He’d broken her once. He told her he didn’t care. He lied. But this moment was different. She wasn’t broken; she wasn’t hiding. But he still wanted to wrap her in his arms and hold her together.
“Kate—”
“Anyway,” she brushed him off. “I cleaned the whole house, but I couldn’t get rid of all that glass. I mean, I could have. But when the whole house was clean and I was left with a handful of broken glass shards, I didn’t want to. I wanted something of his, even if he hated me. I asked Michael to help me make this. My dad wasn’t a good dad. Or really a dad at all. But he was mine. And I didn’t want him to be erased. I wanted to always look at the tree and remember.”
“Remember what?”
Her arms froze over the tree. The whiskey bottle star halted over the greenery. Her face knitted tightly in an expression he’d never seen come across her face before.
“I don’t know,” she confessed. “Remember him. Remember that I survived. Remember that I forgave him and loved him even if he wasn’t good to me.”
“You forgave him?”
Kate blinked. Her long eyelashes were wet with tears, but none fell down her cheeks. Her stare melted into confusion, as if he was a student who’d just asked what the capital of their own state was, as if the answer was so obvious as to render the question absurd.
“I had to.”
“Why?” He asked.
Somehow, Clark and Kate had gotten so close he could feel her breath on his skin. He wanted to kiss the wrinkle between her eyebrow away. He wanted to hold her and tell her nothing could ever hurt her again.
“Because we can’t survive if we’re always carrying dead bodies around, you know? That’s no way to make a happy life.” The sting of conviction stole the breath from Clark’s lungs. He was guilty. He’d been dragging around dead bodies his entire life, robbing himself of any chance of happiness just so he could forget his own pain. Kate rolled her eyes, an attempt to clear the air of tension. “Besides, he was kind of a jerk. He probably would have resented my forgiveness. No better way to get revenge, right?”
She moved to step away, but Clark caught her. He couldn’t help but touch her. Their intimacy demanded it. His cold hand reached up for her left cheek; he cradled it, commanding her eyes. Her breath hitched. His heart stumbled. Kiss her, you moron argued with don’t ruin what you have by kissing her, you moron. He’d gone most of his life without friends, and tonight he’d found one. Learning from her and basking in their friendship had to be more important than kissing her.
“How do you do it?”
“Do what?”
“Stay as hopeful as you do. I don’t understand how it’s possible for one person to be this optimistic all the time. I was awful to you and you didn’t flinch. Your life hasn’t been great but you count it as a blessing… How do you do it?”
“You really want to know?”
“Yeah.”
She bit her lip, an adorable gesture Clark never got in movies but now understood completely. She grew increasingly sheepish as she interrogated his motives.
“You promise you won’t make fun of me? It’s pretty cheesy.”
“Promise.”
“Cross your heart?”
“Yeah.”
She shot him a look. Apparently, she wanted him to actually cross his heart. He did so, all while struggling to maintain a dignified, solemn expression. When she was satisfied, she shoved her hands into her back pockets, staring up at the tree. In the glow of the lights, she looked more than beautiful as she whispered the simple truth that had sustained her through her entire life.
“I keep Christmas with me all year long. It’s the one time of year when I find it impossible to think the worst in people. If I pretend every day is Christmas, it makes life so much easier to live. And people so much easier to love.”
“I wish I could do that,” Clark breathed. He tried to move his hand away from her cheek, but Kate got there first. She held him there, this time forcing him to give her his eyes. A sweet smile encouraged him. Challenged him. Filled him with hope.
“You can.”
Chapter Thirteen
Tree decorating gave way to black-and-white movies and popcorn, which gave way to leftover turkey sandwiches with cranberry sauce which inevitably gave way to heavy eyelids and almost naps. Conversation and laughter flowed easily between them, though Kate got the distinct feeling Clark was out of practice when it came to having a friend. The defenses he threw up against her only this morning diffused, leaving them only with his rusty attempts at humor and near-constant questions about Christmas and its traditions. Kate didn’t mind at all. In fact, she suspected this Christmas would go down as one of her favorites. Not because it was perfect—it definitely wasn’t—but because she’d never experienced anything quite like this, something this pure.
The Festival was her life. Everyone who worked on it was her family. She was immeasurably glad for the security they gave her. The problem came on Christmas night, when her entire year had been leading up to a grand spectacle of the season. She loved the spectacle, but there was something beautiful and singular about sharing a private Christmas with someone who’d never had one before. For the first time, Kate saw the holiday not through her eyes, but his. The beauty of this holiday she loved so much now engulfed her. The lights shone brighter. The classic lines of It’s a Wonderful Life cut deeper. Her faith renewed.
When It’s a Wonderful Life went into its encore showing, Kate stretched her tight muscles along the overstuffed couch. Clark, for his part, sprawled out in a distinctly Victorian armchair. Wide, decorative walls of the chair
