Disclaimer: Not mine, etc., et al.
This is basically a Catherine backstory, set the Christmas before she and Eddie split. Pretty angsty.
Every Christmas of my life Sam Braun somehow managed to make me feel special. This Christmas, my first without him, I think I appreciated that fact more than I ever had while he was alive. He was far from perfect - in many respects he wasn't even a good man - but when he was around, he always let me know that I was his princess, and he always came around at Christmas, his arms laden with whatever gifts my heart most desired. Not this year.
This year would be Lindsey's fifth without Eddie. We were a pair, Lindsey and me - two fatherless girls at Christmas, silently hanging Christmas ornaments on our perfect tree as we tried to forget the empty seats at the table. Both of our fathers had left the world with bullet holes in them, and both had left holes in our hearts that would never fully heal. That was life, I guess - you love, lose, and spend the rest of your days missing someone who isn't where they should be any more. The only salve for the pain of loss was memory, and I have found myself indulging in the comfort of reminiscence a lot recently. This week I've been thinking a lot about that last Christmas Eddie and I shared before we separated...
December 24, 1999
"Eddie! Turn that down! I worked last night, y'know!"
Lindsey turned and put her hands on her hips. "Mommy! We HAVE to play Christmas music! We're wrapping presents!"
"I see." I glanced at Eddie, who favored me with his most heart-melting smile. I returned it in spite of myself - after all, it WAS Christmas Eve, and I DID have the next two nights off.
"I'm sorry we woke you, Cath, but since you're up we can go pick out a Christmas tree."
"We HAVE a Christmas tree." I looked at the bedraggled artificial tree leaning against the far wall of the apartment. If inanimate objects could experience shame, this one must be utterly humiliated. "Sort of."
"Yes, well, I'm going to get us a REAL tree." He pulled Lindsey into his arms and gave her a quick hug. "Just as soon as Lindsey changes out of her pajamas and into some real clothes." He grinned as she disappeared into her room, then leaned close and whispered. "I got her a Furby Baby."
"No, you didn't."
He grinned proudly. "I did."
I frowned. There hadn't been any left in Vegas for weeks. I knew. I'd been looking. "How much?"
He shrugged. "Don't worry about it. Besides, the thing is great. She's gonna love it. Leopardskin, Cath. It has the cutest little expression."
"Eddie. How much?"
"Some of my investments have been panning out, and besides, I only have one daughter. She's worth it." He pulled me into a quick kiss. "Now get dressed. We have a Christmas tree to buy. This is going to be our best Christmas ever."
"Hey, Cath, what about this one?" Eddie pointed to a massive tree at the edge of the lot. "Too much?"
I chuckled. "Not if you're planning on cutting a hole in the ceiling to accommodate it. Otherwise, maybe downsize it just a bit." I looked at a tree to my right. "Now this one might do."
Eddie ambled over and gave the tree a critical look. "I don't know... What do you think, Linds? Is that the one?"
"Yes. That's the one."
"Well, let's pay for it and take it home, then."
The grocery store was next. Eddie loaded up our cart with all the makings for a Christmas feast - ham, sweet potatoes, fruitcake, eggnog, Christmas wine, the works. "Eddie, this is way past what we have budgeted for groceries. "
"Don't sweat it. I'm paying - and cooking." He shot me The Smile again. "I take care of my girls for Christmas."
I wasn't about to point our that he'd spent the last three Christmases drunk at a strip club tucking MY hard-earned money into someone else's G-string, not when he seemed to be actually trying to be nice. I was going to enjoy this for as long as it lasted. "Well, okay. Thank you."
Next stop, at Lindsey's insistence, was McDonald's. "If you'll tell me what you two want, and find us a table, I will be your waiter for the evening." Eddie bowed low and faked a French accent as he spoke to Lindsey. "Good evening, fine ladies. Will you be having the escargot?"
"Ew, no. That's snails. I'll have a Nugget Happy meal. With a girl toy, of course."
I grinned at Lindsey. "I'll have the same, also without snails."
"Daddy's silly," Lindsey whispered as she slipped into a booth near the back.
"That he is."
She sighed. "I'm trying to be really good so he'll keep being nice to you. I don't like when he makes you cry."
I looked at Eddie, who was standing silently behind her. "Sweetie, when your Daddy and I don't get along it has nothing to do with you. It's never your fault."
Her lower lip quivered. "It has to be. Because I'm going to be really good and he's going to be nice and he's not going to leave us any more."
Eddie slipped into the booth next to her. "It's never been your fault, Linds. Never! It's been my fault mostly - but I promise to do better. I promise I'm going to be good to you and your mother from now on. I won't make either of you cry any more." He looked at me. "I'm going to do right by both of you, Cath. You'll see."
Later, he tucked Lindsey in and flopped down next to me on the sofa to watch some generic Christmas music special. He pulled me into his arms and wrapped a blanket around us. "I love you, Cath," he whispered, his voice rough. "You two are everything to me. I want us, our family, I want us to work." I didn't say anything, didn't want to ruin the moment by bringing up the past and his long trail of broken promises. "I want to be a good husband, a good father. I... I can be a good man. You believe I can, don't you? "
He drew back, his gaze nervous and intense. I hesitated for a moment, composing my words carefully. "I believe you can be as good a man as you decide to be," I said finally. "It's all up to you."
He was silent for a few minutes. "I have always wanted to make you two happy," he said finally, his voice flat. "I want you to believe that. It just seems like everything good I try to do falls to pieces in my hands, and then I get frustrated, I figure there's no need for me to even try. Then I get..." he shook his head and put his face in his hands. "I get drunk, or stoned, and it's all out the window then. Look, Cath, I know I've messed up so many times you probably don't even believe I want to do better, and I can't blame you for that, but I'm not all bad. I wish I could convince you of that."
I sighed. "I know you aren't all bad, Eddie, and I do believe that you want to do better. I'm just not sure you want to make us happy as much as you want to have your bad-boy fun."
"Well, then. I guess I'll just have to show you, won't I?" He drew me closer. "I can't lose you, Cath. I can't."
"Mommy! Wake up!" Insistent little hands tugged at my arm, and when she spoke again the words were louder, closer, and much harder to ignore. "MOMMY! WAKE UP! It's Christmas, and Santa came!"
Eddie actually sat up first. "He did? Well, let's go see what he brought, then." He grabbed my hand and pulled. "Get up, Cath. You only get to have Christmas once a year, you know."
Lindsey's haul was impressive - the precious Furby Baby, two Barbies, Barbie Beach House, and an extensive wardrobe improvement; shirt, wallet, and silk boxers for Eddie; for me, a hand-painted mug and coaster from Lindsey, some risque' underthings and diamond earrings from Eddie, and a large, beautifully-cut Lalique bowl from 'Santa' that had to have put Eddie back at least a grand and a half. "Oh, my," I said as I turned it to admire the details. "This is stunning. This must have cost a fortune."
Eddie smirked. "Santa can afford it," he said softly, then looked at Lindsey. "I hear the guy's loaded."
I gingerly placed the precious bowl on the dining-room table. "He must be," I said airily.
The day was warm, happy, and uneventful - just a typical holiday for your average family, but a rare and wonderful blessing for us. Eddie cooked dinner, and after we ate I cleaned up from the meal while Lindsey played with her new toys in her room.
Then everything changed.
Eddie's cell phone was next to the stove, so when it stared to tweet I picked it up to carry it to him. That's when I saw HER name - Amber Wallace, his most recent indiscretion. Amber Wallace, tall and big-breasted and Barbie-doll beautiful, whose underpants I had found in my bed six months earlier, the same Amber Wallace he had vowed he would never speak to again, whose number he had supposedly blocked from the very phone I held in my hand. I lost it right then, began swearing at Eddie like a hooker whose latest John just tipped her with Monopoly money. "So much for Eddie the good, faithful husband. You aren't ever going to change, are you? "
He stalked over with the fire of righteous indignation in his eyes. "I have changed," he hissed. "Look around you."
"Good old Eddie. You're all about grand gestures, but your screw-ups and betrayals are even bigger."
He slammed his fist on the counter. "Maybe if you'd keep that big mouth shut I wouldn't need to cheat," he snarled. "If you believed in me and trusted me I wouldn't need Amber."
I spun around, now absolutely furious. "Maybe I would trust you and believe in you if you didn't lie, cheat, and steal from me. You can't be a decent man for forty-eight hours, can you? You're all charm and sweet words but when it comes down to it there's nothing to you at all. You aren't a man, Eddie - you're a selfish little boy who just has to have it all."
He swung his arm, and the sound of shattering glass filled the room. I knew what it was without looking, because he fell silent and gasped as he realized what he'd done.
"This is what you've done to us," I said quietly, my anger replaced by grief. "You want to be a good man, want to be there for us alright. The problem is, you only want it once in a while."
He didn't say anything, because there really wasn't anything left to say. I heard the apartment door slam shut a few moments later.
That's life I guess - you have good times, you have bad times, and most of the time there aren't any happy endings. We made another couple of half-hearted tries after that, but we both knew that night we were too far gone to make it work. Within six months Lindsey and I had moved out, and four years later Eddie was dead. I never stopped loving him, and I suppose I never will. I guess some things in life really do last forever. It's a shame people aren't one of them.