The Christmas Room

by Catherine Anderson

  After grabbing some breakfast, Caleb told his father that he was working on a surprise for Gram and asked if he could be over on their land all day.

  “Are you making her something?” his dad asked.

  “Sort of. I’ll have to run to town a couple of times.”

  “Do you need money?”

  “I’ve got some of my allowance saved up. I think it’s enough.”

  • • •

  Maddie had suffered through the aftermath of her final chemo treatment, and she felt better physically. Her tangled emotions were another story, but she was trying to conquer those, too. Outside Sam’s dining room window, fluffy snowflakes drifted through the air, creating a winter scene that was almost postcard perfect. The barn sat off to one side, its doors yawning open to reveal the hay stored along the back wall. Next door to it, the shop, also sided with wood and stained the same reddish brown, emitted golden light from its windows to generate a warm glow. Behind both buildings, towering pines rose above the rooflines, resembling frosted Christmas trees.

  Maddie wished that the beautiful surroundings would lift her spirits, but she still felt hollow and sad. Regardless, she had decided that her self-pity party was over. It was high time for her to at least pretend she was filled with Christmas cheer. When she turned from the window, she nearly tripped over Bingo. The other five dogs lay in the kitchen, snoring softly.

  She went to put on a CD to fill the rooms with holiday music and began tackling the chore of wrapping all the gifts that she’d been hiding in her room. It was perfect timing—only Gabriella was in the house, and she was upstairs cleaning. Cam had driven into town with Kirstin because there had been another wedding gown disaster. Caleb was over at their property doing something, and Sam was outside puttering. If Maddie hurried, she could get everything under the tree before anyone got back.

  As she piled presents at one end of the table and organized the other with rolls of paper, ribbon, scissors, and tape, she hummed along with “The First Noel,” wishing she could feel the joy that normally filled her heart when she heard the song. She had every reason to be happy, she reminded herself. She had recovered from her last treatment and wouldn’t need another one. Even though she wouldn’t officially be a cancer survivor for five years, the odds were strongly in her favor. She could begin looking forward again and believe she had a future. Only, as grateful as she was for that, she couldn’t rejoice. Sam had wormed his way into her heart, and now contemplating a life without him made her feel lost.

  As she boxed up a set of sound-canceling earbuds for Caleb, she attempted to push all thoughts of Sam from her mind, but while living in his home, she faced reminders of him everywhere she looked. At the center of the table, Kirstin had put out the Conacher family Christmas shakers, sugar bowl, and tiny cream pitcher, which Sam had given to Annie as a gift years ago. It reminded Maddie of all the pain and suffering Sam had endured over the loss of his wife. Guilt weighed heavily on Maddie’s shoulders, because she truly had deprived Sam of the right to decide if he wished to gamble with his heart again. Even though she now felt almost certain that she’d beaten the cancer, she hadn’t been so sure of that earlier in her friendship with Sam. When their feelings for each other had changed and deepened into love, how could she have continued to tell him she was fine? It hadn’t merely been wrong, but also unforgivably selfish of her. Already set on her course, she’d put Cam and Caleb’s happiness above Sam’s. Who could blame him for questioning her honesty? Or for feeling bitterly angry?

  “Jingle Bells” pealed through the house next, but the jolly refrains didn’t lift Maddie’s spirits. Out of habit, she selected a Santa-patterned gift wrap for her grandson. Always before, she’d used a glue gun to fancy up the gifts she wrapped, but this year, simple would have to do. Her glue gun was in storage, and she lacked the enthusiasm to go to all that bother, anyway.

  Oh, Sam, she thought. He was a man who stood behind what he said, and he’d told her in no uncertain terms that their relationship was over. She had to stop hoping he’d change his mind; she needed to accept the consequences of her own actions. As dismal as the future seemed to her at the moment, she had survived losing her husband. Now she would live through losing Sam as well. She had no choice.

  Sam was doing everything he could to make things tolerable. When he came in for dinner at night, he was friendly enough, but he avoided meeting her gaze and no longer sat in his recliner, waiting for her to finish writing for the day. She missed their evening chats and feeling his arm around her shoulders. She yearned to hear his deep laugh. She even mourned the loss of his sarcastic comments.

  Her book was finally finished and had been sent to her editor. Normally she would have celebrated and felt proud of herself for finishing it up prior to Christmas. Days off loomed before her, allowing time for shopping and baking for the holiday. But her usual enthusiasm evaded her. In short, it didn’t feel like Christmas in this huge house where she no longer felt welcome.

  She yearned to go back to her trailer, but she couldn’t bring herself to ask Cam to make that possible. His mind was on his wedding, the alterations of Kirstin’s gown, and planning their brief honeymoon. In order to move back, she would have to tell Cam that she and Sam were at loggerheads. It didn’t seem right to spoil this special time in his life with her personal problems. She decided to wait until after Cam returned from Hawaii to drop the bomb. It wouldn’t take long to get her trailer inside the building and hooked up to utilities. Caleb could remain on the ranch with his father until the residences were complete.

  “Silent Night” came over the stereo next. Maddie closed her eyes for a moment and focused on what the upcoming holiday truly meant. It wasn’t about jolly songs and piles of gifts around a beautifully decorated tree. It was about hope and believing in something greater than one’s self. Over the coming days, when the situation seemed unbearable, she would remember that.

  • • •

  Sam sat on the three-legged stool in the shop again, rubbing the leather of a saddle. With a start, he realized that he’d been circling the sponge in the same spot for several minutes. He was physically present, but his mind was consumed with thoughts of Maddie. Had he done the right thing by ending their relationship? He enjoyed being with her so much. He loved teasing her and laughing with her. He felt as if he had lost his best friend. And no matter how many times he told himself that he had done the right thing, doubts slipped into his mind.

  When he’d seen Maddie going into the oncology building, he had reacted without thinking beyond his initial emotions, a confusing mixture of anger and fear. Yes, he’d been justified in his anger. But what he hadn’t stopped to consider was that he would lose her for certain if he ended the relationship.

  How did that make sense? He’d been terrified of losing her and then he’d done the one thing that would ensure that he did.

  Fear. It was an evil enemy that could confuse a man and shift his focus as easily as a sleight-of-hand performer. He’d known two men who had left their wives, not because they no longer loved them, but because the women had been about to divorce them. Their husbands had filed for divorce in order to beat them to the punch. Sam had never understood their reasoning—until now. By filing for divorce first, they had avoided being the ones who got left behind.

  Had he essentially done the same thing? Had he tried to avoid losing Maddie by ducking out before she could get sick? By growing angry and accusing her, had he been running from the one thing he couldn’t bear to endure again?

  Sam had never considered himself to be a coward, but for the first time in his life he understood that cowardice came in many different forms and wore just as many faces. He rested his arms on his knees. The sponge slipped from his now-limp fingers and plopped on the concrete floor. He could almost hear Maddie saying, There are no guarantees. She had also warned him that he could never live a happy and contented life if he refused to put his heart at
risk. Only he hadn’t listened. Hadn’t been able to, because every word she’d said had terrified him.

  But this isn’t about only me and my fears. Maddie has borne the burden of having cancer all alone. Do you think she hasn’t felt afraid? Sam wondered how many times she had yearned for just one person she could trust, someone with whom she could share her worries and fears. Sam knew she’d come to trust him at some point, but by then her course had already been set and she had probably felt that it was not only too late but also pointless to confide in him.

  Cancer. Merely by thinking the word, he was filled with terror. Maddie believed she was out of the woods, but there truly weren’t any guarantees. Sam wanted to deal with absolutes, no ifs, ands, or maybes. Why have I been given this second great sorrow in my life?

  Sam found himself standing in front of his house on a shoveled path to the porch. Drifts had formed the previous night, creating whimsical snow sculptures. Pine trees shrouded in white clustered around the back of the structure like ladies-in-waiting. Even in daylight the home looked cheery and bright, every roofline and post delineated by tiny lights. The wreath Maddie had on the door was the perfect size, not too small, not too large, but just right.

  He pictured her off in a corner crying. And suddenly it hit him with the force of a full-size bus that Maddie had to be every bit as terrified as he was. She was a smart lady. Some individuals truly did win the war. But would Maddie be one of them? She had no way of knowing for sure, and neither did Sam. The only thing he knew with absolute certainty was that he had behaved like a fair-weather friend, turning his back on her the instant he learned the truth.

  Filled with regret, Sam walked toward the porch, his thoughts in such a tangle that he barely felt the frigid air cutting through his shirt. Caleb had gone somewhere. Cam and Kirstin were still in town, scrambling to get her wedding gown properly altered before the nuptials. The door squeaked as Sam pushed it open. When he stepped into the entryway, chunks of snow fell from his riding boots onto the dark slate. He moved forward to scan the living room.

  Maddie stood in front of the Christmas tree. Shoulders slumped, she hugged her waist as if to ward off a chill. She looked so forlorn. Sam wondered how he could have done this to her. He crossed the room, stepped around her, and crouched to retrieve a professionally wrapped gift box that he’d stowed under the boughs a few days ago. The scent of pine needles filled his senses, reminding him of Christmases past and present.

  Maddie said nothing as he tore off the gold foil paper. Holding a fold of soft wool in his hands, Sam pushed erect and moved to stand behind her. “I got this for you to wear while you’re writing, but you look as if you need it now.”

  She lifted her head and grasped the ends of the shawl in her fists to hold it snugly around her shoulders. “Thank you. That was thoughtful of you.”

  “Maddie, I’m anything but thoughtful.” Sam enfolded her in his arms and drew her back against his chest. “I’m so sorry for the way I acted when I learned about your cancer. I should have been supportive and understanding, not angry with you.”

  • • •

  Bewilderment washed through Maddie. She turned her head to study his face and saw tears in his eyes. This was a sudden about-face, and she was bewildered.

  “Don’t say anything,” he told her. It was more a request than a command. “I need to do the talking. When I found out about your cancer, I felt cursed, as if my life were repeating itself. I’d fallen in love with a woman, and God was going to steal her from me again. Why would God do that to me? But even scarier, Maddie, how would I survive it?”

  Maddie could see the raw emotion in his expression. “Whatever comes, we somehow live through it, Sam.”

  “I know. Only I’m not worried about that now. I’ve had a lot of time to think about it, and I realize that I haven’t been cursed. Instead I’ve been given a gift, a priceless, precious gift—being able to love again.”

  Maddie felt tears gathering in her own eyes.

  “You won’t have to go through this alone any longer if you can find it in your heart to give me another chance,” Sam continued. “I understand why you kept it from your kids. Even now they would be devastated if you told them. And you made the decision to keep your cancer a secret long before you met me. I was wrong to feel that you deliberately duped me. You were already up to your eyebrows in the deception. The die had been cast.”

  “Oh, Sam. I was wrong not to tell you. So very wrong. I love you, and I’ve felt so lost without you.”

  He turned her in his arms and held her close, his face pressed against her hair. “God, I love the way you smell. You’ll never be without me again, Maddie, unless I go first, and I’ll fight dying with my last breath. I want to enjoy this second chance with you. We’ll be in this together from here on out. I know how terribly afraid you must be. It took incredible courage for you to come this far alone.”

  Maddie hugged his neck and began to weep. “I am afraid,” she confessed. “I keep remembering Graham’s death. Right after his surgery, they said they got it all, only they didn’t. How can I be absolutely sure the same thing won’t happen to me? I don’t want to die that way, Sam. It was so awful.”

  Sam led her to the sofa. As they sat nestled together on the cushions, he said, “Tell me everything.”

  Maddie dried her cheeks. “Well, as you know, I didn’t want my kids to find out, so when I was diagnosed, I flew to Missouri to have surgery and recuperate at my sister’s home. I was incredibly lucky, because I found an oncologist with a new treatment strategy that he wished to try. All he needed was a patient willing to roll the dice.”

  “What’s the strategy?” Sam asked.

  Maddie told him about the new chemo drug. “The doctor’s plan was to administer infusions in lighter doses and for a longer period of time. As he put it, all it takes is for one tiny cancer cell to survive and then his patient doesn’t. He reasons that giving lighter doses of chemo will enable a person to withstand a longer course of treatments and expose any possible cancer cells that remain to the drug. He believes that may increase the odds that those cells will be killed.”

  Sam nodded. His hair caught the variegated light from the Christmas tree, making it look like snow dappled with color by a rainbow. “That makes sense to me. I’ve known so many people who underwent chemo treatments after a cancer surgery only to have the cancer return when the treatments ended.”

  Maddie nodded. “Graham was one of them.”

  “And Annie, too.”

  He tightened his hand around hers. The strength of his grip seemed to lend her strength in equal measure. “It’s so good to just talk with you about it. I never even got an infusion port for fear one of the kids might feel it under my clothing or see it. They would have known right away what it was.”

  Sam drew her closer until she was nestled snugly against him. “Thank you, Maddie.”

  “For what?”

  “For forgiving me. For understanding me. I realized today what a coward I am.”

  “You, a coward?”

  “Oh, yeah. When I first found out I might lose you, I ran.”

  • • •

  Cam sat on a plastic lawn chair outside the dressing room, waiting for Kirstin to emerge in a pinned-together gown that couldn’t be fixed. He was tense, which was evidenced by his clenched hands and the ache of knotted muscles in his shoulders. The dress meant so much to her. Cam couldn’t fully understand why, but that wasn’t necessary. It mattered to her. He was sick-to-death tired of fittings, pins, trim, and tearful outbursts, but he’d never grow tired of Kirstin.

  She emerged from the cubicle. Her steel blue gaze clung to his. Her expression glowed with delight. In his estimation, she’d never looked so beautiful, and it sure as hell wasn’t due to the dress. “It’s fixed, Cam. The piping lines up perfectly and it fits me like a glove.”

  He pushed to his feet, wi
shing he could shout Hallelujah! Day after tomorrow, it would be Christmas Eve. Even the seamstress would close up shop that afternoon. They’d gotten the dress repaired just in the nick of time. He let his gaze move slowly over her. “You’re the most beautiful bride I’ve ever seen.”

  She touched her hair. “I’m actually a mess, but the dress is finally perfect.” A troubled frown creased her brow. “They say it’s bad luck for a groom to see his bride in her dress before the wedding. Do you think there’s any truth in that?”

  “No,” Cam replied. “I’ve never been superstitious, and I won’t start now. And I meant it when I said you’re the most beautiful bride I’ve ever seen. It’s not the dress but the woman wearing it. It’s gorgeous, of course. I don’t mean that it isn’t, but it would never look as beautiful on anyone else.”

  She closed the distance between them and stepped into his arms. “I’m sorry if I’ve been a little crazy. It’s just . . .” Her voice trailed away. “When I was a little girl, I saw a picture of a dress almost exactly like this, and I remembered it all these years.”

  “I know.” Cam heard a thickness in his voice.

  “I was starting to believe I’d never get married. You know? And now that I’ll have a wedding day, I want every detail to be absolutely perfect. I know that’s unrealistic, but I flipped out when the dress arrived and didn’t fit. I became a bridezilla, didn’t I?”

  Cam tightened his embrace. “A sweet and wonderful bridezilla.”

  The seamstress stepped from the cubicle. She beamed a smile at Cam. “We did it. No one will ever know we tore that dress completely apart and put it back together.”

  Cam gave her a grin. “It’s perfect. Thank you so much for saving the day for us.”

  • • •

  Caleb froze when he entered the house and saw Maddie and Sam snuggling on the couch. Exhausted from all the work he had just done, he couldn’t help but start to feel angry. This is just great, he thought. You fight for three days and then make up for no good reason. He went straight to his bedroom and flopped down on the mattress. After a moment, he felt guilty. Gram was happy again. That was all he should have cared about.