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Or maybe no time to worry beforehand was better because my tendency to overthink myself into the ground was part and parcel of my anxiety. Either way, I was looking forward to them going home. As nice as they all seemed.
And they really did. Even my father was being unnaturally sweet, or maybe that was his guilt talking.
Before we sat down to dinner, Clint and I spent a few minutes making small talk with my father. Somehow Christmas came up, and my dad had mentioned how perhaps we could get together with his new gal pal. In my head, I’d screamed that it was too soon to consider it, what if Clint and I just didn’t last that long, but that wasn’t what came out of my mouth. Instead, I’d retold my least favorite Christmas story ever.
How when I was ten, Dad had claimed he was out all Christmas Eve looking for the special doll I wanted—the one that had been all over the news for being sold out since the month before.
Christmas ruined for thousands of desperate kids.
“But I wanted to believe him. I wanted it to be my own Christmas miracle.” I glanced at Clint and bit my lower lip, wishing I’d never gone down this path at all. Would I ever learn?
“And he didn’t get it?”
“No, I didn’t get it,” my father answered. “I really tried. But every other parent had gotten there first. So I got the closest knockoff, even though it wasn’t signed like the real one, so I tried to sign it myself and well, that was a mistake.”
I sighed at the memory. “I burst into tears because I knew it was a fake. And because I’d waited for him all night long for a doll that wasn’t even what I wanted.”
My father’s face was bright red.
“I was seeing a new woman and she was freaked out I had a ten-year-old kid. She didn’t want to be a mom.”
“So you left your child alone on Christmas Eve?” Clint fisted his hands on the counter beside the plate he’d just filled with a couple pieces of pizza.
I tried not to salivate, but I was starving.
We’d ordered out for many pizzas after I fully came to terms with the fact I didn’t have a clue how to make enough stir-fry for an advancing army.
“She was a self-sufficient child, always had been.” My dad’s voice was defensive as he grabbed a slice for himself..
“The operative word was child, and you left her alone on a holiday meant for family. I’ve had my issues with mine,” he said in an undertone, “but I’ll tell you this, my parents would never have left any of us alone on Christmas. And if somehow they had, we had each other. Probably we’d fight through every minute, but we wereneveralone. What did Katherine have? She didn’t even have the doll she wanted. Jesus.”
Swallowing deeply, I reached up to rub Clint’s shoulders. His family was milling about, most of them grabbing slices and sides and dispersing to whatever open seating they could find. “It wasn’t that bad, really. I got over it. It was just a doll.” I couldn’t seem to talk fast enough to dispel the awkwardness hanging thickly in the air like fog. “But I said some not nice stuff to his girlfriend when they finally did show up near midnight.”
“Near midnight?” Clint practically roared it then dialed down his voice when some of his siblings glanced back at him with alarm on their way out of the kitchen. “A ten-year-old child. On Christmas Eve. No wonder she hates the holidays.”
“Now wait a second,” my dad began before I cut him off.
I really did not want to get into a big dramatic scene in front of Clint’s family. Anything but that. Even if I was the one who’d driven down this road.
“That was when I started saying inappropriate stuff,” I continued hurriedly. “At first, I did it to get attention. Anything to be noticed. And then the habit stuck. Now I’m just incapable of not being inappropriate, I guess.”
Exhibit A, right here and now.
“You’re the wrong sort to be a mayor’s wife,” Em said pointedly as she passed by, toasting us with her glass of fizzy water. “Thank God for that, because one Mary Sue is enough around here.”
“Emmaline,” Clint’s father snapped as he scooped salad into a clear bowl from the spread on the very crowded counter. “She and Theo are right in the next room.”
“So? She’s evennamedMary Sue, for pity’s sake. If that’s not made for being political, I don’t know what is.”
“Keep your voice down. We’re going to make the official family mayoral announcement tomorrow while your aunt Erma is in attendance. Not everyone here knows yet.”
Clint’s triplet siblings looked at each other with identical bored expressions from where they were sprawled on stools to guard the spread. “Dad, all of us know. Theo has been crowing for months that Clint was gonna cry when he found out he’d been replaced.” Fletcher shrugged at Clint’s snort. “He’s your brother. Don’t blame me that he’s an ass.”
Inwardly, I swallowed a sigh. I’d tossed my father to the wolves, yes, but his embarrassment was blessedly brief.
A bunch of us moved into Clint’s formal dining room and filled the seats at the long table—that was not nearly long enough. More chairs were found and dragged in, and laughter and holiday cheer filled the room.
The Hausers changed topics quickly and most of them centered around Clintondale in some way or another.
