Let It Snow Part 12

"Hey, do you mind if I take a cigarette?"

"I didn't know you smoked," Tim says, skillfully shaking a cigarette halfway out of his pack, holding it out for Eric to grab. Eric grabs it and leans down into the window for a light. An awkward moment pa.s.ses before Tim realizes that Eric is waiting for him to light the cigarette. He grabs his lighter, and after several failed attempts, Eric finally gets the cigarette lit.

He coughs. "I don't smoke. Never have."

"Not a good habit to start at our age."

"Uh huh," Eric says clumsily, the cigarette in his lips.

"Well, Merry Christmas," Tim says.

"You too."

Tim rolls up the window, and tries to move back onto the road, but he is a little stuck after all. He maneuvers the tires a bit back and forth, gets out of the rut he's made for himself, and moves cautiously back onto the road. He waves to Eric, and moves slowly toward the stop sign at the end of the street.

Eric stands in the middle of the street and watches Tim's car disappear. He decides he doesn't want to go back to the house just yet. He's enjoying being out in middle of the storm too much. He takes another hit off the cigarette, a small one, and suppresses a cough. He decides to take a short walk in the woods that surround their house.

It's the perfect time for a walk. Not only is it beautiful and calm out in the snow, but he is free from all the extracurricular stuff going on at the house. And, besides, his brother and Annie need some s.p.a.ce. There's obviously some things they need to work out, some unfinished business they need to put to rest, and sometimes alone time is exactly what two people need.

A couple years ago, when Eric first took over for the retiring ombudsman, one of the best pieces of advice he got from the old guy was how to recognize when it was necessary to be an active mediator, a pa.s.sive mediator, or an absent mediator. Sometimes, particularly when there are delicate, possibly embarra.s.sing, emotions involved, the best mediation is to get the two parties in the office, have his a.s.sistant call him out of the office for some manufactured reason, and give the parties involved five or ten minutes alone together, and, oftentimes, the problem will resolve itself.

As Eric moves through the snow, taking careful steps, trying to keep the snow from the inside of his dress shoes, he smokes his cigarette, and looks for a place to sit on the tree line of their large back yard. He finds a fallen log, brushes the snow off, and sits. He takes another drag on the cigarette, watches its orange glow, and coughs into the snow, disturbing the quiet.

He can see the lights on in the back of the house, thinks about how much of a home it's become over the years, how much he and Annie have shared these past ten years, and he tries to suppress a fear he's had all night: His brother could steal her away, steal all they have built together.

Eric looks up into the snow, watches all those clumsy clumps of white float down, indeterminately, never knowing where they'll land.

And he smiles at the elegant chaos of it all, embraces it, lets the sweet, cold snow lick at his face.

"I should call his cell, see what's going on," Annie says, staring out the living room window, intentionally not facing Max, who is sitting in the chair near the window, his body twisted so he's facing Annie.

"Why? He said he'd call if he needed help."

"But he won't call."

"How do you know?"

"Because I know him. He doesn't like to ask for help."

"Sounds like him."

"Oh, come on. You hardly know him."

"He's my brother."

"A brother you've avoided for ten years."

"And whose fault is that?"

"Not his."

"No, not his fault alone."

"But you do blame him."

"I blame you both."

"And you're not culpable at all. No. How could you be? You're the master of avoiding difficult situations. You'll rationalize your way out of any responsibility."

"Well, I'm certainly culpable in my absence, but I don't think I could be blamed for not wanting to be around my brother and his wifea"the wife that was supposed to be mine."

"Supposed to be yours?"

"That's right."

"I can't believe you said that."

"Tell me I'm wrong."

A beat pa.s.ses. She stares at him, tries to think of something to say, knows there's no truth she can utter that won't dig her deeper. So, she just turns away.

"You have every right to be upset with me, but not Eric," she says.

"And why's that?"

"Because he doesn't know anything about us. He had no idea about the state of our relations.h.i.+p, the history of us, when I ran into him again after Boston. I'm not even sure if he knows that we've spoken since high school."

"You never told him?"

"No."

"So, he knows nothing about Boston. He doesn't know abouta""

"No, I never told him."

"Don't you think that was something he should've known?"

"Probably, yes. But I decided it was best to keep it to myself. Why hurt him?"

"But you weren't protecting him. You were protecting yourself."

"Maybe, in the beginning, I was protecting myself. But, as time pa.s.sed, and I thought of telling him, particularly after it became clear that you were so angry with us, I realized that it wasn't just me I was protecting anymore. It would've crushed him to know the truth."

"And what truth is that? The truth about Boston? Or the truth about your persistent feelings for me?"

"Boston, Max," she says, sounding suddenly tired.

"But, wait. Let's go back."

"Must we?"

"When you called my parents, after I left for Europe, can I ask if you were going toa"?"

"Say yes to your proposal?"

"Were you?"

"I was thinking about it."

"And Ia""

"You were too prideful. In that way, you are like your brother. But, one thing I can say about him, he would never have bailed on me the way you did."

"But he had no reason to bail. You said yes to him."

"Max, I was shocked. You proposing to me was the last thing I expected. And you just a.s.sumed I would jump at the chance to surrender my future to you. Then you took off before I even had a chance to consider it. With Eric, I was a little bit older, my life was beginning to take on a shape of its own. And, ironically, this personal growth was because of you. You leaving Boston really pushed me to ponder what I wanted from the future. So, after your brother and I were together awhile, I was more prepared to answer those kinds of questionsa"the big questions. With you, at that time, the future seemed scarier, like every decision had an irrevocable finality attached to it."

"Would it help if I said I was sorry I left?"

She laughs. "Now you're sorry?"

"That's not fair. I've been sorry for a very long time. What do you want me to say?"

"I don't want you to say anything."

"Clearly, I shouldn't have reacted the way I did. But I was just a kid."

"We both were."

"And I was hurt. I didn't think marrying me should've been something you had to consider. I still don't think it was something you should've had to consider. You either knew you loved me or you didn't."

"Of course I loved you, Max," she says, shooting the words at him. And the matter-of-fact nature of her voice, the anger and hurt that it communicated, sent a painful truth into the air that reverberated between them, vibrated the entire room. And, suddenly, this truth felt too close, too dangerous.

"But then I met you're brother," she says, filling the silence.

"You did that to get back at me."

"I did not."

"Come on, Annie. Sure you did."

"Is that what you've thought all these years?"

"Well, it's true, isn't it?"

"I can't believe you. You had absolutely nothing to do with it. He and I met by chance. He saw me, remembered me, we struck up a conversation, and the resta""

"But I was what connected you."

"Maybe at first. But, then, we fell in love."

"You did?"

"Yes, we did."

"And you're still in love with him?"

"I still love him, yes."

"I didn't asked if you still loved him. I asked if you were still in love with him."

"What's the difference?" she asks, looking away from him and out the window, trying to look as far as she can into the snow, hoping to see Eric materialize from the storm. But, then again, she's afraid he might materialize, afraid she'll have to let this tense, wonderful, pregnant conversationa"a conversation she's imagined having many, many timesa"fade away.

"You know the difference."

"When you've been with someone as long as I've been with your brother, you have good days and bad days, and the emotions fluctuate from time to time. There are days when I look at him, and I am still in love with hima"moments where things feel certain and real and full. Then there are days wherea I don't know. There are moments of less certainty. But the affection is always there."

"So there are doubts."

"I didn't say that."

"And me?"

"What about you?"

"Are you still in love with me?" he asks, standing up from the chair. He moves closer to her, only inches separate them. He's too close.

"Max," she says, trying to hush her heart, trying to pull the moment softly back to the ground. "I'm not answering that."

"Are you cold?" Michael asks Holly, seeing that her arms are crossed tight around her body.

"A little bit."

"Then let's go inside."

"Not yet," she says. "Let's walk around the house a little. I want to see the back yard in the snow."

She walks by Michael and moves toward the side of the house, treading slowly over the snow. She can hear Michael's footsteps following her.

"Have you ever seen their back yard?" she asks.

"Yeah, we're always back there when I visit in the spring and summer. Eric likes to cook on his grill."

"There's not much that would make me seriously consider living in the country, but their yard always makes me think that it could be nice."

"Considering living out here is about as far as I'd ever go."

"Me too," she says. "So, you come here often?"