Christmas in Cupid Falls

by Holly Jacobs

  Then his father—who’d made it at the last minute—had walked over and joined the group. From her vantage point a few feet away, she saw Malcolm open his arms, as if expecting his father to hug him as well. Then after a few awkward seconds, his arms fell back to his sides and his father patted his shoulder. Even that seemed awk-weird.

  She smiled as she thought about her teenage version of the word.

  She’d used it so often Aunt Betty threatened to fine her if she didn’t stop.

  She hadn’t thought about that in years.

  “You can use whatever odd words you want, as often as you want,” she whispered to the baby.

  She wished she had something else to do around the shop, but she didn’t. So she bundled up and walked over to the Center.

  It was unfortunate that Malcolm worked next to her all day, then lived in Pap’s house next to her all night. Well, at least until he went back to his life in Pittsburgh. He had to go soon. A lawyer couldn’t take an indefinite leave. He had clients, responsibilities. That was his excuse for not coming home for so long. It made sense he’d have to get back.

  She let herself into the Center and called, “Malcolm?”

  “In the office.”

  He looked up as she walked in. “You okay?”

  “Long day.” She wanted to finish this and go home and collapse. She knew she’d have to take off some time after the baby came. She’d fretted about it for months and finally had teamed up with a florist in Erie. Calls to her shop would be forwarded to them, and they’d fill the orders for her. It was a huge hit to her bank account, but she’d been squirreling money away since she’d found out about the baby. She’d be fine. She had to imagine that working with a baby at the shop had to be easier than working when she was as big as a house.

  “Sorry to make to make your day longer,” he said, sounding genuinely contrite.

  “No problem,” Kennedy said, even though it was. “Did you look over my proposal?”

  “I did. Have you thought about mine?” He didn’t clarify.

  Kennedy didn’t really need him to. “Malcolm, I have. But I can’t come up with one good reason for us to marry.”

  He looked as if he were searching for that reason and finally said, “We should marry because we’re going to be parents.”

  “You’ve said that before.” She didn’t know much, but she knew marrying for the sake of a baby couldn’t work.

  As a florist, she was sort of a bartender of relationships. She knew who was in the doghouse, or froghouse in Clarence’s case. She knew who sent sweet gifts just because. When they came and ordered flowers, most people shared the reason. She knew what she wanted in a relationship of her own, and being with someone for a baby’s sake wasn’t on the list. But even without all that, she knew there was only one reason to marry—only one reason that could possibly make two people joining their lives together work. And because they were going to be parents wasn’t it. Practicality wasn’t it.

  She shook her head. “Thank you for asking, but the answer is still no. But what about my proposal to buy the Center?”

  Malcolm’s eyes narrowed as if he were trying to think of some lawyerly response. “I’d consider giving it to you as a wedding gift.”

  She laughed as if she thought he meant it as a joke, though she wasn’t quite sure that he had. “You can’t buy me, Malcolm. This isn’t some contract negotiation where you can find the proper terms to make me do what you want.”

  “I’m a lawyer. Negotiating is a big part of that.”

  She was insulted. If she wouldn’t marry him for a baby’s sake, why would he think she’d marry him to get the Center? “Well, good try, but no.”

  “I’ll ask again,” he said. “To clarify, that’s a promise, not a threat. I really think that being married is the right thing to do for our child.”

  Kennedy thought about making some retort, but in the end she decided it was safer to change the subject. “About the upcoming engagements. Most of the receptions and parties are easy. You unlock the door, then come back when it’s over and lock it again. Most people handle their own cooking and stage the facility on their own. Cleanup is also part of their contract. But we provide any and all if they’re willing to pay for it. Tavi and Gus have been doing the catering for us, and I have a list of kids I hire—well, you hire—to set up or clean up when necessary.”

  She pointed to the lists on the wall. “And that’s our cleaning crew and . . .”

  Half an hour later, Kennedy was pretty sure Malcolm could handle the upcoming events. He’d worked at the Center often enough as a kid. He needed to get caught up on the new procedures his mom had set up. Everything was simple, once you understood it. She was pretty sure he could handle things on his own. “Your mom really streamlined Pap’s system.”

  He looked at the laminated lists on the wall. “She did.”

  Kennedy had bought Val her own laminator last Christmas. Malcolm’s mom had fun using it all over the office. She’d call and fill Kennedy in on what new item had benefitted from her new toy.

  Kennedy felt a pang as she realized Val wouldn’t call her again.

  Malcolm’s expression looked as if he was missing her, too.

  “Sorry. Does it hurt to talk about her?” she asked.

  He thought a moment, then shook his head. “It did. At first it hurt so much. Something would happen and I’d reach for my phone to call her, and realize I couldn’t. I’d call Pap, and he’s always been so supportive, but he’s not Mom.”

  “She was a special lady,” Kennedy agreed. “After I got home from college and moved back in with Aunt Betty, Val found me sitting on the porch reading a book. She said she was baking her world-famous oatmeal cookies and could use a hand. She asked if I’d be interested.”

  “She taught you to make her cookies?” There was a gleam in his eye she’d never seen before as he asked.

  Kennedy nodded. “She taught me a lot about cooking.”

  “Me too. I’d call and ask how do you make this or that, and she’d help me through it, but I never asked about the cookies. She always had a plate of them when I came home. So I never needed to make them on my own. I missed finding them waiting for me when I got here the other day.”

  Without thinking, Kennedy reached over and placed her hand on his.

  He finished, “It really didn’t feel like coming home at all.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  Val had always been the picture of health. The night before she passed away, she’d gone to the movies with Kennedy, like they did most Mondays.

  Then Tuesday morning, Pap had called with the horrible news. He’d sounded so confused. She’d slept in. That’s all I thought. She’d slept in. Only she wasn’t sleeping, he’d said over and over.

  Kennedy had hurried over and was there when the ambulance came. The doctors said it was an aneurism. They said there was no way anyone could have known. Knowing there was nothing they could have done didn’t ease the pain.

  Malcolm looked as lost tonight as Pap had looked that morning.

  She missed Val so much. She could only imagine how much more Malcolm was suffering. She almost leaned over to hug him but pulled herself back and pulled her hand back as well.

  He shot her a questioning look.

  “This is what got us in trouble in the first place,” she said. “I think we better stick to talking about business—”

  He added, “Or the baby.”

  “Or the baby,” she agreed. “We’ll stick to the present or even the baby’s future. The past gets us in trouble. But it was nice to remember her.” Val had been a friend. A mentor. And whenever Kennedy realized that Val was this baby’s grandmother and that the baby would never know her, she cried.

  She blamed pregnancy hormones for the tears welling in her eyes as she said, “Val was an amazing lady.”
/>   “Yeah, she was. When I was younger, the fact our names rhymed presented all kinds of confusion.”

  When they were kids, she’d thought of him as Mal, but she’d referred to his mom as Mrs. Carter then. Later, he was Malcolm to her, and Val was Val, so there was still no rhyming. “I never really thought about it, but I can imagine it did. Why didn’t they name you something else?”

  “Mom wanted to,” he said. “Dad insisted his son would carry on the family name. He always referred to me as Malcolm and her as Valerie. He insisted it wasn’t a problem. The rest of the world called us Val and Mal. Except you?” He turned the statement into an almost question.

  Kennedy found herself answering. “I don’t know why. Malcolm seems more lawyerly. It seems like a serious name. A name to be reckoned with. Mal seems like a young kid or the captain of a starship.”

  “Huh?” he asked, looking confused.

  “You never watched Firefly or Serenity?” Kennedy was a sci-fi geek. She didn’t go around wearing costumes and didn’t speak Klingon, at least not in public, but she loved all things science fiction.

  “No, I’ve never seen them,” Malcolm said.

  “You’ve missed out. And speaking of out, it’s time for me to go. I think you’re caught up on how things run here. If you run into any trouble, holler. And I hope before you go home to Pittsburgh you consider my offer on the business.”

  She rose with difficulty and asked, “Just when are you leaving?” She tried not to infuse too much hope in the question, but when Mal frowned, she wasn’t sure she’d succeeded.

  “Like I said,” he said slowly, “I’m not leaving until we’ve worked things out. My father’s none too happy about it, but I know I can’t go yet, Kennedy.”

  “Oh.”

  He offered her a small smile. “Don’t sound so enthused at the thought of my staying here.”

  She didn’t want to tell him how absolutely unenthused she really was, so she simply said, “I really need to head home.”

  Malcolm sprang from his chair with ease. “Wait a minute while I lock up and I’ll walk back with you.”

  “It’s okay, Malcolm. It’s only four blocks. Just because I’m pregnant doesn’t mean I’m incapable of looking after myself.”

  “Kennedy, were you always this prickly, or is it the pregnancy?” Before she could answer, he added, “I’m heading home anyway and it doesn’t make sense to walk separately. I mean, I could follow behind you, but that looks a bit stalkery, doesn’t it? And what if May saw me skulking after you? She’d be calling the cops for sure.”

  There was no way to say no and not sound rude, so Kennedy resigned herself to walking home with Malcolm. She waited while he turned off lights and locked the back door.

  He offered her his arm as they approached the snow-dusted sidewalk.

  “I’m capable of walking on my own, Malcolm. I’m pregnant, not an invalid.” She realized that did sound prickly. She was pretty sure it wasn’t the pregnancy, but Malcolm who brought it out in her.

  He dropped his arm.

  They walked side by side down Main Street to the corner and turned onto a residential street. It was seven on a November evening, so it was already dark and the lights from the homes spilled out the windows.

  Kennedy walked this way home every day. She knew the houses, knew each family.

  “Mr. Peterson’s sidewalk’s cleared,” she murmured more to herself than Malcolm.

  “And that’s a good thing?” he asked.

  “It means I won’t get a visit from May Williams tomorrow complaining. Well, she might complain, but it won’t be about his sidewalk.”

  “May has always been a spitfire. She rented the Center once for some party and my mother swore that she’d never make that mistake again. If May asked about a date, we’d be booked or closed for repairs. She said she’d paint the place herself in order to escape May’s nitpicking.”

  “That bad?” Kennedy asked.

  “She made my mom dust the ceiling.”

  “Pardon?” She laughed. She could almost hear Val complaining about dusting a ceiling.

  “May claimed the ceiling was dusty and she didn’t want dust dropping in her food.”

  “Oh, I can so imagine her tone. ‘Val, your ceiling is dusty. How do I know? Why, I saw a dust mote float to the floor. Yes, only one, but if there’s one, there’s more. What if that piece of dust fell on my cucumber sandwiches?’” Having dealt with May on a regular basis since becoming mayor, Kennedy was pretty sure she’d nailed her impression of her.

  Malcolm burst into out-and-out laughter. “Yes, that was about it.”

  “She’s been really difficult lately. I really think it has to do with her losing June. I’m hoping I can convince her to adopt a new dog at the Everything But a Dog event.”

  “I’m not sure a dog will be enough,” he teased.

  His shoulder brushed hers as they crossed the street to the second block. Kennedy felt an urge to lean into it. But she held herself back. Present or future, she reminded herself. Talking about the past was obviously trouble.

  She searched for something innocuous to say. “It’s a beautiful night” was the best she could come up with.

  “I always liked walking at night,” Malcolm replied. “I forget how much when I’m in Pittsburgh. I leave for the office in the morning, come home, pull in the garage, and go straight inside. I’m always so busy that I forget to take a break and get outside.”

  “I live so close to work, I rarely drive. I can stop in at Elmer’s Market and get any groceries I need over lunch.”

  She contrasted the life he’d described in Pittsburgh and her life here. His seemed incredibly lonely to her. “I can’t imagine never going outside and not being able to walk to things. I can go weeks without using my car. That’s one of my favorite parts of Cupid Falls. It’s a green thing.”

  She made a mental note to try to think about a green campaign for town. She’d heard the term ecotourism bandied around. She’d have to explore the idea. After all, they had Lincoln Lighting now. It made LED lights and had started making solar panels, too. That was as green as green could get. She was always looking for angles to promote Cupid Falls, so she filed it away and concentrated on Malcolm.

  “Mom used to walk me to school every day, then pick me up. Until I got so old that I told her it was embarrassing. I wish I’d have realized . . .” He stopped, as if there was so much he wished he’d have realized that he couldn’t list it all.

  “Your mom and I walked home in the evening together. Pap came along if we went in the mornings, but he was gone by the time she closed up the shop. We walked home most nights on this same route.”

  Malcolm didn’t say anything.

  “She used to talk about you, you know. She was so proud of you.” But it was more than that. Val used to tell Kennedy every detail of Malcolm’s life. When he graduated college, when he got accepted to law school. She shared the big moments in his life in the most minute of details.

  Kennedy wouldn’t let him know how much she knew about him.

  She knew about his first big heartbreak.

  She knew how much Malcolm wanted to please his father.

  She knew that Val had worried that he felt torn between his parents. Val had always tried to shelter him from her difficulties with his father.

  Kennedy wanted to reach out and take Malcolm’s hand.

  Present or future, she scolded herself. She couldn’t allow herself to get lost in the past and feel bad about things she couldn’t change.

  “I love how quiet it is this time of night,” Kennedy said, trying to place them firmly back in the present.

  “I like how the houses are all lit up. You can imagine the family all coming together after a day of school or work,” Mal said.

  Kennedy caught the beginning of the fantasy and added, “Sitting
down and sharing their day as they share a meal.”

  Malcolm must have sensed the rhythm. He added, “Maybe the neighbor runs over for sugar.”

  “No, that’s cliché,” Kennedy scolded. “Maybe the neighbor runs over for cinnamon.”

  “Cinnamon?” Mal asked with a chuckle.

  “I was thinking about your mom’s oatmeal cookies, and she always claimed the cinnamon was the trick.” What was wrong with her? Thinking about Val, about their loss, got them in trouble.

  “Oh, great,” Mal said, a note of teasing in his voice. “I’d forgotten the cookies, but now I’m pining for them again.”

  Kennedy pulled the conversation back to the present. “About our fictional family, maybe the dog’s jumping up on them, begging to go for a walk.”

  She pointed across the street at Lamar Thomas. He was a big, burly man. His father was a fisherman back when Lake Erie was populated with fishing boats. Lamar’s father had fished, even through retirement, even as the number of fishing boats dwindled.

  Lamar had grown up on the boat, and now he was Cupid Falls’ street department. A department of one. He did more than plow and maintain . . . he was a general handyman. Kennedy had never asked Lamar to do something and not had him find a way to accomplish it.

  “Hi, Lamar. Hi, Otis.” Otis was his aging cocker spaniel.

  “Good evening, Mayor. Mal,” he called back as they passed.

  Mal looked back at the man and his dog. “Do I know him?”

  “No, I don’t think so. He moved here from Erie.”

  “But he knew my name,” Mal said, glancing back again.

  Kennedy laughed. “You’ve been in Pittsburgh too long. You forget what it’s like here in Cupid Falls. Everyone knows everyone, even if they don’t. And everyone knows everyone’s business, even when it’s none of theirs. You have always been the subject of a lot of the town’s talk. Malcolm Carter the Fourth, Esquire. It’s a ‘local boy moves to the big city and makes good’ sort of thing.”

  He glanced back again, but Kennedy didn’t need to in order to know Lamar had long since turned the corner with Otis and headed home. Malcolm was still quiet, which made her nervous, so she blurted out, “Did you know Lamar means ‘from the ocean’?”