When he heard jingle bells and a familiar laugh, he knew he was in the right place.
Chapter Two: Early Drafts
It was getting late into the night when Rowan found herself at the Bennett's kitchen table, her laptop open in front of her as she typed away madly, the word processor barely keeping up with her pace. She was alone, everything was entirely silent, save for the clicking of the keys and the occasional crunching as she reached into the nearby bowl of popcorn and shoved a handful into her mouth, always wiping the excess grease off on her pajama pants before going straight back to typing.
"Still up, Rowan?"
The girl jumped in surprise and coughed on a kernel as the voice of her aunt broke the silence. Removing her hands from the keyboard, she covered her mouth as she continued coughing. The older woman pat Rowan on the back and soon enough she returned to normal breathing.
"I didn't mean to scare you!" Lorelei said, pushing choppy bangs out of her niece's face.
"Next time produce some noise while you're walking, holy shit, Aunt," Rowan said, reaching for her glass of water and slowly taking a drink.
"I'll try to keep that in mind," the woman laughed slightly. "I thought you would've been asleep by now, you were saying you were so tired."
"I am tired," Rowan said with a sigh, "But I had an idea for a story, so I had to get it down while I remembered it. And then I had an, apparently deadly, craving for popcorn and helped myself to the box you had."
"Another story idea? Have you ever finished any of these stories?"
"Yes... just not most of them," Rowan confessed, scrolling through folders upon folders filled with files upon files of stories, notes and ideas. "I just have more ideas than I have time."
"What's this one about?"
"It's a concept for a series of children's books about a vampire family and how they try to partake in everyday activities with their own little twists, ultimately embracing their unique way of life and making friends along the way," Rowan said, saving her document and closing her laptop.
"That sounds fun. Vampires are popular right now," Lorelei commented, helping herself to some of the popcorn in the bowl.
Rowan rolled her eyes at the thought of the vampires currently running wild in popular culture, "Pansy vampires are popular right now, I want these ones to be a bit more traditional."
"Sleeping in coffins and all that? Jamie thinks one of the teachers at his school is a vampire."
"Really? I'll have to ask him about that later."
"Speaking of Jamie..." the older woman said, seeming to hesitate slightly.
"What's up?" Rowan asked.
"I really hate to ask, but I got called in to work Black Friday, which means I need to go in to the store Thursday night. I tried getting out of it but I'm one of the store managers, so, I have to go. I really need someone to watch Jamie and Sophie."
"That's fine, Aunt, I'm gonna be here anyway," Rowan said with a slight shrug.
"Oh, thank you, thank you, this is going to help me out so much," Lorelei said, seeming to have a weight lifted from her shoulders upon Rowan's agreement.
"It's no problem, they'll be full of turkey and probably exhausted anyway."
"I just wasn't sure if you had plans to go meet up with Danny or not, his family's only a half hour or so out of Burgess aren't they?"
Rowan groaned at the mention of the name, taking a moment to stuff a rather large handful of popcorn into her mouth in order to avoid making a comment for a little while longer.
"Oh no, trouble?" Lorelei asked.
"We broke up last month, I thought mom would have told you since she can't keep a secret," Rowan mumbled.
"No! What happened?" Lorelei seemed honestly surprised at the news.
The young girl sighed, avoided eye contact with her aunt as she continued, "I kind of, sort of, wrote him what might be the greatest breakup letter since the Declaration of Independence. In my humble opinion."
"Oh, Rowan, you did it through a letter?"
"If I tried saying it to his face he was going to get all 'Oh, but Rowan, it's not that way, you know I'm not like that' and try to talk me out of it. Plus I'm better with words when they're written down, anyway."
"What did he do to necessitate this letter?"
"He kept making comments about what I'm doing being a 'hobby.' Yeah, I'm definitely going into debt to get a BFA in Children's Book Illustration and Creative Writing so I can pursue it as a hobby," Rowan said, her tone dripping with sarcasm. She picked at a sticker on the back of her computer and continued, "Like, he very clearly didn't think there was any way I could make money off of it, and kept making plans for our future that involved him supporting me, and I'm kind of wondering when exactly we agreed to get married because I certainly had no intentions of becoming his house wife."
"Did you tell him that?"
"Yes, and then he offered to try to get me a receptionist position at his dad's law firm. You know, since I got that receptionist job for work study. And I didn't even really know how to respond to that because when did he get the impression that I wanted to be a receptionist for the rest of my life? He seemed to think we would do fine with him doing his journalism thing, even though his writing was shit until I started proof reading for him. He didn't start doing well in his major until after he started hanging out with me."
"Sounds like he didn't have as much faith in you as he did in himself," Lorelei commented, giving Rowan a sympathetic look.
"Auntie, he didn't believe in me at all," Rowan said with a frown. "He didn't believe I could do any of it and make a living off of it. And you know? Maybe I can't. Maybe I will end up as a receptionist to pay the bills while harassing publishing houses with dummy books and ideas. But I have to do this. I have to, I don't know what I'll do without my stories, and I can't be with someone who doesn't believe in them."
"It sounds like you did the right thing," Lorelei said, reaching over and rubbing Rowan's shoulder in what she hoped was a comforting way.
"Yeah... besides, marriage? I'm nineteen! I get terrified committing to classes for a semester," Rowan said with a small laugh.
"You've got plenty of time for that."
"Definitely. I mean, it was fun when he wasn't being a jerk about everything. He was really nice the first couple months... and I do wish it would have worked out but I just couldn't deal with him anymore," Rowan said, sadness clear in her eyes.
"Well, he's missing out," Lorelei said, standing up and kissing the top of Rowan's head. "You're an amazing young lady and any boy would be lucky to be with you."
"You have to say that, you're my aunt," Rowan said, though she couldn't help but smile at the gesture anyway.
"It's still true, Ro," the woman replied with a smile. "Try to go to bed soon."
"I will."
Jamie stumbled slightly as he followed the trail leading into the small woods around the lake. He had left his home a good ten minutes before, after his mother insisted he eat a waffle and shoved his hat on his head. Sophie had already eaten and was playing with one of Jamie's old action figures at the table. Just as Jamie was about to leave, Rowan had finally rolled off the couch where she had been sleeping and mumbled a "good morning" before pouring at least half the sugar dish into her coffee mug.
After promising his mother that he wouldn't be gone too long, he found himself on this uneven trail, clearly not used very often. The word "trail" had been left in the frost on his window that morning, though the longer he walked the more he began to wonder if there wasn't another trail he was supposed to take.
When he heard jingle bells and a familiar laugh, he knew he was in the right place.
Jamie approached a clearing, a small valley that he had never been to before, finding numerous ice paths, still unfinished. The paths mimicked the drawing he'd given to Jack before. Three elves sat on a makeshift sleigh, cascading down one of the incomplete ramps before flying straight into a snow bank. They stumbled out of the snow dizzily, huge grins on their faces.
"I told you guys, that part's not done yet," Jack laughed, pointing his staff at the ramp and carefully adding another section.
"This is so cool!" Jamie said, his eyes wide as he took in all the parts that were already finished.
"Hey, you got my message!" Jack said, pleased to see the boy. He turned back to watch the elves set up to go down the unfinished ramp again, shaking his head slightly. "It's not done yet but I thought you'd like to see what I have so far."
"When do you think it'll be done?" Jamie asked eagerly, wincing slightly as the elves crashed again.
"Probably later tonight," Jack said, carefully aiming the staff and adding yet another angled block of ice. "I promised North I'd give him back the elves by tomorrow, these guys are on reindeer duty."
The elves in question briefly stopped their ascent back up the hill at this statement and seemed to pout at the idea of taking care of the reindeer.
"What do they do on reindeer duty?" Jamie asked, smiling at their obvious discomfort at the idea.
"Groom them, clean the stables, shoe them," Jack explained. "I think they've been taking them out to fly so they're ready for Christmas, too."
The elves now seemed rather depressed at the idea, one looking especially sad when Jack mentioned the "cleaning the stables" aspect of the job. Jack smiled down at them, before kneeling down and scooping some snow from the ground. He lightly blew onto the snow, watching as it sparkled before throwing the snowball at the elf standing in the center of the other two. The snow bounced off him and hit the others. Their eyes glistened with the magic, and they grinned before taking their sleigh and sliding down the (still unfinished) path yet again.
"Santa must be pretty busy now, huh?" Jamie asked.
"Yeah, but he's got a really efficient system going," Jack said, recalling all the yetis he'd seen adding finishing touches to existing toys, wrapping completed toys, and even beginning last minute designs when he went to retrieve the elves. "Sent him your letter yet?"
"Last week," Jamie said proudly.
"Good, he likes when kids get them in early," Jack said.
"Do you hang out with the other guardians a lot?" Jamie asked.
"Every now and again. Sandy and Tooth are busy a lot, but I'll catch them while they're working sometimes. North and Bunny, I mostly see if there's something important happening or a meeting or if I just feel like messing with Bunny," Jack explained, Jamie hanging on his every word.
"What do you guys do at meetings?" he asked.
"They're really boring. Lots of numbers, lots of-" Jack was cut off as the elves crashed into another iced path with a huge crack. He winced as they brought themselves back to their feet in an uncoordinated fashion, holding their heads as their bells jingled slightly.
"See, this is why they're testing it out before you guys," Jack said, gliding down to where the elves were and kneeling down before them. "You guys okay?"
The elves didn't seem to be paying much mind to Jack, instead were lumbering about with their arms spread in an attempt to keep their balance.
"Hey!" Jack said, snapping his fingers in front of them, hoping to get their attention. They finally turned to him, one falling over in the process. "Take ten, okay? No sled until you stop seeing spots."
The elves nodded and took a seat in the snow as Jack returned to where Jamie still stood, watching.
"Are they going to be okay?" asked the child, watching the elves with concern.
"They should be, they're pretty resilient," Jack assured him. "Looks like it just shook them up a little. Besides, maybe now I can actually get this part of the course done before they try to test it out again."
Jack reached into his pocket and pulled out Jamie's drawing, carefully unrolling it and handing it to the boy. "Willing to be my construction supervisor for a while?"
"Definitely!" Jamie said, looking down at the drawing before pointing to part of the course. "We need at least three feet more ice there, and support beams over there!"
"Can do," Jack laughed, hovering above the areas in question, creating ice as he went.
