Santa's Secret

by Serenity Woods

  “I wish we could lie here forever,” Eva whispered.

  He nuzzled her hair, kissed her neck. “Shall we say we will lay here until the sun comes up?”

  “I thought the sun didn’t rise at all for weeks?”

  “Exactly.”

  He’d meant to make her laugh, but instead she just fell quiet, and he realised she must be thinking about the fact that it was Christmas Eve, and although they had Christmas Day left, after that it would be time to say goodbye. A wave of sorrow swept over him, so strong it made him catch his breath. She’d come into his life like the angel Isabel had coloured and covered in glitter, sitting on the table in front of the TV. He’d not believed it possible, but Eva had made him realise that the magic of Christmas didn’t have to vanish when one became an adult; that it was still possible to retain the joy of childhood into maturity, even though one knew the truth about Santa and Rudolph.

  Her breathing had grown regular, and he realised she had fallen asleep.

  He rested his head on his hand and looked out at the snow. He wished he’d met Eva before Isabel had been told the truth about Christmas. When she’d come home upset that the boy had told her Rudolph wasn’t real, he should have taken the time to sit and explain that although that might be the case, Christmas could still be magical. He’d thought the truth would prepare her for the harsh reality of life. But instead all he’d done was to take away the magic completely.

  His throat tightened. Poor Isabel. He could blame his father for his own attitude towards Christmas, blame Vanessa for his marriage failing, but ultimately he couldn’t blame anyone for the way he’d acted towards his daughter. He’d directed his own disappointment and frustrations onto her, and all he had done was make things worse.

  He looked at Eva, at the curve of her cheek and the shell of her ear, her pale skin still flushed and warm from the sauna, her damn hair curling around her neck. What he felt for her was as fragile and delicate as a snowflake, but that didn’t make it any less wonderful. And although he knew if he tried to catch it and examine it, it would melt away, that didn’t mean he shouldn’t enjoy for what it was—a piece of Christmas beauty, a moment of magic.

  He lay there for half an hour, letting his thoughts flurry in his mind like the snow outside, and then he woke Eva up and kissed her for a bit before they rose to get dressed.

  They walked back slowly to pick up the kids, holding hands.

  “What would you like to do this evening?” he asked. “Dinner?”

  “That would be nice. I might put Oscar down for a nap first though—he was very tired yesterday after coming back from the club, and otherwise he’ll be up terribly early in the morning.”

  “Of course. Perhaps we can meet up at six? It will give us something to do for a few hours before the excitement of waiting for Santa.” He couldn’t put a lot of enthusiasm into the smile. Santa’s Secret Village offered the option of having Santa deliver the children’s presents late in the evening, but he hadn’t bothered to book it because what was the point when Isabel had seen her presents and had picked out the art set he’d bought for her? “Did you book Santa?”

  “No,” she admitted. “Because of the jet lag I thought Oscar could be asleep really early and I didn’t want to wake him up for it or he’d never get back to sleep. Now I kind of wish I had—it would have been fun, I suppose. But there you go.”

  They arrived at the Centre and went through to the Little Elves room, laughing as they saw Isabel and Oscar in the middle of a game. They were both wearing dressing up outfits—Isabel had a princess dress on over her clothes and Oscar wore a reindeer suit complete with antlers over his, and they were completing some kind of obstacle course, clambering over large cubes and through tunnels the elves had set up for them. As they watched, Oscar gave a squeal, unable to get up onto one of the cubes. Isabel stopped immediately and turned to help him, making Eva cover her mouth with a hand and Rudi say, “Oh. How sweet.” She’d really taken to the boy, he thought.

  A shame she’ll probably never have any brothers or sisters.

  The realisation hit him like a snowball, just as shocking. He honestly hadn’t thought about it before. He’d known he wouldn’t stay celibate forever and would one day meet someone who’d help him move on from Vanessa, but he’d assumed it would be a fling, a physical affair. He’d had no intention of getting married again, and certainly not of bringing any more children into the world.

  But now, watching Eva pick up Oscar and hold Isabel’s hand as they walked back towards him, he realised how much he had turned his back on. Marriage didn’t have to be about arguments, irritation, frustration and compromise all the time. It was also about companionship, about sharing one’s life, about making a family and being safe and secure, as well as about sharing oneself physically.

  Or was he fooling himself? Was he just caught up in the moment? Did all marriages disintegrate in the cold light of morning, like waking up on Christmas Day when the presents were opened and the dinner eaten, when all the magic had gone and all that was left were wrapping paper and the scraps of turkey and a whole lot of washing up? Did love last? Or did it truly melt like the snow as the weeks turned to months and then to years?

  He kissed Isabel on the forehead as she ran up to him, and then they all walked out and across the park to the cabins again.

  “Time for Oscar to have a rest,” Rudi said to Isabel when she complained, “and then we will have dinner together, okay?”

  Eva took her son into their cabin, and he went into his with Isabel and closed the door.

  “I’m not tired,” Isabel said in Finnish.

  “Of course not,” he agreed. “But Oscar needs a rest—he’s still a baby, really.”

  “I suppose.” She looked over at the TV. “I’ll do some colouring.”

  He hesitated. He hadn’t done any work for ages—God knew how many emails were waiting for him. But almost certainly there wasn’t anything that couldn’t wait. It was Christmas Eve, and he was alone with his daughter.

  “How about a game?” he asked. “I saw several in the cabinet under the TV.”

  Her face lit up. “Are you sure, Daddy? I thought you might have to work.”

  “And miss time with my little girl?” He smiled. “Go on, choose something and we’ll have a play.”

  So Isabel hurriedly took off her coat and boots and skipped over to the cabinet, and Rudi also took off his coat and poured them both a glass of lemonade before joining her on the sofa. She’d picked out Operation, and was busy putting the relevant bones into the patient’s body and dishing out the money.

  “Ready, Daddy? You can go first, pick a card.” She tapped the board as he turned the first one over. “You have to take out his funny bone—that’s in his elbow. Go on! I bet you can’t.”

  He was going to fudge it but didn’t have to because the little sucker was a tricky one and the buzzer sounded without him having to pretend to fail. He sighed and gave her the tweezers as she giggled.

  “Go on then, Miss Perfect. Let’s see you have a go.”

  Of course, with her tiny dextrous fingers she managed it first time and crowed triumphantly before picking the next card.

  They passed a pleasant forty-five minutes playing a couple of different games, and then Rudi’s mobile rung where he’d left it on the table. He picked it up, and his heart sank as he saw Vanessa come up on the screen. He really didn’t want to talk to her, and she’d probably rung for Isabel anyway.

  “It’s your mother,” he said. “Do you want to answer it?”

  Isabel took the phone obediently. “Okay, Daddy.” She flipped it open and answered. “Hello?”

  Rudi stood and left her to it, went over to the main phone and called the restaurant to book a table. Then he went into the bathroom and took the wet towels he and Eva had used, folded them and left them in the sauna, tidied up in there to make sure it was clean, and tried not to look longingly at the bench where he had sat with her only a couple of hours before, with
her naked and glistening and touching herself in such a sexy and abandoned manner that he’d nearly come on the spot.

  Sighing, he went back into the bathroom and put his hand on the door handle. Then he stopped, hearing Isabel’s raised voice.

  “It was one ice cream,” Isabel snapped. “Stop fussing.”

  Vanessa obviously berated her harshly then, because Isabel fell quiet. Rudi frowned. Vanessa hated her eating anything but wholesome fruit and vegetables. But it was Christmas, for God’s sake. Couldn’t she relax just a bit and let the child enjoy herself?

  It remained quiet, so he opened the door and went into the room, his hands stuffed in the pockets of his jeans. Isabel stood in front of the TV. Her blonde hair, loosened from its braids, had fallen forwards as she looked at her feet, and he couldn’t see her face.

  “No,” he heard her say eventually. She lifted her head then, and the mutinous look on her face surprised him.

  She saw him, ran towards him, almost threw the phone at him, then went into the bathroom and locked the door.

  He looked at the phone, saw the light still on and held it to his ear. “Vanessa?”

  “I don’t know what’s got into that girl,” his ex-wife said bitterly in Finnish. “She is so rude! That’s what having ice cream does for children, Rudi.”

  “It has nothing to do with ice cream,” he said as mildly as he could manage. “What did you say to her?”

  “I just…” Vanessa fell quiet.

  Rudi waited, used to the dramas she always brought with her. But she didn’t speak, and that was unusual. “What’s the matter?” he pressed.

  “I wish I hadn’t yelled at her,” she said softly. “I didn’t mean to. I only ever want the best for her.”

  He sighed. “I know.” He walked over to the window, looking out at the twilight sky that was starting to darken to a deep midnight-blue. What was Eva doing now? Was she thinking about him?

  “Rudi, I…” Another pause. “I wondered…I know it’s late, but I wondered if I could fly up and join you for Christmas Day?”

  He stared out at the view. “What?”

  “There’s a last minute flight up—I’d be there by ten o’clock, and then I could watch Isabel open her presents in the morning. I miss her. I didn’t think I’d mind not seeing her at Christmas, but I realised I do.”

  He massaged his forehead with his hand. “I don’t understand. What’s happened?”

  “Nothing’s happened. I just want to see my daughter.” Her voice had taken on a defensive tone, but he knew her better than that.

  “Vanessa, the last thing I heard you were going to Rome and there’s no way you’d give that up unless something had happened.”

  She went quiet again, and he closed his eyes and wished he hadn’t spoken so harshly. She always did this to him, drove him to the point where he couldn’t hold in the words, like a Christmas stocking stuffed with too many presents.

  “He left me,” she said.

  The lack of drama in her voice made Rudi open his eyes and blink with surprise. “What?”

  “Stefan. He left me two days ago.” Her voice was flat and unemotional. She didn’t cry either, and that only made her reaction more genuine. “I wasn’t going to ring you, Rudi, I swear. I don’t mean to be dramatic. I know it’s not fair on either of you.”

  He let out a long, frustrated sigh and ran his hand through his hair. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “I’m sure you’re not, but thank you anyway. Look, I’m really not expecting anything—I’m not looking for a big reunion. I just thought it might be nice to see Isabel.”

  He leaned on the window. It was a perfectly legitimate request. How could he say no? In many ways he hated her for what she’d done to him—for making him feel as if love was a fabrication, for making him hard and cynical, but was that truly all her fault? Or did it have roots in his past, in how his father had made him feel over the years? He didn’t love her, but she was the mother of his child. Could he really tell her she couldn’t spend Christmas with her daughter? What kind of person did that make him?

  “Who’s Eva?” she said.

  Rudi froze. “What?”

  “Isabel said I couldn’t come up because you were seeing Eva.”

  He blew out a breath and ran his hand through his hair again. “Just a girl I met when I arrived here.”

  “A girl?”

  “A woman. She has a son—he’s three. We’ve spent a bit of time together, that’s all.”

  “I see.”

  “Vanessa…”

  “Honey,” she said softly, “it’s okay.”

  He squeezed his eyes shut. “It’s not a thing; I’ve only known her a few days.”

  “Rudi, please, it’s none of my business. And why on earth wouldn’t any woman snap you up?”

  He couldn’t believe she was forgiving him, and her compliment took him by surprise. “I’m not flaunting anything in front of Isabel,” he said, wondering why he felt the need to say so.

  “She knows. Don’t be fooled.”

  “It’s irrelevant,” he persisted, frustration overwhelming him. “Eva’s a New Zealander living in England. It’s not going anywhere.”

  “I doesn’t have to, honey. It just means you’re moving on. I didn’t realise you had, but it’s a good thing, and I should have realised it would happen. I thought…” She cleared her throat. “I suppose I thought you’d wait for me forever, but that was stupid.”

  He rested his forehead on his hand. It was nearly dark outside, and getting close to six o’clock. “We were never going to work,” he said, finally admitting it to her as well as himself. “You are elegant and beautiful, and you were a superb corporate wife—you carried that role out to perfection. But a marriage has to be more than that, if it’s going to last. You deserve someone who’ll be devoted to you—everyone deserves that.”

  “Including you,” she said softly. “You are such a sweet boy, Rudi.”

  He sank his hand into his hair. It was the first time in a long time that they’d been nice to each other, and it seemed to be more final than all the arguments and shouting they’d done in the past. “I brought a lot of baggage with me,” he said. “From the past.”

  “We all do, sweetheart. And sometimes it’s just too much. Look, I have to go. Please wish Izzy a merry Christmas for me, and tell her I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset her.”

  “I’ll do that. Will you be okay?” He didn’t like to think of her alone and unhappy.

  “I have a friend in Paris who’s offered to put me up. I’ll be fine.”

  His throat tightened. “Merry Christmas, Vanessa.”

  “Merry Christmas, Rudi.”

  She hung up.

  He clipped the phone shut and stared at it for a moment.

  Then he walked over to the bathroom and knocked on the door. “Izzy?”

  “Go away.”

  “Come out, will you?”

  “I’m doing personal girl things.”

  He stifled a laugh. “No, you’re not; you’re sitting on the toilet seat and glaring at me.”

  She muttered under her breath and something clattered on the floor; it sounded like a soap dish, and he crossed his fingers it wasn’t broken.

  Then he heard footsteps, and the door opened.

  She looked up at him, her face sullen. “I don’t want her to come.”

  “She’s your mother,” he berated her gently. “She just wants to see you at Christmas.”

  “If she comes I can’t have ice cream or crisps, and she’ll fuss over what I’m wearing.” She looked suddenly upset. “I’m sorry, I don’t want to be mean. I love her so much, and I miss her.”

  “I know.” He pulled her into his arms and she buried her face in his jumper.

  “I used to want you to get back together,” she said, voice muffled against his chest. “But then I saw you with Eva, and it was like someone switched a light on inside you. You never looked like that with Mummy, and I realised, you know?
What love is.”

  “I don’t love Eva, honey,” he said gently, although his heart pounded. “We’ve only just met, and love is something that takes time to grow.”

  “Eva said that being in love and loving someone are two different things,” Isabel pointed out. “She said one takes a long time to grow, but the other can happen when you first see someone. Are you in love with her?”

  He said nothing for a moment, surprised at Eva’s words and Isabel’s astuteness. He went to deny it, and then she looked up at him, her blue eyes—so like his—alight with hope.

  “Yes,” he said. “I think I am.”

  “What will you do when it’s time for us all to go home?”

  He rested his lips on her hair. “I don’t know, darling. She lives in another country. And I don’t even know if she feels the same way.”

  “I think she does.”

  He thought so too, but didn’t want to say so. “Unfortunately, real life isn’t always like a fairy tale,” he said.

  “But it’s Christmas, Daddy. Isn’t that when miracles are supposed to happen?”

  He tightened his arms around her. What was he supposed to say to that?

  Chapter Nineteen

  Eva woke Oscar fifteen minutes before six. As usual, he woke grumpy, threw Pooh Bear across the bed, knocked over a glass of water and promptly burst into tears. But after that was all cleared up and Bear tucked back under his arm, he cheered up at the news that it was still Christmas Eve, that Santa was packing up his sleigh, and that they were about to go to dinner with Rudi and Isabel.

  He bounced on the bed. “I’m starving.”

  “Me too.”

  “Starving Marvin,” Oscar declared.

  “I wonder who he is and why he’s so hungry?” Eva pulled on her coat.

  Oscar chuckled, bounced onto his bottom and then back onto his feet. “I’m on a tramperleen, Mummy!”

  “You’ll break the bed. You’re heavy as an elephant.”

  “No, I’m not,” he scoffed. “You’re heavy as an elephant.”

  “Hmm.” She thought about the way Rudi had picked her up as if she’d weighed little more than a pillow. “I suppose.”