“Well, that looks bad,” Aunt Edie told him.
Thea put down her fork and got up to look out the window. “I hate driving in deep snow.”
“Kara and I could drive you home if you need it,” Ron volunteered. “It might be a little crowded in my Jeep but it will get you there.”
“Or you could stay overnight here if you prefer,” Ruth assured them.
Thea clearly didn't like either of those options, but she also wasn't anxious to disrupt the holiday spirit. “It's probably not that bad yet,” she said. “I guess we'll just keep an eye on the weather for a while.”
* * * *
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Chapter Sixteen
“I think that's done it,” Al said.
The radio in the garage was playing Gene Autry's Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Snow continued to fall heavily outside.
Kara picked up a broom and began to sweep sand off the floor. Ron and Al had poured six fifty-pound bags into the base of the basketball hoop and they hadn't been particularly neat about it. “It doesn't look like you can even stand it up in the garage,” she noted.
“The height of the backboard is adjustable,” Ron assured her. “That way if Jenny and her friends want to play, we can lower it down and if Marc and his friends want to play, we can raise it to regulation height.”
“Too bad we can't try it out at regulation height in the garage,” Al said.
“Why do it in the garage?” Ron asked. “Let's take it outside and give it a try.”
Kara glanced at the small windows in the garage door. Sure enough, snow continued to fall heavily outside. It was actually the reason she'd come into the garage five minutes before. They'd had two inches of snowfall since dinner and Aunt Edie had decided it was time for her and her daughters to go home. “You do remember it's snowing?” she asked.
Ron just grinned.
Al grinned, too. “You know I can't remember the last time I played hoops with snow on the ground,” he said.
“That's because you can't bounce the basketball in the snow,” Kara reminded them.
Both men just kept grinning.
Kara tried one more time to divert them from insanity. “Was this present for Marc or you men?”
Al answered by flicking the switch on the automatic garage door opener. “If we take the hoop out and pull Ruth's car back into the garage,” he said, “we ought to even be able to dribble a bit. The driveway will be clear where her car used to be.”
“I'm game if you are, old man,” Ron told him. “Shall we get Marc?”
“Can't very well have a Christmas basketball game without my son,” Al said. “You think you can handle the both of us by yourself?”
The garage had been cold compared to the rest of the house even with Al's space heater running, but now that the garage door had been opened, it was quickly becoming frigid.
“Of course, I could,” Ron assured him.
Kara frowned. She had seen Ron exhibit this sort of cocky machismo when they got together with his friends, but it had rarely come out this strongly with Al before.
“But I won't have to,” Ron continued, “because Kara will be on my team.”
Kara jerked her head around to stare at him. “I am not playing basketball in the snow,” she said.
Halfway through her sentence, Thea came out into the garage. “Hey, Kara, Al, Ron, it looks like we're really leaving—” she stopped as Kara's words sunk in and she saw the completed basketball hoop and the open garage door. “Did you just say we're playing basketball in the snow?”
“No—” Kara started to tell her, but Ron was already saying the opposite.
“Just a quick game,” he told Thea. “You want in? Marc and Al are going to need help when Kara and I start pressing them.”
Thea stood with her hands on her hips for a moment while a broad smile slowly took shape on her face. “Just try to stop me!” she said. “I'm in!”
Kara made one more half-hearted effort to restore some sanity to the occasion. “I don't think you can play ball in the snow,” she said.
“People play football in the snow all the time,” Ron reminded her. “Basketball won't be that much different.”
[Back to Table of Contents]
* * *
Chapter Seventeen
Basketball was different.
It took a few minutes to find their coats and grab the children. Jenny, unsurprisingly, wanted to play as well, so Kara and Ron took her on their team. Then, with Mama and Aunt Edie complaining, the whole family made their way out into the yard for the game. The snow was four inches deep in the driveway—except for the small spot where Ruth had parked her car. Al's car still sat at the front of the driveway near the street, but if they were careful, there was just enough room to dribble a little and shoot.
Ron tossed the ball to Marc and told Jenny to go out and cover him. Kara took a stance near Thea. She was a lot more athletic than she'd been a year ago when she met Ron, but she didn't know if that meant she could cover her cousin. Marc quickly dribbled around Jenny and shot for the hoop. Ron batted the ball away so that Al recovered it. Marc and Jenny both howled with excitement as their father shot and the ball bounced off the rim. Kara put her hands up to catch it but her cousin, overcome by a surprising burst of competitiveness darted in front of her and snatched the ball out of the air.
Suddenly the cold mattered a lot less to Kara. She leapt up in her good clothes and long coat and blocked Thea's shot from behind. She was feeling pretty good about herself until the soles of her fashionable boots hit the slick pavement and she and Thea both fell over into the snow.
“Ha, ha, ha, Aunt Kara!” Jenny squealed.
Ron, showing more interest in the game than his girlfriend, scooped up the ball, bounced it twice, and sank the first basket of the night.
“Why don't you help your woman up, Ron?” Al said. “We can wait.”
“Thanks!” Ron said and hurried over to offer Kara and then Thea a hand. Al waited patiently while Kara got to her feet, but the moment Ron started helping Thea he passed the ball to Marc and shouted, “Shoot, boy, shoot!”
Marc's first over-excited effort hit the rim on the way up and bounced directly back down to him.
Kara jumped in front of him, skidded on the slick pavement and almost went down again.
Ron tried to drop Thea to move to defend the basket, but Kara's feisty cousin wouldn't let go of him and he tumbled over in the snow beside her.
“One basket apiece,” Al smugly announced as his son succeeded in sinking his follow up shot.
“So that's the way you want to play,” Ron observed. He stood up, brushed the snow off his coat, and then stepped over beside Kara and Jenny. “You ready, girls?” he asked.
“Ready!” Kara and Jenny promised.
“It's bad enough that the men want to act like fools,” Mama called out. “But why do you and Thea have to encourage them?”
Kara ignored her mother. Ron tossed her the ball and she tried to dribble in the snow, but all she succeeded in doing was getting the ball to bounce off at a crazy angle. Marc ran for it, but Ruth of all people snatched it up from the sidelines and tossed it effortlessly through the net.
Everyone froze.
“Ruth?” Kara asked the question all of them were wondering. “When did you learn to shoot a basketball?”
Ruth just smiled at her.
“Hey, we're up two to one!” Marc shouted.
“No, you're not!” Jenny shouted back. “Mom is on our team!”
“No, she's not!” Marc insisted.
While they were speaking, Becka snatched the ball out of Al's hand and made her own basket. “Two to two,” she announced.
Jenny started clapping.
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* * *
Chapter Eighteen
Kara shot her basket, barely getting it past Thea's outstretched hand. She'd missed every shot s
he'd taken tonight and she really wanted this one to go in. They were down nine to six. Ron was good, but he never forgot that Marc and Jenny were in the game. He'd spank the ball out of the sky to reject Al, Ruth and Thea's shots, but other than that first time he'd blocked Marc, he pretty much let Kara's nephew shoot at will. And he'd even taken to picking up Jenny so she could have a better chance of putting the ball through the rim. The kids adored him for it, but Kara knew it would bother him if they let Al win.
Her ball bounced off the rim, ricocheted, to the other side, and slipped into the net.
“Way to go, Kara!” Ron told her. His arms slipped around her and his cold lips briefly pressed against her equally chilled face. Then he was hurrying back to defend the basket again.
His phone started ringing from somewhere inside his coat. He'd changed the jingle for the holidays to Baby It's Cold Outside and he reached for it now while calling timeout.
Al went ahead and took a shot anyway, while Ron in his good shoes walked off into the snowy yard. “Hello!”
Thea put her hand on Kara's arm to catch her attention. “I like him,” she said.
“What?”
“Ron,” Thea explained. “I like him. I didn't think I was going to after the stories Aunt Margaret's been telling Mom. But I like him.”
“I like him, too,” Kara said. And then for reasons she didn't quite understand, she confessed. “It's harder than I thought it would be. But I really like him.”
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Ron duck his head as if trying to hear his phone better. He said. “No, Eric, I haven't heard from her all day.”
“What do you mean harder?” Thea asked. “You mean living together?”
“Yeah, living together is tough,” Kara said. “It's nothing big, but we're very different and the little things get to me sometimes. But it was hard before that, too. His family is flat out weird and—”
Thea's broadening smile caused Kara to break off her complaint. “What?”
Thea didn't answer immediately.
Kara could hear Ron say: “You mean she said she was coming here?"
Kara started to turn to Ron to find out what was going on but Thea was still standing beside her grinning, so she kept most of her attention on her cousin. “What?” Kara repeated.
“I was just thinking,” Thea told her, “how normal our family is. I've got a secret for you Kara—nobody's family is that normal.”
Kara conceded the point. “Well, okay, but his father—”
Thea's continued grin made her break off and started over again. “Okay,” she repeated, “so both of our families are difficult. What do we do about it?”
Thea shrugged. “You do the best you can. Are you going to marry him?”
Kara shivered and despite the snow falling all around her, she didn't think it was the cold that caused it. “I don't know if he wants to,” she whispered. “I kind of thought...well, we've sort of been fighting this weekend, but it all seems kind of stupid now.”
Thea shrugged again. “Most couples fight over the stupid things. I don't really know why that it is but I have a theory. The big things—like not being able to stand the idea of spending a whole day with each other's family for the holiday—are things you know are going to make you look like an ass if you pick a fight over them. But all of those bad feelings are still there. So you pick a fight over something stupid but what you're really saying is I don't want to spend another day with your parents.”
Kara shuddered this time, not a little shiver, but a full-fledged body wrenching shudder.
“Hit a nerve, didn't I?” Thea observed.
Off to the side, Ron said, “Sure, I'll try phoning her, but if she's not taking your calls, why do you think she'll take mine?”
Kara said, “Do you really think that's why I've been picking fights with him? Because I didn't want to spend Christmas Eve with his family?”
Thea hugged herself against the cold. “I don't know,” she said. “What were you fighting about?”
Kara remembered the first fight—the real fight—when she'd gotten mad that Ron wanted to fuck her too much. There was no way she could tell Thea that!
“What?” Thea asked her. “You just made the strangest facial expression.”
Thea's eyes gleamed with sudden understanding. She leaned in closer to Kara and whispered a question. “Did he want to try something really kinky?”
Kara tried to school her expression but Thea saw something in it anyway.
“He did, he did!” she squealed. “I think I like this guy even more now.”
Ron glanced over at them for a moment, but instead of crossing the driveway to see what they were talking about, he pushed a button on his phone and lifted it back to his ear to listen. Mama stood in her coat talking to Aunt Edie as the snow fell around them. Al and Marc were taking shots at the hoop. And Ruth had picked up Jenny while she talked quietly to Becka.
No one was actually paying much attention to Kara and Thea so Kara partly gave into her confessional impulse. “I don't know how to put this exactly,” she said, “but things are normally really good between Ron and me. It's just that sometimes he wants them to be good at really awkward times.”
Kara wasn't certain Thea would follow her allusion, but her cousin had obviously stayed right with her. “There are worse problems to have,” she said. “I mean, as long as he keeps it zipped during church, what's the problem.”
Kara could actually think of a lot of places besides church that she didn't want Ron unzipping his pants, but what she said was, “I hadn't realized how adventurous you are, Thea.”
Across the driveway, Ron started leaving a voicemail for his sister. “Hey, Kitten, it's Ron. Eric and your kids are pretty worried about you. Please give me a call when you get this message. Whatever's wrong, we'll figure out a way to work it out. Love you, Sis!”
“All of that adventure is in my head,” Thea confessed. “I haven't had a boyfriend in years. All the good men are gone. Except for nights like this, I spend all of my evenings at home with Mom and my cats.”
Her voice trailed off.
“Hey, Ron,” Al called out. “It's cold out here! Are we going to play another round?”
Ron held up a hand to Al as if he were holding him off. “Give me another minute, Al. My sister is missing and her husband's freaking out.”
Ron's comment jarred Kara out of her conversation with Thea. “Did you say Kitten is missing?”
Ron lifted his phone back to his ear. “Yeah, she apparently—” he broke off in mid-sentence and spoke into the phone. “Eric, she didn't take my call. How bad do you think this is? Should we start calling hospitals?”
“Would you excuse me for a moment?” Kara asked Thea before hurrying over to Ron's side.
Thea walked with her, and the rest of Kara's family gravitated toward him as well—even Mama and Aunt Edie offering the support of their concern, even if Mama probably didn't realize that was what she was doing.
“Well, what do you want me to do then?” Ron asked.
He listened for a moment and shook his head.
“No, I'm not going to forget about it. I don't care if it's Christmas. Kitten's my sister. I want to help.”
Kara was close enough now to hear Eric's voice coming out of the little speaker, but not to make out his words.
“Eric,” Ron responded. “I've got a Grand Cherokee. Ford makes it. I could drive up Mount Everest in it if I had to.”
“What's going on?” Thea whispered to her.
“I'm not sure,” Kara whispered back, “but Ron's sisters found out they were adopted a few months ago and Kitten hasn't been dealing with it very well. To make matters worse, his other sister, Anne, spent today with her birthmother and it's apparently been going fabulously. Kitten was really upset last night.”
“I'll try and think of where she could go,” Ron said. “I've got a full tank of gas. The least I can do is drive around. You keep in touch in case you hear from her or you think of
something.”
Ron disconnected the call and stuck the phone in his pocket. When he looked up, he seemed to notice for the first time that everyone had crossed the driveway to form a half circle around him.
“I'm sorry everyone,” he said, “but my sister went off in this snow a couple of hours ago saying she was coming to talk to me and no one knows what happened to her. I'm sorry, but I've got to go look for her.”
“Completely understandable,” Al said. “Is there anything we can do to help?”
“Just let Kara stay here while I search,” Ron said.
“I'm going with you!” Kara told him.
“Kara,” Mama began, but Kara cut her off.
“I don't want to hear any opposing opinions,” she said. “If Kitten's in trouble, I'm going to help you look!”
Ron stepped in front of her and gently took hold of her by her upper arms, looking into her eyes. “It's a terrible way to spend Christmas night,” he told her. “You'll be warmer and more comfortable if you stay with your family.”
“The only place I want to spend Christmas is with you,” she told him. Despite all the fights yesterday and the unpleasantness this morning, and the trouble with Mama and Bobby this afternoon, Kara knew she'd said the simple unvarnished truth.
Ron kissed her. Not a deep searching exploration of her mouth but a simple meaningful pressing of his lips against hers. “Thanks,” he said. “I needed to hear that right now.”
The warmth that stirred in her heart right then could have sustained her through a thousand blizzards. “I love you, Ron,” she whispered.
“I love you, too,” he said, “more than I think you could ever possibly know.”
He kissed her one more time, a warm but fleetingly meeting of their mouths. Then he turned around. “I'm sorry everyone, but we have to go,” he said. “Ruth, it was a wonderful dinner as always. Thank you.” He hurried over to her and gave her a quick hug. “Merry Christmas!”
“Merry Christmas, Ron,” Ruth said. Then added, “You be sure to call us when you find your sister.”
“I will!” Ron promised.
He shook Al and Marc's hands and hugged Jenny before telling Kara's aunt and cousins it had been nice to finally meet them. Kara, of course, was doing the same thing, giving plenty of hugs and kisses, and heartfelt wishes of Merry Christmas, while keeping a caring eye on Ron.
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