Chapter Thirty-Eight / Christmas
Nick
Abbey and I dropped onto the couch and stared up at the tree lights glowing against the walls in her apartment. I wrapped my arm over her shoulder as we admired our handiwork. Santa Claus had just come to town and Matty was going to be delighted at the assortment of toys that cluttered the space under the tree. It'd been about two weeks since the surgery and even though we'd spent December 25th in the hospital wings listening to a local church go room to room singing Christmas carols, we were celebrating Christmas ourselves a couple nights late. Luckily, Jeraldo had relayed our message to the North Pole so Santa knew not to let the reindeer retire for the season just yet.
Abbey looked up at me, a smile curling on her lips in the colorful light of the tree.
We fell asleep only to be awakened by Matty when he came out of his room - not running, but still excited. "Jeraldo really told Santa!" he shouted when he saw all the presents we'd laid out around the room and the half-eaten cookies whose crumbs I quickly swiped off the chest of my shirt as I sat up before he could see them. "I can't believe it!" he sat down an started rolling a plastic Batmobile around the bottom of the tree in exciitement.
Abbey stirred and saw him playing at our feet and sat up, "Merry Christmas," she yawned as she stretched.
"Thanks mom!" he said and he dove for another toy a couple inches away.
He was doing great. He was still on the medication to keep his body from rejecting the new heart, but so far it had taken quite well and he'd sailed through the recovery time without any complications. Dr. Potter had said that she was surprised by how incredibly well his body had adjusted. He wasn't 100% yet, obviously, it was still fresh, still new -- but he was on his way. Phil had done an excellent job with his dream, preparing his heart to save Matty's life. Little did he know he'd saved mine, too.
Abbey made pancakes and we had sausages and curled up on the couch all together, our plates balanced on our knees as we ate and watched It's a Wonderful Life. We unwrapped presents and played Monopoly and Hungry Hungry Hippos and Rock'em Sock'em Robots on the living room carpet. Nacho chewed happily on a Christmas rawhide cookie we'd bought him and magic seemed to hang in the air all around us. It was easily the best Christmas I'd ever had.
And that night when it was time to tuck Matty up in bed, Abbey handed the book to me and she sat on the floor holding Matty's hand, both of them staring up at me, as I read the bedtime story. I've never read a bed time story before, despite all the kids I've been around in my life, so I worked hard to do it right, the way I remembered my grampa reading us bedtime stories and stuff, with voices and sound effects and everything. When I was finished, Matty's eyes were droopy, but a big smile was on his face as he drifted off to sleep.
Abbey pushed his hair out of his face and we snuck out of the room, leaving him and Nacho curled up under his Iron Man blankets.
Abbey
Nick and I were back on the couch later, watching some stupid sci-fi about Santa Claus being kidnapped by martians on Netflix. We'd laughed through the whole thing - even if it was incredibly corny - and shared a little of the special egg nog that I'd mixed for us. It tasted as warm as I felt sitting with Nick. Then, just before Santa taught the martians how to celebrate Christmas without kidnapping its greatest iconic figurehead, Nick leaned over and pressed a kiss to my mouth. I kissed him back.
"I think Santa forgot to give one last gift," he whispered, and he reached behind him and pulled a box out of his pocket. My heart raced. He couldn'nt be proposing. No, it was way too fast for that. I panicked as he put the box into my hands. It was too light - too small. What was I going to say? I didn't want to say no, but at the same time it was too soon to say yes. I didn't wanna break his heart, though. Not on Christmas. And what if he took a no the wrong way entirely, took it to mean never? Cos I would want to say yes eventually, just not yet...
"Go on," he whispered, "Open it."
With a shaking, reluctant hand, I slid the ribbon away from the box and pulled the lid off slowly. My throat was throbbing in time with my heart like it was up inside it or something. But when I looked into the box, I, thankfully, didn't see the glint of a diamond. Instead, there were several pieces of folded up paper. He watched nervously as I pulled out the first one. It was a napkin with the logo of the club we'd met at on Halloween seven years ago. And the second was the yellow parking ticket he'd gotten for illegally parking on the street in front of the club. Next was a cover page torn from the inside of a book with my phone number scribbled across the bottom. And under that an empty condom wrapper.
I laughed, "A condom wrapper?"
"It's from the first night we had together here," he said.
I felt my cheeks turn red. I looked at all the things and I whispered, "I can't believe you saved all this stuff." I ran my hand over the napkin, "Is this really from that night?"
"I used several napkins just like it rubbing zombie bride make up off your face," he laughed.
I nodded. I remembered. I didn't realize he did.
It was simple, but it was perfect. "I love it," I said, "I love that you saved all this stuff."
"I love you," he replied, and he leaned closer and hugged me tight and I thought to myself as I stared down at the napkin and the parking ticket and the scribbled phone number that maybe a diamond wouldn't have been so terrible a thing to open up the box to see. I pictured what it would be like to be Mrs. Nick Carter...
I know what I'll want next year for Christmas.
"So," he said quietly, "What do you think? You think we've done okay this Christmas?"
"Done okay?" I said, chuckling, "We all three got everything we wanted. I think we did...fine."
"We did great," he agreed, snuggling into me.
I kissed him softly, smiling as I whispered, "That's it."
Chapter End Notes:
So... do you think Abbey will get her wish next year? Only 12 more months 'til next Christmas! ;)
