The Christmas Catch

Christine feared she heard kissing and hoped Ellen wasn’t making out on the other end of the line.
    “I’m not like you, Ellen. This is different. I’m—”
    “Chicken.”
    “No. Out of practice.”
    “That’s the whole point, Christine. It’s been over two years. Don’t you think it’s time?”

    Christine opened her laptop and set it on the counter. Of all the nerve! Ellen went and Googled her guy before she’d had a chance to. Christine felt a rash of embarrassment for thinking of John Steadman as hers. She hadn’t laid claim to him, for heaven’s sake. They barely even knew each other and had only met a couple of times. By accident. Literally.
    Suddenly a smoke alarm sounded and Christine looked up to find chili bubbling over on the cooktop and black smoke curling from the oven. “Oh no!” she cried, leaping from the barstool.
    Tyler rushed into the room, hollering, “Something’s on fire!”
    She grabbed two potholders and pulled the charred cornbread from the oven. Quickly opening the kitchen door, she tossed the seared pan out in the snow, then dashed back inside to wave a towel beneath the blaring smoke detector.
    Tyler clambered up on the kitchen stool to watch the show as the air cleared and the wailing instrument finally quieted.
    “Whew!” Christine breathed, dabbing her forehead with the dishtowel.
    Tyler slowly spun his stool toward the counter, then cried with delight.
    “Mommy, Mommy! Look! It’s our angel!”
    Christine crossed to the counter and shut her laptop.
    “John’s not an angel, baby. I already explained that to you.”
    “But, when he helped us you said—”
    “It was a figure of speech. Something someone says when they mean something else.”
    “But that doesn’t make any sense.”
    “That’s how people talk sometimes.”
    “Why don’t they just say what they mean?”
    “I guess that would be too easy.” She reached for her son and helped him off of the stool. “Come on, let’s get ready to eat. You hungry for dinner?”
    Tyler wrinkled his nose. “Can I skip the cornbread?”

    An hour later, Christine and Tyler were constructing a fortress out of Lincoln Logs. Tyler crowned the final turret with a tiny toy flag. “Tadahh!” he proclaimed proudly. “It’s done!”
    Christine’s heart swelled with pride. She was so honored to call this charming young man her son. “It’s awesome, Ty. World’s best.”
    Tyler beamed.
    “You see,” Christine told him, “playing the old-fashioned way isn’t really so rotten.”
    “It’s all right, I guess.” Tyler yawned and rubbed his eyes.
    Christine checked the mantel clock, seeing it was after nine.
    “Oh gosh, look at the time. It’s up to bed with you.”
    “But mom—” he protested, even as he picked up Jasper.
    “No buts about it. There will be more time for play tomorrow.”
    “You mean it?”
    Christine nodded as he headed up the stairs dragging his teddy beside him. Slowly, thoughtfully, he turned toward his mom. “I like Vermont,” he said.
    “Yeah, buddy,” she answered, smiling softly, “I like it, too.”

Chapter Five

    With Tyler tucked in, Christine sat at the dining room table to work on her drafts. Her first task was reworking her earlier sketch of Santa’s sleigh over a rooftop by using Winterhaven as a model for the scene. After a while, tired from her labors, she stood for a stretch and walked to the window, surveying the already buried-in-snow SUV. Guardian Angel, she thought with a chuckle, casting her gaze up the stairs to where Tyler lay sleeping.
    Nabbing her laptop off of an end table, she carried it with her to the sofa and perched it on her knees. Within seconds, a computerized voice told her she had mail. Curious, Christine opened her messages to find a new e-mail in her inbox from, of all things, the University of North Carolina Alumni Association. She thought of John, but then realized she was being ridiculous to take this sheer coincidence as any sort of sign. Even if they had gone to the same school, she reasoned, they probably hadn’t been there at the same time. He had to be in his mid to late thirties at least, and she had just turned thirty-one. Still, she couldn’t keep herself from clicking over to his Web page, which she’d bookmarked earlier, to review its details one more time.
    Department Chair John Steadman is a full professor of business and economics. Steadman holds a BA from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a PhD from the