Chapter Two
Dillon
The holiday season was always a busy time for the grocery store, but somehow it had seemed even worse this year.
More hectic, the customers more demanding, running out of items too fast.
Maybe because I was actually running the place, not just helping his folks out.
I never seemed to be able to slow down — there was always something else that needed to be ordered, or a home delivery to make, or someone who just wanted a chat.None of which I minded doing, that was the business after all, but I never had a moment to breathe.
The To Do list in my mind had a new item every five minutes.
Each morning, I thanked Christian from the bottom of my soul just for turning up again.
“It’s been so busy, I wouldn’t blame you if you quit,” I said, on the morning of December twelfth. “I thought it wouldn’t be like this until the week before Christmas.”
Christian chuckled. “Well, I want to be helpful, and I can clearly see I’m helping!” He gave me a soothing pat on the shoulder. “I’m here for you.”
I held back the sudden urge to give the other man a bear hug and cry on his shoulder. “Thanks.”
Truth be told, I couldn’t have held it together without Christian. The guy went above and beyond, and was very thoughtful in a way I was constantly grateful for. We got into the habit of ensuring the other was taking breaks and staying hydrated.
I made another order of frozen turkeys. They’d run out so fast. According to his Dad’s ledger, he should have easily ordered enough, but somehow... no. And the hams weren’t selling as fast as they should be. Why was everyone wanting turkey? Had they all skipped Thanksgiving?
Then there were those chocolates that had somehow gone viral online and everyone wanted them. I’d ordered twice as many boxes of those than I thought I’d need at the start of the month and they were already all gone.
Just before he left for the day, I gave Christian the second to last take-and-bake pizzas from the deli fridge. “They won’t be as good tomorrow, I’ll take the last one.”
“I can pay for it,” Christian offered.
I shook my head and ushered him out of the door. “Consider it a tip for hard work.”
It wasn’t exactly the most nutritious dinner, but it was something.
Before I went home, I took a look at the takings and wondered if there was enough income to hire someone else. Maybe that kid, Henry? Just for the next couple of weeks to help with stocking shelves?
I probably could. Assuming Henry was interested. I’d talk to Tane about it.
Or maybe Tane could come in for some hours...
Locking up the store for the night, I looked at the windows. I hadn’t even managed to put up the traditional Christmas decorations in the window. They’d be stored somewhere in back, I assumed.
I added that to the mental To Do list for tomorrow. That was a problem for future Dillon.
I walked home slowly, trying to let go of the rush of the day in order to be relaxed when I saw Tane.
Tane, gorgeous, sweet Tane.
The ring I’d impulsively ordered online was metaphorically burning a hole in my pocket. I wanted to give it to Tane, but I didn’t want to scare him off.
Our relationship, what we had, It was all still so new.
We’d fallen in love so fast that it felt fragile, delicate. Like something he had to handle carefully, to protect. It made me think of a Taylor Swift song, something off Folklore maybe.
Maybe Christmas would be the right time?
Or maybe New Year’s? New Year’s Eve was a nice, celebratory time to pop the question.
Valentine’s Day wasn’t too long after that, either.
I sighed aloud, my breath puffing white in front of me.
I looked up at the sky, the clouds were few, and fluffy white.
We very rarely got snow in Foggy Basin, but it was chilly all the same. The hint of snow, even if we weren’t likely to see snow. I always liked to check for the heavy purple clouds, just in case.
The thing that was weighing on me was pretty clear. Proposing was such a big step. It was a commitment, it meant something.
I was relatively sure that Tane would say yes, but I wanted to do it right.
Make it romantic.
Make it something as special as Tane himself was.
I balanced the pizza carefully as I went up the stairs to the apartment, and opened the door to a huge surprise.
The room was filled with the festive scent of Christmas — and the source? A big fluffy pine tree positioned in the corner by the window. Tane leaped out of the couch and gave me a sheepish smile.
The coffee table was covered with bits of paper and a roll of sticky tape. The tree was garlanded with a simple paper chain, and on top sat a handmade paper angel.
“Surprise! Merry Christmas!” Tane said. “Do you like it?”
“It’s wonderful.” I said it quickly, to reassure Tane, but in truth I was a bit dumbfounded. “You did this? Today?”
“Yes, and there’s more coming tomorrow, I did an order, um. But it wasn’t going to turn up in time and the tree looked sad with nothing on it, so I started handmaking stuff.”
Tane moved closer, took the pizza out of my hands and placed a semi-circle of paper in his hand instead. “Your job is to make another angel, decorate it any way you like and it can go on the mantelpiece.”
I looked at the mantel and saw a carefully-made paper angel. It was so simple, so sweet, so earnest. My heart throbbed with affection.
“I... Thank you. This is amazing.”
Tane kissed my cheek. “Thanks for the pizza, got so wrapped up in this I forgot about eating. I’ll get it cooked.”
“I can do it,” I protested, but Tane had already taken the pizza into the kitchen.
Left alone, I thought about what he said. He’d given me a job, so I might as well do it. I sat down, picked up a gold metallic marker pen and drew a little grocer’s apron on the angel’s body.
My lines were a bit wobbly, and I wasn’t as delicate at drawing as I’d hoped. Iit came out a little messy, but it was at least recognisable.
“That’s cute.”
I looked over my shoulder to see Tane smiling. “You’re just saying that.”
“Nope, it’s cute. It’s very you. Now the wings...” he pointed at an already cut out set of white wings on the table.
I dutifully decorated the wings, using the small, colourful scraps of paper Tane had left behind and glueing them down. The effect was sort of feathery, and all colours of the rainbow.
Something about working with my hands, doing crafts that absolutely didn’t have to be done was soothing. I hadn’t expected that. The stress and tension from the day left me and I found himself smiling at my little haphazard creation.
Tane taped it together for me and set it on the mantel next to his own.
“Where’d you learn to make those?” I asked.
Tane flopped onto the couch beside me with a happy sigh. “Made them as a kid. We didn’t always have a lot of money so we often made our own decorations. There’s something sweet about them, eh?”
He put his arm around me and I leaned into his warmth.
“I get that. I usually just did those turkeys from a handprint at Thanksgiving and that was the extent of it. Aster’s were always nicer looking than mine.”
“I don’t think it’s about looking nicer,” Tane’s voice went a little dreamy, like it did when he was explaining the concept behind a song.
“I think it’s about having made something yourself, something that no one else in the world has.
Then, next year you can dig it out again and remember how you made it, that’s pretty magic. ”
I leaned my head on Tane’s shoulder, loving him a little more every moment. “It is. We’ll have to get Aster to make one too, when he gets home.”
“When’s he due back?”
“I think he said the twentieth.”
“What was it like, Christmas I mean, when you were kids?” Tane’s hand stroked my upper arm, a calm, repetitive movement he knew soothed me.
I thought back. “Well, my folks were always so busy with the store, right up until closing time Christmas Eve, so we didn’t do a lot of like, home baking or making decorations, obviously.
But Dad would bring home whatever seasonal stuff hadn’t sold on Christmas Eve and we’d have this big feast. They always went all out on our presents.
Bikes, big action figure playsets, whole series of books at once, that kind of thing. It was a lot of fun.”
“That’s cool.” Tane kissed my hair.
“How about you?”
“There used to be this awesome Christmas parade,” Tane said.
“We were pretty rural so Santa rode on a tractor, but we loved it. They’d give out lollies, er.
.. candy. The whole community came together at Christmas, made sure no one was going hungry, or going without presents.
Even if it was just a cheap K-mart teddy bear, we always got something, you know? ”
“I love that.”
A buzzer went off in the kitchen and Tane got up to cut the pizza.
He’d got me thinking about Foggy Basin and our community here... Foggy Basin Grocer’s was, in some ways, the main purveyor of food for a lot of people. I didn’t think there were exactly a lot of homeless folks in their small town, but there had to be some families doing it rough.
Maybe there’s something I can do to help. But what?