A Family for Christmas (6 page)

Getting to his feet, Trent realized, that the tiredness that had felt so good before he'd told Maggie of his
decision no longer felt quite so satisfying. Now he just felt battered by life.

He headed toward the workshop and put the tools he'd used during the day back where they belonged. It was a ritual he'd begun a week earlier on the day he'd decided to finish Mike's work. His brother had been nearly fanatical about keeping his workshop in order, and to leave it a mess felt like a crime.

There was a strange side effect to all the manual labor he was doing. It was one thing he'd learned quickly. When you worked with your hands, your mind had time to think. And thinking too deeply was something he'd avoided his entire life.

In boarding school he'd signed up for every sport, club and committee he could fit into his schedule. He'd done the same thing in college and again in graduate school. With his busy life he'd avoided a lot of painful hours of thinking. He hadn't had time to be lonely for his family. He hadn't had time to remember all he was missing by being so far away from home. It quickly became a habit that extended to avoiding self-examination, as well.

After college he'd bulldozed through life putting. one foot in front of the other, never looking back but never looking toward the future, either. He'd made business plans but never personal ones. He'd met and married Maggie because he loved her to distraction—but he'd never really thought it out.

Then had come the moment when a discouraged, heartbroken Maggie had brought up the idea of adoption. Again, he hadn't thought. The niggling fear that he wouldn't make a good father had grown in him
quietly, insidiously. And he'd realized it in that blinding moment of clarity. Grasping on to the only excuse open to him, he'd declared that he didn't believe in adoption. That he'd never raise another man's child.

And he'd stuck with his story for years while he pushed forward on a treadmill of his own making. He'd ignored Maggie's unhappiness, until seemingly without warning—though now he knew there had been plenty—she'd left.

And he'd seen what his stand had done to both of them.

But did he stop, take stock, think about his future or the mistakes of the past? No!

Again, he'd pushed on. He'd been lonely, so he'd started dating, never giving a thought to the fact that his divorce wasn't final. He'd filled every hour with work, concerts, plays, cocktail parties and fundraising dinners. But he never, ever let himself think about his life—where it was going or where it had been.

When Maggie had begged for reconciliation, he hadn't considered her request for even a second. He'd told her they were better off apart and had dismissed her time and again. He'd thought he was trying to protect her, but seeing her tonight, her pain, the way she pointed the finger of blame at herself alone, he knew he'd been lying to himself. It was easy to do if you never stopped to contemplate your actions.

The truth was that it had been himself he was trying to protect, and it still was. But now he wasn't sure it was worth the price. He was here in the carriage house facing another lonely night. Another lonely
night in a lonely bed with Maggie just across the yard in hers. And the worst part was that he knew he was welcome anytime he decided to take a chance on resuming their marriage.

But as much as he wanted Maggie in his arms and in his bed, he wasn't ready to forgive her for leaving, or to take a chance on being hurt again.

M
aggie walked into what was to be her new room. The beautiful mahogany Victorian bedroom suite had a Caribbean influence. She and Sarah had enhanced that feeling with yards of soft netting draped as curtains, swags and a loose flowing canopy. The walls were covered in a creamy beige, woven-grass wallpaper, adding to the Caribbean theme.

She loved this room, and it didn't bother her at all that it had been Sarah and Michael's room. In fact, it was a comfort to be here. She felt closer to them here where they had shared so much love and happiness. Knowing they were happy with the Lord now had already helped dull her grief a little, and she knew that they would want those they'd left behind to celebrate their lives rather than dwell on their untimely deaths.

But the room didn't feel quite right she thought And as she sank down onto the high four-poster bed,
she knew why that was. The room had been designed for two. For love. For romance. It wasn't a room to be alone in, and the very atmosphere reminded her that she was alone. And lonely. But that was what her life was right now. Lonely.

Oh, she had the children to fill her days, and she knew that taking care of them would keep her busy until well into each evening. But there was always this solitary time at the end of each day. It was a time during their marriage when she and Trent had always discussed their respective days. When she'd pictured them as parents, she'd seen this as the time when she would share the funny things, the heart-tugging things, even the maddening things their children had done during the day. Since leaving Trent, it was the time of the day when she'd missed him the most, and that had never been more true than since the children had come into her life. And now he was back, but not in the way she needed.

Maggie stood and went to the window facing the carriage house as a damp, late-summer breeze wafted into the room, stirring the gauzy curtains. As she looked into the open window of the carriage house, Maggie saw Trent pace a few times before he threw himself into a chair. Even from across the yard she could see the pent-up tension in his quick jerky movements, but she knew he didn't want her comfort. She was more than likely the cause of his stress.

Wrapping her arms about her waist, Maggie leaned her shoulder and head against the window frame. She desperately needed to feel Trent's arms around her right now to reassure her.

After several long minutes of deep thought as she stared across the yard and drive, Maggie unconsciously reached out to trace his beloved face, only to encounter the screen beneath her fingertips. She snapped back to reality.

He's so close, yet so far away. Lord, I know You have more for us than this. I know I have to wait, but I don't know how much longer I can do this alone. I need him. Please bring him back to me.

“You can endure all things through Christ who strengthens you,”
a quiet voice called from somewhere inside her. It was the verse that her pastor had given her when he'd called Florida to console her.

Maggie pursed her lips, and with one more glance at Trent, turned away to face the inevitable. She reluctantly moved toward the bed and climbed in. She had a long day ahead of her tomorrow. She needed her sleep.

But sleep was a long time in coming. Even when it did, she woke in tears several times during the night tortured by dreams of lost love and the hopeless feeling that she knew came because the pain she must endure was of her own making.

“I want waffles,” Daniel whined. “I don't like pancakes.”

“You do, too,” Rachel shouted. “He does, too, Aunt Maggie.”

“Do not!”

“Do, too!” Grace added.

A high-pitched whistle put an end to the cacophony. Maggie turned toward the noise to find Trent
standing just inside the back door. Seeing him once again clad in rugged attire, formfitting blue jeans and a white T-shirt, her heart raced.

“Who likes pancakes?” he asked, and Rachel and Grace shouted their support.

Daniel crossed his arms and scowled as an answer. “The mes have it, Aunt Maggie. Today it's pancakes, one of my personal favorites,” Trent confided to Daniel as he sat down next to him and ruffled his auburn hair. “Maybe the next time she has the time to make a special breakfast like this one, she'll make waffles. Another of my personal favorites,” Trent added with a grin and a wink to Maggie.

Maggie's stomach did a somersault. She turned away, flustered, telling herself it meant nothing that their first meeting had begun with just such a teasing gesture. Because unless something had changed since last night, this day wouldn't end with dinner, dancing and a good-night kiss on the cheek.

“So what are your plans for today?” she asked him.

“The guy who promised to give Mike a hand with the heater called. He's coming by.”

“The heater? We don't need heat. Why don't you concentrate on putting the front rooms back together? There's no room to even walk in the family room, and I live in fear that Grace will get past me and into that area.”

“Can't,” he said around a piece of pancake.

Rachel's brown eyes widened. “Uncle Trent. You aren't supposed to talk with anything in your mouth.”

“Girls are so dumb!” Daniel pronounced. “He has to talk with his teeth and tongue in there, you know.”

“You know I meant food, dummy!” Rachel yelled.

“Aunt Maggie asked him a question. How was he 'sposed to answer?”

“He could have waited to answer,” Rachel retorted.

Trent swung his head back and forth from one child to the other, looking like a spectator at Wimbledon. “Time!” he said at last, his mouth empty but for his teeth and tongue. “I really think we need some rules here. First one. No arguing at the table. Everybody agree?”

Daniel and Rachel were clearly shocked at the idea of rules or agreeing to abide by them. Maggie knew it was a new idea, because though Sarah and Michael had been wonderful parents, they were lenient at times.

“What's a rule?” Daniel asked.

“Something you either always have to do or it's something you must never do,” Maggie explained.

Daniel and Rachel looked blankly at the adults who had taken over their world. “Like…” Trent hesitated, thinking, “you have to brush your teeth before bed and in the morning. And you shouldn't fight with your sisters, especially at the table where you'll ruin everyone's meal. Aunt Maggie works hard to cook for us. We shouldn't ruin her meal with bickering. That sounds fair, doesn't it?”

Maggie watched the byplay and wondered, not for the first or even the hundredth time, why Trent was
so convinced he didn't want to be a father. He was so good at it!

It was several hours later that Maggie pulled up her mother's long drive. Maggie's mother, Ester, and Sarah's mother, Nancy Merritt, were out on the front lawn waiting for the children. Nancy was no longer a maid, but her mother's friend and companion. Their relationship had changed over the years from employer and employee to friends. Her mother had taken on a caregiver's role for her former maid after Nancy collapsed and was diagnosed with a serious heart condition.

It was because her condition had been aggravated by the news of the accident that Nancy hadn't been able to travel to Florida to be with the children. This was the first time she'd see them since losing Sarah.

The two older women were sitting in the shade of the towering old elm tree, one of a few still alive in the Philadelphia area. Hanging from one of its tall limbs was a tire swing just waiting for the children. Under the same tree, on a similar swing, Maggie's lifelong friendship with Sarah had begun nearly thirty years earlier.

It was clear by the way the older women stood and waved that they were both waiting anxiously for the same thing: their grandchildren.

“Mom-mom! Grandmom!” the children shrieked as they spilled out of the van. Maggie unbuckled Grace from her car seat and put her on the ground, then grabbed the bag that held emergency clothing changes for all three before heading across the lawn.

Even from a distance Maggie could see that as Rachel and Daniel went into their grandmother's embrace, it was a tearful reunion. Ester soon had Grace in her lap, and it seemed that to the little girl this was just another visit. Maggie didn't know whether to be relieved or concerned that Grace had already begun to forget her parents and the tragedy of their passing.

By the time she reached the two older women under the tree, it was Maggie's turn for a hug. To her everlasting chagrin, her eyes filled with tears. She blinked furiously, trying to stem their flow, but Grace, who was talking more every day, blew the whistle, so to speak. “Why Aunt Maggie crywin'?” she asked.

Both Nancy and her mother pulled back, and the looks of love and support on their beloved faces opened the floodgates that Maggie had kept tightly locked for weeks. She felt her face crumple along with her control.

“Oh, dear,” Nancy whispered, then gathered the children around her. “Suppose we go in and see how the cookies we baked this morning taste along with a big cold glass of milk?”

The children followed Nancy toward the back of the house. Considering the older woman's great loss, her kindness and understanding only made Maggie grow more weepy. Her mother enfolded her in her embrace once again, and they sank together onto the bench under the tree. No force on earth, especially Maggie's crumbling reserve of strength, could have held back the force of her tears. In seconds she began
to sob openly. Unfortunately, her tears weren't the healing kind, but the sign of a breaking heart

When Maggie ran out of tears, Ester cupped her daughter's face in her aging hands. Maggie looked into her mother's round face. “I'm sorry.”

“For what? Being human?”

“But I cried in front of the children.”

Ester's brown eyes, so like Maggie's own, widened exaggeratedly. “Oh! Horrors. Now they know you're human.”

Maggie felt a helpless grin curve her lips. “I don't know what happened. Being hugged just felt so good. And then everything I've been feeling these last weeks all bubbled to the surface.”

Her mother eyed her with a penetrating look. “Why aren't you getting hugs from Trent?”

“Trent keeps his distance from me,” Maggie answered with a shrug that failed to lend the casual air she'd hope it would to her admission.

Ester's gaze sharpened. “So he really moved into that carriage house apartment. Nancy thought he might. He's turned out to be a carbon copy of Royce Osborne, with a few of his mother's character flaws thrown in for bad measure.”

“No, he isn't like either of them at all,” Maggie protested. “Michael's death has been hard on him, and you keep forgetting that I hurt him.”

“He hurt you, too. He denied you children for years. Is that what all this is about? He's still piqued that you left to give him a wake-up call!”

Maggie shook her head. “I didn't tell him that when I walked out. I didn't even consciously know it
myself ‘til later. How was
he
supposed to know what I didn't even see? He's hurt. I wouldn't call what he's exhibiting a fit of pique. I don't think this will blow over quite so easily. Especially since I also think he resents being pushed into a corner. A week before the accident he told me to leave him alone. Nothing angers him more than to be forced into a position, and he
was
forced.”

“So he had to take you back and had to compromise on raising someone else's children.” Maggie nodded and watched her mother's eyes spark. “I suppose Michael let that truck driver hit them just to inconvenience Trent Osborne!”

“Mom! That's a terrible thing to say. It isn't like that.
He
isn't like that. Michael's death devastated him. And he's been very gracious about all this, considering. He says he just needs time, and I'm trying to give it to him.” Maggie frowned, wishing she could understand Trent's inner feelings. “He's so good with the children. You should see them together. He loves them so much. You should have seen him when Albertine and Royce came to the hospital. He was like a mother bear defending her cubs when they said they wanted the children. It's weird, but I'd swear he's afraid of those kids sometimes. Then other times, he says or does just the right thing as naturally as if he were a born father.”

“But how is he with you?”

“Distant. Sometimes angry.” Maggie narrowed her eyes, considering. “Confused, too, I think.”

“And you still love him no matter what?” her mother said.

Maggie nodded. “That won't ever change. All I have to do is look at Albertine and Royce and I understand every one of Trent's faults. Except his stand on adoption. That I've never understood, but Ed Hanson says a lot of men feel the same way. Of course, that doesn't really matter anymore, does it?”

“You aren't feeling guilty, are you?”

“Occasionally,” Maggie said with a self-conscious shrug. “I'm alive and Sarah's not. I'm enjoying her children, Sarah's not. Oh, Mom.” Maggie sniffled and reached for the tissue her mother held out. “I miss her so much!”

“Grief fades, darling. You still miss your father, don't you? But not every single minute anymore. Right? You just hang in there and come here if you need a hug. With you loving him, one day Trent's going to wake up and see what a gem he has in you.”

Maggie gave her mother a watery smile. “Maybe you're just a mite prejudiced, Mom.”

“Just exactly the way you've always been about those children. You're going to be a wonderful mother to them.” Ester squeezed Maggie's hand. “Come on. Let's go see what Nancy's up to with those grandchildren of ours. By the way, how's the house coming along? Nancy and I were horrified when we saw it last week. Apparently Michael had been busy right before they left.”

Maggie chuckled. “I imagine you two felt somewhat like I did when I walked in there yesterday.” Maggie held the screen door into the kitchen area open for her mother, then finished her explanation. “It looks like a bomb went off. Trent says tearing it
all out and putting it back right is probably the fastest way to go about it. Unfortunately, there are a bunch of children living in the midst of the chaos.”