A Winter Discovery (5 page)

Reese’s voice got softer. “And she loved me?”

Gerry hugged Reese tighter. “Way, way more than Christmas.”

“But she didn’t know me.”

“She carried you inside of her, so she probably knew you better than anyone. And she had a little time with you after you were born and she cherished every second of that, believe me.”

Reese brought the snowflake to his chest. “We did have one Christmas together, right?”

“You did. I think that might have been Mom’s favorite Christmas.” Gerry knew that wasn’t the case because that was the year Tanya was gone, but there was no need for Reese to know this now.

“Dad?”

“Yeah?”

“Did she dress me up in elf pajamas?”

Gerry laughed out loud. “How’d you know about that?”

Reese glanced up at him and Gerry could see that his son’s eyes were misty as well. “Tanya told me she had ’em.”

“Yeah, you had them, too.”

Reese giggled and Gerry hugged him closer. Reese held up the snowflake. “I’m really glad we found this.”

Gerry kissed the boy on the head. “Me too. And I know your mom is really glad you made this discovery.”

Chapter Ten

A deep breath

Dad asked Reese if they should sleep in the guest room, but Reese decided it was okay to sleep upstairs. He even told Dad to forget about the latch. Something told him that the Grinch wasn’t going to be coming to the house. He took the snowflake with him and lay it on his pillow.

The next morning, after Dad made pancakes and Millie made her hot chocolate – which Reese thought was the best hot chocolate in the entire world – they decorated the giant tree that they cut down yesterday. They had this whole thing in the family about decorating trees. First Dad had to put on his Christmas music. Then Reese got to put on the first ornament because he was the youngest. He picked one with Santa Claus riding a surfboard, which was definitely one of his favorites. As others came out of the boxes, though, he kept thinking that maybe he should have put up something else first, like the snowman playing guitar or the reindeer with a football helmet.

After Reese put up the first ornament, Tanya put up the next one because she was next youngest. Millie made a big deal about how her turn was next because she was younger than Dad, and Dad made believe he was offended by this. Reese had no idea why anyone would be offended by being older. He couldn’t wait to be older.

It took a while – they had a lot of ornaments – but they finally filled up the tree. The decorations boxes weren’t totally empty, but everyone agreed that the tree looked like it didn’t want anything more on it. The final thing was Tanya putting on the big Santa tree topper. She got to do that because she was the oldest kid. When they were finished, Dad plugged in the lights and everyone made noises about how great the tree looked.

After that, everyone ran around the house putting up more decorations. Reese and Millie wrapped garland around the banister going upstairs, while Dad put Christmas lights around the windows and Tanya put out all the little statues and stuff, including some things that she’d made when she was in kindergarten that Mom had kept.

By the time everyone was finished, Reese thought the place looked pretty festive. Everyone else seemed to think so, too.

But the decorating wasn’t finished. At least not for Reese.

“I’m gonna go do my tree,” he said, going up the stairs to his room with the others following behind him. Yesterday, they put the tree in his room and put a blanket around the bottom, but he didn’t want to put anything on it until the big tree was done. After what he discovered in the guest room closet last night, he was especially glad he had waited.

He went to his pillow and picked up the snowflake his mother had made for him, getting that goopy feeling he got whenever he held the thing. He’d put it back there after he brought it downstairs before breakfast to show Millie and Tanya. They both started crying when they saw it, but he figured they weren’t going to do that again now. It would be pretty weird if they started crying every time they looked at it. There was a tiny hole in the top for a hanger, and Reese put in one that he’d taken from downstairs.

“Um, you’re not gonna try to put that on the tree, are you?” Tanya said.

Reese looked at her. “Yeah, of course I am. It’s got a hangy-thing, right?”

Tanya scrunched up her face. “But it’s big and your tree is so...
not
big.”

Reese shrugged at her. “It’s good.”

Then he walked over to the tree and bent down to it, since the very top only came up to his shoulders. He picked out a good strong branch and hung the snowflake from there. For a second, it looked like the branch he picked was gonna sag. But then the tree took a deep breath – or whatever trees do – and held on to the ornament.

“Wow,” Dad said. “It worked.”

Millie stood next to him and put a hand on his arm. “It’s beautiful, Reese.”

Reese smiled up at her.

“I’ll go get you some of the leftover ornaments,” Tanya said. “I think we have a string of lights left, too.”

Reese turned toward his sister and then turned back to the tree. “No, that’s okay. I think this is all I need.”

Reese thought his Christmas tree looked perfect. The best thing about it was that his mom had made the ornament for him, so they would always get to share this part of Christmas. The second best thing about it was that she’d made the ornament from non-melty snow. It was never, ever gonna go away.

“Yep, this is definitely all I need.”