Chapter 5 #3
As he waved and smiled at all the little faces, a bit of the Christmas spirit worked its way into his heart.
This was what the season was all about. Sharing love and happiness.
At the end of the street his nephews’ faces glowed with excitement.
Although this costume weighed a ton and the white beard had been tricky, he was glad to be here.
His throat was feeling scratchy from calling out, “Ho, ho, ho!” in a deep voice.
The sleigh circled and he stepped down. A high back chair draped in red stood in front of some pine trees.
Sitting down, he adjusted his cap. Dressed as elves with bells bobbing on their caps, two high school girls coaxed children toward him.
The line began to move. The smaller children sat on his knee while older kids stood.
Some took out a list. With the exception of a little girl who burst into tears and was bundled away by her dad, the children were really into this.
The lists were similar, he soon learned, depending on the age. The younger kids wanted play action figures or Frozen dolls. If they were older, electronic iPads and iPhones, drones and robots topped their list. Some drilled down to model numbers, which was hilarious.
Then Cole stepped up with his little girl Natalie.
“And thank you, Santa, for visiting Gull Harbor today,” Cole said pointedly.
Hah. The guy was just relieved that Ryan had said yes or he’d be the one in the suit that felt hotter than one of the ovens.
Cole’s daughter Natalie ticked things off on her gloved fingers while her father rolled his eyes.
“And a new iPad with a hot pink cover,” she concluded.
With a parting wave, Cole led his family away. Kate and Cole were such a great couple. Sarah had told him the two had been together in Debate Club in high school.
Ryan adjusted his cap. The winter sun blazed, hotter than he’d imagined.
As he welcomed the next child, Ryan kept one eye on Sarah talking to the women in front of her.
She could probably win the prize as Miss Congeniality of Gull Harbor.
While the other children jumped up and down and chattered with excitement, Nathan and Justin had a solemn concentration about them.
He began to sweat big time. Finally, his nephews stepped up.
Showtime. “Ho, ho, ho! And what have we here? Are you two twins?”
“We’re not twins,” Nathan said dismissively. “We’re brothers. I’m the oldest.” The boys did not sit on his knee. They stood like the older kids, and that tore off a little piece of Ryan’s heart. But he had a job to do.
“And what would you like under your tree?”
Drawing closer, they looked cautiously over their shoulder at Sarah. “We don’t want our mom to hear,” Nathan whispered.
“I can fix that.” Ryan motioned to Sarah. “Can you wait over by the tree. Santa has his secrets.” He pointed to a tree at the end of the group of pines. Not looking happy, Sarah edged back.
“You see, here’s the thing,” Nathan began. “We lost our dad.” His voice broke and another chunk of Ryan’s heart ripped away.
Justin picked up. “Yeah, we need a daddy. Mommy says ours is not coming back ‘cause he’s our heavenly hero now.”
He never saw this coming. Gutted, Ryan wet his lips. “Your dad must have been a very good man. I’m sure he felt bad about leaving you, but heroes have a job to do.” What was he rambling about?
“Heroes give up their lives so that all families can be free.” Nathan rattled off. Ryan would bet a hundred bucks Sarah had used those words with the boys more than once. What a load she carried.
“....so we want Uncle Ryan.”
Wait. What? Bending, he drew closer to the boys. “You want this Uncle Ryan to do what?” If they had an expectation, then he wanted to meet it.
“We want Uncle Ryan to marry our mom so we have him for a dad,” Nathan said with maddening practicality.
“Nobody else,” Justin added, stabbing one mittened hand into the other. “He’s the one.”
The one? Was Sarah seeing other men? The waiting families were getting restless.
“Got it. I mean, Santa tries very hard to make all Christmas dreams came true.” He gulped. “Anything else you’d like?”
Both boys shook their heads. The elves waited with a little girl.
Nathan and Justin walked away with their shoulders squared.
They looked proud, like they’d finished the job.
He remembered the year he and Jamie picked apples in their grandmother’s orchard.
She wanted a bushel. They gave her three.
That’s how the kids looked. Like they’d accomplished something.
He blinked furiously. “Are you okay?” One of the elves asked, leading a little girl in a green jacket toward him.
He stabbed at his damp eyes with a red mitten. “This moustache is driving Santa crazy.”
By the time two o’clock came, Ryan had lost his voice.
The reindeer dragged the sleigh to storage at the North Pole.
Then he had to hightail it back to the bakery.
Lila had offered him her apartment to change.
He had an appointment up in St. Joe at the shoemaker’s shop and they closed at four because of their own holiday walk.
Fumbling with the glossy black buttons, he wanted to rip off the Santa suit. The expressions on his nephews’ faces stayed with him. Why had they chosen him?
Sarah deserved a better man. Not a goof-off who’d spent most of high school smoking in back of old man Johnson’s farm. A guy who’d been so crazy that he’d taken a bet to race down Red Arrow and nearly killed himself.
A new heel on his boot wouldn’t matter. He was not the man for Sarah and her boys.