The Doctor's Christmas (7 page)

He was coming back from the bedroom, pulling on a sweater, when he heard someone pounding persistently at the back door. Tugging the sweater down, he opened the door.

Joey had come out without a coat, and he hopped up and down on the porch to keep warm. “Maggie says the 'lectricity is out. Maggie says come over to our place so you won't freeze.”

An afternoon in close quarters with Maggie and the three kids. And a fireplace. And a wood burner.

Joey danced. “You comin' or not?”

It was better than freezing.

“You go on back. Tell Maggie I'll be along in a minute.”

The apartment was already cooling. He picked up an armful of journals he hadn't had time to read yet. This wouldn't be so bad. Maggie would undoubtedly occupy the kids, and he could immerse himself in the journals. He could make decent use of the time.

Pulling on his jacket, he hurried outside, slamming
the door behind him. A step off the porch took him to his shoe tops in snow. He strode across the yard behind the clinic to Maggie's kitchen door, gave a cursory knock and opened it.

“Maggie?”

“Come on in.” The croak had to be Maggie's voice, but it sounded more like a frog.

He crossed to the living room doorway, shedding his jacket on the way. He paused.

Maggie sat on the braided rug in front of the fireplace, surrounded by Christmas ornaments and the three kids. The blue spruce they'd cut the previous day occupied the place of honor in front of the window. They'd clearly been spending their Sunday afternoon trimming it.

The room looked like Christmas. Bright cards decorated the top of the pine jelly cabinet in the corner, and a rather crooked red-and-green paper chain swung from the white window curtains.

Maggie didn't look as festive as the setting. She sneezed several times, then mopped her face with a tissue. Her eyes were about as red as her nose, and her usually glossy hair was disheveled.

“I said you were catching something, didn't I?” He picked his way through the boxes scattered on the braided rug to reach her. “Do you have a fever?”

She evaded his hand. “No. It's just a cold.”

He touched her cheek. “And a fever. And a sore throat. What have you taken?”

“Nothing.” At his look, she went defensive. “I
can't take something that will make me sleepy, not when I have the children to take care of.”

He glanced at the kids. They stood close together, eyes wary, obviously not sure what to do when Maggie, always strong Maggie, wasn't herself.

“I'll watch the kids. You need to take something right now and get some sleep.”

He'd
watch the kids? Where did that come from?

Maggie apparently found the suggestion just as incredible. “I'll be fine.”

He grabbed her arms and hoisted her to her feet, surprised by how light she was. Maybe her assertive attitude made her seem bigger than she was. He guided her to the couch.

“You won't be fine unless you follow doctor's orders. Do you have something to take, or do I have to go over to the clinic?”

Maggie sank down on the couch, apparently too sick to argue. That alarmed him more than anything.

“Top shelf above the sink in the kitchen,” she murmured.

He found the vial, nodded his approval and raided the refrigerator for juice. He went back to the living room to find her curled up, eyes half-closed.

“Here.” He stood over her while she downed the pills he doled out, then handed her a glass of juice. “Drink that and relax for a while.”

She nodded, tucking her hand under the bright pillow with a little sigh.

He turned to the kids, to find they were all looking at him. A flicker of panic touched him. He couldn't
suggest they watch television, not without electricity. What was he going to do with them?

“Why don't you guys sit down by the fireplace and…um, play a game.”

Joey shook his head with a look of disgust. “We don't want to play any old game. We want to finish trimming the Christmas tree.”

A voice seemed to echo over the years. Jason's voice.

Don't you wish we had a Christmas tree of our very own, Grant? One we could trim ourselves?

He swung toward Maggie, ready to demand she get well and take over.

Maggie slept, her flushed cheek pressed against the patchwork pillow that he'd bet Aunt Elly had made for her. Silky dark hair swung across her face, and one blue-jeaned leg dangled from the couch.

He lifted her leg to the couch, moved the orange juice glass and brushed a strand of hair back from her face. It flowed through his fingers damply, clinging.

A patchwork quilt draped over the back of the couch. He pulled the quilt free, then tucked it around her, moving with the utmost care so he wouldn't wake her. Finally, satisfied that she was comfortable, he turned back to the kids.

He didn't want to do this. But Maggie needed him.

“So, what do you say we finish trimming this Christmas tree?”

 

Maggie woke reluctantly from a dream in which she had been warm and safe—a child snug in a soft bed, tucked in with love and kisses.

She blinked, coming back to the present. Firelight—yes, the power was off. The room was warm, and the murmur of voices must have made the background music for her dream.

She sniffed, not stirring. Someone must have been cooking on the wood burner. Maybe Aunt Elly had taken over while she was sleeping.

Still reluctant to move, she snuggled under the quilt. Someone had covered her. Someone had tucked her in and told her to sleep. Grant.

She looked toward the fireplace.

Grant sat on the rug in front of the fire, Tacey on his lap, Robby leaning against his knee, Joey sitting cross-legged holding her big yellow mixing bowl filled with popcorn. The old metal popcorn popper she used for camping was propped against the stone fireplace.

“…so Jack and his mother lived happily ever after. The end.”

If someone had told her yesterday that Dr. Grant Hardesty would be telling fairy tales to the Bascom kids on her living room rug, she'd have thought they were lying. But this was definitely Grant, even though his face looked softer, somehow, with the firelight flickering on it.

Tacey reached up to tug at Grant's sweater. “A Christmas story,” she said softly.

“Yeah, tell us a Christmas story,” Joey chipped in. He shoved a handful of popcorn in his mouth.

She wasn't imagining the shadow that crossed Grant's face at that request. Something about Christ
mas disturbed him at a level so deep, he probably never let it show. Did he admit it to himself?

He ruffled Joey's hair, and for once the boy didn't duck away from a touch. “Why don't we—” He glanced across the room and saw she was awake. “Why don't we see if Maggie needs anything, okay?”

She roused herself to push the quilt back. Those children were her responsibility, and she'd been sound asleep, leaving them to Grant.

“Sorry I slept so long. I'll get up and—”

Grant was there before she could get off the couch. He shoved her gently back to a sitting position on the couch. “No, you won't do any such thing.”

She'd have taken offense at the order, but it was said with such concern that she couldn't. It must be the cold that made her feel so tearful. “I'm sorry. I shouldn't have left you with the kids.”

He raised an eyebrow even as he touched her cheek and then felt her pulse. “Don't you think I can manage three kids, a power outage and a snowstorm?”

Her gaze tangled with his, and her breath caught. “I think you can manage just about anything you set your mind to.”

Joey leaned against the couch and eyed her critically. “You look some better, Maggie.”

“Thanks.” Although with Grant's fingers on her wrist, her pulse was probably racing. “You guys behaving?”

He looked affronted. “O' course we are. Grant made popcorn.”

“A little fast,” Grant murmured, and he let go of her hand.

She felt the heat rise in her cheeks. “I'm feeling much better. I didn't realize you could cook.”

“Hey, if you want popcorn or soup, I'm your man.” He straightened, stretching. “We kept some chicken soup warm for you. You feel as if you can eat some?”

She started to get up and was pushed back again.

“Sit still. Tacey and I are in charge of serving, aren't we, Tacey?”

The little girl actually giggled. Then she nodded and raced to the kitchen. It looked as if Grant had made a conquest.

Of Tacey, she reminded herself quickly. Not of her.

Something remarkably like panic ripped along her nerves, pulling her upright. She couldn't let a momentary gentleness and an afternoon's support make her feel anything for Grant. She wouldn't. That could only lead to heartbreak.

G
rant shoved another log on the fire and watched as Maggie tucked blankets around the sleeping children. After several stories and snacks, the kids had finally curled up in the nests of blankets she'd created on the living room rug. Thanks to a busy afternoon the tree was trimmed and the ornament boxes put away.

Maggie looked better, and she had things under control. He ought to go back to his own place.

Instead of moving, he settled comfortably into the spot on the braided rug he'd occupied for the past hour, his back against the couch. He stretched out his legs toward the fire.

The power was still off. His apartment would be cold. Maggie might need something.

Those sounded like good enough reasons for staying right where he was.

Maggie glanced out the window at the snowy darkness, then came and sat down next to him. The flush
in her cheeks looked natural now, rather than fever-caused.

He put the backs of his fingers against her cheek, just to be sure. Her skin was warm and smooth.

“You okay?” He kept his voice low, although he didn't think anything short of an explosion would wake the kids now.

“Fine.” She withdrew a fraction of an inch. “Would you believe it's still snowing out? I'd guess we'll have close to two feet by the time it's done.”

“Probably just raining in Baltimore.”

She settled back against the couch. “I'll take snow anytime. Maybe we'll have a white Christmas.”

Christmas.
The holiday was as unavoidable here as it was everywhere else this time of year. A flare of resentment went through him. Why did he have to be reminded?

Maggie seemed to take his silence for assent. She stared into the fire, apparently content for once to sit and watch instead of doing something.

She tilted her head, looking at the battered metal star he'd placed on the very top of the tree. “It looks nice, doesn't it?”

He assessed the spruce. The branches were crooked, and the top tilted a little oddly in spite of his best efforts to straighten it. Half the ornaments were old and worn, the other half homemade.

“Nice,” he agreed.

She shot him a look, as if he'd argued about it. “I know it can't compare to a decorator-trimmed tree, but I think it's pretty good.”

His brother would have loved the tree, right down to the angels made from paper plates and glitter. The thought of Jason's reaction stabbed him to the heart.

“You have a beautiful tree, Maggie.” The thing to do was keep the focus on Maggie and her Christmas, not his. That way was safe. “The kids are crazy about it.”

“They are, aren't they?” She smiled in their direction, then got up. “I forgot one ornament.”

She took a small box from the mantel, then opened it and removed something. For a moment she held the object protectively between her hands, and then she lifted it so he could see.

A fragile glass angel dangled from her fingers, the flickering light from the fire turning the wings to gold. The way she looked at the angel told him it had a special significance for her.

He got to his feet to look more closely. “Very pretty. It looks old.”

“It was my mother's.” Emotion shadowed her eyes. “The only thing I have left that was hers.”

He touched one wing with a fingertip. “There's a little chip out. If the piece is in the box, maybe I could glue it in place.”

“No.” Something suddenly pained her face. “I don't have the piece. It was broken a long time ago.”

“What happened?” The question was out before he considered that she might find it intrusive.

She shrugged, turning away to hang the angel from a high branch, safe from little hands, he supposed.

“Just an accident.”

It must have been more than that, or she wouldn't have that shadow on her face when she looked at the angel's wing. But she clearly didn't intend to share the story with him.

Maggie bent over the enameled coffeepot that she'd put next to the fire to stay warm. “Ready for some more hot chocolate?”

“Sure, why not?” He picked up the mug he'd been using and held it out for a refill. He didn't have the right to push for answers she didn't want to give. He sat back down, letting her choose another subject.

She glanced toward the window again as she joined him on the floor. “I just hope the snow won't keep everyone home from pageant practice this week.”

A safe enough subject, he supposed. “How is the pageant coming along? No more disputes about the magi?”

“No.” She smiled. “But Pastor Jim used your comments about the magi in his sermon this morning. He said he wanted people to actually listen to the story instead of thinking they know it already.”

Being quoted in a sermon had to be a first for him. “I wish I'd heard him.”

“You could have come to church.”

It blindsided him, coming on the heels of a casual comment he hadn't really meant. He didn't let his expression change, but she probably felt his tension.

“I could have. I didn't.”

Let her make of that what she would. She'd probably get defensive. He didn't care. His private quarrel with God wasn't her concern.

“I hope you'll come on Christmas Eve for the pageant. The children would like that.”

He couldn't detect anything critical in her voice, but she still might be thinking it.

“Maybe.” He made his tone noncommittal. “If I'm still here.”

He wouldn't be. His term of service was up that day. He'd be on the road back to his real life by the time the kids began to sing, letting Maggie and Button Gap recede in his rearview mirror and his memory.

 

What had possessed her to push him on that subject? Maggie could feel Grant's tension through the arm that brushed against hers. The moment she'd mentioned church, he'd withdrawn.

Well, he'd already made it fairly clear that church wasn't one of his priorities. And that it wasn't any of her business.

Besides, she didn't even want him to stay for the pageant. The sooner Grant left Button Gap, the sooner she could relax and get her life back to normal.

It was definitely time for a change of subject. Past time, really.

“Speaking of holidays, is Joey getting the toboggan he wants for his birthday?” Grant must have been thinking the same thing she was. He nodded toward the window. “Looks as if he'll have plenty of chances to use it.”

She glanced at Joey, sprawled on his quilt, his fine blond hair almost white in the dim light. He looked defenseless in sleep, the way a child should.

“I managed to get a snow saucer for him from the church rummage sale. Once I've painted it, it'll be fine.” Grant had probably never had a used present in his life, but Joey would appreciate it. “I'm afraid he'll have to share with the other two, though. They only had the one.”

“I thought maybe his mother—”

Her hands, clasped loosely around her knees, gripped each other. “Nella can't afford a toboggan.”

“Will she be back by Joey's birthday?”

“If she can be.”

Lord, please bring Nella home by then. Let her see how much the children need her. Give her strength.

For a moment the silence stretched between them, broken only by the hiss and crackle of the fire. It was oddly comfortable, in spite of the awkward moments.

Well, Grant had things he didn't want to talk about, and she had her own secrets to hide. As long as they respected each other's boundaries, they could be—

That thought then led to a question. Friends? She wasn't sure that best described their relationship. Colleagues, maybe. At least they didn't have to be adversaries, did they?

Grant shifted, propping one elbow on his knee. In his jeans and white sweater, he should have looked casually at home, but an indefinable something set him apart.

“So tell me, Maggie. What was it like, growing up here in Button Gap?”

She shrugged, thinking of all the things she wouldn't say to him about her childhood. “About like
it is now. Small, isolated. Everyone knew everyone else.”

“You lived right here in town?”

“No.” Her fingers tightened as the image of the old farmhouse flashed into her mind, and she forced them to relax. “We lived out of town a couple of miles.”

“So you rode the bus to school.”

“Yes.” When she came. When her father wasn't ranting about the uselessness of educating girls to think they were better than they were.

Grant lifted an eyebrow. “Would you like me to start paying you per word?”

“Sorry.” She forced a smile. She'd learned ways of talking about the past that evaded the truth, that made it sound as if she'd had a childhood just like other kids. Why was it so hard to come up with the familiar fantasy for Grant? “Guess I'm just tired.”

“Do you want to stretch out on the couch?”

He started to move, but she stopped him with a hand on his arm.

“No, I'm fine.” She spread her hands, palms up. “There's not much to tell. I always wanted to be a nurse, but there wasn't enough money for college. So I went to Hagerstown, where I could get a decent job. I took classes at the community college.”

“In a nursing degree program?”

“I planned to get into an LPN program. That was all I could afford. But some people at the church I went to took an interest in me. They helped me get
scholarship money and made it possible to go for an R.N. instead.”

“It sounds as if they were friends.”

She nodded, thinking of the college professor and his wife who'd practically adopted her, of the young family who'd given her room and board in exchange for baby-sitting, of the elderly woman who'd paid her tuition when she couldn't possibly have gone to school otherwise.

“They were good friends.” Her throat tightened. “I owe them a great deal.”

“I'm sure you repaid them when you could.”

She shook her head, getting a lump in her throat at the thought of their responses.

“I tried to. They all said the same thing. ‘Use that degree to do good.' That's all they wanted.”

“So you came back to Button Gap and did just that.” He smiled, his eyes warm with what she might almost imagine was admiration. “I suspect those people are proud of you.”

Grant's warmth drew her closer, like a flower turning toward the sun. He was only inches away in the quiet room, and the firelight flickered on his strong features and gilded his skin.

She took a breath, feeling as if she hadn't bothered to do that for several minutes.

“That's my story.” She cleared her throat. “What about you?”

“How did I end up a doctor, you mean?”

She nodded.
Come on, Grant. Talk about some
thing, anything, that's neutral enough to let me get my balance.

“Was your father a doctor?”

He made a sound that might have been a laugh if it had had any humor in it. “That's not very likely. My father lives and breathes business. His company is all that interests him.”

“I suppose he wanted you to go into business with him, then.”

“That was the plan.” His lips tightened. “When I decided to take premed, he persuaded himself it was a momentary lapse. I'd grow up and get over it. When I applied to medical school instead of Harvard Business School, the explosion could be heard up and down the eastern seaboard.”

“Obviously you got your way.” There was more tension in him than she'd have expected over a quarrel with his father that must have taken place several years earlier.

He shrugged. “There wasn't anything he could do to stop me. I had my own money.”

The simple sentence defined the difference between them. He'd had his own money. Doors to the life he'd wanted had opened to him, because he'd been able to pay. Could he even imagine what life was like without that?

“Have you and your father made up?”

He tilted his head in a slight nod. “I guess so. We were never close, and that hasn't changed. Maybe he still expects me to walk into his office and take my rightful place at some point. It won't happen.”

“No. You already have a partnership waiting for you, don't you?”

“I hope I do.” He looked at her, a question in eyes that looked more green than blue in the dim light. “That's the life I want. Is something wrong with that?”

“I wasn't being critical.” At least, she hoped she wasn't. “It sounds like a great opportunity. You'll be doing good work.”

His smile broke through again. “It's not in a league with Button Gap, I admit. No one there will bring me apple butter in exchange for an office visit.” His voice was gently teasing, and he leaned closer.

Did he realize how close he was? She could see the flecks of gold and hazel in his eyes, almost count the fine lines around his mouth.

“You'll miss that,” she managed to say.

“That's not the only thing I'll miss,” he said softly. And then his lips closed over hers.

For one second she almost believed she could pull back. Then her heart stirred and she melted against him, returning kiss for kiss. She touched his cheek, feeling the faint stubble of beard, the high cheekbone, the curve of his brow. It was as if she'd already memorized how his face would feel and only needed to touch it in confirmation.

His lips moved to her cheek, and he traced a line of soft kisses. “Maggie.”

The sound of her name seemed to bring her back to herself. Slowly, carefully, she drew away. Her heart thudded, and her breath came as if she'd been
running. Firelight still flickered, the children still slept. Everything in the room was the same.

Except her.

She wanted to make light of it, wanted to say it was nothing, just a kiss, but she couldn't. Even now, the weakness seemed to permeate her very bones.

Weakness. She couldn't be weak. She could never be weak.