It's been an interesting year, with the usual ups and downs…both in real life and in reel life. I want to thank everyone who has read and shown interest in this story, and there are still plenty of twists left to come.
Cybertoast to a happy new year for all!
####
"And yesterday, when I looked at him, he looked away real quick, like…"
"Like he'd been caught watching you and maybe got embarrassed?"
The girl's blush could not hide her emerging smile. "Well….yeah. So what should I do?"
She considered all of the tricks she might have tried at the girl's age. Dropping something in front of the boy so he, of course, would be obliged to pick it up. Complementing him on his not-so-fascinating new toy. Or, her personal favorite: playing hard to get. Erica smiled down at the girl on her lap, considered the words of the wisest woman she ever knew, and said: "Just talk to him, sweetie. Get to know him, and be yourself. That's the most important thing: just be you, and the rest will fall into place. I promise you."
That priceless beam let Erica know that her response was the right one.
Maybe this hard head did let a little something through on occasion, Mom.
The girl scanned her surroundings apprehensively before motioning for Erica to lean closer. When she did, a barely uttered question brought a full grin to Erica's face.
"Do you think he'll…kiss me?"
That wasn't exactly the question she'd anticipated but, then again, this young girl had managed to surprise and charm her since the first moment they'd met in the oncology ward. Alison had spent so much time worrying about being different, about fitting in. One of the few joyous moments of the past year had occurred the day Erica had returned to the hospital for the first time since foregoing the fancy wigs. Ali had been the first to greet her. She'd been touched when the girl found the courage to remove her own hairpiece. Since then, they'd been the Shiny Head duo.
"I…I want to kiss a boy before …"
That tiny, trailing statement jolted her from her thoughts and brought an instant response. She massaged the smooth skin atop Alison's head. "You'll have plenty of chances for that, honey. In addition to going on dates, showing that silly Ms. Landon just how smart you are, graduating and finding a wonderful career, and getting married."
Hopefully just once on the latter, she silently added with a bemused smile.
"And I expect to have a front row seat for it all. Do you understand me, young lady?"
It was not a question, but an affirmation….for herself and for the little girl cuddling against her chest.
Just as the girl nodded, another pint-sized force of nature launched herself into Erica's lap.
"Gran –" Miranda abruptly stopped herself. For the life of her, Erica could not understand why these little ones were still so hesitant in calling her by her name.
She looked between the two little girls, each occupying a leg. She addressed Ali, who was still staring at Miranda with unabashed curiosity. "Alison, I would like you to meet my granddaughter, Miranda."
Erica admittedly held her breath. Although she loved Miranda more than anything, she knew her granddaughter well enough to know that she didn't exactly always play well with others. The girl had a bit of an aura – that Erica also recognized too well – that could be…off-putting.
Her fears, in this case, were in vain. Miranda instantly stuck her hand out, half-proper lady and half-bouncing little girl. "Pleased to meet you."
After a moment, Ali smiled. It was not tense or strained. It was the smile of the happy little girl that Erica had come to love. "Hi," she said, taking Miranda's hand.
"And this –" Erica said, tilting her head toward the other new arrivals, "is my granddaughter Gabby and her mom, my daughter Bianca."
Bianca led her daughter by the hand until they were beside the trio. "Hello, Alison," she said warmly. "It's very nice for Gabby and I to meet you."
Then, both mother and daughter – the latter's shyness temporarily forgotten - gave Erica a two-for-one special hug that would remain one of the best Christmas presents she'd received this year. Before she knew it, her lap was suddenly free as three small bodies hurtled towards the play area. Ali was giving her new friends the insider's tour of the large hospital waiting area.
Erica looked over to her daughter, who was watching her own daughters, arms crossed, with exactly the look she was likely sporting right now. "How was Paris?" she asked.
"Good," Bianca said. "I'm glad we decided to stay the extra time. They really needed the time away, and truthfully…"
It seemed her daughter had picked up a trailing-off habit from a certain little girl, but Erica only smiled. "You could, too?" she guessed.
Bianca rubbed her arms and glanced sideways at her mother. "Please don't misunderstand me. No matter where I've been physically, this has always and will always be my home. I missed you, I missed Kendall and the boys, and I'm glad we got back for Christmas. And there are a few gifts waiting for you , by the way."
Erica nodded, suppressing a grin as her daughter paused long enough for one breath.
"It's just that, life here can be a little overwhelming sometimes."
"I think that's quite an understatement, sweetie, and I do understand. More than you know."
"You mean the great Erica Kane is actually capable of being overwhelmed?" Bianca asked in mock horror.
When the two shared a laugh, Bianca tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. Her daughter was not the dramatic hair-flipping type, but Erica knew that particular gesture almost as well as the small lip bite her daughter would soon undertake. She was relieved that at least some things about her daughter were a constant. Since the surgery, she was admittedly relieved to see the kind heart she had come to admire so much not just as a mother but as a woman peek through.
"How was Reese?" Erica thought about holding back on the question she really wanted to ask, but the past few months she had decided to try a new approach not always honored so well in the past: honesty. "Did she pressure you, honey?"
She had managed to ascertain from what little Kendall seemed to know about her sister's life lately that her daughter's ex-wife was eyeing a reconciliation.
Bianca had traded rubbing her own arms for rubbing the arms of the wheelchair. "She didn't pressure me. She was honest, and I was honest in return. I told her that it wasn't happening. Her. Love. It's over."
Erica had also learned the art of dialing back. She knew that her daughter would say no more, but it didn't stop her heart from breaking a little at the jaded and generalized nature of the final words in Bianca's statement.
She only offered a soft repetiton of her new mantra: "Don't give up."
Bianca nodded just as softly. "How…how are things going now?"
Erica didn't need elaboration. She was going to take her own advice and focus on the positive. "I'm still having my treatments. I won't pretend like they're the most exhilarating experiences in the world, but I think - I know they're helping. I may not have heard the word I want to hear yet - remission - but I'll just keep going until I do."
"You won't give up," Bianca said with a smile. "Just like you're teaching these kids not to give up, without ever saying a word. I really admire what you're doing for them, Mom."
Erica shook her head as their spirited trio approached again. "It's not what I'm doing for them, sweetie. It's what they do for me every day."
"Mom, Ali asked me to be an angel for the play," Miranda said breathlessly. "Can I? It starts in a few minutes."
Bianca looked over to her mother, who provided a head tilt of encouragement. "Sure, Mimo. Just remember to -"
"Behave myself. I know," Miranda said with exasperation, an unspoken Don't I always? evident in her tone. Before rushing off again, she skipped over and gave her mother a kiss on the cheek. "Thanks, Mom."
Gabby settled onto Bianca's lap as the two joined the other children to begin their preparations.
"What about you, honey? Would you like to be an angel, too?" Erica asked.
Gabby simply shook her head and settled further into her mother.
"This angel's not one for the spotlight," Bianca whispered.
Like grandmother, like mother, like daughter.
Fifteen minutes later, the partial collection of Kane women were enjoying the performance of the best Mary – and the best angel, of course – any of them had ever seen.
####
This was a first.
"You actually knocked. I suppose I should be grateful for that small bit of decorum."
Typically, visits to this household consisted of some loud-mouthed charlatan barging in and making monkeys of his crackpot security team or breaking in by….other means. He'd had the latter problem taken care of, however. He only wished he had taken the initiative sooner.
"And you actually answered your own door," his visitor observed. "I guess that bit of decorum should impress me."
Adam sighed, leaning against said door. "What do you want, Lavery? "I don't see a caroling choir behind you, and please, please don't say you're my Ghost of Christmas Past. I'd be really disappointed, as I was expecting someone I could actually stand the sight of."
Ryan grinned. "Doesn't leave too many people, does it?" He turned serious, or at least as 'serious' as that perpetually gape-mouthed stare was capable. "I'd like to talk to you."
It was Adam's turn to grin. "Better luck next time, boy. I don't have any wives for you to cavort with just yet. Check back in, oh, next to never."
The boy placed his foot between the door and Adam's not-so-well-placed attempts at slamming it.
"I wouldn't underestimate the old man. Remember where I grew up. I can still knock you flat on your pretty-boy a-"
"It's about Colby, Adam."
That should have been it.
That should have been his impetus to make good on his threat and pound Lavery until the only things that would recognize him were the vultures on the side of the road. But as he raised his hand, it betrayed him and motioned for his visitor to come inside.
When he opened his mouth to alternately shame Lavery and tell him to go to Hell, those traitorous lips instead muttered, "You have five minutes."
####
"We heard that large crash, and we knew it was either your vase or my lamp. I know how you always hated that thing….said I was like the dad in that Christmas movie with his leg-o-lamp, so while I was already plotting to take away Tad's allowance until the next Christmas, you were thinking of giving him a bonus. And then, then we go through that kitchen door, plans in hand, only to find Joey standing over the broken coffee table. That poor boy looked like his pet had just died, so we didn't have the heart…"
She squeezed his knee.
"See, I know what that means, 'Yes, I remember…I love you….and -'"
"You're talking too much."
The Irish brogue brought him from his reminiscence, and he turned to its source.
A portly gentleman with a perennial smile tipped his hat.
"How did you know?.." Joe rose from his place beside his wife. She was still smiling down at him, oblivious to their new arrival. "Are you one of the other patients?"
He had seen them on occasion, mostly roaming the halls: individuals stuck in much the same limbo as himself. Once he returned - if he returned - he would have quite the write-up for his next medical journal. But the others, none had ever attempted to communicate with him, and they usually appeared more…distressed. This fellow, his knowing smile remained.
"I have been around a while. As to your first question, you will find that I am quite observant."
Joe believed it. The stranger's pale, clear eyes: they seemed to see nothing and everything. He felt at ease with the man for reasons he couldn't quite pinpoint. "That's our all-purpose signal, the knee thing," he said, turning back to Ruth and pointing to his wife's outstretched hand. "It's her reminder that sometimes we don't have to say anything to know what's needed."
"A wise woman," the man remarked.
For the first time, he noticed the stranger' s collar. "I am sorry, Father. Please forgive my manners."
The man, in his previous life, must have become accustomed to individuals rambling, but perhaps now he needed a friendly ear himself. They had no one else at the moment, after all.
"If you would like to talk, Father, about the circumstances that brought you to the hospital…"
The man didn't move about the room, but his gaze still absorbed all. "I would much rather hear about your lovely family."
The protest on Joe's lips faded away, replaced by a smile. "I'm sure you have observed enough to ascertain that this lovely creature is my wife, Ruth. And that hodge-podge of wonderful humanity over there –" he motioned to the gaggle of laughing Santas and elves – "consists of my children and their family." He paused long enough to acknowledge the two cards set beside the eggnog and the red Rudolph nose: part of his required annual Christmas wardrobe. "All of my family couldn't be here today. Tara visited earlier this month, but she had to get back home….to her job and her new fiancé. And Bobby, well, he's doing his best to keep his skiing business afloat, but he sent his love through this beautiful letter. Ruth reads part of it to me nearly every night."
"You worry about them."
The stranger's eyes were trained on the group engaged in a spirited game of hot potato football: the Christmas tradition his family was thankfully determined not to abandon. Joe wanted nothing more than to assume his usual role as the caller: the guardsman. He sat on the edge of the bed, just inches away from his giggling youngest granddaughter, who was currently one of four hangers-on. He reached out and stroked her hair, a phantom's touch.
"It's part of the job description," he said. "Tad, my boy, he's trying so hard to fill the gap. There's so much love in their family, but so much…left unsaid." He watched as his son, Santa minus the beard, threw the bag to the room's other Santa, who winked at his Mrs. Santa. "And Joey - Jake - he just told me how he and Amanda were going to Africa to meet their new daughter: my new granddaughter. It makes me still believe in life, in hope. And maybe it's selfish, but I want to be a part of that."
"The only thing stopping you, Joe Martin, is you. Your wife is wise, so heed her words. You have what you need.."
"How did you know my –"
The area of his bed opposite his wife was now vacant.
"Name," Joe muttered.
"Face it, baby Martin, you're going to –" Joe turned in time to see Tad's trademark smirk plastered all over his face, ready for the next launch.
"Stop!" Joe called out the command on cue. If he were the ref, that would've taught his eldest boy –
Seven suddenly wide mouths in a haphazard semicircle might usually signal a Christmas carol. but silence had replaced the spirited bantereing. Puzzled, he turned back toward Ruth. Except, he didn't need to turn back. Even through the sudden fog, he could see her bright smile in full view.
Right beside him, where she had always been.
"Wh –" His voice had suddenly diminished and, he could taste sour - he could taste!
He tried to lift his arm, but it tingled and ached.
It felt.
"Sh, sh, don't talk, hon." And a pair of the sweetest lips he would ever know – God how he had missed them – ensured that he, for once, did shut up.
With seven bodies rapidly progressing toward him, Joe was also sure that he couldn't wait to be this Christmas football game's tackle dummy.
####
He poured with an unsteady hand, but he never got the opportunity to offer his guest or himself a much-needed distraction.
Ryan grabbed his hand, and to Adam's surprise he didn't protest or yank his arm back. He just relinquished his tense grip on the sifter.
"I was there," Ryan said, as if it explained anything and everything. His gaze was intense but…
Adam could not look away. "We were all there." The words did not hold nearly as much sarcasm or conviction as he would have liked.
"I had pushed Greenlee to the floor."
Of course, ever the noble hero.
"But I…I looked up. And it was mostly chaos. Blurs. Half of it I don't even remember. "
Ryan took a breath, and Adam released the one he had been holding for dear life. Somehow, they managed a kind of harmony.
"I saw her. Her eyes. This one pinpoint of clarity. She…there were no words."
The quiet. The damning silence.
"But she still spoke, if that makes any sense."
Too much.
"I don't think she really knew what was happening around her, if that brings you some measure of comfort."
It never could, and it did.
"But before, right before -"
"Please, stop." Adam wanted to eliminate the frail old man who had dared make his presence known, until he realized the weak, insipid voice belonged to himself. Perhaps then he wanted it even more.
"I can't," Ryan whispered. He, too, was captive to something unseen but never far away. "I can chase it away during the day with work and family, but nights….nights, God." He ran both hands through his hair before pointing vehemently at his head. "She's still in here, every night. Her eyes. I think…I think I finally get it. She needs me to tell you."
"Tell me what?" Those traitor lips compelled him again, compelled him to ask for the answer he never wanted….the one he needed more than his next breath.
"When you watch the life drain from somebody, maybe a part of you is hoping for some grand revelation – to make sense out of the senseless. It's not like that, though. Not even close. I still have just as many questions as I had that night, and maybe I'll spend the rest of my life searching for a suitable answer. It might ultimately be a fool's quest, but then again, maybe –"
"I don't need to hear about you finding the light, Lavery. Please, just…"
"What I saw was a million minutes condensed to one. I think in part its true, what they say. You experience everything again. You feel your life fully and one hundred percent one final time before it fades. Anger, sadness, fear, innocence: it was all there. She felt it all."
If Lavery was trying to get one last laugh and one final ounce of vengeance on him, he was more than exceeding his goal.
"Do you want to know the last thing I saw before her eyes closed?"
Adam's chest tightened painfully. He only nodded, because he had long ago given up the pretense of pretending he could put up a defense.
"She smiled, not with her mouth, but with something deeper inside. I think…I think she wanted you to know that it mattered. Her. You. Her time. Your time together. It all mattered."
The silence had settled again. This time, however, he didn't fear it.
Finally, Ryan rose from the sofa. "That's what I wanted to tell you, Adam." He glanced at the clock on the mantel, and his gaze lingered for just a moment. "I'm sorry it took longer than five minutes," he added with a lightness uncharacteristic of any of their previous encounters.
This time, Adam stopped the exit. "Why…" He cleared his throat but, try as he might, the sharpness would not come. "Why me?"
Ryan wrapped his scarf and gave one final appraisal of the mantel. "Because you need it, Adam. Especially today."
As Ryan turned to leave, Adam turned – compelled – to the mantel.
The most beautiful smile he had ever known greeted him.
His chest unclenched, and he smiled back at his daughter. Not fully, not perfectly. But good enough.
It mattered.
####
Erica handed Bianca the tree's next angel.
"I thought you might want to hang this one," she said.
Her daughter's chin trembled, and she reached out and stilled it, caressing away a lone tear that had settled.
Bianca placed the crystal figurine bearing Marissa's name with the other angels, each named for an individual who had passed.
Many of the smaller angels had recently been patients in this hospital. Their friends stood in a tight and secure circle around the tree, each sending a silent message to a special someone. The collection of tiny smiles showed that those messages were being returned, perhaps not in words, but in more lasting ways.
The group clustered closer and stood in wide-eyed awe when a figure clad in red and clutching a full sack came bounding through the hall. Their innocent expressions could not match Erica's astonishment, however, as she recognized the gruff voice and the silver hair behind that 'ho, ho, ho' and white beard.
Stuart Chandler, she could believe. Maybe that's the identity this misbegotten Santa would even claim if pressed. But Erica would know that mischievous eye twinkle anywhere. When "Santa" caught her eye, Erica winked at her ex-husband.
While the kids busied themselves with opening their presents, Erica approached Adam and handed him the final two ornaments. When he gazed down at their names, he started and stood silent for a long moment. Finally, he looked back up. With a slight mist in his eyes, he mouthed a 'Thank you' before securing Scott and Colby's place among the angels.
After the gift-giving had concluded, they all gathered once more around the tree for a song. A slight commotion sounded from the other side of the trunk. Curious, Erica glanced over as the children separated, making way for a new entrant. Her throat clenched, refusing admittance to her rapidly rising heart.
Tired, weak, but with one of the strongest voices she ever heard, Joe Martin joined in for the final soaring note of "Oh Holy Night."
Behind him, a man she had never met in her life – a man she recognized nonetheless – stood in the corridor. He was watching them.
No, watching over us, Erica thought before dismissing the utterance from her mind.
Each of the tree's angels now shone with a bright light. Funny, that feature hadn't been in the decorations' specifications. Witnessing the shining faces surrounding her, she realized the small mystery didn't matter.
She wanted to share this insight with the stranger, but the corridor was now empty.
The familiar stranger would never really be gone, though. That, Erica knew as surely as she knew the power of the Christmas spirit…and the human spirit it encompassed.