23. Nash #2
The city is alive with Christmas energy. Store windows draped in lights and garland, street vendors selling hot chestnuts and pretzels, the distant sound of Christmas carols drifting from somewhere nearby. Eve takes it all in with wide eyes, like she's seeing it for the first time.
Which, in a way, she is.
"Where are we going first?" she asks, falling into step beside me as we navigate the crowds of holiday shoppers.
"Rockefeller Center," I say, guiding her around a cluster of tourists taking photos. "Can't do Christmas in New York without seeing the tree."
The smile that spreads across her face is worth every awkward moment from this morning. "I think I know what that is. Maybe I've seen pictures."
"Pictures don't do it justice," I tell her, and it's true. The Rockefeller Christmas tree is one of those things that has to be experienced to be understood—the sheer scale of it, the way it dominates the plaza, the magic of standing beneath something that enormous and beautiful.
When we round the corner and the tree comes into view, Eve stops dead in her tracks.
I watch her face as she takes it in—the seventy-five-foot Norway spruce decorated with thousands of lights, the skating rink below with couples gliding across the ice, the golden Prometheus statue gleaming in the winter sunlight.
"Oh," she breathes, her voice soft with wonder. "It's beautiful."
Beautiful doesn't begin to cover it. The tree is magnificent, but what takes my breath away is the expression on Eve's face as she stares up at it.
Joy and wonder and something that looks almost like peace.
For this moment, she's not the woman who can't remember her life or the girl who grew up hating me.
She's just Eve, experiencing something magical for the first time.
"Come on," I say, offering her my arm. "Let's get closer."
We make our way through the crowd to the railing overlooking the ice rink. Eve leans against the metal barrier, still staring up at the tree, and I lean beside her, close enough to smell her shampoo over the scent of roasted nuts and winter air.
"Do you come here every year?" she asks, turning to look at me.
"Not really," I admit. "Too touristy. But it's worth seeing at least once."
"Why did you bring me here then?"
The question catches me off guard, partly because of its directness and partly because I don't have a good answer. Why did I bring her here? Because I wanted to see her face light up the way it just did? Because I wanted to give her something beautiful to remember about today?
"Because you deserve to see beautiful things," I say finally, the words coming out more honest than I intended.
Eve fights a smile as she looks down at the ice rink, where couples are skating hand in hand, some graceful, others clinging to each other and laughing as they struggle to stay upright.
"Have you ever ice skated?" I ask. I'm certain she has. When Silver Lake freezes over in the winter, we've all been out there, and I know I've seen Eve out there. But I don't want to tell her that.
"I don't know," she says, frustration creeping into her voice. "I can't remember. I know how to walk and talk and make coffee, but I can't remember if I've ever done something as basic as ice skating."
The frustration in her voice makes my chest ache. It has to be maddening, not knowing your own preferences and experiences, feeling like a stranger in your own life.
"Want to find out?" I ask impulsively.
Eve turns to stare at me. "You want to ice skate? Here? With all these people?"
"Why not?" I'm already mentally calculating whether the rink is too crowded, whether the risk of someone recognizing her is worth it. But the longing in her eyes as she watches the skaters decides it for me. "Unless you don't want to."
"I do," she says quickly, then looks down at her feet. "But what if I'm terrible at it?"
"Then you'll be terrible at it with me," I say, pushing away from the railing. "Come on. Let's go rent some skates."
Twenty minutes later, we're sitting on a bench lacing up rental skates that have seen better days. Eve fumbles with the laces, her fingers clumsy with cold and nerves, and I resist the urge to help her. She needs to do this herself, needs to feel capable of something.
"These feel weird," she says, standing up on the rubber mats and wobbling slightly.
"Everything feels weird the first time," I tell her, standing and offering her my hand. "Or the first time you can remember, anyway."
She takes my hand, her fingers sliding into mine like they belong there. Her palm is soft and warm despite the cold, and for a moment I let myself imagine this is normal—that we're just a couple spending a winter day together, trying new things and making memories.
The moment we step onto the ice, Eve's legs go out from under her. I catch her before she can fall, my arm wrapping around her waist as she grabs onto my jacket with both hands.
"Okay," she says, breathing hard. "This is harder than it looks."
"You're overthinking it," I tell her, keeping my arm around her waist as we glide slowly along the edge of the rink. "Just let your body remember."
For the next hour, we make slow circuits around the rink.
Eve gradually gains confidence, her death grip on my hand loosening as she finds her balance.
She's actually not bad at it—there's a natural grace to her movements once she stops fighting them, a fluidity that suggests this isn't actually her first time on ice.
"I think I've done this before," she says as we glide past a group of teenagers showing off with spins and jumps. "My body knows what to do, even if my brain doesn't remember learning it."
"Muscle memory," I agree, watching her face as she concentrates on keeping her balance. "Your body remembers even when your mind doesn't."
There's something almost meditative about skating with her, the repetitive motion of gliding around the rink, the way she gradually relaxes into the rhythm.
By the time we decide to take a break, she looks alive with excitement, and she's laughing at something a little kid said as he wobbled past us.
"Hot chocolate?" I suggest as we make our way off the ice.
"God, yes," Eve says, unlacing her skates with fingers that are definitely numb from cold. "I think I'm starting to understand why people don't do this year-round."
We find a vendor selling hot chocolate from a cart decorated with Christmas lights and garland. The elderly woman behind the counter smiles at us as she pours steaming chocolate into paper cups topped with whipped cream and a sprinkle of cinnamon.
"You two look like you're having fun," she says, handing Eve her cup with a knowing smile. "Young love and Christmas—nothing sweeter."
I open my mouth to correct her, but Eve speaks first. "Thank you," she says simply, accepting the hot chocolate with both hands.
We find a bench away from the crowd, and Eve immediately wraps her hands around her cup, sighing in relief as the warmth seeps through the paper.
"This is perfect," she says, taking a careful sip and closing her eyes in appreciation. "I don't think I've ever tasted anything this good."
"That's because you've been living on hospital food and whatever Morgan brings from the deli," I point out, settling beside her on the bench. "Your standards have been pretty low."