Mac, Trish and Isabelle were in the kitchen of Grandma Sarah's house in Belleville preparing the Christmas dinner. It was Christmas Eve and the three of them had already been at the house for two days getting everything in order and enjoying some of the early holiday atmosphere. They were all going to celebrate Christmas up here on the farm. Any minute now the car with Harm, Frank, Sturgis and Bobbie was going to arrive. They had all had to come later because of their jobs.
Ever since Isabelle was born Mac, Trish, Frank, Sturgis and of course Isabelle had celebrated Christmas together at the farm. After a couple of years Bobbie and later Jack had joined them. After Sarah Rabb passed away, they had continued to drive up to the farm for Christmas. It was simply so wonderful to be able to share the time of year with the people you cared about away from all the stress of the everyday life.
"I heard a car, Mom," Isabelle said for the millionth time "Did you hear it, Grandma?"
"Yes, I think this time I did," Trish answered her "Go open the door and check, won't you?"
"It was them," Isabelle shouted excited when she opened the door.
"Put your shoes on," Mac shouted back knowing Isabelle was probably already halfway out the door. Mac and Trish walked over to the door as well to greet them. They saw how Isabelle rushed towards the car. Harm braised himself for the impact of his daughter throwing himself at him, but to his surprise she ran around the car and up into Frank's arms instead.
"Hey Grandpa. I missed you really, really, really much," Isabelle said hugging him very tightly.
"I missed you too, sweetheart."
"You didn't miss me?" Harm joked with her. He for sure had missed her and wanted a hug too. Meanwhile Sturgis had put the wheelchair next to the car so that Bobbie could get into it. Harm had gotten two of the bags out of the car and Sturgis got the rest of them. Together the group started walking up to the porch where Mac and Trish were waiting.
"Yes, a little bit, but I see you everyday, Dad," Isabelle said. "And it was forever since I saw grandpa."
At hearing that Trish grabbed a hold on Mac's arm. "I can't believe children forget things so fast. I mean I have a hard time believing that he's here even when he's standing right in front of me and for her it's so certain that she sees him everyday."
"Well, I guess … We do see him everyday and he is a … I mean I feel certain too that we have him as a part of our life from now on, but ..." she sighed "I haven't forgotten though …" she added and the pain in her voice was heartbreaking to Trish.
Their conversation was caught short when the newcomers had arrived at the door and Trish hurried them inside to try to keep the heat inside the house. Several minutes were spent greeting, hugging and kissing each other. Mac had to go and check on the food while the rest of them went upstairs to install themselves in the rooms upstairs. It was a good thing this house had many bedrooms. While everyone went upstairs Harm excused himself saying he needed to visit the restroom, however he sneaked off into the kitchen and Mac. Mac was quite surprised that suddenly she found herself in his arms being twirled around. Their mouths found each other for a quick kiss.
"Hey," Mac said.
"I missed you."
"Missed you too." Harm tried to lip lock with her again, but now she protested, "What if someone catches us?"
"Right now I don't care," Harm held on to her a little longer. Mac couldn't help laughing, it was such a wonderful joyful and festive atmosphere around the house "But I guess you're right." He backed away from her "I'll be back, though."
"I'm counting on it," Mac laughed at him.
Soon everyone was gathered around the dinner table and they enjoyed the food in a very festive spirit. Everyone was talking and laughing and though they remained quite long after they had finished eating, it didn't feel like very much time had passed when they finally got up from the table.
"You better get going?" Trish turned to Mac and Sturgis. She had just discovered really how late it was.
"You still want to do it?" Mac looked at Sturgis.
"Yeah. Well, it's a tradition, isn't it?" Sturgis simply said.
"You're still not going to tell us what exactly it is that you are doing?" Frank laughed at them and Mac and Sturgis looked at each other and shook their heads 'no'.
"Just get it over with," Trish said "We'll take care of everything here."
"Are you sure?" Mac asked.
"Just go," Trish said and smiled. She knew that something with this walk they took every Christmas Eve was very important to them even though she didn't know at all what it was about.
Mac and Sturgis went and got dressed to go outside and meanwhile the rest took care of the kitchen and then went to sit in the living room. Meanwhile Isabelle had gone upstairs and put her pajamas on and brushed her teeth so now she could sit on Harm's lap and slowly doze off into sleep.
An hour after they had left Sturgis and Mac returned. Isabelle was pretty much asleep and Mac lifted her up to carry her up to bed. When she returned downstairs she sat down beside Trish on the couch.
"Everything OK?" Trish asked her.
"Yeah, she didn't even wake up."
"There's only one person missing here now," Frank said.
"I think she's still here even if we can't see her," Mac said looking dreamingly out through the window.
Sturgis looked at her skeptically. "Do you see something we don't, Mac?"
Mac picked up the little cushion behind her and threw it at Sturgis.
"Play nicely," Trish laughed them. Sometimes you could really think that they were real siblings and probably quite a few years younger as well. "I think I'm going to go to bed now," she added and got up.
"I' coming with you," Frank said. He was ready to go even though he was still on California-time and it wasn't really all that late to him.
Sturgis and Bobbie looked on each other and jointly decided to follow the older couples example.
"I'll wait until the fire is burned down," Ham said and motioned towards the fireplace.
"I can keep you company," Mac said very casually.
"Good night you two then," Trish said and several good nights were exchanged between them.
Once they were all upstairs Harm looked at Mac. "Aren't you going to come over here?" He was sitting on the couch on the other side of the table.
"Just a second," Mac said and walked up to the fireplace and put some really big logs in it.
"But now it'll never burn down," Harm protested slightly.
"Exactly," Mac sat down on his lap and rested her head against his chest. "I missed you."
"Missed you too."
They sat silent for a couple of minutes. "So are you going to ask?" Mac then suddenly asked Harm. He'd been looking at her rather intensely.
"Ask what?"
"What Sturgis and I were doing?"
"I'm not saying that I'm not curious, but I don't want to push you into telling me something you'd rather keep to yourself."
She looked up at him and smiled "Did you go to the wall?" she then asked him.
"Yeah, I did. Actually Frank came with me."
"Oh. How was that?"
"It felt good."
"Good," Mac nodded "He's a good man, Frank."
"Yeah, he is."
"Trish is quite anxious for him to slow down a bit."
"He should," Harm agreed.
Again they silently watched the fire burning just being glad to be together.
"Mac, there's something I want to talk to you about," Harm broke the silence after a couple of minutes. "I know this is may be moving way to fast," Harm started off.
"Well, we don't exactly have a record of moving slowly," Mac reassured him "I mean seriously we slept together on our first date. Before our first date really," she said a bit thoughtfully.
"If you feel that this is way too soon or not right or I don't know anything ... I want you to know that I … I will wait for as long as it takes," he paused and started to take something out of his pocket that was luckily not covered by Mac. "Mac, I love you and I love our daughter. There's no one else I know better than I know you and I know that we will be there for each other through better and worse, and that's why I don't want to wait with asking you this," Harm had gotten the little box out of his pocket and opened it to take out a ring. Holding it between his fingers he showed it to Mac.
Harm took a deep breath before he started off again "That first night you asked where do we go from here and later I realized I already know where I want us to go. I don't want to wait any longer, I want us to be a family and live together and share everything with each other. All the dreams I have for my life, you are present in all of them. I couldn't imagine a future without you in it. Love you so much," He paused for a few moments. For the first time during his speech feeling nervous about it, but it was too late to turn back now. "Mac, will you marry me?"
TBC