Chapter 2
Chapter two
Ben
I flipped on the workshop lights, and the old building seemed to sigh with contentment. After ten years of restoration work, I'd learned the Yuletide Valley Theater had moods. During the Twelve Nights, it had opinions.
This morning, it was expectant.
The theater was always opinionated during the Twelve Nights, but this year it felt downright driven.
Maybe it knew how much was riding on the performance.
The hospital fundraiser show always mattered, but the pediatric wing needed new equipment, and Charice had been working herself half to death to make sure we hit our numbers.
Kids deserved something bright in midwinter.
Maybe that's why the theater felt restless—like it wanted everything perfect.
I'd told myself I'd come in early to finish the Macy's storefront facade.
That's what I'd told Holly when she'd texted at midnight asking if I was "prepared for tomorrow.
" But as I ran my hand over the pine boards, feeling the grain beneath my fingers, I knew I was really here because Alex Garland was coming at seven, and I wanted everything to be perfect.
Maybe I was being a little ridiculous. He was only observing. No promises, he'd said.
The wood warmed under my palm, and I thought I heard my grandfather's voice: The valley knows what it wants, Benny. And what the valley wants, it keeps.
"Not helping, Grandpa," I muttered.
I made coffee in the ancient percolator backstage—the one that only worked during the Christmas season and produced the best coffee I'd ever tasted despite its ancient age. As it bubbled and hissed, I checked my work from yesterday.
The storefront was coming together nicely. I'd hand-carved the Art Deco details to match the Macy's Department Store of the 1940s, the setting of Miracle on 34th Street. Each rosette and every bit of scrollwork required patience and precision.
My phone buzzed.
Holly: He's nervous. Be gentle.
Ben: When am I not gentle?
Holly: With wood, always. With your own heart, never. You need to fix that.
I set the phone down, trying to ignore my racing pulse. The Christmas lights strung throughout the theater flickered, then settled into a warm, steady glow.
At 6:55, I heard the stage door creak. My heart leaped into my throat.
Alex stepped out of the cold morning darkness, snowflakes caught in his dark hair, and cheeks flushed from the walk. He wore a different coat—still expensive, but more casual. It was a shade of forest green that made his eyes look even brighter.
"You're early," I said, then wanted to kick myself. Smooth, Ben.
"So are you." His smile was tentative, but real. "I couldn't sleep. Kept thinking about..."
He trailed off, but his gaze dropped to my hands. The same hands that held his last night.
"The theater?" I offered, though we both knew that wasn't what he meant.
"Sure. Let's go with that." His laugh was soft, almost shy. "Something smells amazing."
"Coffee. It's probably magic, and it's caffeinated." I gestured toward the backstage area. "Come on. I'll give you the full tour before everyone else arrives."
As he followed me through the wings, the stage lights flickered on by themselves. Both of us stopped.
"Did you...?" Alex asked.
"No." I looked up at the old lighting board. "The theater does that sometimes. During the Twelve Nights, especially. I think it wants to show off."
"Right. That's totally normal." He smiled as he said it, and I noticed he didn't seem surprised. He'd spent fifteen years away, but Yuletide Valley had raised him. I was confident that part of him still believed.
I poured him coffee in a chipped mug that read "Break a Leg" in fading gold letters. Our fingers brushed as I handed it to him, and heat shot up my arm.
The overhead lights brightened.
Alex cleared his throat, wrapping both hands around the mug. "So, the tour?"
"Right." I led him toward the front of the house, fully aware of how he moved beside me. "I thought we'd start with my favorite part."
The early morning light transformed the lobby. The chandelier cast prismatic rainbows across the restored woodwork, and garlands of fresh evergreen draped the banisters, filling the air with the mingled scents of pine and cinnamon.
The real showpiece was the ticket booth.
"This is incredible," Alex breathed, stepping closer. "The detail work..."
"Come inside. I want to show you something." I opened the narrow door.
The original artisans had designed the booth for one person. With both of us inside, there was nowhere to go that wasn't close together. I caught the scent of Alex's shampoo—something crisp and clean with a hint of bergamot—layered over the smell of old wood and morning coffee.
"These brass fittings are original," I said, trying to focus on the restoration instead of how Alex's shoulder pressed against my chest. "Everything but the hinges. See this rosette?" I reached past him to point out the carved detail above the ticket window.
Alex tilted his head back to look, and his hair brushed my jaw. "You carved this by hand?"
"About six hours per rosette. I like knowing how things fit together. How each piece serves a purpose."
He turned his head, and suddenly his face was inches from mine. Those green eyes were darker in the close space, pupils wide. "The craftsmanship is..." He swallowed. "It's beautiful, Ben."
The ticket drawer rolled open by itself with a soft brass chime.
We both looked down at it, then at each other.
"The theater has opinions this morning," I said.
"Apparently." Alex's breath ghosted across my lips. "What's it trying to say?"
That you belong here. That I've been waiting for you. That the valley knows what it wants.
"I have no idea," I fudged.
The moment stretched, taut and electric. The chandelier outside the booth began to chime softly, crystals singing against each other despite the still air.
Alex stepped back first, his exit from the booth carefully controlled despite the flush on his cheeks. "What else did you restore?"
He'd performed on Broadway stages while I'd been sanding floorboards in a town most people only visited for kitsch Christmas photos.
What did I have to offer someone like him? Callused hands and sawdust in my hair? A life measured in dovetail joints and carefully restored rosettes?
The valley might know what it wanted, but did Alex?
I followed him out, my heart hammering. "I refurbished the proscenium arch. Want to see?"
We walked down the center aisle, and I watched his professional eye assess everything—the sight lines, the acoustics, and how the morning light slanted through the high windows.
He was trying to stay detached and analytical, but his fingers trailed along the back of each seat we passed.
I recognized the gesture. Reacquainting himself and coming home.
"The acoustics are different," he said quietly. "Better."
"We adjusted the angle of the back wall three degrees during renovation. Makes a huge difference in sound reflection." When he looked surprised that I'd heard him, I shrugged. "Architecture degree. Comes in handy."
"You're full of surprises."
I continued the tour. "Workshop's this way. I'll show you where the magic happens. At least the sawdust part of it."
The workshop was my sanctuary, and bringing Alex into it was significant to me. Tools hung in careful arrangement on the walls. The scent of fresh-cut pine mixed with decades of theater dust and the cinnamon-clove smell that permeated everything during the Christmas season.
"Your last name is Blitzen?" Alex asked, running his hand along my workbench. "Like the reindeer?"
I smiled. People asked me that question my entire life. "Actually, the reindeer is named after my family. My great-great-grandfather Johan Blitzen was one of Yuletide Valley's founding fathers, back when it was still called Upper Creekville."
"You're serious, and I don't remember the story from when we were in school together." He ran his fingers over the Macy's counter I was building, testing the smoothness of a dovetailed joint with a dancer's sensitivity to texture.
"Well—that. My parents weren't big on the story, and they did their best to bury it.
I got interested in genealogy as an adult.
Family legend says Johan left Sweden in 1889, looking for somewhere to practice traditional woodworking, but nothing felt right.
Then he got lost in these mountains during a terrible blizzard. "
I picked up a chisel to show him the rosette detail work along the counter's edge. "According to my grandfather, a mysterious stranger in red helped Johan find shelter—"
The chisel slipped. I'd been watching Alex's face instead of my hands—mesmerized by the way the morning light sparkled in his eyes.
The blade skipped across the wood and sliced across my palm.
"Shit." Blood welled up immediately, bright red against my skin.
"Ben!" Alex was there in an instant, his hand catching my wrist. "Let me see. Do you have a first aid kit?"
"Workshop rules." I pointed.
He cleaned and bandaged my hand with the careful precision of someone who'd dealt with theater injuries. His fingers on my wrist were steady, competent.
"You don't have to—" I started.
"I know." He looked at me. "But I want to. You've been taking care of everyone else. Let someone take care of you for a minute."
The bandage glowed faintly gold for a moment. Holly's healing magic, maybe. Or the valley approving.
"Thank you," I said quietly.
"It's just a bandage, Ben."
"Not for this." I turned my hand over in his. "For all of it."
Reluctantly, I pulled back and gestured to the workbench. "Where was I? Right—mysterious stranger in red..."
"Finish the story," Alex said softly. "I want to hear it."
"The next morning, Johan found himself at the edge of this valley. The snow had stopped, the sun was shining, and reindeer tracks led away from the cave." I shrugged.
"He always claimed they went straight up into the sky."