Chantelle looked overjoyed when Emily and Daniel arrived to pick her up from school the next day, with Patricia sitting patiently in the back seat. She looked very out of place in the truck in her two-piece outfit and blazer combo but Chantelle didn't seem to notice. She leaped into the backseat, beaming, her cheeks pink from the chilly weather.
"Christmas tree time!" she declared.
Daniel drove them. The weather still hadn't fully turned yet, though it was much colder than it had been. There wasn't even any frost, which was common at this time of year. Emily was grateful that the weather had held up so far. It meant that Evan, Clyde and Stu had been able to do their work on the island unimpeded.
The Christmas Tree farm was quite a way out of Sunset Harbor. They could, of course, just go to the depot at Ellsworth, but that was hardly a magical experience for Chantelle! So they went even further, to the one in Taunton Bay.
As they pulled down the small, bumpy, potholed road that lead to the farm, Emily could see the extra journey was well worth it. The Christmas Tree farm was enormous, and thanks to the sloping hillside that ran all the way down from the road to the lake, they had an amazing view of all the trees.
"It's like a whole forest of Christmas," Chantelle said, in awe.
Daniel pulled up into the makeshift lot, which was really just a patch of flattened ground, covered in hay to stop it becoming too muddy. There was a small wood-panelled house to one side, with a handmade sign proclaiming; Christmas Trees!
Emily looked over at Patricia in the backseat beside Chantelle. She was wearing her typical snooty expression, and peering out the window with a fearful expression for the dirty ground she was about to step on. But she held her tongue and Emily smiled to herself. That, in itself, felt like a small victory.
Everyone climbed out of the pickup truck, just at the same time the front door to the house opened. A man stepped out, waving at them. He seemed very jolly, with a round belly. Emily wondered if he'd ever considered becoming a Santa, he certainly had the look for it.
"Hi folks!" he said, grinning. "I'm Terry. Are you here to cut down your own tree?"
"We certainly are," Daniel said.
Chantelle hurried up to the man. "Actually, we need five trees. We have an inn, you see, and a restaurant and spa and they all need a tree. So does the ballroom."
"How about we just start with one?" Emily suggested, thinking of the fact there were no guests at the inn right now to enjoy the trees. "Then if we need more, we can come back for another day trip."
That seemed to please Chantelle, and she nodded in agreement.
Terry showed them the tools they would need, then they waved goodbye and headed out into the forest of trees. Emily thought of the farm they'd visited last year, which had been very busy, run more like a fare with tractor rides and hot chocolate to purchase. She liked this more back-to-basics experience, especially since the moment they were inside the forest everything became very quiet.
"It's like we're the only people in the world," she said, her hands protectively cradling her bump.
She looked back to see how Patricia was getting on. Despite walking on her tiptoes and wearing a slightly pinched expression, she wasn't complaining at all. Emily wondered if perhaps she might be enjoying herself, though too proud to admit it.
"Nana Patty," Chantelle said, hurrying back and grasping her hand. "I think there's some really, really dark green ones over here. Come on!"
Emily smiled to herself as she watched her daughter pull her mom along. She couldn't recall a time when Patricia had been so compliant, joining in with an activity. Chantelle was clearly rubbing off on her.
Daniel put an arm around Emily's shoulders, bringing her body close to his.
"This is wonderful, isn't it?" he said. "I love how enthusiastic she gets about these sort of things. I can't wait to see how much she enjoys Hanukkah."
"What date does it start this year?" Emily asked him.
"Sixteenth."
"So after Charlotte has joined us?" she asked, grinning, thinking about having a newborn in the house during this wonderful time of the year, when everyone was celebrating.
"Maybe even on the first day," he said, smiling. "Wouldn't that be lovely?"
Emily nodded in agreement. It would certainly be delightful for Daniel to have his daughter born on such a significant day.
Just then, they heard Chantelle calling through the trees.
"Mom! Dad! We've got it!"
They smiled at one another then trudge towards her voice. Chantelle was standing next to gorgeous tree, with the darkest pines Emily had ever seen. It was wonderfully symmetrical, too, the sort of perfect tree that would be used in magazines. And of course, it was enormous.
"Nana Patty chose it," Chantelle said, looking proudly at Patricia.
"Did she now?" Emily asked, pleased to see how well the two were bonding.
Even Patricia looked quietly pleased.
"In that case," Daniel said, "Nana Patty ought to have the first go."
"Oh goodness, no," Patricia said, shaking her hands at the saw Daniel was offering her.
"Yes!" Chantelle cried, jumping up and down, clapping her hands. "Please Nana Patty! It's really fun. I promise you'll enjoy it."
Patricia hesitated, then finally relented. "Oh, all right then. If you insist."
She took the saw from Daniel and glared at the tree like it was an enemy. Daniel bent down and moved the large branches out of her way, exposing the truck where she was to cut. Patricia squatted, clearly in an attempt to not let her knee touch the muddy ground. Emily couldn't help but laugh to herself. Her mom looked like a frog!
Patricia reached in and sawed across the trunk of the tree. She squealed, elated, and looked back at the family watching on.
"You're right," she said to Chantelle. "That is fun!"
Emily chuckled aloud. Just a few days in Maine with her family and Patricia had eaten smores and chopped wood!
Terry arrived then with his tractor and put the tree in the back.
"All aboard," he said.
They all got into the back with the tree, but Patricia didn't move. She looked stunned.
"You want me to ride in that?"
Chantelle bounced up and down on the wooden bench. "It's fun! You have to trust me!"
"Do I have a choice?" Patricia asked.
Chantelle shook her head, still grinning wickedly.
Patricia sighed and climbed into the tractor trailer.
Once everyone was settled, Terry drove them back to their car and helped Daniel secure the very large tree onto the roof of his truck. Then they paid him and left the farm, all feeling exhilarated.
"I can't wait to decorate it," Chantelle said. "Will you help Nana Patty?"
Patricia nodded. "Yes, but then I must leave after that. Okay?"
Chantelle pouted, looking a little sad. "If you have too. But I've loved you being here. Will you come back for Christmas?"
Emily watched her mom in the rear-view mirror. She couldn't even recall the last time they'd spent Christmas together. Even when she was living in New York with Ben, they'd tended to spend Christmas with his family rather than Patricia. It wasn't like the woman ever particularly got into the Christmas spirit and it seemed like a dumb idea as far as Emily was concerned to put themselves through the misery. She wondered whether the softer side of Patricia she'd seen over the last few days could extend that far.
"Maybe," she said, evasively. "I think your mother and father might have a lot on at that point in time. The baby will be born by then, won't she?"
"Even better!" Chantelle pressed. "She needs to meet her Nana Patty."
Clearly realizing that she'd come up against Patricia's stubborn side, Chantelle offered another suggestion. "Or if not Christmas, maybe New Years? We have a party at the inn. You can come to that, right?"
Patricia remained evasive in her answers. "We will have to see," was all she'd commit to.
Chantelle looked over at Emily next. "Do you think Papa Roy might want to come for Christmas?" she asked.
Emily felt tense. It was even less likely her father would be able to come with his health deteriorating.
"We can ask," Emily told her, and the conversation died down to silence.
They reached the inn and Daniel parked up. Stu, Clyde and Evan were home, so they came out to help carry the tree inside. Then, together, the four men heaved it up into its position in the foyer.
"That's one big tree," Clyde said, whistling. He wiped the perspiration from his forehead and looked down at Chantelle. "How are you going to get the angel on the top? Even on my shoulders I don't think you'll make it."
To iterate his point, he swept a giggling Chantelle up into his strong arms and plonked her on his shoulders. He began parading her around. Emily noticed Patricia wincing. Probably worrying about the hard wooden floor beneath them, a mother's instinct that even Patricia possessed!
"I'll go get the ladder," Stu said, heading off in the direction of the garage.
Evan and Clyde helped, too, by carrying all the boxes of decorations out of the garage. Then the three men headed off into town to watch the game and have a drink after their long day working on the island, leaving just the family to decorate.
"We need to put on Christmas music," Emily said, heading over to the reception desk where the sound system was set up. She found an old Christmas Crooners CD and put it on. Frank Sinatra's voice filled the hall.
"And," Daniel added. "We need to have hot chocolates!"
Chantelle nodded enthusiastically, and they all hurried into the kitchen. Daniel boiled milk on the stove, while Chantelle searched the pantry for leftover marshmallows. She returned with not only marshmallows, but also rainbow sprinkles and whipped cream.
"Excellent," Daniel said, as he poured them each a mug of hot chocolate, then topped them with cream, marshmallows and sprinkles.
Emily had never seen Patricia consume anything like that in her life! The smores had been a sight enough to behold, but this was a whole other thing. It was like Patricia had been transformed by the spirit of Christmas, at last, after sixty-odd years of resistance!
They headed back into the hall, where the giant Christmas tree stood waiting to be decorated, and got to work. Of course, Chantelle took the lead.
"We need lights over here, Daddy," she said to Daniel, pointing at a bare patch. "And Nana Patty, those reindeer need to be on this branch."
Emily leaned in to her mom and said, "Chantelle has a very specific vision."
Patricia laughed. "Yes, I can tell. She has an eye for detail. She'll make a wonderful interior designer one day."
Emily could certainly picture it. Either that, or some kind of events organizer. She touched her bump, wondering what kind of personality Baby Charlotte would have, whether she'd be similar to her sister--a leader, organizer, socializer, performer--or whether she'd have a different way about her. Perhaps she'd take after Emily herself, and be less inclined towards the limelight, more content to read a book and take the dogs on quiet, countryside walks. Or perhaps she'd be like her father, practical and hardworking, prone to moments of broodiness. Or, as Emily tended to think, she might take after the aunt for which she was named; sweet, imaginative, inquisitive, calm. She couldn't wait to find out.
"Nana Patty," Chantelle said then, breaking through Emily's reverie. "What was mommy like when she was my age?"
Patricia was busy stretching a large piece of sparkly tinsel across the branches, weaving it through them so it wouldn't fall.
"At eight-years-old? Well let me think. Her hair was very curly then, much more than it is now. She used to wear these beautiful plaid dresses. Do you remember darling?"
Emily cast her mind back in time. The plaid dress and itchy tights combo her mom always dressed her up in had been a source of numerous fights. Emily had hated the way she wasn't allowed to run or climb trees because Patricia didn't want her to mess up her clothes.
"I remember," she replied.
Patricia continued. "Her father was teaching her piano then as well. She was quite good at it but lost interest."
Emily wished now that she hadn't. That she'd continued to sit beside her dad on that battered piano stool, learning songs from musicals and old classics. Those were precious times and she hadn't made the most of them. She hadn't known that she needed to.
"Papa Roy?" Chantelle asked.
"Yes," Patricia said. She smiled. "He was very gifted at the piano. And he loved it. That's why he had to have one in this house, even though we were only here a few weeks a year. But he'd light the fire and play us the piano, and Emily would wrap herself up in a blanket and fall asleep." She let out a melancholy sigh. "There were always wonderful moments in between, weren't there, sweetheart?"
Emily knew what she meant. In between the pain of losing Charlotte. That after her death, when the silence grew between her parents like an invisible wall of glass, there were some moments of normalcy, of joy, even, when the quietness was filled with beauty and their minds were given a reprieve from grief.
"I love Papa Roy," Chantelle told Patricia. "Was he a very good husband?"
Patricia looked back at Chantelle. And to Emily's shock and surprise, she reached out and stroked the girl's head.
"He was. Not always. But no one is perfect."
"Did you love him?"
"With all my heart."
"What about now?" Chantelle asked.
"Hush," Emily interrupted. "That's a personal question."
"I don't mind," Patricia said. She looked Chantelle squarely then, and spoke in an undeterred voice. "We spent many years as husband and wife, many good years. But we weren't happy and the most important thing in life is to be happy. It was very hard to say goodbye to him, but in the end it was for the best. And yes, I still love him now. Once you love someone you can never really stop."
Emily turned away then, wiping the tear that had formed in the corner of her eye. During her entire lifetime, Patricia had only ever bad-mouthed her father. Never once had she heard her admit that she still loved Roy.
Silence fell then, and the family quietly put the last decorations on the tree. The melancholy air that hovered around them dissipated only when Daniel took the angel statue out of the box.
"It's time," he said, handing it to Chantelle.
With an excited smile on her face, Chantelle climbed the ladder, stretched her arm as long as she could, and placed the angel on the top branch of the tree.
"Ta da!" she cried.
Daniel helped her back down the ladder and everyone stepped back to admire their handywork. Emily felt overcome with emotion as it occurred to her that this was the first tree she had decorated alongside her mom for close to twenty years. Patricia had withdrawn from the ritual shortly after Charlotte's death. But now, with a new family around her, and a new child growing inside Emily, she had come back. The timing felt poignant to Emily, as if the spirit of Charlotte had had a hand in making it happen.
"I think this is the most beautiful tree I've ever seen," she said, looking with gratitude to each of her family members.
*
With the tree complete and the hot chocolates drunk, it was time for Patricia to say goodbye.
"I wish you didn't have to leave," Chantelle said, clasping her arms around Patricia's waist.
Emily watched her mom hug the child back, looking significantly less awkward than she usually did with overt displays of affection.
"We can speak on the telephone, if you want to," Patricia told the child.
"Will you Face Time with us?" Chantelle exclaimed, her face breaking into a huge grin.
"Will I what now?" Patricia asked, looking bemused.
"Video messaging, mom," Emily explained. "Chantelle loves it."
"We video message with Papa Roy all the time," Chantelle told her. "Can we? Can we? Can we?"
Patricia nodded. "Of course. If that's what you want."
She looked genuinely touched, Emily thought, that Chantelle would want to keep in contact with her.
"And," Emily added, "Please do think about coming for Christmas. We would love to have you."
"I don't want to get in the way," Patricia said.
Daniel piped up then. "You wouldn't be in the way," he said. "We have no bookings at the moment. If you want a bit of your own space we could even put you in the carriage house."
"Well," Patricia said, looking like she was trying to hide her touched expression. "I will certainly consider it."
Her cab arrived then, coming down the long drive, its tires crunching on the gravel. Daniel picked up Patricia's case and carried it down the porch steps. The rest of the family followed. Even Mogsy and Rain came out to see her off, wagging their tails in unison as they peered through the posts.
Daniel put the case in the trunk, then hugged Patricia goodbye. Chantelle clung to her.
"I love you Nana Patty," she exclaimed. "Please come back soon."
"I will darling," Patricia said, stroking her head. "It won't be long at all."
Then it was Emily's turn. She hugged her mother, feeling herself filled with gratitude and appreciation. It may have taken years to get to this point--and the horrible, sobering shock of Roy's illness--but it seemed like things were finally changing for the better between them.
"Please stay in touch," Emily said to her mom.
"I will," Patricia replied. "I promise."
They released one another and Patricia climbed into the cab. Emily joined her family, feeling Daniel's arm reach around her shoulders and Chantelle's hands clinging onto her. She cradled her bump with one hand, and waved goodbye to her mom with the other. They stayed there until the cab had disappeared out of sight.
As they turned back to head into the inn, Emily heard the phone start to ring. She went over to the reception desk and answered it. It was Amy's voice on the other end.
"Em, I just saw the bulletin outside the town hall," she said.
Emily was still struggling to wrap her head around the fact that Amy was a Sunset Harbor resident, that she paid attention to the goings on of their little town.
"What bulletin?" Emily asked.
"Raven's inn! The meeting is tomorrow. The one they postponed until after Thanksgiving."
"Tomorrow?" Emily exclaimed. "That's a bit short notice! And hardly much of a postponement!"
"I know. What do you think it means that it's so soon?"
"I can only assume that means the zoning board came to a quick and unanimous decision," Emily told her, recalling the process of getting her own inn licence.
"A unanimous yes or a unanimous no?"
"We'll find out soon enough."
Amy sounded incredibly stressed about the whole thing, which Emily found a little odd considering she was the one who'd be most affected by the outcome.
"We have to go to the meeting," she said brusquely. "Can you clear your calendar?"
"Maybe. I'm not sure why I need to though. I already said my piece."
She could hear the impatience in Amy's voice. "Emily, you have to go. You have to shoot it down! If Raven opens an inn in Sunset Harbor your business will struggle."
"You should have more faith in me," Emily told her. "I don't mind competition."
"Well you should," Amy told her. "Especially coming from Raven Kingsley. She'll crush you."
Emily thought of the moments she'd spent with Raven. They hadn't bonded, as such, but they were on friendly terms. Raven had helped her when Daniel was in his boating accident, and she'd even come to the town Thanksgiving dinner Emily had thrown. She perceived Raven's inn as friendly competition.
"What makes you say that?" Emily said, shaking her head. "Raven's just like any other business owner. She wants to work hard and make a success of herself. I know she's been a bit of a vulture in the past, but she wants to settle here. Her husband left her and she just wants the kids to be in one place for some stability."
"I think you're being naive," Amy said. "A leopard doesn't change its spots."
"Amy, my mother just drank hot chocolate with cream and marshmallows and chopped and helped saw down a Christmas tree. Leopards, like dragons, can, indeed, change their spots."
But Amy wasn't backing down. "Raven will drive you out of business then head to the next town. It's what she does. She's got a history of doing it, destroying local areas with her big, flashy hotels. It's all corporate, soulless. The last thing the town needs. And she has so many of them, she makes the room prices dirt cheap to start with. Even if she runs a loss for the first five years she'll do it, just so she can eliminate the competition!"
Emily couldn't reconcile the Raven Amy was talking about and the one she'd become acquaintances with. But hearing what Amy had to say was starting to rattle her.
"Just come to the meeting," Amy said.
"Okay," Emily said.
As she placed the receiver down, she wondered whether Amy was right. Maybe Raven was as ruthless as all that. But if Emily didn't have the inn, what would become of her? Of her family? Suddenly, she felt as if the ground beneath her was becoming unstable. What if the dream life she was living turned out to be temporary after all…?
