Baby It's Cold Outside (19 page)

He watched her pick up the pot, ladle cereal and compote into five bowls. Christmas Eve.

“I would be at home, trying to figure out what to get my mother for Christmas,” he said.

She laughed. “Me too. My mother is impossible to shop for. I think she hates gifts. I usually give her a new brush, or even perfume.” She’d barely given her poor mother a thought over the past two days. She dearly hoped that her mother knew she was safe and warm at Dottie’s. Perhaps her brothers would trek out to Dottie’s when the storm died.

“My mother prefers donations to charity, although she never minded when my father ‘surprised’ her with a string of pearls.”

She grinned at him, blowing on the spoon, then taking a bit of the remains before dropping it in the sink. “And what girl wouldn’t?”

He hid his frown. But…uh…
her
? Hadn’t she written in one of her letters that she found jewelry and perfume a waste of good money? That she’d much prefer something practical?

She put a towel over the bowls to hold in the heat. “Poor Arnie. It’s not much of a Christmas celebration here. And although the snow seems to have lightened, the wind chill could freeze a man’s nose off his face. Listen to it—I think it’s trying to blow the house over. There’s no going out in this.”

“I wish we had electricity. We could at least put up those Christmas lights.” He moved toward the door, glancing at the mudroom. “I need to get some wood.” He wrenched open the door, bracing himself for the cold.

Indeed, the room felt like an igloo, chill brushing off the walls. Last night’s woodpile run had netted enough wood for last night, but they’d need a fresh supply for the day.

He grabbed his long coat, the wool hat and muffler, as well as Gordy’s gloves. He’d just take a quick run out to the barn.

He nearly plowed into the door when it didn’t open. He shoved it again, but it only creaked, the sound of snow crunching against it.

Violet had come into the mudroom, rubbing her arms. She reached for her boots. “I’ll help you carry in a load.”

He tried the door again, adding some oomph. It didn’t move.

“What’s holding it shut?”

“Snow. Last night it was drifting over good. We may be trapped.”

Her eyes widened. “Trapped?”

“Don’t worry, Vi. We’ll figure this out—”

“Where is he?”

The voice came from the parlor—Dottie’s voice, crisp, with the sharp edge of panic.

Violet turned, but Jake brushed past her, clomping through the kitchen in his boots. Dottie came into the kitchen, wearing a wool sweater over a pair of pants, her blond hair down, tangled. “He’s gone. Arnie is gone.”

* * * * *

Dottie had awakened with the conviction that Gordy was trying to torture her.

She had spent the better part of the night listing all the reasons why she’d never forgiven him for not knocking at her door, for not barging his way into her stubborn heart.

Although, he seemed to be doing a fairly good job of it over the past twenty-four hours, without even trying. Like him calling her a hero. At least, that’s how she interpreted his words.
I just meant that it takes a hero to raise one.

His words had stolen hers, churned her thoughts together into a hot ball.

Maybe
Gordy
had been the hero. For sure he’d been Nelson’s hero. How many times had Nelson come home, brimming with stories of hunting or fishing or working the farm with Gordy?

She should forgive him. Dottie couldn’t pinpoint the source of that impulse, but the thought wound through her brain, startled her awake numerous times to stare at the crackling fire.

Jake, too, seem bothered, because every time she woke, it seemed he sat in his chair, mesmerized by the flickering flames. He finally fell asleep in the wee hours. And not long afterwards, Violet rose and tiptoed to the kitchen.

If Violet could scrape together something for breakfast, then miracles could happen. Since Arnie’d arrived on Dottie’s doorstep, she’d kept flirting with creative ways to use canned ham to craft a holiday meal. Some Christmas Eve.

Forgive Gordy.
She couldn’t escape the thought, it seemed.

Forgive him for not knocking at her door. Forgive him for teaching her son how to shoot.

Forgive him for making Nelson want him for his father.

She could hear him, even now.
“I sure wish Mr. Lindholm was my daddy.”
Nelson’s words were an arrow, piercing her as he’d shuffled into the kitchen for the second time, after peeling off his muddy boots. Dottie had kept her face stoic, her breathing calm.

Nelson slid onto one of the oak chairs at the table. She poured him a glass of milk from one of the bottles he’d brought home from Gordy’s farm. “Mommy, how come you and Mr. Lindholm don’t get married?”

This answer came easier. “I’m too old to get married again.” Except, thirty-two wasn’t old, was it? Even now, forty-four didn’t seem so old. Until she looked at the trail of the past.

“But Mrs. Olafson at school got married again, and she’s old.” The milk left a mustache as he downed it.

“Well, if Mr. Lindholm asks, then I’ll consider it.” In the well of her heart, Dottie had hoped Nelson might pass that tidbit of information along, but perhaps it left his head the moment he ran upstairs to his room.

What if she did forgive Gordy? She’d lived so long with the anger burrowing inside her, she might just collapse in on herself, nothing to keep her warm when her visitors left. When Gordy returned home and they went back to keeping track of each other’s lighted windows.

Dottie had finally untangled herself from her memories, her what-ifs, then tiptoed upstairs to dig out a wool sweater, long johns, and a pair of wool shoes. The house contained a hovering chill, and she feared that the blizzard would freeze her water pipes. Oh, the mess, come spring.

She stopped by the bathroom and spent way too long in front of the mirror, considering her hair up, or down, the wrinkles around her eyes, the loosening jowls around her jawline.

On a whim, she put on lipstick, a little face powder. A dash of perfume, just because it was there. It raised gooseflesh on her skin. And, she left her hair down.

On a whim.

Returning downstairs, she could hear voices in the kitchen, then the back door opening. Jake had vanished from his perch by the fire. She smelled something cooking in the kitchen, peeked in and saw Jake and Violet by the stove, stirring some concoction.

They could be a cute couple, what with Jake’s broad shoulders, his kind blue eyes, the way Violet laughed at his jokes, her eyes shining. Dottie had watched them dancing together last night, and for a moment, she saw herself and Gordy, that Christmas before she returned to teachers college in Mankato.

Why hadn’t he asked her to stay home that New Year’s weekend? She told herself for years that she would have stayed if he asked, but as the memory dusted over her, perhaps she’d been too headstrong. Maybe she’d simply wanted an escape from her quiet, brooding father, so solemn after her mother died, spending his money and time on gadgets and new inventions. Too many evenings as she’d grown up, the only sound between them was the fluttering of pages from his vast book collection.

Regardless of her reasons, she’d had her taste of freedom.

Gordy had learned to dance that year, and stepping into his arms felt like stepping into home. He smelled clean and fresh, with a dash of cologne, and in his suit appeared a real gentleman. She remembered tucking her face close to his neck, smelling him.

She may have even kissed him.

When she’d caught his gaze, however, the heat, the desire in it had frightened her. She wasn’t ready for the world he wanted for them.

She just needed more time. So she’d told him about Minneapolis.

It was only the first of her mistakes.

The second was thinking that TJ Morgan might truly love her, that the words he crooned into her ears might be enough.

It hadn’t been Gordy’s fault she didn’t say yes. She understood his proposal well enough, had even, for a moment, surrendered to his touch, had wanted him to continue.

She’d never been kissed like Gordon Lindholm had kissed her in the barn. But, she hadn’t wanted the adventure to end.

Probably she needed his forgiveness too.

She had no idea, however, how to ask.

Or, perhaps, offer it.

She stepped into the kitchen, noticed that Violet and Jake had slipped into the mudroom. Probably to get more wood. The ice frosted the window completely over, letting in only wan light. She couldn’t see outside, although the wind howled.

Today, maybe, the storm would die. They could all be back in their homes by Christmas. She wasn’t sure why that thought rattled her, hollowed her out.

Bowls of breakfast cooled on the counter, covered with a towel. She went over, carried two to the table.

Maybe she’d invite Gordy to eat breakfast with her, while the kids were out fetching wood.

Tiptoeing back into the parlor, she glanced at him lying on the floor by the Silvertone. He’d propped his head on a sofa pillow, his legs drawn up, her mother’s wedding ring quilt over him. Strange that he’d sleep so long—in fact, yesterday he’d risen last also.

And that’s when she noticed it—the empty blankets near him, where Arnie had slept. Where—

She ran into the kitchen. No Arnie. Back to the parlor.

“Where is he?”

Gordy roused at her voice, but she didn’t stay, just ran back to the kitchen.

Jake came through the door, bundled in his jacket, his boots.

“He’s gone. Arnie is gone.”

“How could he be gone?” Gordy said, leaping to his feet so fast, she could doubt he’d slept at all. “Where could he go?”

“All yesterday he cried about going home. Maybe he left this morning?”

“We’re snowed in,” Jake said. “The door’s frozen shut.”

“What about the front door?”

“I haven’t used it in years.” But Dottie headed into the front hall anyway. She unbolted the door, turned the handle.

It didn’t budge.

“Let me try,” Gordy said.

“If you can’t open it, I can guarantee Arnie wouldn’t be able to,” Violet said, but Gordy tried anyway.

He peered out the window in the parlor. “These are covered in snow. He didn’t get out.”

“Search the house.” Jake shucked off his jacket, heading back to the parlor.

Violet opened the door to the sewing room, the arctic blast from the closed room chilling the house. She hadn’t set foot in her mother’s sewing room since before Nelson left for war.

Dottie headed upstairs, first stopping at her room, then the bathroom. She was striding by Nelson’s room when she heard it.

The faint sounds of a train.

She heard the little-boy-made
choo, choo
sounds of the engine, breath huffing through puffy cheeks, and steeled herself against what she’d see.

Quietly, she eased the door open.

Arnie sat on the floor, the worn box to the Hafner wind-up train on Nelson’s twin bed. And, in the middle of the floor, in the center of the rag rug, Arnie had assembled the track into an oval. Around and around went the wind-up train, all four cars—the engine, the green grain car, the black coal car, and the shiny red caboose with the word P
ENNSYLVANIA
scripted on the side.

Dottie pressed her hand to her chest as she listened to the boy make the sounds. He’d also set up Nelson’s old farm set, with the painted wooden tractor Gordy had given him on his fifth birthday.

The engine died and Arnie picked it up, inserting the windup key in the engine, and cranking it until it started rolling again. When he set it back on the track, he looked up at her, stilling.

The engine continued its trek around the oval as he drew in a breath.

Why was this child so afraid of her? She couldn’t erase the way he looked at her yesterday when he’d awakened in Gordy’s arms.

She kept her voice soft. “It’s okay, Arnie. You can play with those.”

The room bespoke the smell of mustiness, age. The fact that she hadn’t opened it to air out, receive the warmth of the house since Nelson shipped out, evidenced in the dust mites under the bed, the scent of age embedded in the bed linens. Nelson had cleaned out most of his childhood mementos, packing them in boxes in the closet. The train set, and other toys, he must have shoved under the bed, because one end of the blue bedspread was flung up.

How had Arnie found this room, these toys?

And not just any toys. These were the toys Gordy had given Nelson over the years. Her gifts—Monopoly and Sorry, the many Hardy Boys books—he’d packed away in the closet. But Gordy’s toys he’d packed separately, made them accessible.

As if he knew that someday, some other little boy might need them.

Oh, being trapped in this house had turned her all soft and sentimental.

“You found him.”

Gordy’s voice, behind her, and she glanced at him. Smiled. “He’s just playing.”

But Gordy was staring at the boy as if he’d seen the ghost of Christmas past. “You kept it.”

“Kept what?”

He looked at her. “I gave that to Nelson when he was ten. And that farm set—I left that on the stoop.”

“Like Santa Claus. Thank you for that. Nelson was a believer until he was twelve because of your many midnight visits.” But nothing of resentment hued her words. She looked at him, smiling. “You nurtured the magic of Christmas for him.”

“I always wondered if he liked them. I…never knew.”

She drew in a quick breath. Of course. Nelson thought Santa had brought them, had probably never thought to thank Gordy.

And she, of course, couldn’t bear to acknowledge that Gordy’s gifts to her son had made him feel loved.

Made her feel loved.

No—no… Gordy loved her
son
. Not her.

Still, as she watched Arnie sacrifice a cow to the terrible train monster, she couldn’t help but lean over to Gordy and whisper into his ear. “Thank you, Santa.”

He smiled, and she saw a blush spread up his neck. “You’re welcome.”

* * * * *

Who was Violet kidding? Jake had about as much interest in her as he had in a can of ham. For a moment there, standing in the kitchen next to the stove, Violet had thought…well, she’d thought he might kiss her, which only attested to the fact that three days cooped up in Dottie’s too-large-for-its-own-good house had gone straight to her head. She’d heard of cabin fever. What about old- Victorian-on-the-hill fever?