Chapter 7 Ember #2
The vastness used to comfort me.
I became a speck. And so did my worries.
Tonight, I try to find that feeling again. But it’s harder when the ache is closer than the stars, and I can smell my problem’s cologne.
“This was Zermatt…what? Jean? 2007?” Uncle Bob is launching into a tale that he’s told several times.
“2008,” Papa corrects him.
Uncle Bob leans back in his chair, swirling his cognac. “Well, Hélène—Commissioner Dubois back then—takes a nasty fall halfway down the red slope.”
Aksel grins. He’s heard this before, too. “Oh no.”
Papa gives him a withering look. “Other people haven’t heard this story.”
“True.” Calypso raises her hand like we’re in school. “I haven’t.”
Ransom has his arm around her. “Neither have I. Continue.”
Uncle Bob, who loves an audience, does so. “She gets up—clearly limping—and says, ‘I have meetings with the Germans tomorrow. I will not arrive in a wheelchair.’ Then, mon Dieu, she skis the rest of the slope. Broken tibia and all.”
Calypso laughs. “You’re kidding!”
“I was there,” Aunt Tanya declares, nodding solemnly.
Uncle Bob smirks. “Tanya, you were in Nice that winter.”
She shrugs. “Well, I heard about it. Same thing.”
Margot rolls her eyes. “You always manage to insert yourself into history. Next, you’ll tell us you advised Napoleon.”
“I did. He didn’t listen,” Aunt Tanya says primly, taking a sip of her mulled wine. “If he had, he wouldn’t have been exiled to Elba.”
Her husband scoffs. “And would’ve probably won against the Russians, too.”
Everyone is in good spirits.
I force myself to feel it.
It’s not like I’ve spent the past five years moping around over Ransom…okay, some of the time I have, but the heart wants what it wants, right?
I can’t help who I love.
I couldn’t help it—no matter who I dated after Ransom, they always came up short.
“Come on, I want a taste,” Jonathan cries out as Freja snatches a piece of roasted almond brittle away from him.
“This has cardamom. I’m not sharing.”
“Marriage is legally binding, which includes confectionery communism.” He pulls her legs onto his lap.
Freja kicks him lightly. “This is how revolutions start.” She holds out the brittle, and her husband takes a bite.
“One would think we don’t give you enough to eat,” Mama says in mock exasperation.
“How was the Christmas market?” Papa asks. “We haven’t been yet.”
“Perfect like always,” Freja says indulgently.
“Remember the year Freja threw a snowball at Santa because he told her to smile more?” Ransom reminisces.
“That man was condescending!” Freja protests.
“I hate men who ask women to smile,” Calypso interjects.
“Exactly! And I was twelve,” Freja pouts.
“You were sixteen,” Aksel states dryly. “And it wasn’t just a snowball. It had ice in it.”
“Improvised weaponry.” Ransom laughs. “Impressive aim.”
“Thank you.” Freja bows her head. “I come from a long line of women who know how to throw things.”
“Indeed,” Mama drawls as she assembles a Croque-Nuit on a lacquered tray. “My Baccarat vase still remembers.”
“This is such a calorie fest,” Calypso comments again.
“We only do this at Christmas.” Mama carefully balances marshmallows on skewers. “The rest of the year, sugar is banned.”
“For some of us,” Freja points out. “I love my Dunkin’.”
“I can’t believe I have a daughter who eats donuts.” Mama wrinkles her nose as she hands a constructed Croque-Nuit to Latika.
Latika bites into it, eyes closing in satisfaction. “Still the best part of Christmas.”
“Excuse me,” Aksel says, lifting his mug. “I was told the mulled wine was the highlight.”
“Both things can be true,” she replies diplomatically and kisses his jaw.
Papa shifts in his chair. “Anyone going skiing tomorrow?”
“I’m taking Thomas on the bunny slope,” Aksel says proudly. “And Ember is going to take Anika.”
My niece and I have been skiing together for a few years now. After an hour or so, I hand her back to her parents so I can get to some of the challenging slopes. That is ritual, too.
“Thomas will last ten minutes and demand hot chocolate,” Latika says fondly. “But sure, ski day.”
“I’ll join you all.” Freja yawns again and looks at her watch. “Assuming I don’t get buried under a pile of correspondence from work tonight. People never stop leaking things two days before Christmas.”
“Same,” Jonathan sighs. “The House won’t vote until January, but the press won’t rest.”
I realize, as the conversation fades and one by one we head to our beds, that I haven’t said a word since we got here. I haven’t spoken at all.
One-on-one, I can hold a conversation just fine.
With Freja, I can tease and laugh and match her note for note.
With Aksel, I can be quiet, thoughtful, and dryly funny in a way that makes him snort wine through his nose.
Even with Jonathan, I know how to joke with, and ask questions that matter.
But when everyone is together—when voices rise and crisscross and become a living, breathing tapestry of conversation—I fade. I shrink.
I think too much.
Am I talking too little?
Should I interrupt?
That joke in my head—is it funny or just weird?
I become too aware of myself, of the way my mouth doesn’t open when the perfect window passes. Of how I reach for a comment, but it vanishes under someone else’s punchline.
However, I enjoy these times with my family, even if I’m more of an observer than a participant. Because sometimes love looks like letting me sit under the stars with a warm drink, saying nothing at all.