AN: Here we are, another chapter here.
Of course, there will be quite a few Christmas-themed events that take place around our regular family and MC happenings.
I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!
111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111
The artificial tree, once all the pieces were stacked together on the tree stand, needed to be "fluffed up." It had been smashed into a box and needed more than a little help getting its shape. Carol had put the hold on the Christmas plans for a bit. She'd urged both Sophia and Daryl toward having breakfast, and then she'd let Daryl wash the dishes and clean the little kitchen while she'd dragged the decorations out of the small extra room where Daryl had put them after bringing the few boxes down from the attic.
The tree took up most of one side of the living room—not that there was much room in the little starter house to begin with—so Carol set up the other side of the living room with the boxes. She settled Sophia there and gave her the most important job of taking all the decorations out of the boxes and sorting them into like categories. She would create piles of tangled light strands, piles of well-used tinsel, and piles of ornaments, baubles, and other items they would use to decorate the tree.
The condition of the decorations and the boxes—and the haphazard way that everything was thrown into those boxes—told Carol that Andrea had likely had brothers packing her Christmas decorations away each year. With little guidance, many of the brothers would think that "put away" was a job well done as they'd stuffed the mismatched boxes into the attic. And, likely, it had suited Andrea well enough at the time.
Now, the sorting gave Sophia something to do so that she had a very distinct job, but she also wasn't bored by the tedious task of straightening and rearranging the many branches on the artificial tree. Carol and Daryl, instead, put themselves to that task, both of them starting with the bottom and twisting the tiniest branches this way and that.
"If we make them go in all different directions," Carol offered gently, so as to be sure that she sounded like she was offering advice about something she'd just thought of, and not at all like she was scolding, "then it should give the tree the appearance of being fuller than it is."
"Too much fuller," Daryl said with a laugh, "and we'll just have to box it up until next Christmas because it won't fit in this house."
Carol shushed him, though she did laugh.
"Please be careful," she whispered, leaning her face close to Daryl's where he sat on the floor. "Sophia's so looking forward to this…I don't want her to misunderstand teasing and think that we're going to…"
"It's OK," Daryl said, interrupting her. "I was teasin'. And if she got upset, I'd just explain to her that—I was teasin'. She'd be OK. She understands teasin' pretty good. She's had to learn that pretty quick."
Carol peeked around the tree. Sophia was absorbed in what she was doing and, at the moment, she was clearly paying them very little attention, if she was paying them any attention at all. She was very delicately sorting the plastic ornaments as though they were precious crystal. Carol realized that, very often, she'd kept Sophia from really helping her very much with decorating for the holidays. Ed was very particular about things and anything out of place could end with Ed in a bad mood. And Ed, when he was in a bad mood, could be set off by some of the most unpredictable things imaginable. He was also so particular about money—especially around the holidays when the extra emphasis on spending made him nervous—that Carol was always very concerned that Sophia might break an ornament or two and, if she did, Carol might have to request to buy something as a replacement. She made it a point to try her best never to have to ask to buy anything.
Sophia had missed out on a lot of the decorating because of Carol's fear—because of Ed's easy anger.
And now, completely involved in the decorating with boxes of things that she could do very little to damage and which, even if they were completely destroyed, would not be worth much, Sophia was as happy as she could be to touch, with reverence, the cheap, glitter-coated plastic of each of the ornaments left behind by Andrea.
"I didn't let her do things," Carol breathed out, not putting even the slightest bit of sound behind her breathy whisper. "I was afraid of Ed. Afraid for myself. And so—I didn't let her do things, Daryl. I took all that from her."
"Shhhh," Daryl said. Carol jumped, without meaning to, when she felt him squeeze her neck. He froze for a second, clearly letting her take in the fact that he was only affectionately touching her, and then he kneaded her shoulder muscle. "Don't get upset. You only gonna—upset you, and Pea Baby, and then Sophia's gonna get upset. And it don't change nothin'. Don't matter. You didn't do nothin' wrong. And she's about to have the best damn Christmas ever—'cause she's got a whole damn family that's gonna see to that."
Carol couldn't help but smile to herself.
"We're not alone anymore," she said, glancing at Daryl. He brushed his thumb under her eye and wiped away a tear that had just slipped from where her lower lashes had trapped it.
"None of us are," Daryl said, leaving the statement at that. Carol's stomach tightened in response to his words and his tone. There were many different kinds of alone—that was all that needed to be said about that.
Carol reached her hand up and, catching Daryl's hand, she squeezed it before she brought it around and kissed it. His skin was rough and a little leathery, and she closed her eyes because she loved the feeling of it next to hers, even if it was just his rough knuckles against her lips.
She loved him. She loved everything about him.
They worked in silence for a while, straightening branches and making the tree look just right. When, standing back from it as far as the cramped space allowed, Carol was satisfied that the tree looked just right, she announced that it was time for the lights.
Carol relinquished control entirely, even though it was a little difficult for her. Something as simple as imperfect lights or ornaments placed too clustered together on the tree could be enough to irritate Ed if he had a bad day and was looking for a reason to fight. In her old life, Carol had lived walking on eggshells and always trying to anticipate every little thing that might irritate him when he was looking for something about which he could be good and irritated—and she had spent her life trying to stop those things before they happened.
Now, Daryl picked up a giggling Sophia and, together, they strung the lights on the Christmas tree—from bottom to top—and they were anything but perfect. No magazine would have ever said they wanted to feature the tree put together by the two of them, but Carol thought it was pretty beautiful. It was the first Christmas tree that she'd ever seen that had lights strung by Sophia's giggles and Daryl's happy smiles.
In the end, nothing else really mattered.
When the lights were on the tree, Daryl and Sophia repeated their light-stringing practice—with Daryl swooping the girl this way and that so that she laughed and howled as she worked—with the plastic ornaments left behind for them. Carol joined in when Daryl insisted, and together they put every single plastic ornament into place. They repeated the process with the somewhat ragged tinsel that had been left behind. All things considered, it didn't look too bad, really, when they were done.
And, finally, Daryl drew them both together to show them the ornaments that he'd purchased the night before. They were, he told them, the first of many. It was important to him that his family begin to collect ornaments so that each of the pieces on their tree would someday be beautiful and meaningful to all of them.
He unwrapped the ornaments in his lap.
"Got this one for Pea Baby," he said, opening the first that he came to and removing it from the paper that the store had used to pad it.
It was a glass ornament with a painted rocking horse. It read, just as Daryl had mentioned he might like, "Baby's First Christmas," painted in the style of wooden alphabet blocks, above the date.
Sophie oohed and ahhhed dramatically over the pretty glass ornament—just the way that a five-year-old can really do over something she finds lovely in a way that adults can't quite see things any longer, overflowing with what Carol couldn't help but name, to herself, as Christmas magic— and she touched it gingerly with her fingertip as it rested in Daryl's lap.
Daryl opened the next ornament.
"Got this one to celebrate—our first Christmas as a family. All of us."
From the wall of ornaments, Daryl had selected one that was a glass ball—blue, but Carol didn't know how much choice the store had offered him—with an ornate silver "D" painted on it with the date in the same fancy font.
"It's beautiful," Carol assured him when he clearly looked at her seeking reassurance that he'd done well in picking out their decorations.
He passed her the blue glass ball, and took the final ornament to be front and center for its unveiling.
"Got this one for you, Soph," Daryl said. "It weren't exactly what I wanted, but—soon as I saw it…" He didn't finish, but he didn't have to. Sophia spoke his language perfectly. He'd wanted an ornament that would declare it was Sophia's first Christmas as a Dixon.
The ornament, when he unwrapped it, was another one made of glass. This one, though, was smaller and longer than the others. It was painted with nearly every color they could possibly associate with Christmas. Santa stood, on his sleigh, behind eight tiny reindeer and urged them onward.
Carol couldn't help but smile to herself. Sophia's eyes lit up at the little miniature scene of Santa and his reindeer. She reached her little hands out to stroke the ornament with her fingertips, and Daryl held it more in her direction so that she could admire it as much as she liked.
"It's your first ornament on our tree, Soph," Daryl said. "Just for you. Just to mark this Christmas. You like it?"
"It's my favorite," Sophia said, with enough awe in her voice to make it clear that she'd not yet reached the age where she was trying to lie to simply save Daryl's feelings. Daryl smiled to himself, but then he looked at Carol somewhat apologetically. "It doesn't say it's her first Christmas or nothin'," he said.
Carol smiled at him reassuringly.
"It doesn't matter," she whispered, leaning her face so close to his that she could brush her lips against his ear. She felt him shiver and smiled to herself before she planted a very gentle kiss against his ear and spoke again. "I think we'll remember. I think we'll remember everything about this Christmas, Daryl…forever."
"I didn't do too bad?" He asked her quietly, raising his eyebrows at her.
"You did perfect," Carol assured him.
Daryl was confident enough that, if he'd wanted to, Carol was certain he could have easily filled Merle's shoes as the MC's president. He was a great VP for the Judges, and he had no problem running the businesses in Merle's absence, handling club business, or getting and keeping an unruly brother in line.
But, every now and again, Carol saw the deep-seated insecurities around his edges—and she loved him even more, for them, than she loved him for his confidence.
He was always pleased with her praise, though, and immediately he seemed to find some new energy in her approval of his attempts to make this a perfect holiday.
"What'cha say, Soph? You gonna help me figure out where these fancy ornaments go on the tree?" Daryl asked, passing the glass baubles gently to Carol and standing up so that he could lift Sophia into his arms. She squealed and declared that she would help him, not that he'd had any doubt.
Carol stood with them, and she passed one ornament and then the next to them as Daryl circled the tree and Sophia searched for just the right spot. Her own ornament she put close to the bottom of the tree—close to her actual eye level—and Daryl and Carol both promised her it was really the best spot for the glass ornament.
When they'd finished, Carol found a Christmas movie on the television for Sophia to watch, and started toward the kitchen to begin making them a nice dinner. She'd only just started washing the potatoes that she meant to cut up for beef stew, when Daryl came up behind her. He caught her around the waist, rested his body as flush against hers as possible, and kissed her neck before nestling his chin there.
"You OK with our tree, woman?" He asked.
"It's the most beautiful tree I've ever seen," Carol said. And she absolutely meant it.