization that it made more sense to hold the big event here. So now, Lucy makes dinner for her family and mine on Christmas Eve. And Scout and I share cooking duties on the day itself.
I’ve loved watching my wife come into her own as a cook. I’ll admit that it gave me pause at first, but now I love the spark of competition that flares between us, the rush I get whenever that spark bursts into flame. Working together as a team…well, that’s been nothing short of amazing. But, if I’m honest…I still kind of miss those quiet, intimate Christmas Eves we used to have here. I miss having Scout just hanging out in the kitchen with me while I cook—sipping a glass of wine, telling me about her day, asking me about mine; both of us relaxed and content, not a care in the world.
And I also miss being the sole provider of sustenance for my family. Is that weird? It was more than a habit; it was almost a ritual. A way to decompress after a long day at work. An act of service. A way to show my family how much I care. Of course, it’s still all of those things, obviously. But…I dunno. Maybe it’s a control issue. Maybe I just like being in charge, calling the shots.
It certainly wouldn’t be the first time I’ve had those charge laid at my door.
Our kitchen is amazing, too, by the way. Large and bright with high ceilings, and an abundance of storage in the form of cabinets, closets, and shelves. Apparently, Scout’s stepmother was an accomplished cook and foodie with enough money to afford the best of everything. And it shows. The countertops are marble. The farmhouse sink is massive. The integrated refrigerator is hidden behind cabinet doors.
There’s a dinette table tucked into one of the bow windows that overlook the backyard. And a large central island, with stools along one side for extra seating, and more storage beneath.
And then there’s the AGA. It’s a classic; with brass knobs and handles, five burners, two ovens and a separate broiler. Located in its own alcove, where I’m sure the original, cast-iron stove once stood, it dominates the room.
I set it to pre-heat, then get to work making gingerbread—extra spicy, the way my wife likes it.
It’s one of the things I started doing shortly after our marriage, one of our traditions, if you will. Each year, I bake a big, gingerbread house resembling our real one, and individual cookies shaped like all the people—big and little—and the animals that make up our extended family. And then we decorate them all, as a family, on Christmas Eve. And when I say “as a family” I mean that it’s mostly the kids—mine and Lucy’s—doing the heavy lifting at this point, with only an occasional assist from the adults.
But the older kids are almost adults now, themselves, and losing interest fast. Last year was really the first time Cole participated and I had envisioned it becoming something that he and I would end up doing together after everyone else dropped out—our own private tradition, if you will. But, if Lucy’s right…in another few years I might have a new helper.
Which would not be the worst thing in the world.
I’m still thinking about that when Kate gets home from her pre-Christmas get-together with her mother who’ll be out of town for the holidays.
“How was dinner?” I ask, as she takes a seat at the island. My ex-wife, Lauren, is not much of a cook. And I know what you’re thinking. There must be a reason that I keep marrying these women who can’t cook—right? Yeah, well…you’re not completely wrong about that.
“It was all right,” Kate replies with a shrug. She reaches for the tray of gingerbread, picks up a cookie and asks, “You’re still making these? How come?”
This takes me by surprise, until I realize the cookie in question is shaped like a dog. And we no longer have one. “Huh. Good question.” It’s a very good question, actually. Where is my head? We lost Sara earlier this year. We put flowers and dog biscuits on our Day of the Dead altar just last month. It’s not like I forgot she was dead. So why am I still making dog-shaped cookies?
My gaze strays involuntarily toward the space on the floor where we used to keep her bowls. “I guess I didn’t really think about it,” I say, feeling sad, now that I have. She was a good dog. She deserves better than to be forgotten so easily. Not that she is, really. I miss her every time I leave the house for one of my morning runs. Sure, she’d slowed down noticeably in the last few months as her age caught up with her. And, towards the end, I’d actually begun to leave her home any time I wanted a real workout. But, even so, mornings just aren’t the same without her.
“Sorry,” Kate says, still flipping the cookie between her fingers. “Didn’t mean to harsh your vibe. I think it’s…nice…that you’re still thinking of her.”
“Yeah, well… It is what it is,” I tell her, but before she can put the cookie in her mouth, I slide a plate of broken pieces in front of her. “Here. Eat these. Let’s save the rest are for Christmas Eve. Okay?”
“Mm. These are good. Spicy,” she murmurs approvingly, scarfing down one of the pieces and immediately reaching for another.
I nod in acknowledgment—they really are. I grate fresh ginger into the batter—in addition to the standard dried ginger-cinnamon-nutmeg-allspice-clove spice blend. And then I add a generous measure of both black and cayenne pepper. And no, you can’t have the recipe. My family’s weirdly obsessed with keeping those things secret.
“So, does this mean Scout’s back?” Kate asks, a logical leap since, as previously mentioned, my wife likes the spice.
“Not ’til tomorrow,” I reply and then, noticing the way Kate’s gaze keeps drifting back toward the cookies, I make my own logical leap as to the quality of her dinner, and suggest, “There’s some leftover pizza in the fridge. Want me to heat it up for you?”
“Yes, please,” she responds instantly. She brushes the crumbs from her hands and gets up to get herself a drink while I slide what’s left of the pie into the second oven.
“So, she asks,” once we’re both seated at the island with our drinks and our pizza. “When do you plan on expanding the family?”
“What?” I stare at her in alarm. “Who’ve you been talking to? Did you see Lucy tonight, or Mandy? Did one of them say something to you about this?”
“No,” my daughter stops eating to frown at me. “Why would they? What are you getting worked up for?”
“What do you mean ‘why would they’? Who’d you get that idea from, if it wasn’t from them? Was it Scout? Did she say something about it?”
“About the cookies? No. I don’t think so. So, are you?”
“Wait… Cookies?”
Katie nods, then gestures at the figures lined up on the trays. “I thought maybe it was time. Like…maybe you might want to start updating your cutters? Maybe change a few out, add some new ones?”
“Oh.” I take a long drink of beer to hide my embarrassment. It’s been a few years, actually, since we—by which I mean Scout; she’s the artist after all—designed the templates for our bespoke cookie cutters. The family has both grown up and expanded considerably since then. We have no babies, at the moment, but we also have no pre-school kid cutters, either. An obvious omission. “Yeah, I think that’s probably a good idea. Smart thinking. I’ll ask Scout about making some new ones as soon as she’s back.”
“Okay, well, good. Glad to hear it. But not before this Christmas, right?”
“No. Not this Christmas.”
From there, we move on to other topics. School, mostly, on her part. Kate’s a senior now and she and Lucy’s daughter Mandy are both on the fence about where they want to go, what they want to do. It’s apparently been causing some friction between them.
I don’t care what she chooses, as long as it makes her happy. I have enough to worry about with how I’m gonna pay for it. Scout will want to use her money and I’m more open to that now than I would have been a few years ago. But it still doesn’t sit right.
Eventually, our conversation runs down. Kate finishes her meal, wishes me goodnight, and then heads upstairs to her bedroom, leaving me alone in the kitchen with my pizza, my beer, my memories. And there are so many of those.
We ate pizza in this very kitchen five and a half years ago on the first night that Scout and I got back together after being apart for twenty years. It’s funny to think about it now. We’d spent the day searching for Sara, who’d gotten lost. And I was half out of my mind by the time we’d made it back to the house. Out of my mind with longing for Scout, and out of my mind due to my mistaken belief that she’d never loved me back.
I’d asked her why she’d stayed away so long, and she’d told me she had nothing to come back here for.
In truth, I should have known better than to ask that question. I should have had the sense to realize how much she was hurting. She’d lost her stepmother; she’d lost her dog (we wouldn’t find Sara until the next day—safe, if not exactly sound) and I’d done too good of a job convincing her of my own indifference. So, neither of us were in a happy mood that night…
“Do you want me to leave?” I’d asked, though God only knew what I thought I was doing with that question either. Leaving her was not an option. Yet, what choice would I have had, if she’d said yes
“No,” she whispered. And just the sound of her voice, that husky whisper, was enough to drive me mad.
I flipped open the box and picked up a slice—out of self-preservation. The idea being that if I stuffed my mouth with enough pizza, maybe I could avoid saying anything even more stupid. “Come on,” I told her. “We better eat this. It’s not gonna get any warmer.”
She was drinking wine; I was drinking beer. We both were eating pizza with grim determination—and little-to-no enjoyment. It’s a small town, like I said. We got our pizza that night from the same place we always do. And in general, I have no complaints; they make a pretty good pie. But that night…well, I might as well have been eating the box.
So, we stood there in the kitchen, desperately searching for a way to connect with each other, while daylight—and all our hopes—dimmed around us. All day long, I’d been aware of the heat that still flared between us. Only a faint spark, compared to what we’d once had, it kept trying to catch fire, all the same. It kept trying to burst back into brightness. But everything—every cold word we spoke, all the suffocating silence in between, the smothering weight of too many years apart—seemed to conspire against it.
I didn’t want to accept it, but in my heart, I believed that it was a lost cause. With each moment that passed, I became more and more convinced that by the end of the night, we’d for sure have found some way to kill it.
In about an hour, I figured—maybe two hours, tops—I was going to have to press a last kiss to her cheek and walk out of her life, closing the door on twenty years of hopes and dreams, leaving them scattered like fallen leaves on the floor, dead and dried, and ready to be blown away. Or burned to ash. Or shoveled into a bag and driven to a landfill. And then… And then everything changed.
A cry of pain, like ice cracking, broke from Scout’s lips as she hurled herself against me, clutching at my shoulders, kissing me for all she was worth. And, oh God, the feel of her body pressed against mine, the taste of her mouth! How had I lived all those years without them?
I fell back a step, staggered by the impact. I held her close, wrapping my arms around her, and kissed her back. People talk about finding God at times of extreme emotion, and I don’t know that I’d go that far. But, in that moment, I knew beyond doubt that I’d come home; that this right here, locked in her embrace, was where I’d always belong.
“Your bedroom. Where…?” I heard myself say a moment—or an eternity—later as we grappled with clothing, as I bent my head again and again to devour her lips, her throat, her breasts. I tugged at her hair, forcing her head back, causing her back to bow, feasting my eyes on the sight of her, lost to desire. I filled my hands and my mouth with soft, soft flesh, reveling in the taste and the smell and the sound of her. And I tried, with all my might, to resist the urge to take her right there in the kitchen, to strip her bare, lay her out on top of the island and fuck her into mindlessness with all the strength of twenty years of pent-up lust, and need, and loneliness.
Somehow, we made it to her bedroom. Which was upstairs, of course, nearly a continent away.
It’s been so long; I remember thinking as the memories came thundering back. Each piece of clothing removed; each inch of flesh revealed ramped up my impatience. Had I ever been this greedy before, this desperate, this close to losing the entirety of my mind? I didn’t think it was possible.
Then finally, finally, finally, we tumbled into bed. Which was when the real problem occurred to me.
There’d been alarm bells ringing in the back of my mind, unpleasant thoughts percolating up from the depths of my brain for the past several minutes; and I’d been doing my best to ignore them. But the truth was, I hadn’t planned on doing this tonight. In fact, I’d actively refused to even let myself hope for more than a kiss—at most.
All of which goes to say, I was woefully unprepared for actual sex.
“Scout. Stop a minute,” I begged—my voice harsh in my throat, my body shaking with the effort to not plunge into her right then and there. “We need protection. Do you have anything…?”
“Would it really be so terrible?” she asked instead—and I promptly lost my breath as a vision of my future—of our future—of (at the very least) one possible future out of a host of alternatives, unfolded before my mind’s eye. A vision of the two of us, bound together forever, a family. I lost my breath completely as I realized how much I wanted that—more than anything, more than ever. And, after all that I’d gone through, all the pain of the past twenty years? I figured the universe owed it to me.
There was no possible way I could refuse.
“Nothing that comes of this could ever be terrible,” I promised her as I gathered her back into my arms, as I took her mouth with sweet passion. As I plunged inside her, making us one, making her mine, recapturing the heart I’d lost to her years ago, staking my claim on the future—our future. The only future I’d ever really wanted.
I love you , I thought; I love you. I love you. I love you .
Sadly, I didn’t say the words aloud—not then. I’d have saved us both a lot of trouble, a lot of heartache, maybe a lot of danger, if I had. But speech was beyond me by that point. So the opportunity for that possibly easier future sailed on by, unremarked, and disappeared over the horizon.
Not that I noticed, of course. I was lost in the moment, overcome with the rightness of what we were doing, the seeming inevitability of it all. I probably wouldn’t have cared if I had noticed. Because it was inconceivable that she might not understand how I felt. It seemed impossible that she did not feel the same about me. But humans are foolish creatures. We evolved words for a reason. I really should have remembered that.
But even though we stumble and fall sometimes, even though we oftentimes get lost and wander from our path, occasionally we do find our way home, we do get things right.
And that night, the night we threw caution, common sense and the very concept of contraception to the wind (and ended up making Cole, in the process) we got things very, very right.
I spend the next few minutes straightening up. I pack away the cookies so that they’ll stay fresh. I load the dishwasher and turn it on. I do a perimeter check—making sure doors are locked and lights are off. I catch myself thinking that I should probably let the dog out, one last time—and then allow myself a moment to grieve when I remember that I already did that, months ago.
Upstairs, I can hear Kate through the door of her room giggling on the phone. Cole’s kicked his covers off again, so I take a moment to tuck him in once more. In our bedroom, two of our cats—cupcake and snickerdoodle—yawn and stretch when I flick on the light. I’m fine with them staying, but they scamper off the bed and out the door before I can close it, no doubt in search of wider spaces.
If Lucy’s correct about there being a baby on the way, I can think of at least one reason why Scout might be hesitant to tell me. I’ve been known to have money issues. Specifically, I’ve occasionally reacted badly to the fact that she has more of it than I do. I like to think those problems are in the past, but are they really?
There has to be a way that I can signal that to her, that I can let her know that all I really want in life is to walk beside her. That whatever path she chooses to take, is the path we’ll both take—no questions asked. That whatever adventure she chooses to embark on, my bags are packed and waiting by the door.
But the truth is…words aren’t always that useful, in situations like these. I mean, sure everything I just said sounds good and all. And in this moment, I mean every word. But I wouldn’t believe me, either, if I were her. If I were listening to me say any of that—I’d have questions, to say the least. I’d have serious doubts about my ability to follow through.
Actions are what this moment calls for. I need to step up and make sure she knows that whatever life brings us, I’m there for it. Not just to stand by her side—although I’ll do that, too. But also to face it head on—all of it, the good and the bad—together, as a team.
How do I plan on doing all that? What action do I intend on taking? I have no freaking clue. But hey, there are still a few days left before Christmas. That’s more than enough time to come up with something. But, in the meantime…
I hit the shower, let the hot water wash away all the frustrations I’m feeling—and rub a quick one out as I indulge in more memories of Scout—gasping and whimpering as I torment her with my tongue. Of the taste and smell of her, wondrous and intoxicating. The softness of her hair, the sleekness of her skin. The strength of her internal muscles clenching, clenching, clenching.
I brace one hand against the wall for support, take hold of my shaft with the other and stroke. And, as I do, I relive every detail. The way her lips look when they’re stretched around my dick. The way her cheeks hollow out as she sucks. How her arms reach out to clasp me tight. How her legs wrap my hips. How her body welcomes me, eagerly, passionately, wetly.
The way it feels when our hands are clasped on the bed above her head, fingers entwined, breath coming hard. Words of love—whether spoken or unspoken, grunted, whispered, chanted or prayed—all get lost amid the shudders, the sobs and the groans, amid the coming together, mindless and hot.
Slowly, my awareness returns to the present. To the water still needling my skin. To the traces of cum still sliding down the tile to circle the drain before eventually disappearing.
Eventually, my heartbeat slows, my breathing returns to normal, my muscles unclench. And for all that my children are both safe in their rooms, just footsteps away; for all that a phalanx of cats patrols my hallways and are generally amenable to being scooped up and cuddled, if need be; I feel bereft, I feel alone, I miss my wife.
Tomorrow cannot come soon enough.