We Need a Little Christmas (10 page)

Liv didn't answer. But her stomach fluttered.

Chapter 10

Scott followed Liv back into Nammy's house, carrying the big white bag of fried chicken.

“I know that smell!” Rachel practically yanked the bag from his hands.

“Not much trouble with morning sickness, huh?” Liv said.

“Not on your life.”

“I wasn't thinking,” Faye said. “Didn't we pack away all the dishes?”

Liv frowned, but Rachel resurfaced from the chicken bag with a wide smile. “Taken care of.” She held up a handful of paper plates from the bag.

“Sherry thinks of everything,” Scott said.

And saw three curious glances dart his way.
No, as a matter of fact, Sherry and I never dated.
But saying it would just sound defensive. He was used to defending himself on the old goose story. That was ancient history, and it was fun to tell. The whole serial dater thing, though—that was getting old.

He figured the only way to put it behind him was to keep moving forward. So Scott said, “Something I need to talk to the three of you about—”

“Drumstick?” Liv interrupted, fishing one out of the bag. It looked crispy and delectable.

“Ladies first,” he said.

Liv held the drumstick up in front of Rachel and her mother. “Age before beauty? Or—”

“Pregnancy trumps,” Faye said.

Rachel didn't argue. She nabbed the drumstick and put it on her plate.

Scott cleared his throat. “As I was saying—”

“Let's eat first,” Liv said, and pressed a plate into his hand. He felt absurdly pleased at the wordless invitation. Although sending him out the door without any Pine 'n' Dine chicken . . . that would have just been cruel.

So Scott waited until everyone had their plates dished up. Then it was confession time. He had to stop putting it off.

“That heater,” he said. “I didn't fix it. It's probably going to do the same thing tomorrow.”

Once again, three pairs of female eyes settled on him. He noticed that Rachel and Faye's eyes were the same shade of light gray. Only Liv's had that hazel blend of blue and green, flecked with brown.

And he was studying those eyes too long, he realized. The way he'd caught himself doing in the truck a little while ago.

“What do you mean?” Faye asked.

“I mean, I couldn't find anything wrong with the heater.” He turned a chicken wing in his hand. This was embarrassing. “Sometimes, when something doesn't work and you can't tell why, you try what I call the Captain Obvious method.”

They looked at him questioningly. Scott sucked in his breath and gritted his teeth.

“I switched the unit off and back on again,” he said.

“Oh,” Liv said, and suddenly he felt several inches shorter.

“Well,” Rachel said, “since it worked again today, maybe you could show us how to do that so you don't have to keep running over here?”

“Right, and that might work. As a stop-gap method. But something must be wrong with it, and if you're planning to sell this house eventually . . .”

They all nodded slowly.

“So, I called the manufacturer after I left this morning,” Scott said. “I left a message on their voice mail. Maybe they'll know of a solution they can explain to me over the phone. Otherwise”—he hated to say it—“I'll have them send out one of their own representatives to look it over.”

It felt like admitting defeat. But they all nodded again. Obviously they didn't know a man's pride was at stake.

“Okay,” Liv said.

Okay. If they could overlook it, surely he could get over it, too. “I'll show you how to work the switch in case it happens again tomorrow morning.”

After lunch he showed Liv, the most able-bodied of the three, where to find the switch on the unit in the garage. One less reason for him to come around. He hoped they'd keep coming up with others.

As he and Liv came back into the kitchen, Scott asked, “By the way, what did you decide to do with the tree?”

Faye and Rachel looked at him blankly. Liv threw him a sharp glance, as if he'd tattled on her.

“The tree?” Faye asked.

All attention turned Liv's way. She lowered her gaze. “It's still in Rachel's trunk.”

Rachel brightened. “You saved the silver tree?”

Liv blushed.

Rachel stood and caught her sister in a hug. “I'm glad. I was so depressed seeing it go out the door.”

“I got a little . . . depressed myself,” Liv admitted.

She darted another quick look at Scott, as if daring him to say something about their little scene in the truck. As if he ever would. Especially if he valued his life.

“Why didn't you tell us?” Rachel asked.

“I wasn't sure why I wanted to keep it. I didn't know what I was going to do with it.”

“I do.” That was Faye.

The girls turned to her as one.

“Let's put it up at my house.” Faye indicated her propped-up leg. “I don't see myself running out and buying a fresh tree this year.”

Liv's expression went from discomfort and embarrassment to something softer. “That's a great idea.”

“We could use Nammy's ornaments.” Rachel glanced toward the living room, where the “keep” pile had continued to grow. “It'd be a fun way to sort through them, and decide who wants to keep which ones.”

“And you girls could decide how much you really like the tree,” Faye said. “You've never had to put it up before. You'll get a ton of shocks from those metal branches.”

Liv pretended to glare at the naysayer. Then she bent down and hugged her. “Thanks, Mom.”

Faye put her arms around her girl, and it was only when Liv's chin was over her mom's shoulder that Scott noticed the misty look in Faye's eyes.

Women were complicated, all right, and emotions tangled among the three of them like a ball of yarn. But Scott wasn't so dense that he couldn't read the simplest and most overriding one in this room: love.

It felt like the right moment to bow out. Scott started quietly toward the front door, planning to say his goodbyes when he was safely at the exit.

“Scotty,” Rachel said before he was halfway across the living room.

He turned.

“Do you want to come over tonight? And help us set up the tree?”

Straightening from her mother's arms, Liv aimed a look at Rachel. Scott fumbled for an answer.

He'd probably be intruding. It probably wasn't a great idea. But the invitation touched him almost as much as it surprised him. He watched Liv for some kind of a cue, but she was busy sending one of those female-only telepathic messages to Rachel.

Faye chimed in. “That'd be nice. Unless you have other plans. My mom was really fond of you.”

How could he say no to that?

Except that there was a lot going on behind Liv's hazel eyes, and he couldn't decipher any of it.

“If you think you can deal with a room full of us,” Liv finally said enigmatically.

But she
was
smiling, and smiles from Liv weren't too easy to come by. At least not these days.

He edged toward the door. “I'll bring eggnog,” he said, his hand on the knob.

An evening with this little family could be an eventful one.

* * *

Liv gathered paper plates and chicken bones until she heard Scotty's truck pull out of the driveway. Then she turned to Rachel. “Where did
that
come from?”

“Don't be a Grinch.” Rachel smiled serenely as she held the big white takeout bag open for Liv to deposit the trash. “Scotty's doing a lot for us, and he won't take a dime. Besides, you heard him at the memorial. He was pretty attached to Nammy himself.”

Okay, she couldn't argue with that. But she still wondered if Rachel had something else in mind.

“And if we've got him around while we're putting up the tree, we might not get so—soupy,” Mom said.

She couldn't argue with
that,
either. Liv remembered the way he'd made her laugh with the goose story, when laughing had been the furthest thing from her mind.

But she still envisioned wheels turning behind Rachel's guileless eyes.

Chapter 11

When Liv opened her mother's door after dinner that evening, Scott looked as confused about his presence tonight as she felt. But he'd been game enough to show up, grocery sack of eggnog in hand, that slightly crooked smile at the ready.

And he looked good. He'd changed out of his work shirt and vest, into a red sweater that definitely said Christmas. He wore the same corduroy jacket he'd draped around her the evening it snowed after the memorial.

Remembering that, perversely, she shivered as she let him in and closed the door.

“It feels great in here,” Scott said. “It's cold tonight.”

Liv nodded as she led him into the kitchen to put the eggnog away. They'd spent the last hour and a half straightening the living room for their suddenly invited company. Her sister, in particular, had gone to extensive lengths to make things cozy. Rachel had started a fire in the fireplace, put Christmas music on the living room stereo, and she'd even asked Mom if she had any candles. They'd finally dug up a couple of tall red ones and put them on the mantel, although it felt like overkill to Liv.

And just where
were
Mom and Rachel right now? Once again, Liv smelled a rat.

Liv's heels clacked on the kitchen tile, and she felt Scotty's glance sweep down to her feet. She'd never decorated a Christmas tree in high heels before, but she was wearing them tonight. She didn't want to spend the evening craning her neck to look up at him. If there was one thing she never wanted to come across as, it was small and waifish.

“Thanks.” She smiled at Scott as he handed her the eggnog, one carton at a time, to load into the refrigerator. Regular, low fat, and her favorite: vanilla spice.

Scott unloaded one more item out of the grocery bag. “I brought these, too.” He held out a plastic-lidded platter of cookies dusted with powdered sugar.

“Pfeffernuss,” she said.

“Is that what they're called?”

“Nammy didn't tell you that?” She'd loved teaching Liv German words, even though she probably hadn't known more than a dozen of them herself.

“No,” Scott said. “I just know they were the cookies she used to give me after a run to the home store. I thought they were homemade until I spotted them in the grocery store.”

Liv pulled open the lid and set the cookies on the kitchen island. “Know what
pfeffernuss
means?”

He shook his head. “I guess she knew I had enough trouble with Neuenschwander. Probably one reason she let me call her Nammy.”

Although, as they both knew,
Olivia
wasn't hard to say. Undeniably, he'd been special to Nammy, even if he tried to downplay it.

Liv heard herself chatter on.“
Pfeffernuss
means ‘pepper nut.' Germans just love compound words. You know what the German word is for
thimble
?”

He shook his head, looking a little perplexed.

“
Fingerhut.
” She carefully pronounced the soft “g” sound, but landed hard on the “t.” Scott looked even more puzzled. “It means ‘finger hat.' I always thought that was adorable.”

“I think the only German word I ever heard her say was a swear word. When she dropped an egg.”

“
Himmel
?”

He nodded.

Liv grinned. “It means
heaven
.”

“Not the way she said it.”

“You should have heard the way she said it to
us
.”

Liv picked up one of the white-powdered cookies and bit into it. She'd been served her fair share of them, too. The familiar flavor—a little like licorice, a little like gingerbread—brought another keen reminder of Nammy. It made her absence hit harder, too. But remembering was better than forgetting. That was what tonight was all about.

Feeling her eyes sting, Liv turned to the lower kitchen cabinet, where her mother usually kept the big platters, and found a Christmas plate edged with holly. Perfect. By the time she put the plate on the kitchen island, her tears had receded. She started transferring the cookies to the platter. “Thanks for coming.”

“Thanks for letting me come.”

He probably realized Rachel had put her on the spot with her out-of-the-blue invitation. She held the Christmas plate out to him, although it was still less than halfway loaded. “Pfeffernuss?”

Scott picked up a cookie with a smile, blue eyes on hers. “Don't mind if I do.”

How could a smile be serious? Pondering the answer to that one, Liv set the plate on the countertop with a clumsy clatter.

“Liv?” Mom's voice called from the living room. So her mother and sister hadn't gone completely AWOL.

German lesson over
, Liv thought. “Coming,” she said.

It didn't take long to assemble the tree. Liv was sure that on his own, Scotty could have put it together in about thirty seconds. But he hung back, as Liv noticed he had a tendency to do where her family was concerned, while Liv and Rachel carefully gauged the size of the branches they were inserting into the tree's metal tube of a trunk. Small ones on top, big ones on the bottom.

Unleashing the branches from their individual brown paper tubes was the best part. As the branches slid out, the fake needles blossomed into shiny silver plumes, at least twice as big around as the tubes that had held them.

The worst part, as Mom had predicted, was the static that came out with the branches. Sweet little Rachel actually swore when she got her first shock.

“I warned you,” Mom said from her place in the easy chair, where they'd consigned her for Phase One of the project. Even if the crutches themselves hadn't excused Mom from tree-assembly duty, she said, she'd earned a free pass from all the years she'd helped Nammy put the tree together.

Rachel shook the hand the tree had stung. “Nobody likes an I-told-you-so.”

Halfway through the undertaking, Scott stepped in to help, and the rest of the tree was built in no time. He stood back with Liv and Rachel to regard the tree, squinting faintly. Liv wondered what he thought of their artificial heirloom. It wasn't often Scott didn't have
some
kind of comment.

She had to admit, it didn't look like much. The tree stood shorter than she remembered—much shorter than Scotty and just a few inches over Liv's own five-foot-eight. The branches weren't dusty, but they didn't have quite the magical luster she'd pictured in her mind. Of course, the living room was fully lit. When the room was dim and the tree was lit up—

She and Rachel turned to each other at the same moment.

“The color wheel,” they said in unison. Then they looked down at the rectangular box, now empty except for the brown shells of those paper tubes. Of course the color wheel couldn't have fit in there.

“I didn't think of it,” Mom said, no longer teasing or smug.

“It wasn't in the closet,” Rachel said.

“You're sure?” Scotty said. “Not even on the top shelf?”

Rachel shook her head. “We cleared the top shelf. There was gift wrap, some more decorations, a few board games—”

Realization sank in on Liv. “You cleared the top shelf while I was gone the other day?”

“Sure. I stood on a chair—”

“You stood on a chair?” Liv couldn't keep the alarm from her voice. She looked pointedly at Rachel's middle, then back up to her face, which took on a guilty look.

“Hey.” That seemed to be Scott's universal word for smoothing things out. He rested a hand on Liv's shoulder. Not Rachel's, she noticed, although he directed a look at her sister. “No harm done. Just remember, no more climbing.” One side of his mouth lifted in a crooked grin. “That goes for you too, Mrs. Tomblyn.”

Mom's mouth quirked up in response. “Faye,” she reminded him.

Scott nodded. “Remember, if you need to move something that's high up, I'm never too far away.”

Belatedly, he lifted his hand from Liv's shoulder, and she released a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding.

She spoke to Rachel again, her tone milder this time. “The color wheel's got to be in the house somewhere. After all, she held on to the tree. We'll find it.”

“You know where it might be,” Scotty said. “She had me take some things up to the attic a few times when I was over. She just didn't believe in throwing things away.”

Liv frowned. “There's an attic?”

“Well, more of a glorified crawl space. California houses aren't much on attics. Not even way back when that house was built.”

“How much stuff is up there?”

“A lot of boxes. No furniture or anything like that. But if I moved a box with a color wheel in it, I wouldn't have known what it was. I'm
still
not sure what a color wheel is.”

A smile glimmered on Rachel's face. “You'll just have to see.”

Liv gave Rachel a scolding look. “
You're
not going up there.”

Then she bit her tongue. The big-sister routine
was
hard to shake.

“I'll help,” Scott interjected.

“We can't keep—”

“Look,” he said. “Here's what we'll do. The heater company's sending a guy out Tuesday. It makes sense for me to be there when he shows up. After all, I'm the one who put the heater in.”

“You installed the heater?” Liv asked. “When?”

He shifted his feet. “About a year ago.”

“It's a
new
heater?”

“Right. So I must have done something wrong, and I want to know what. I'll make it right. I promise.”

Liv turned to her mother. “Did Nammy have any trouble with the heater last winter?”

Mom shook her head. “Never.”

She turned back to Scotty. “So what makes you think it's your fault?”

“What else could it be? The truth is, I'd love to know it's not my fault. But I've
got
to know what the problem is.”

Liv was silent. She understood that. She hated making mistakes, and when she did, she wanted to know what went wrong.

“So, anyway. While I'm waiting for the heater guy to show, I'll unload the attic.” His eyes flicked from one woman to the next. “Safely,” he assured them. “So we don't have any pregnant women jumping up on chairs like mountain goats.”

“Did you say Tuesday?” Liv said. “That's when Mom has her appointment with the specialist.”

“I can drive Mom,” Rachel said. “She doesn't really need both of us there.” She looked to their mother for confirmation, and Faye nodded.

Liv hesitated. Mom seemed to mean it. Maybe having both of them hover over her got a little overwhelming. And maybe Rachel didn't need Liv second-guessing her judgment. Maybe the most useful thing she could do was stay behind and go through the attic.

“Are you sure?” she asked, and Mom and Rachel both nodded.

“Meantime,” Mom said, pulling herself up from the armchair, “we've got a tree to decorate. Let's get to work.”

They uncapped the first tin of ornaments and got started, unrolling the decorations from their protective wrappings of tissue paper, paper towels and kitchen napkins. There were so many, and no two were alike. What one of them didn't remember, another of them would.

“Oh, gosh, Liv, remember these?” Rachel's face lit up as she unrolled another ball of tissue paper. “The gingerbread men we made that year we decided to make decorations for Nammy. This one was yours.” Rachel handed a stuffed felt figure to Liv.

“No, the pink one was yours. The green one was mine.”

“Are you sure?” Rachel squinted, studying the workmanship.

“Positive. Pink was your favorite color then, remember?”

“Either way, not a very natural color for gingerbread.”

“Well, neither of us liked brown.”

Rachel grinned. “I guess kids don't go in much for realism.”

“And here's that bluebird.” Liv gently pulled out a sequined glass bird with blue feathers to fill in the details of its wings and tail.

“Oh.” Rachel sighed. “I love that one.”

“That's mine,” Mom said, but Liv was already handing it to her.

“What's the story behind that one?” Liv asked.

Mom held the ornament by its hook, letting the blue sequins catch the light. “I'm not sure. We had it from the time I was little. I always wanted to be the one to hang it.”

Leaning on one crutch, she hung the bird with care on a prominent branch near the top of the tree, while Liv silently prayed she didn't topple over.

They couldn't keep Mom off her feet the whole time, so she spent half her time leaning on one crutch while she hung an ornament with her free hand. To make rest breaks easier, Liv and Rachel brought in a kitchen chair and put it close to the tree. They kept Scotty involved by handing off some of the more masculine decorations to him: a toy train, a nutcracker, a duck in flight.

“Is this as old as I think it is?” Scotty handed their mother a tarnished, flat gold bell. Mom, seated in the kitchen chair, brushed the ornament's surface lightly with her fingertips, as if to shine it.

“I don't remember that one.” Liv stepped behind Mom and peered over her shoulder. Rachel joined her on the left.

“Nammy always hung this one.” Mom's voice had that rarely heard shaky quality. A faint inscription was engraved on the surface of the bell. Liv could barely make out her grandparents' names, with the year below. “It was from their first Christmas,” Mom said. “She told me she ordered it with cereal box tops. I don't think they even make that cereal anymore.”