The Heart of Christmas

by Kathryn Shay

  Conor opened his mouth and closed it. “I…” He paused again. He seemed thunderstruck.

  “Even if most of your photos of your wife are digital, you can print them up. I think Amy would appreciate something physical. Something she can hold in her hands.”

  Again he seemed on the verge of speaking, then hesitated. Then said, “My late wife.”

  She frowned, not quite sure what he was getting at. “Yes. Your late wife.”

  “She’s dead,” he said.

  Was he grieving? Or just reminding himself of his current situation? “I know that,” she said quietly.

  “I don’t have a wife,” he said, stressing each word, sounding almost angry. “I did. But now I don’t.”

  “I know, Conor—”

  “As for the scrapbook…” His voice mellowed. “That’s a brilliant idea.”

  “I don’t know if it’s brilliant,” she said modestly. “But…” How much did she want to tell him? They’d been intimate physically, but did she really want to share her bleak recent biography with someone when she had no idea what their relationship entailed?

  She decided she could tell him this much: “I lost my mother last March. It’s nothing like what Amy’s going through, but it was a shock, and very painful.” Her eyes stung. She blinked them quickly, refusing to cry. “I put together a scrapbook from the old pictures I found of her when my brother and I packed up her house. Looking at those photos comforts me.”

  “I’m sorry. About your mother, I mean.”

  “Thanks.” She blinked again.

  “Maybe that’s why you’re so good with Amy—because you’ve both lost your mothers. Or maybe it’s just that you’re a professional.”

  Eliza wanted to believe her ability to connect with Amy transcended her role as a psychologist. And then she decided she didn’t want to believe that at all. She was trying to extricate herself from the Malones, not make things more personal than they already were.

  “Why didn’t you talk to me on Sunday?” Apparently he was done being sympathetic. “I phoned. I left two messages. Why didn’t you call me back?”

  She sighed. If he wanted to know, she would tell him. “You’re still healing, Conor. There’s a limit to how many people I can help heal. I’ll help Amy if I can. But I’ve been through my own small hell, and I’m still healing, too. I can’t…” Another deep sigh, and she forced out the words. “I can’t be the woman who makes everything better for you. I just can’t do that.”

  His jaw twitched; he was clearly on the verge of saying something. But he remained silent for a moment, then nodded. “Right.” A glance at his watch. “I’ve got to go pick up Amy at the YMCA.”

  “You don’t want to be late for that.”

  “Yeah.” He stepped toward the automatic doors, which swung outward into the chilly evening. “Thanks for the help.”

  “She’ll like those pajamas.” A stupid thing to say, but Eliza couldn’t come up with anything better, anything that wouldn’t tap into the undercurrents pulsing between them. She knew that once Conor walked down Hauser Street and out of sight, she might never see him again.

  Perhaps she would talk to him when Amy had an issue at school—although it would be better if Rosalyn Hoffman could ease the little girl through her crises. But Eliza and Conor couldn’t be friends. She’d spoken the truth, and he hadn’t argued. He was looking for someone to fix his life, and she couldn’t be that person.

  She was a healer—of psyches, of emotions, of troubled minds. But she could not be a healer and a lover at the same time. Not until she herself had healed.

  SHE WAS RIGHT, damn it.

  He stalked down the Hauser Street, not bothering to sidestep the puddles and piles of slush that dampened the pavement as he wove a path through the after-work browsers and shoppers crowding the sidewalks. The bag holding Amy’s new pajamas banged against his thigh with each step, but he didn’t care if the gift box got dented, the tissue paper wrinkled.

  Eliza was gorgeous. She was hot. She was honest, benevolent…and smart. Too smart. Her professional training enabled her to read him more accurately than he could read himself. Sure, he wanted her—wanted her the way a suffocating man wanted oxygen. Not just because making love with her had felt so amazingly good but because she was his route back to happiness, and pleasure, and normalcy. The land of the living. The land of the breathing. She was his oxygen, all right.

  It had never even occurred to him to learn anything about her. She’d lost her mother recently, and he hadn’t known that until just now. She’d been through her own small hell, she’d said. And he’d been so wrapped up in his wants and needs, and Amy’s, that he’d never bothered to ask Eliza about her needs, her wants.

  That ought to score him pretty high on the asshole scale.

  He reached his car, stashed his purchase in the trunk where Amy wouldn’t see it, climbed in behind the wheel and drove the few blocks to the Y. He found Amy in the after-school room, seated around a table with Erin and Sean Murphy and two other kids, engrossed in a game of Clue. Sean had the other children convulsed in giggles by speaking in a pompous phony-British accent: “Pro-fess-ah Plummm in the li-bree with the cahn-dlestick!”

  Conor inched back a step, away from the door and Amy’s view. Let her play for a few more minutes. He needed those few extra minutes to calm down, clear his brain and, if not forgive himself, at least find some sort of equilibrium that would allow him to get through the rest of the evening without sticking his fist through a wall.

  Amy’s session with Dr. Hoffman yesterday had gone well enough. Rosalyn Hoffman didn’t discuss her sessions in detail with outsiders—even if the outsider was the father of a nine-year-old client. She said she had to respect the confidentiality of the session. But because Amy was so young and Conor was her guardian, as well as the guy paying the doctor’s fee, Dr. Hoffman did inform him that Amy seemed stronger than she’d been the last time they’d had a session, back in June, and that while Amy was still in a great deal of pain, she was obviously improving.

  Conor wished Amy’s improvement was as obvious to him as it was to Dr. Hoffman.

  More than that, he wished Amy could still have Eliza in her life. But he’d doomed his daughter’s friendship with Eliza the instant he and Eliza had made love. After talking to her in the vestibule of Adler’s, he couldn’t imagine her coming to his house to bake with Amy, to admire the Christmas tree, to enjoy the warmth and peace of the holiday. He’d destroyed that connection with his own neediness.

  And yet, Eliza had come through for him. A scrapbook about Sheila. He’d told her the idea was brilliant. What an understatement.

  Within a few minutes, several other parents had joined him at the doorway. One of the teachers alerted the children that it was time to put the game away. They swung around in their seats, saw their parents and raced to the door, shouting greetings and announcements about their respective days: “I have a permission slip for a class trip!” “I got an A on my spelling test!” “Is it snowing out?”

  Amy charged at him, as happy and energetic as her friends. She didn’t think he was an asshole. Maybe he could hide that truth from her for a while longer. Once she hit adolescence, of course, she’d consider him a total loser, but he hoped for a few more good years before puberty kicked in.

  It wasn’t snowing, and Conor made the drive home in under ten minutes. Amy chattered about the school’s upcoming winter concert, Ms. Rodriguez’s new haircut and the odds that Arlington would experience a white Christmas this year. She and Conor had a peaceful dinner of Vera’s delicious beef stew. Amy drank two full glasses of milk, and Conor wondered if she would outgrow her new pajamas by New Year’s Day.

  After he tucked her into bed, kissed her forehead and wished her a good night, he retired to his den and turned on his computer. He knew nothing about scrapbooks. When he had to deal with a subject about which he knew nothing, scouring the internet was his default option.

  To his dismay, he discovered that sc
rapbooking—since when had the word become a verb?—was an elaborate craft, one well beyond his artistic capabilities. Give him some code and he could perform magic. Give him a software product and he could parlay it into a successful company. But the notion of creating a pretty book out of scissors, glue, ribbons and photographs left him reeling. Scrapbooks were apparently a lot more complicated than printing up some digital pictures and sliding them into the sleeves of a photo album.

  He could use help with this. Not to be sexist, but he could use female help. He was a guy, a computer geek, a businessman. What did he know about the esthetics of book design?

  He checked his watch. A little past nine—not too late to phone Erin and Sean’s stepmother. He tugged his cell phone from the pocket of his khakis and clicked on her icon.

  “Scrapbooking?” Gail laughed. “That’s a hobby for women who have free time. I’ve got a full-time job and a couple of ridiculously energetic twins. Also a husband who seems to want my attention every now and then. Free time and I are not acquainted.”

  “Do you think your sister might know something about scrapbooking?” Conor asked. Gail’s sister Molly ran the Daddy School, after all. Anyone smart enough to be able to teach men how to be better fathers could probably put together scrapbooks without breaking a sweat.

  “Molly does lots of arts and crafts projects with her kids at the preschool,” Gail said. “But she’s never gotten into scrapbooking. Honestly, when she gets home after a long day at the Children’s Garden, the last thing she wants to do is more arts and crafts. By the way, how’d you make out with your first Daddy School class?”

  “It was great. I want to go again this Saturday—if I can line up a sitter for Amy.” No way could he ask Eliza to stay with Amy again.

  “Why don’t you drop Amy off here Saturday morning before class? We were planning to take the kids to that new Pixar movie after lunch. She can join us.”

  “You’re a life-saver,” Conor said. Maybe Gail couldn’t teach him how to make a scrapbook, but she was still worthy of sainthood.

  He thanked her, ended the call and considered whom to call next. Would his mother know anything about scrapbooking? His obligation to create a Sheila-related Christmas present for Amy was his mother’s fault, after all. But he’d never seen his mother engage in anything like what the scrapbooking websites had described. She worked for the state’s highway department, she gardened, she stayed fit by swimming laps at the local community pool and she met with her book club once a month. She did not make scrapbooks.

  He couldn’t imagine grilling Dr. Hoffman about scrapbooks. Or Amy’s teacher with her new haircut. The only woman in his circle of acquaintances who he knew for certain had created a scrapbook was Eliza.

  Damn.

  This wasn’t about him. It was about Amy. Yes, he needed Eliza’s help. Yes, he would once again be calling upon her to do something for him, to support him, to fix things for him. But really, she’d be doing it for Amy. She’d be doing it for a girl who, like her, had lost her mother much too young.

  If Eliza wound up hating him, so be it. She was the one who’d planted this idea in his head. She might as well teach him how to water and fertilize it so it would grow into something worth harvesting.

  Steeling himself, he thumbed in her link. He heard the phone ring a few times on her end, and then her voice: “Hello?”

  “Eliza? It’s Conor,” he said. “I need help.”

  Chapter Eleven

  HER HOME WAS nothing like what he’d expected.

  By the time he arrived at the condominium complex where she lived, at around noon on Saturday, he felt as if he’d already lived several days since he’d arisen that morning. He’d dropped Amy off at the Murphys’ house. Then he’d headed to the Children’s Garden Preschool for his Daddy School class, where the discussion had focused on such heavyweight topics as religion, faith, and steering children’s hopes and dreams in a healthy direction. After that, a trip to a crafts store to buy all the items on the shopping list Eliza had provided over the phone, and then a stop at a gourmet shop for eighty dollars worth of cheese, grapes, pears, a loaf of fresh-baked sourdough bread, two different patés, a jar of marinated mushrooms, a bottle of chardonnay and a box of Belgian chocolates.

  Overkill, he knew. But Eliza was doing him an enormous favor. The very least he could do was feed her well. He thought about bringing her flowers, too, then decided he was turning into a cliché. The wine, food and chocolate would have to do.

  Burdened with three canvas totes bulging with edibles, scrapbooking supplies and the thick folder of digital photos he’d printed, he had to press her doorbell button with his elbow. After a few long seconds, she swung open the door and let out a little gasp. “Oh, my god. What did you bring?”

  “Lunch. And the stuff on your list. Can I come in?”

  She stepped back, allowing him to enter. Her townhouse had appeared rather bland from the outside, but inside it was all dramatic modern angles, stark white walls and polished hardwood and tile floors. The living room she led him through featured a soaring ceiling and a loft. Vast windows overlooked a deck and beyond it an expanse of snow-dappled woods. The kitchen looked like an illustration from an architectural magazine, hard surfaces, glossy counters, stainless-steel appliances.

  He remembered the way his kitchen had smelled when he’d arrived home after last week’s Daddy School class, that mouth-watering aroma of fresh-baked cookies. This kitchen was too clean. He wondered if Eliza ever baked cookies here.

  He set the canvas bags on the center island and turned to her—and forgot all about cookies. His mouth watered for her. Dressed in blue jeans, an oversized gray sweater and thick wool socks, her hair pulled into a sloppy ponytail, she looked young and fresh and more delicious than any cookie ever invented. In fact, she looked like the antithesis of her austere condo: warm, a little messy and utterly comfortable. That baggy sweater, the strands of hair that had escaped from her ponytail and drizzled in soft waves around her face, her large, dark eyes and the tiny spot of worn, fraying denim on her left knee all seemed to say, make yourself at home.

  He couldn’t. Not until he convinced her that he was worth inviting in—to her condo, her home, her life. Her heart and her soul.

  “We should eat first,” he said. “We can do the scrapbook after. If that’s all right with you,” he quickly added.

  She turned from him and surveyed the bags. “I thought you were going to bring some burgers from McDonalds. Or pizza.”

  “I brought this,” he said simply, then proceeded to unload the gourmet feast from the tote bags. He saved the chocolates for last, and rather than lining them up with all the other food, he placed the box in her hands. “These are for you, for later.”

  “Conor.” She gazed at the gold-foil box for a moment, then set it on the counter and shook her head. “I’m doing this to help Amy,” she reminded him. “You didn’t have to bribe me with chocolate.”

  “It’s not a bribe. It’s lunch. Enough lunch to give us time to talk while we eat. If you’re okay, time-wise,” he added again. This was about her, not him. Her needs, not his.

  “I don’t have any plans this afternoon,” she said. “Other than making this scrapbook. What about you? When do you have to get back to Amy?”

  “She’s with friends. They’re going to a one-thirty movie. I’ve got all afternoon, too. Corkscrew?” He presented the wine bottle to her.

  She bit her lip, as if trying to decide whether wine was a good idea. With a shrug, she pulled two wine goblets from a cabinet and a corkscrew from a drawer. For the next several minutes, they worked side by side in silence, arranging the cheeses on a cutting board, rinsing the fruit and piling it into a bowl, lining a straw basket with a napkin and filling it with fist-sized chunks of bread. She gathered as much as she could onto a tray and carried it to a dining area at one end of her cavernous living room, leaving Conor to follow her with the open wine bottle and glasses. Beyond the window next to the table, a so
ft snow began to fall.

  “This is quite a townhouse,” he said discreetly. It really was striking. It just didn’t seem like Eliza.

  She snorted. “It was the only place I could find in my price range on short notice,” she told him. “Well, there was a house that had a flooding problem in the basement, and a tiny apartment in a building that smelled of mildew. Not too many rentals in Arlington. Most properties are for purchase, not rent.”

  Conor nodded. “And you didn’t want to buy a place?”

  “I wanted to get to know the area first. And who knows if this job will work out? They gave me a three-year contract, but…” She shrugged, then tasted the wine. “This is delicious.”

  “Tell me about your hell,” he said.

  Her eyes flicked at him, a sharp stare before she averted her gaze. “What I said at the store the other day—”

  “—was true,” he cut her off. “You were right. All I ever thought about was me and Amy and our loss. And that was wrong. I hope you can forgive me. I want to know everything about you. Everything you’re willing to tell me.”

  She laughed vaguely. “There’s not that much to tell.”

  “Tell me about your mother.”

  She stared at him again, this time a long, measuring look. “All right,” she said.

  Chapter Twelve

  HE TRULY SEEMED to want her to talk. She stalled by piling her plate with cheese and grapes, bread and a slice of pear, but he only watched her, saying nothing, waiting for her to speak. After a long minute, she did.

  “My mother raised my brother and me herself,” she said. “My father left her when I was about three. I hardly remember him. He sent birthday cards for a few years, but I guess he really didn’t want a family. Which was okay, because my mother was a wonderful parent. She worked so hard, went back to school at night, got her Realtor’s license and became a real estate broker. We grew up in Jacksonville, and after my brother and I left home, we’d always go back to Florida to be with her for Christmas. This will be the first year we won’t be doing that.” Eliza’s voice cracked slightly, and she eased it with another sip of wine.