Chapter 13
Maybe it is a brain bleed , I think, my feet sliding in Mom’s boots as I walk.
They’re a half size too big, even though I’ve tied the laces as tightly as they go.
The no-sock thing isn’t helping, and there’s something sharp (a decorative pine-cone barb, I learn later when I have to tweeze it out of my skin) that keeps stabbing my left sole.
Is it a coma? A fever-induced dream? One too many glasses of eggnog at the wedding? Or related, a brand-new dairy allergy?
As a doctor, I make decisions based on evidence, and so I do a lightning-quick evaluation of the current situation.
It feels all too real to be a coma-induced dream.
I pinch the web of skin between my finger and thumb, and it hurts.
I plunge my bare hand into the snow, and it prickles with the cold.
I inhale deeply and catch scents of evergreen needles, until the inside of my nose freezes up and the scent fades.
I’m definitely here … wherever, and whenever, here is.
So that moves time travel to the top of the list, however unbelievable.
By the time I reach the town square, I’m no closer to untangling the mess I woke up into. Like, why am I here two days before mom’s ankle fracture, which was the reason I returned to Harmony Hills last year? Why this date, in particular?
“Please be there, please be there,” I murmur, and thankfully Helena picks up after one ring.
“Hey, you! How was your trip home?” she asks.
“Trip home was… uneventful.”
“You sound weird,” Helena says. “Are you okay?”
Definitely not okay. “I have food poisoning. I ate a sandwich from the gas station.”
There’s a sigh on the other end, which is sympathetic but tinged with exasperation. “Elizabeth, how many times do we have to talk about this? Never eat anything from a gas station that isn’t in a package ,” she says.
There’s ambient sounds of traffic—horns, sirens, revving car engines—and I know she’s outside the hospital, likely finishing her morning coffee before her shift starts. “Actually, never eat anything at a gas station. Maybe that should be the rule? No wiggle room.”
“I know. I have a problem.” This is not my first bout of road-trip food poisoning, and it likely won’t be my last. But also, I have much bigger problems than my less-than-wise food choices.
“Ah, it’s part of your charm. I’m sorry you’re sick.
Is Austin racing there to wipe your fevered brow?
” Helena’s tone is laced with sarcasm. She is not my ex-boyfriend’s biggest fan, hence the quip.
Helena, who, unlike Austin, did come by to check on me when I had the flu (she actually signed for his soup delivery), said, “Yes, it’s a nice gesture…
for a coworker , not the supposed love of your life. ”
“He can’t make it,” I reply now, ignoring Helena’s mumbled “Surprise, surprise” reply. I think about how she responded to our breakup, with similar mumbling but with the words good riddance tacked on.
“But he’s coming, isn’t he?” she asks. “Before your trip, for an early Christmas with your family?”
“He can’t. Surgeries. You know how it is.” I swallow hard. “It’s so last minute he can’t reschedule anything.”
“Surprise, surprise,” Helena mutters again, less quietly this time. “That one is horny for surgeries.”
I burst out laughing, and the release feels wonderful. A brief respite from whatever this new, inexplicable reality is. “Well, he is a surgeon, Helly. Being ‘horny for surgery’ is a good thing.”
“Whatever, you know what I mean,” Helena replies, her voice softening. I do know what she means. But Austin’s lack of bedside manner is irrelevant now. As is how much the soup thing bothered me, even though I’ve never admitted it out loud.
“I need to ask you something.” I sit heavily on a nearby bench and toe at the soft snow on the ground, remembering how last year there was plenty of pre-Christmas snow—a record, actually.
More proof that I have in fact travelled back in time, or that I’ve lost it and hallucinated the end of my relationship, Amelia’s wedding, Liam and Mary Piggins…
I don’t know if I want to laugh or cry at the incredulity of this.
“Sure. What’s up?” Helena replies.
I pause for a beat, then, “How old is Adelaide?”
A matching pause on the other end before, “How sick are you exactly?”
“Please, Helly,” I reply, my tone pleading. I’m reminded of my earlier conversation with Austin, and set my head in my hand, closing my eyes. “Just answer the question.”
“She’s two, Elizabeth, which of course you know because you were at her birthday party a week ago . Gave her that super-expensive doll I told you not to buy, but that is now her favourite thing on this planet, remember?”
But in my most recent memory, sweet Adelaide just had her third birthday.
The doll from last year remains a beloved toy, and this year I gifted her accessories for it, including a plush show horse and an adorable mini–riding outfit for Adelaide.
Helena rolled her eyes at this year’s gift and nudged me hard with her elbow, whispering, “Thought we were besties; thanks for nothing, Aunt Elizabeth.” They lug that doll everywhere they go, including to preschool, the park, even the grocery store.
Now Adelaide insists the horse must come along as well.
“I need to tell you something, but don’t freak out, okay?”
“I won’t freak out,” Helena replies, steady-voiced to prove it. “But are you about to tell me you’re a spy or something? Is that it? Are you a spy? ” She mock whispers the last part.
Helena is pragmatic, not prone to melodrama, and I’m positive she can handle anything thrown her way. However, this might be the exception. But I need to say it out loud—to tell someone what’s happening. Besides, Helena knows me better than anyone. She has to believe me.
“Come on, Elizabeth,” Helena continues, impatient with my prolonged silence. “Out with it.”
I take a deep breath. “I think I’ve gone back in time. To last December.”
“I bet!” Helena laughs. “Isn’t that part of the Harmony Hills charm, though? ‘It’s like Christmas copied and pasted itself,’ I think is how you put it.”
“No, Helly, I’m serious. Not like, This Christmas feels like every other Christmas … I’m living last Christmas season all over again. Like, literally over again .”
“Did your mom give you a pharmaceutical?” Helena asks. She’s no longer laughing.
“No! Listen, I know this sounds… impossible… but something happened last night at Mila and Beckett’s wedding, and I—”
“Hold on… Amelia’s married?! Why didn’t you tell me this was happening? Or was it a surprise? Holy shit, that’s amazing, if so. Talk about burying the lede!” David, her ex, is a journalist at the Star , and she often uses this line.
“That’s why I came home—for Amelia’s wedding.
Except when I woke up this morning, no one knew anything about a wedding.
It was like I dreamt it, except I didn’t,” I reply, growing more agitated.
I’m desperate for Helena to believe me, despite how far-fetched this all sounds.
I walk back and forth in front of the bench as I try to explain the situation.
My pacing creates a deep trough in the snow.
“I’m not following,” she replies once I’m done.
“I’m sure I’ve told you about how we have this tree-lighting ceremony in Harmony Hills, and how if it snows right as the tree lights up, your wish will come true?”
Helena murmurs, “Yes, love that.”
“Well, last night, when the tree lit up, it also started snowing—the first snowfall of the holiday season, which is a big deal in Harmony Hills—and Mr. Livery-Quinn—that’s Beckett’s dad—read the poem about the snowfall and wishes, and then Mary Piggins got loose and knocked me out cold, because I was on the ground one minute and the next waking up in Amelia’s bedroom at our parents’ house, but it was, or is , last Christmas, and nothing is—”
“Elizabeth, stop. Stop speaking.” Helena’s voice reminds me of how she talks to Adelaide when she needs the toddler to pay attention, right this minute .
I stop talking, shaking both from the cold and the burst of adrenaline in recounting the impossible situation I’ve found myself in.
“Look, I have no idea what’s going on with you—and I absolutely have questions about who Mary Piggins is—but… I believe you,” Helena says.
“ Thank you. I can’t tell you how relieved I am!” I release my breath with an audible whoosh. “I knew you’d believe me. I thought, Call Helly, she’ll know what to do , and you—”
“Hang on a second, friend. I believe you believe this is happening.”
It’s like I’ve swallowed a snowball—my stomach goes ice-cold, and my relief evaporates. “So wait… you don’t actually believe me?”
“I mean… you’re a Christmas time traveller back from the future? ” Helena asks. “Would you believe me if I called you with a similar story?”
I frown, dejected by this truth. “Unlikely.”
“How would you respond? If I told you I had travelled through time?” she asks, her tone gentle but no-nonsense.
Sighing, I reply, “I’d order a head CT, STAT.”
“Exactly,” Helena says. “So maybe get a head CT, STAT?”
Disappointment fills me, along with a fresh wave of fear, because of course what I’m saying is preposterous. If someone came into my emergency room with this sort of claim, I would order a full workup, plus call in a psych consult for good measure.
“You know, it’s probably dehydration,” I reply, keeping my voice as steady as possible. “Don’t worry about me—I promise I’m fine. I know you have to get to work.”
“I do have to get to work, but I will continue to worry about you until you tell me you no longer think you’ve time-travelled,” Helena says. “Keep me posted, and for the love of all things, get some fluids in you, okay?”
I promise I will, then end the call. A moment later, it begins snowing.
Gigantic, fluffy flakes that stay on your coat long enough to see each flake’s unique and intricate pattern.
I glance at the evergreen tree beside me, which is already partially decorated for the upcoming tree lighting.
The twinkle lights are wrapped around the branches, but of course they haven’t been illuminated yet—that tradition is saved for the ceremony.
Well, it’s worth a try.
I close my eyes, tilting my head up to the sky, and whisper:
“Gather ’round, young and old,
A wondrous sight, a tale to be told.
With sparkling lights and branches green,
A special wish for a festive scene.
As snowflakes fall on this glorious night,
Close your eyes; close them tight.
If you believe, just wait and see
What magic comes from the Christmas tree!”
I take a breath, eyes still firmly closed, and add, “I wish for everything to be exactly as it was at last night’s tree-lighting ceremony. The wedding, the snowfall, the—”
But my fervent wish is interrupted by a loud snort. My eyes snap open at the sound and, discombobulated, I lose my balance and fall dramatically into a soft mound of snow under the lowest branches of the evergreen.