Anna J. - Christmas, Actually

“What?” The word left her mouth in a whisper. She turned back to the fence and resumed working in silence. Jack followed. He could have walked away, but realized what he was doing to her.

He didn’t have enough courage to risk loving the baby they had made together. How could he do that when he was already fighting every day to be sane, to look normal because of another child?

“Why did you come back here after you left me?” She tugged more holly out of his tight grip. “I was so sad after you walked out, I would have screamed at the first jaunty caroler.”

“They don’t sing all year.” He couldn’t explain his need for familiar faces, for the love of his brother and sister, if he couldn’t have Sophie’s anymore.

“Sophie Palmer,” a man called out. Tessie’s cousin, Otto Taver, must have heard enough about Sophie to recognize her, a stranger helping out like a Christmas Townie.

Uncharacteristically shy, she nodded, stepping closer to Jack. Did she even realize she’d eased his way for support? He didn’t move. For this moment, he wouldn’t abandon her, even though Otto meant no harm.

“Just wanted to thank you.” The other man yanked off his thick gloves and shook her hand, hard. “Tessie’s my cousin. I hear she might have ended up in big trouble if not for you.”

“Thank you, but she only needed a tourniquet. Jack did the hard part.”

“That’s not true,” Jack said, unable to stop himself from putting the story straight. “That tourniquet saved Tessie’s life.”

“I’m glad you were there to tie it.” Otto shook her hand again and nodded at Jack. “Doc, good to see you.” He strode off, heading toward the stage with his tool bag.

Sophie pushed her hands into her coat pockets. “You were the one who saved her life,” she said.

“She wouldn’t have had a life to save if you hadn’t stopped her bleeding.”

“How do you manage their expectations?” she asked, looking around. “Don’t you know you could fail them, too?”

“I’m trying not to mess up.”

She was silent for a moment and then shivered. He took the stapler and balanced it on the fence. “Are you cold?”

“A little.”

“You shouldn’t let your core cool. Why don’t you head back to the B and B?”

“I’m fine if I keep moving.”

“Georgette told you to rest, didn’t she?”

“I haven’t been overdoing it.” Sophie’s low, intense tone and the pulse beating just above the collar of her coat dared him to express concern about the unborn infant he was so intent on abandoning.

“I’m not an animal,” he said. “I don’t want you or the baby to be at risk. I’ll walk you back to Esther’s.”

“I’m capable of walking by myself.”

“I’m walking with you, Sophie.”

She gave in. He handed the stapler to one of the other helpers and turned back toward Sophie.

She had already started across the green, but Jack caught up in a few steps. “Will you please consider taking Fred Everly’s advice and go home until your car’s ready?”

“Your advice.”

“It’s a good plan.”

“I’m not coming back here. When I leave, I’m gone for good.” She pushed ahead of him. “Which means your clock is ticking, Jack.”

He caught up again. “Stop running away.”

She turned to him, her hair flying in a gust of snow. “No one has ever made me as angry as you.”

Or as desperate. He saw it in her eyes. She needed to understand, and he’d never explained what had happened to him.

He watched the woman he’d loved desperately trying to avoid him, as if she couldn’t bear to share the same oxygen.

If he told her, maybe they’d find a way. Maybe she’d help him see his future in a different light. He started to reach for her shoulder, then stopped himself and let her add to the distance between them.

* * *

WHEN THEY REACHED the B and B, Sophie said goodbye over her shoulder as she ran up the salted steps and into the house, shutting the door behind her.

In the foyer, people were laughing, anticipating a late lunch or an early dinner. Sophie nodded at Esther as she took off her mittens and stuffed them into her coat pocket.

“Hungry?” her hostess asked.

“Not right now. Maybe later.”

“Do you want a menu to take to your room?”

Sophie shook her head. “No, thanks.”

She hurried up the stairs. She’d threatened Jack with a ticking clock, but she was the one who felt Big Ben banging out the passing quarter hours in the back of her head.

Inside her room, she sat with a sense of relief, suddenly understanding Jack’s ability to hide from the truth or the past, or whatever horrible moments had their claws in him.

Someone knocked on her door and she jumped. For a second, Sophie hoped. With all her heart, with all the foolishness of a pregnant woman who still cared too intensely for the man who’d left her.

But then she came to her senses and opened the door.

A uniformed policeman and a woman in a dark suit waited in the hall. The officer lifted his cap. “I’m Sergeant Reese. This is Celia Dane. She’s a probation officer with Christmas County. You may not remember me, but I was at the accident scene after Tessie Blaylock struck your car.”

“I remember.” Vaguely. He’d taken a brief statement as the EMTs were checking her vitals inside the ambulance. “What can I do for you?”

“May we come in?” Ms. Dane asked.

Anxiety bloomed inside Sophie’s chest. No nurse wanted to go to court. But it was a fact of life that came with her job. No one wanted to take anyone down, or prop someone else up, without good reason. Tessie’s future was too much responsibility.

The same way a baby’s future might seem like too much responsibility?

Sophie held the door open. “I don’t have anything to offer you here, but could I call down to ask for coffee? Or water?”

“Just talk,” Ms. Dane said.

They took the chairs at either side of the fireplace. Sophie sat on the tufted chest at the end of the bed.

“I know you’ve spoken to Tessie,” the probation officer said. “I have to check on her, too. I’ve spoken to her teachers, her friends and her parents. I’ve even had a word with her doctors.”

“Jack Banning?” Sophie hadn’t asked him how he felt about Tessie’s mistake.

“And her GP. I’d like to hear your version of the accident.”

“I spoke to Officer Reese, and I wrote a statement for the police.”

“But I need to hear what you remember now.” Celia smiled. “We’re not out to get Tessie. We want to do the right thing to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”

Someone else knocked at the door. Sophie stood. “Excuse me. You probably know Esther’s a little protective of her guests.”

She was wrong again. Jack stood on the threshold. He looked distracted and unsettled, but determined. “I thought you might need—” he looked past her, into the room “—something.”

Baffled, Sophie let him in. “I’m fine.”

“You act as if you’re concerned, Jack,” the officer said.

“Sophie’s alone here. She doesn’t know many people.”

“Let me repeat what I told your friend,” Celia said, and Jack didn’t deny that they knew each other. “We’re searching for the right solution for Tessie. We already know this accident was not Sophie’s fault.”

Jack backed down, but Sophie couldn’t look away from him.

“Ms. Palmer?” the officer said.

She returned her attention to the visitors. “I already told you how it happened. I came off the exit ramp and saw Tessie driving toward me. She was weaving. She saw my car and tried to swerve.” Sophie reached behind her neck to smooth out her hair. To breathe in and out. Her baby was okay, but those horrifying moments replayed in startling clarity. She glanced at Jack again. Was this what happened to him?