Rescuing Christmas (8 page)

Kevin led him to a massive SUV type limousine. They got in and Kevin drove out of the garage and headed into town.

***

Chris got off the phone and smiled as he hit his list of contacts and dialed Jamie.

“Hey hon, what’s going on?” asked Jamie when he answered the phone.

Chris said, “I just got off the phone with Deputy Clark. They finally got that fake bodyguard who was at my house and kidnapped you. We finally got all of them wrapped up.”

Jamie laughed, his voice shaking just a little, relief evident. “Good. I am very glad. Anyway, I will be home in thirty minutes. Want me to pick something up to eat?”

Chris said, “No. Dinner will be ready by the time you get here. I gotta go now. I have some things to finish up here. Love you.”

Jamie thrilled to the sound of hearing Chris say that. “I love you too.”

Chris hung up the phone and turned around looking around him. The entire inside of the house had been decorated and Christmas lights were everywhere making everything sparkle. Statuary and wall decorations, new rugs on the floor, mistletoe hanging from the ceiling. There were even large stuffed Christmas animals placed all over the house on the floor and on random pieces of furniture. They had repositioned everything in the living room and placed a massive Christmas tree but it had yet to be decorated. All around it in boxes were decorations for the tree and some of them he had gone and picked up from Mrs. McCormick and others were his that had been sitting in his precinct. He had been planning on using them to decorate the station but figured they would be of better use here since they were childhood decorations and would help bring back some good memories for Jamie. The rest were new items. He was waiting for Jamie to get home to save this bit of decorating for the two of them.

He just hoped all of this wouldn’t send Jamie into a tailspin of anger because Jamie would see the outside decorations long before he saw the inside decorations. Every tree and fountain had been festooned with lights. The outside of the house was decorated and the expansive grounds had been covered with Christmas statuary.

Chris touched the mic at his ear and said, “Jamie will be here in thirty everyone. Let’s get this place cleaned up and get the table ready. I want this place smelling like Christmas and don’t forget, you are all going to sit at that table with us tonight. Mrs. McCormick will be here in about five minutes. Kevin, hit the music please.”

Soft Christmas music flooded through the house on the hidden speakers. Chris recognized the sound of Irving Berlin’s White Christmas sung by Bing Crosby. They had decided on his Christmas album to be playing softly in the background. At that moment the front door opened and Mrs. McCormick walked in, as soon as the door shut behind her Billy stepped up to take her coat. Lights started going off all over the house and candles were being lit. The soft glow of candlelight and the sparkling of all the Christmas lights made for a cheery atmosphere, especially once the smells of the dinner started permeating the air around them.

They were grouped near the front door singing along to Bing Crosby when the door opened and Jamie stepped inside twenty minutes later, his face registering shock. He closed the door behind him and while the staff continued singing softly in the background, Mrs. McCormick and Chris stopped singing and waited with baited breath for Jamie to say something.

“It’s beautiful! I am just glad I have a reason to start celebrating again,” he finally said. Everyone stopped singing long enough to cheer as Jamie hugged his mother and then Chris took him in his arms and dragged him under the closest bunch of mistletoe, tilted him backwards before kissing him long and deep.

Everyone cheered again and when Chris finally stood Jamie back on his feet he smiled and said, “Welcome home Jamie and Merry Christmas.”

THE LETTERS

Waking up the following morning Jamie smiled and stretched as he sat up in bed. He looked over to the other side of the massive triple king sized bed and frowned; Chris was not in bed and he wasn’t in the room either. He got out of bed, pulled on his robe and went downstairs. He looked at the tree they had spent hours decorating the night before with his mother and the staff all taking part.

The moment he stepped foot on the plush carpet of the first floor, soft Christmas music started playing again, but this time it was just a random mix. They had set it up the night before to play random Christmas music from that point on.

The front door opened, bringing a draft of cold air that caught Jamie’s robe and parted it, revealing he was naked underneath. Chris stopped and looked just before someone bumped into him from behind. Jamie hurriedly redid his rob ties and blushed as Chris smiled at him.

Chris had a box in his hands and as he moved forward into the house, eight of the members of their staff walked in behind him each carrying two to three boxes as well, each a pretty good size.

“Okay guys, take them over there to the couch by the tree and thank you.” Chris smiled and handed his box over to Kevin who reached for it at that moment, the suspense killing him.

Chris walked up and kissed Jamie warmly and said, “Good morning my love.”

Jamie smiled at him, adjusting himself as the very nearness of Chris had his blood flowing wild and free.

“Later,” Chris whispered making Jamie groan. “What, you didn’t get enough of me last night?”

Jamie frowned and said, “I had to make do without you for twenty years, I do not intend on doing that again. Anyway, what is all this stuff?” He turned and made a sweeping gesture with his arm to indicate all the boxes that had been brought inside and were now covering the floor and couch next to their massive Christmas tree.

Chris smiled and said, “I told you I would find out what happened to those letter I sent you, and I did find out. Now, as soon as I find out who is responsible for it, I will be turning the case over to the Feds, as I am feeling just that vindictive about it.”

Jamie frowned and said, “What do you mean?” Together the two moved toward the couch as Kevin brought them a tray of coffee and muffins.

Unless Jamie was at the bar, Kevin was with him at all times. Jamie considered him family and the closest friend he had and he wasn’t about to start shutting him out of things now. Kevin sat down on the couch with them and the three of them started opening boxes. Each of them was filled to the brim with envelopes, all opened. Jamie could see a progression and noticed each box was dated. There were twenty boxes and each one was labeled by year. The first box was labeled the year following the Christmas that Chris had moved away and the writing on those envelopes showed they were written by a child. Each year the handwriting got better until the most recent where Jamie even recognized the handwriting and on the very top was a brand new letter, stuffed inside a Christmas card.

With shaking hands, he took the card from Kevin as he handed it to him. Chris sat there silently and waited. Jamie opened the card and found it to be a cute comical cartoon Christmas card and inside was a letter. Jamie pulled the letter out and opened it.

Dear Jamie,

I had begun to despair of ever seeing you again. As an adult I suppose I could have come back home years ago, but I had my responsibilities and I could not just in good conscience walk away from them. However, in light of recent events I have decided to do just that. I don’t know if you are reading my letters or even getting them or if you even care about me anymore at this point but I wanted to let you know something. If you have read my past letters, you will know I am a cop in Los Angeles. Well, that is no longer true. I quit the force and was offered the job of Sheriff back in Baysville.

I called Sheriff Quinn there and inquired about any openings for deputies and he informed me that he was retiring and none of the current deputies wanted the job so after he received all of my credentials and talked to my old boss here, and he interviewed me over the phone, he offered me the job. Anyway, I will be moving there next week and I hope that at some point we will see each other and at least can become friends. I would like to be the type of friends we were back when we were only eight years old, but I will understand if you are no longer interested in being friends.

Hope to see you soon and with all of my love,

Christopher Jeremiah Anderson

Kevin took the letter from Jamie’s still trembling hands and handed him another one, from the very first box. Chris put his hands over the top of Jamie’s and waited until he looked up at him.

When he did Chris said, “I have to go to work, but I want you to keep reading the letters or do something, anything that would keep a smile on your face. Just don’t be unhappy please. I will tell you what happened with the letters and all of that later when I get home. I love you.”

Jamie could only nod and hold his face up for Chris to kiss before he walked out of the house and headed off to work.

Jamie looked down at the letter in his hands and pulled the piece of paper out. It was one of those types of paper kids use to practice writing letters of the alphabet on.

Jamie

Mom and dad said I have to go with them and I can’t see you anymore. They won’t tell me why and I wish they would. When I get enough money saved up from the newspaper route I just got, I will run away and come live with you.

Chris

Jamie laughed and then began to sob as the letter fell to the floor. Kevin pulled him into his arms and held on to him letting him cry until he had nothing left.

After that Jamie spent the rest of the day reading. Kevin read each letter after Jamie finished them and together the two of them spent the day blowing their noses and wiping their eyes and there was also a lot of laughter, light smiles and even anger over some of the things in the letters that were hurting Chris. Chris had tried desperately over the years to maintain contact with his best friend and the man he hoped to share his love and life with at some point. It was clear from all of the letters that Chris knew he was in love with Jamie and would stop at nothing to get to him, even if it meant at some point forcing a divorce on whatever woman Jamie had married if he had.

At some point Chris had come home and gone to bed after kissing Jamie on the forehead and smiling down at him. Kevin and Jamie ate through a tray of cold cuts that Chris had sent out to them before he went to sleep.

The next morning as Chris came downstairs he saw Jamie was reading the last letter and still awake, Kevin curled into a ball on the couch next to him, his head in his lap, snoring very gently with Jamie stroking his hair as he read. He put the letter down and stretched, disturbing Kevin who sat up and looked around.

“Oh damn, what did I miss?” Kevin asked.

“Just the last ten letters. I left them on the coffee table there for you. Here is the last one,” he said as he handed it to Kevin who put it at the bottom of the pile on the coffee table.

Chris cleared his throat and they both looked up at him, smiling. Kevin stood up and stretched and said, “I need to take a piss.” He smiled and walked off leaving Chris and Jamie to greet each other.

Chris said, “Did you actually stay up all night and read every single letter?”

Jamie nodded and said, “I just couldn’t stop. Once I started, I felt like I was living your life as you tried to communicate with me.”

Chris sat down next to him on the couch and said, “So, are you ready to hear the story now?”

Nodding Jamie said, “Yeah. Just let me use the bathroom first and get some coffee in here.”

Chris said, “Coffee, bacon and eggs are on the way already. Just go use the bathroom.”

Jamie fled down the hall and into the small downstairs bathroom just as Kevin was coming out of it.

Kevin walked over to the couch and sat down on Chris’s other side. “Man, it really sucks that all of this happened to you guys. I wish I had known you guys long before this and had been able to help you guys out. You know about ten years ago when Jamie was just going into his freshman year of college I asked him out on a date. He said he was already in love with someone else. Over the next two years I noticed he was never around anyone so I approached him again and asked and he told me the exact same thing.”

Chris said, “What did he say then?”

Jamie spoke up from beside the couch and said, “I told him to quit asking me for a date, fuck me and get it over with and then hired him to be my personal bodyguard.”

Chris laughed and said, “What happened?”

Kevin said, “Well, I wasn’t going to turn down an invitation like that, so I fucked him and became his bodyguard then moved on to the head of his security after Michael his former head of security had a heart attack and died. I stayed on as his bodyguard though. That was the one and only time we ever had sex though.”

Chris just smiled and said, “You guys don’t need to feel guilty about it. I wasn’t here and I have no claim to him from those past twenty years.”

Kevin smiled and said, “That is where you are wrong. These past ten years I have known him, you have always had the only claim on him that I have ever been able to see. Then he started semi-dating that Kelly girl a couple years ago. When he got raped I tried to go to the police but he wouldn’t let me. I tried quitting because I let him down, but he wouldn’t let me. He had told me to stay home. Normally I would have ignored that and tailed him anyway as I do every day he is gone, except recently when he was with you, but I had just received word my grandmother was in the hospital in New York and wouldn’t make it past the holiday, so I went to see her.”