The Homespun Holiday

The Homespun Holiday

By Sarah O’Rourke

Table of Contents

One:  It’s Beginning to Look a Lot
Like Christmas

Two:  Do
You Hear What I Hear?

Three: 
You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch

Four: 
Little St. Nick

Five: 
Angels from the Realms of Glory

Six: 
Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree

Seven: 
Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer

Eight: 
What Child is This?

Nine: 
Please Christmas, Don’t Be Late

Ten: 
Santa Claus is Watching You

Eleven: 
Kissin’ by the Mistletoe

Twelve: 
I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus

Thirteen: 
Away in a Manger

The Homespun Holiday by Sarah O’Rourke

Copyright
 
©
 
2015
by Sarah O’Rourke

All rights reserved. No part of this
publication or cover design artwork may be reproduced, distributed, or
transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or
other electronic or mechanical methods in current use or to be developed in the
future,
 
without the prior express
written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations
embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by
copyright law (US. Copyright Act of 1976).

This is a work of fiction. All names,
characters, and settings are fictitious, and are the sole property of Sarah
O’Rourke. Any resemblance to actual events, names, locales, organizations, or
persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. Any real setting, person, or
situation is used in a fictitious manner with literary license.

This work of fiction is intended for
mature audiences.

If you steal our work, we’ll sic our
Mommas on you.  Crazy One’s Momma will hunt you down and make you pay in
blood.  Crazy Two’s Momma will pray “for” you.  And trust us...you
won’t win when she goes to the Almighty.  And if that doesn’t scare you,
please be advised that we have an attorney on retainer who will sue you. 
Don’t risk it.  This is us, being there for you.

****

Want to know more about the two crazies
that are Sarah O’Rourke and their crazy books?

www.sarahorourke.info

www.amazon.com/author/sarahorourke

www.facebook.com/sarah.orourke.507

www.twitter.com/SarahORourke99

[email protected]

****

Dedication

We dedicate this book to Santa Claus ...

who is the reason we believe in the magic
of Christmas!

Crazy One and Crazy Two

Friday, December 13

People here were crazy, damn it. 

As Dr. Mackenzie Daniels, resident
small town OB-GYN and self-admitted all-around grouch, walked into the only
decent sit-down restaurant within a hundred miles, he growled to himself.  Damn
this Christmas-y country wasteland where he now reluctantly lived!  Festive
holiday lights twinkled from the fully decorated, towering Douglas fir tree
that stood majestically in the front corner of the busy café.  Offering the fir
a hard frown, he couldn’t help feeling like that damn tree was mocking him. 
Because if there was one thing he hated more than the actual town of Paradise,
it was celebrating the frickin’ holidays in the town of Paradise. 

People here weren’t the usual,
everyday crazy that he’d been dealing with on a daily basis for the past year. 
That insanity he’d managed to get mildly accustomed to enduring. 

No, this newest brand of wackiness
all seemed to revolve around the current date. 

December 13. 

It was officially the twelve days
preceding Christmas and the residents of the town of Paradise took that shit
seriously.

God, how he craved the anonymity of
the cities he’d lived in all his life up until now.  Seattle.  New York.
Philadelphia.  Hell, even in Houston, he had managed to be able to lose himself
in the obscurity of the city.  People didn’t chase you down while you ambled
through the aisles of the grocery store just to say a quick hello.  Nobody
invited him to visit their church on a weekly basis there.  And certainly no
one had brought him a pie or cake to say thanks for his help with their kid’s
birth.

Hell, he’d gone up two sizes in his
slacks since moving here.  Evidently, the good people of Paradise had never
heard of a low-fat diet.  In these parts, the secret ingredient to any recipe
was obviously full-fat lard.

But fat cells aside, he was here to
stay.  After his divorce, he’d made a rash decision to put as much distance
between him and the she-devil as he could.  When the medical headhunter had
reached out to him, his confused brain had somehow convinced him that Podunk
Paradise, Tennessee, was the Promised Land.  Damn, had that been a freaking bad
decision!  Between the apparently iron-clad deal he’d made with the hospital
board and his desire to escape his ex-wife and ex-life, he would be living in
the oh-so-lovely town of Paradise for many years to come.  But he didn’t have
to be happy about it, now did he?

Sidestepping the gathered crowd
clamoring to buy one of the many freshly baked pies on the counter where Honor
McKinnon stood, Mack offered the young woman a terse nod and tried not to
wrinkle his nose as the tantalizing aroma of those dessert treats competed with
the overpowering smell of fresh pine emanating from the Christmas tree.

If he were anywhere else, he’d
bitch about the smell, but here...here, he kept his mouth shut.  He did this
for a couple of different reasons.  First, he liked Honor McKinnon and the
three other McKinnon sisters that ran the food joint.  Insulting any of them
was out of the question.  Not just because all four ladies were his patients,
but also because they were exceptionally nice women that had been dealt some
seriously crappy hands in life.  Thankfully, three of the four women had found
men that had made the battles they’d faced worth the effort.  For Honor McKinnon,
however ... finding a happy ending was a work in progress.  But if the Sheriff
sitting on that stool in front of her counter had anything to say about it,
Mack knew she’d get one, too.  Sheriff Zeke Monroe would find a way to bring
her the moon if she asked him to do it.

The second reason he kept his trap
closed about the warring odors inside the café was because it wasn’t anybody
else’s fault that he hated Christmas with a deep-seated passion that had
settled into his bones over the years.  Mack’s sister Aubree would say that his
dislike of the holidays was a classic case of transference.  Since his own
marriage had dissolved to dust over the Yuletide season over a decade ago, his
baby sister theorized that with the demise of his marriage went his love of all
things Christmas.

He thought her questionable expert
analysis was utter bullshit (after all, it had been
his
unilateral
decision to divorce his unfaithful wife during what was supposed to be the
happiest time of the year), but he’d be damned if he argued with his sibling
about it.  The stubborn loon had graduated (with honors no less!) and gotten her
degree from
the
Harvard Medical School (the one
he
hadn’t gotten
into himself, the fuckers!) with a specialty in psychiatry.  Needless to say,
Aubree wasn’t exactly shy about waving that degree underneath his nose and making
mental health diagnoses on their entire family.  According to her, there was
more than one successful doctor in the family now, and she insisted that she be
heard.  His sister could be a real pain in the ass like that.

At any rate, he kept his mouth shut
and headed toward his usual booth in the back, passing Patience McKinnon Turner
on the way to his seat.  He couldn’t help but grin when he noted that she had
not one, but two, infants attached to her body, one in the front and one in the
back.  Anyone that had known Patience pre-motherhood would have said this day
would never happen.  They’d have even placed money on her taking her happily
empty womb to the grave with her.   He knew this because approximately a month
ago he’d lost a hundred bucks to Ice Monroe on the day he’d helped her deliver
three tiny, little Turners into the world.  He wasn’t ashamed of his loss; a
lot
of people lost money that day.

“I see you have Larry and Moe. 
Where’s Curly?” Mack asked gruffly, reaching out to lightly stroke the foot on
the baby held in the harness at Patience’s chest.

“Very funny, Big Mac.  I think I
already told you to quit calling my babies by the Three Stooges’ names, didn’t
I?  You really wanna tick off the woman that’s gonna bring you your food?” his
former patient asked him dryly.

“I do,” Mack confirmed,
straight-faced.  “Especially since despite my best efforts, you’re still
calling me by that horrible nickname yourself.  Big Mac,” he sneered with a
shudder.  “I could forgive you for it when you were still on your back in a
hospital bed, but now that you’re back in prime health, I don’t think I should
be expected to overlook it.”

“Suck it up, Big Mac.  According to
my niece, Heaven, and her friend, Paisley, whiners are wieners.  Haven’t you
heard?” Patience retorted as Mack slid into the vinyl seat of the booth, his
back to the wall so that he could see the rest of the café. 

Mack’s lips twitched at the mention
of the two cute little girls, one of which he’d gotten to know fairly well over
the past several months.  Paisley Robbins was the daughter of his right-hand
woman, Millicent Robbins.  He’d hired the talented nurse just as she’d
graduated college back in May, and while the single mom’s mouth might be a
trial to put up with at times, her skill and way with patients made her well
worth every penny he paid her.  It didn’t hurt that her body was sex on a stick
and that she possessed a face that would make most grown men willing to kill
for her.  Those attributes were just icing on the cake.  The cincher, however,
had been her adorably precocious five year old little girl, Paisley.  That kid
had sealed the deal for him.

Because while he might not like
most kids, Paisley Robbins was a rule unto herself.

The sweet little girl had spent most
of July and August coloring at a little table in his office and keeping him
company.  And since school started, he’d spent most afternoons seeing the
little cutie between patients while she waited – not always patiently – for her
mother to get off work. 

It had all began as a good deed
he’d been willing to do for a down-on-her-luck single mom.  At the time, Millie
Robbins had been his newest employee, up to her gorgeous eyeballs in debt
because of student loans and a long departed ex-husband that had left her with
a crapload of his bills.  Affording quality childcare on her budget had been
impossible, even in their backwater town.  Millie’s mom had usually babysat while
Millie worked, but the grandma had unfortunately come down with a nasty case of
shingles earlier in the summer just as Millie had gotten the job with him.  He’d
almost decided against hiring her when he’d learned that she’d need to bring
her daughter to work for a month until a spot opened up in one of the better daycare
centers in town.  But after he listened to his physician colleague Cain Turner
and his wife Faith (one of the infamous McKinnon sisters) sing Millie’s praises,
Mack had reevaluated his decision and allowed the little imp to come hang out
in his office while her mom worked.

It was the best decision he’d ever
made – mostly because seeing that little girl and her momma around his office
comprised the best part of his day.

Not that he’d be sharing that
information with them.  Knowledge was power, and he didn’t believe in handing
that kind of control over to anybody willingly.

“You want your usual today, Doc?” Patience
asked, her pencil poised above the notepad she used to take orders as she
pulled him from his thoughts.

“Yeah.  My regular sounds good,
Patience,” he agreed with a nod before looking up at the woman.  This week, she’d
dyed the hair framing her face a bright indigo blue, and he idly wondered if
she was trying to give her silky tresses a holiday pick-me-up.   “You been
feeling okay since the wreck?” he asked.  It had been a car wreck that had
brought on the pre-term labor of her triplets.  Both she and her sister, Honor,
had nearly been killed when Honor’s car had sailed over the embankment and into
a creek just outside of town.  Patience and all three babies had recovered,
relatively unscathed by the experience.  But, he still liked to check up on his
patients every now and then. 

“Right as rain.  You know Abel
barely lets any of us out of his sight anymore.  He’s in the kitchen right now
giving Harri her bottle.  I got custody of the other two until it’s their
turn,” she explained with a grin, mentioning her new husband as she patted one
of her babies’ backs where it rested against her chest.

“Abel is still on paternity leave,
I take it?” Mack asked, his interest suddenly waning as he spotted his nurse
and her daughter entering through the glass door at the front of the
restaurant.  His heart sped up as he watched them wave at Honor behind the
counter.  Millie looked a little pained, but Paisley seemed her usual energetic
self. 

“Well,
he owns the business, so I’m not sure you can call it paternity leave.  Every
day he thinks of a new reason why it isn’t the right time to go back to work,
but I know the truth.  He can’t stand the thought of leaving The Trifecta,” she
declared with a grin, using the nickname the NICU nurses had christened the
triplets during their stay in the hospital.  “Thankfully, Maggie is keeping
things running for him though. I don’t know what Abel or I would do without
her.  We have hope that he’ll start back next week.”

“That’s
good.  Be grateful that you’ve got a man that
wants
to spend time with
his progeny.  I see it the other way around all too often.”

“Don’t
worry, I am.  I’ll just put this order in.  It won’t take but a couple of
minutes.  I’ll get one of the girls to bring your coffee on over to you,”
Patience said, grimacing as the baby attached to her back began to squirm.  “I
think Grange just decided that it’s his turn to eat,” she laughed while peering
over her shoulder.

Mack
nodded, settling back in his seat as he watched Millicent guide Paisley over to
a table up front where an older version of Millie waited for them.  He supposed
it was her mother.  He wasn’t sure since he’d never met either of Millicent’s
parents. When he thought about it, there was very little he knew about his lead
nurse beyond the fact that she was a hard worker that possessed a killer rack and
she had a kickass kid.

Maybe
he should make an effort to get to know his favorite employee a little better. 
As he continued to watch them covertly, he couldn’t help pondering the idea.

~~**~~

Several
minutes later while he sat quietly nursing his coffee (which he incidentally
wished he could spike heavily with a good shot of premium bourbon) in the very last
booth in the absolute farthest corner of the I Don’t Care Café, Mack silently
came to the conclusion that living in a small town was a lot like living in a tiny,
decorative fishbowl. Sure, the bowl was pretty to look at and kept your fish
alive, but after a while, those fish got tired of being confined.  It sucked
when everybody could see every single movement that got made.  It was enough to
make a fish yearn for the big blue freedom of the ocean.

He
ought to know since he felt like the fuckin’ fish in this scenario.

In
the thirty minutes he’d been in the café, he’d noticed no less than fifteen
watchful gazes leveled on him while he’d eaten, their intrusive eyeballs cataloguing
his every movement.  Then, to add salt in the very raw wound, he’d been interrupted
from his meal a half-dozen times.  Three of the interlopers paused by his table
to ask if he had holiday plans and try to include him in theirs.  Two uninvited
parties stopped by his booth to invite him to Christmas dinner because “nobody should
be alone at the holidays.”  And the last intruder on his peaceful lunch had
sought a date for her very own daughter.  The lucky, lucky daughter had a
company Christmas party coming up and “it would just be the greatest if her
date was a bona fide
doctor
.”