Closing On Christmas (Second Glance Second Chance Book 1)

by Christine Zane

  This isn’t exactly true. If Avery somehow knew there was a text waiting from Jackson Rimes, then I might be willing to hobble in that direction.

  Jackson Rimes. His Facebook pictures don’t do him justice. His posts either. He’s not the type of guy to talk about his accomplishments. In fact, he barely posts at all—only a few photos of his kids from time to time, and those are probably for his parents or Amy’s family to see. They’re not meant for me. I’m a pariah, stalking his perfect little family.

  You have to stop this, I tell myself. Seriously, I say it all the time. He’s married—or he was married.

  My picture of the perfect guy isn’t someone with two kids and a ton of heartache. Or it’s not supposed to be. Thirty is the new twenty. Not really. Anyone who says that hasn’t met any thirty-year-old bachelors. Ugh. My picture of the perfect guy has faded like Marty’s siblings in Back to the Future. It’s just a silhouette, a shape of a man, and he’s missing more parts than Dorothy’s compatriots on her walk down the yellow brick road.

  “Your phone’s in your office, right?” Avery does the walking for me. The click-clack of her heels on the hardwood floors pick up the pace after she finds it.

  “It’s not a meme,” she says, “and it definitely cannot wait.”

  “How do you know what’s on my phone?” I ask her when she reappears from the kitchen.

  While her feet do the walking, her face does a lot of talking. I’m not sure if I’ve seen her so unsure about anything since agreeing to a date with Will Martin our senior year.

  Now they have three lovely girls and run the most successful law practice in town. Together. How she finished law school pregnant while raising their first child still baffles the hell out of me.

  “I just know.” She holds the phone out tentatively.

  “Avery, what is it?”

  “Now,” she clears her throat, “don’t shoot the messenger. It’s not my fault, really—it was Lana’s idea.”

  “What was Lana’s idea? Honestly, Avery, I’m not a fan of mysteries. What have you two done?”

  Lana Seagle, our sister from another mister, is the absolute worst when it comes to mischief. Whatever this is, I know it can’t be good.

  The phone glows bright, showing me everything I’ve missed.

  “Avery,” I say, “why do I have six missed calls—one from the mayor?” I only have his number stored because he’s a big fan of Mable’s Kitchen, and he likes to have his table reserved. Of course, we don’t actually do reservations... but with the mayor, you make exceptions.

  “Tim doesn’t call you often, huh?”

  “No. He doesn’t.”

  “Listen.” Avery taps her red nails nervously on the table, hovering over me and the phone. “You remember a few years ago when the three of us put in to be Missus Claus in the parade?”

  “I remember you and Lana forcing me to do so, yeah. Thank God we didn’t get it. Can you imagine?”

  “I, uh, I can imagine,” Avery says. “Honestly, Eve, it was Lana’s idea. Here, listen to your messages.”

  With a roll of my eyes, I unlock the phone and select the first message from an unknown city number. Then I put the phone on speaker for us both to hear.

  “Hi, Eve. This is Jen Haddock from the city council. I’m calling to give you a big congratulations on your selection this year.

  “As you’re aware, we sponsor Santa and Mrs. Claus in both the parade and holiday festivities each year. I’m so happy to tell that out of eighty-five entrants, your name was selected.

  “We look forward to seeing you this Thursday for the dress fitting, and we’ll expect you here no later than noon on Saturday for pictures and parade prep. Your duties will end promptly at eight p.m.

  “You’re also invited to the city’s holiday party afterward. But don’t worry, you aren’t expected to stay in character for that. Talk soon.”

  I’m stunned—so shocked that I can barely speak. Then Avery steps in like the party is the problem and the whole me playing Mrs. Claus thing is a foregone conclusion.

  “What she’s failed to mention,” Avery says, “is you’ll need something formal for the party. That’s the one Will and I hosted last year.”

  “I remember,” I grouse. “I also remember offering to cater.”

  “I know. I know. Sorry but I couldn’t stand the thought of you working while at my house. I much prefer the thought of you attending as a guest—which I remember offering. There’s always plenty of eligible men.”

  “Eligible men,” I huff. “I’m sure they’re desperate to hook up with Missus Claus. Honestly, Avery, what were you two thinking? I can’t do this.”

  * * *

  JACKSON

  “Well, that was an interesting phone call,” my mom says as if I’d caught her getting off the phone. I hadn’t.

  In her kitchen baking loaves of fruitcake, her fingers are covered with sticky mess, and her Christmas sweater, complete with Rudolph sporting a real light-up nose, is powdered with flour.

  “Uh huh.” I attempt to skirt around Mom, looking for my two troublemakers. But she blocks my way.

  Mom and I share a lot of characteristics. We have the same gray eyes, the same dark brown hair—hers longer than mine, shoulder length. We both have noses slightly too big for our face. And we both love sweets, especially the Christmas kind.

  The whole house smells of sugar and citrus. Every day it’s something—gingerbread houses, chocolate chip cookies, and today fruitcake. At least the kids won’t starve.

  My dad, affectionately known as Pop, entertains them on his iPad at the dining room table. Bald before he was twenty, he makes up for it with a big salt-and-pepper beard.

  At this time last year, we were at my in-laws’ place for Christmas. It was strange to be there without her. But good for them and for the kids. They live in a little Georgian town called Lanai, only a couple hours’ drive from Atlanta.

  This year, I haven’t visited Lanai as often as I should’ve. And I hadn’t been home in God knows when. The drive up with the kids, to my hometown of Caribou Lake, Virginia, was much more of an ordeal. Between the potty breaks, the snack and meal breaks, and the traffic, we tacked on about three additional hours to my best time.

  “Hey, Pop,” I poke my head above Mom’s, “not too much screen time today, all right?”

  “We’re reading books,” he calls. “Seriously, this app just reads books. It’s not a game or anything. And speaking of, you know it’s your move on Words? I think I’ve got you this game.”

  “This game?” I scoff. “You’ve got me in every game.”

  “And don’t you forget it!”

  “It’s ’cause he cheats,” I whisper to Mom.

  “He doesn’t cheat.” Mom’s always on Pop’s defensive. “He’s that good.”

  “Taking two hours to meticulously go over every possible letter combo is cheating. We couldn’t do that playing Scrabble on a board in the living room.”

  “It’s better than going to that website like I do sometimes.”

  “Mom!”

  She shrugs. “What? I like to win a game or two from time to time. Now, do you want to hear about my phone call or what?”

  “Sure.” I peel off a piece of warm fruitcake and stuff it into my mouth.

  “You know the Olde Time Christmas parade?”

  I nod, my mouth open, fanning it as the fruitcake threatens to burn off my taste buds.

  “You know what an honor it is to play Santa and Missus Claus?”

  “I don’t know if… I’d… call it… an honor,” I stutter, then I’m finally able to swallow. The heat burns all the way down my esophagus.

  “Do you know how they get picked?”

  The answer is I don’t, but I give her my best guess. “Uh, don’t they offer it to some civic-minded person? Isn’t it usually the mayor? Or someone on city council needing reelection. Something like that, right?”

  Mom shakes her head. “No. Well, yes. It’s usually someone like th
at. But that’s just because they put their name into the drawing.”

  “Yeah, ’cause I’m sure it’s a ‘random’ drawing.” I do air quotes.

  “It is!” Mom totally disregards my sarcasm.

  “Oh, it is? And how would you know?”

  “Because this year, I entered your name,” she says. “And I’m looking into the eyes of the next Santa Claus.”

  Three

  EVE

  Main Street, Mable’s Kitchen, and my junky car parked in the back alley blur past as Avery weaves in and out of lanes on the highway through town.

  “We have just enough time to run the presents home before Will and the kids get back,” she says. “He took them out for pizza. You’re good, right? Nothing to do tonight. No hot dates?”

  She acts as if I have any choice in the matter. I’m held hostage in her car the same way I was held hostage in the dressing room at the boutique where she picked out and insisted on buying my new dress—the one for the Christmas party that I don’t plan on attending. I’m still trying to figure a way to weasel out of playing Mrs. Claus. I don’t tell her any of that.

  Avery follows inches behind bumpers and narrowly misses a man on a motorcycle before we finally stop at the entrance to the gated subdivision where she and Will built their home five years ago.

  Around that same time, I bought my compact townhome. It was all I could afford at the time; it’s all I can afford now.

  Not that Mable’s Kitchen is doing bad per se. I just didn’t realize that opening my own business would mean giving up on my own life. My money stays there. Instead of buying a new nightstand for my bedroom, I bought a wine rack. Even this year, this month—knowing that we’re about to close—I went overboard on Christmas decorations. Instead of buying new shoes, I bought tinsel.

  Okay, maybe I went a little overboard on the tinsel. And the mistletoe. It’s just I didn’t think everything would go downhill so fast. First, my landlord says he’s moving to Florida. Then he tells me he’s putting the building up for sale. So I try to buy it. And when the sale doesn’t go through, I hear that a big corporate chain thinks the location is perfect—because of course they do.

  Avery calls it being preemptive. It was mostly her advice, to go ahead and close shop while I’m still ahead. To me it feels like waving the white flag.

  “Is that Jackson Rimes at his parent’s house?”

  I perk up from my pity party long enough to see his tall frame jog in his parents’ yard. He tags his little girl on the shoulder and she freezes still. Then he’s off after the little boy whose legs pump and pump but get him nowhere fast.

  “It is,” I say. “I saw him earlier. I didn’t know his parents lived in your neighborhood.”

  “They moved in about six months ago. His mom flies out a lot. This is the first time I’ve seen him here.”

  “Well, can you blame him?”

  “Of course not.” Avery shakes her head sadly. She swings into her driveway and brakes hard like we’re about to do a NASCAR pitstop. But we both sit in the car, still watching Jackson play with his kids.

  “It’s so sad,” she says. “I just can’t imagine. And he’s all alone there in Atlanta. I don’t see why he doesn’t move back.”

  “I don’t know either.” A part of me wishes he would. Then maybe we’d have a chance. If I gave him enough time, time to heal. Then maybe, just maybe, his heart could find some room for me.

  “And I didn’t know kids still played tag,” Avery continues.

  “I know, right? He needs to get those kids an iPad!” My attempt at humor. Avery has two iPads wrapped up in the trunk as we speak.

  “If that’s a veiled criticism of my parenting techniques, then I’m going to take offense.”

  “If it was veiled,” I say, “it was done thinly.”

  We both laugh.

  “Girl, I’m going to make you walk to your car!”

  Good, I think, then I’d probably get home faster.

  Avery recovers from my torment, and we gather the iPads and the other bags. We’re to the door when she turns and gets one more look at Jackson.

  “Look at those moves,” she says. “Maybe he should’ve played football with Will. Oh, did you see that? He definitely let the little one tag him.”

  “For sure.” I smile.

  “You know,” Avery teases, “I always thought you and him… After prom.”

  “I know,” I sigh. “And I told you we were just friends.”

  “Oh, I’m well aware of that. You made sure we all did. I’m pretty sure you told anyone with a pulse that was there that Jackson and you, you weren’t a thing. And I saw Jackson’s face every single time you said it.”

  “Oh?” I question. “And what did Jackson’s face say?”

  “It said a lot. It said he wished you were going as more than friends with a capital M-O-R-E.”

  “It did not.”

  Avery rolls her eyes, setting the bags on her dining room table. “Whatever. You couldn’t get your mind off that dress. If you weren’t telling someone Jackson wasn’t your boyfriend, you were moaning about your dress. All freakin’ night.”

  “I’m pretty sure I’d have noticed if Jackson Rimes was interested in me,” I say.

  “Would you, Eve? Would you really?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means,” Avery says, “that never in your life have you known when a guy was interested—not before he came out and said as much. Even then.”

  I glare at Avery. She stares back. I know what she’s trying to say.

  “Please don’t bring up the Ethan Robinson incident.”

  “Ethan Robinson called you every day for two weeks!”

  “I didn’t like Ethan.”

  “Then you should’ve told him. You didn’t have to give him your phone number or answer your phone. Or let him talk to you for hours on end.”

  “You told me I should.”

  “I wanted you to come out of your shell! How was I supposed to know it’d take until you were twenty-six?”

  My first steady boyfriend lasted three years, from twenty-six to twenty-nine. Avery is still mad at him for stealing my youth. Her words.

  “I really need a new best friend,” I say.

  “What you really need is to get laid,” Avery says. “And I know just the single widower for the job.”

  “It’s Christmas. He lost his wife a year ago. He’s got a thousand other things to do than go on a date with me.”

  “So, you’re saying you’re interested?”

  “I’m saying it’s not going to happen. I probably won’t see him ever again.”

  But I remembered Jackson’s promise to visit the restaurant. Just my luck, he’d probably be there on Saturday when I wouldn’t be there. No, I’d be pretending to be Mrs. Claus.

  * * *

  JACKSON

  “Who was that on the phone?” Dad asks me.

  “No one.”

  It’s not a lie, not exactly. But the truth eludes my lips. I’ve been keeping a lot of things from my parents, from the kids.

  Everything started out okay after Amy passed. I went back to work. The kids went back to school. Life trudged on. Thankfully, Amy’s mom, and mine, visited Atlanta often those first couple of months. They allowed me to get settled.

  Then life went on for them too. They weren’t as available. And I got in over my head.

  I don’t tell Dad who was on the phone, or what my plans are after Christmas. I don’t tell him that I lost my job. That’s not really true. I didn’t lose it. I gave it away.

  Dad sees there’s something wrong. He’s good like that.

  “Have you given any more thought to moving back?” Dad sips on his eighty-second cup of coffee. “You know you’re welcome to stay here however long you need.”

  “I know,” I say.

  I don’t tell him how much thought I’ve put into it. How much effort too.

  Right now, movers are picking apart the house. I’
ve sold it. They’re storing my life with Amy away somewhere. And I have to find somewhere new, somewhere to start fresh.

  And I’m not ready to commit, at least not here—not to Caribou Lake. I can’t start fresh where I’ve already spent two-thirds of my life.

  Can I? I don’t know.

  “All right. What are we doing?”

  Amanda’s head bobs up from a sheet of paper. The thing about having the kids at my parents’ house is unless they’re doing a project, they end up watching too much television or being sucked down the hole that is an iPad.

  Luckily, my mom lives for projects.

  “We’re writing letters to Santa,” she says. “We just started if you’d like to join.”

  “Obviously. Maybe Santa will finally bring me that guitar I wanted in middle school.”

  “Keep dreaming,” Mom says.

  “Santa doesn’t bring gifts to anyone over twenty,” Amanda says flatly.

  “Who told you that?” I ask.

  “You did.” She’s like an elephant. She doesn’t forget anything.

  “I did?”

  Amanda has a candy cane sticking from the side of her mouth. She pulls it out to reveal the deadliest prison shank I’ve ever seen. “Last year, at Gram and Gramps’s house. You said Santa doesn’t come to anyone over twenty.”

  “Okay then, I guess I won’t be getting that guitar.”

  Amanda sharpens the blade with a lick, then smiles.

  “It doesn’t hurt to try.” Mom hands me a sheet of paper. “He likes drawings too, if you can’t spell guitar. You see what Jordan’s drawing?”

  I eye his list to find what resembles a puppy.

  “Is that a dragon?” I ask.

  “It’s a puppy, Daddy.”

  I wince. “Except Santa doesn’t bring live animals either.”

  “That’s not true,” Amanda says. “Sophie Rogers in my class got a cat for Christmas last year.”

  “And you’re sure she got it from Santa, not her parents?”

  “She said Santa.”

  I don’t know what to say, so Mom steps in for me. “I heard Santa has to ask parents if they want a puppy before he can bring one. Because a puppy is a very big commitment. It’s more than a little boy or girl can deal with on their own.”