Maggie was driving Reese back to the house. She had joined her in doing some Christmas shopping for the kids. The festive music that seemed to be playing on a loop throughout the town was now playing in a similar loop in her head.

"Do you want to come in for a coffee?" Reese asked as they pulled in to the drive.

"Sure." said Maggie with a smile. "Thank you."

As Maggie walked into the entrance hall she stopped and frowned. She walked over and peered into the parlour too. It all looked decidedly bare.

"What's up?" Reese asked, confused by her behaviour.

"Okay, I know things have been rough," exclaimed Maggie, "But what have you done with Christmas? There's two days to go and you haven't even got a tree!"

…

It felt an awkward subject to broach with Marissa, while she was in mourning. Marissa wasn't upset in the way Reese imagined when she mentioned the lack of Christmas decorations. She was more annoyed at herself, that she hadn't noticed how much time had passed.

"I can't let the kids miss Christmas too! " said Marissa, as realisation struck. "It wasn't like they had had much of a Thanksgiving this year either. If Adam hadn't invited us all to join the Chandler's celebrations we wouldn't have had turkey at all. We need a tree."

"You need to buy a big one," agreed Reese, "For the entrance hall; it will look spectacular." Her architects eye already seeing the possibilities.

"Not too big or we won't get it in the car." countered Maggie

"Have we left it too late though?" Marissa asked. "It's almost Christmas Eve."

"There used to be an old Christmas tree farm down on the freeway." said Maggie. "We could try there."

"Okay." said Marissa, mobilised from where she was working in the office. "Let's get the kids wrapped up and go and choose ourselves a tree! Maggie do you mind coming with us to give directions?"

"I'd love to!"

…

They were in luck when they found the Christmas tree place out on the freeway; they still had a good stock of trees.

"Right," said Marissa as she took Gabby's mittened hand, "Let's find us our special tree!"

Reese and Maggie hung back as Miranda and AJ led Marissa and Gabby into the rows of waiting trees.

"This is what they needed." said Reese, pleased to hear the playfulness in Miranda's tone as she cried out in contradiction to AJ's choice of tree.

Maggie nudged her friend.

"So are you going to stay for Christmas?" she asked.

"I'd like to." said Reese. "As determined as Marissa is, I doubt custody will be finalised until the New Year. One more Christmas where I'm still their mom, even if it is name only, might be nice." she regarded Maggie beside her. "If you don't have to hurry back, you could stay too. It's not like you have family waiting for you back in Paris."

Before Maggie could answer there was a squeal of excitement somewhere amongst the maze of trees ahead. It looked like the kids had found their tree.

Maggie gave Reese a wide grin.

"You know I think I might like that." she said. "Kids really do make Christmas."

…

Marissa had picked the tree and she had chosen a big one. They had to tie it to the roof of the car in order to get it back home.

Marissa, Reese and Maggie worked together to drag it inside while the kids were sent to the basement to get the boxes decorations. There would be a few trips to bring it all up as between Bianca's, Marissa's and AJ's special decorations there were several boxes.

Rather than setting the tree up in the entrance hall as Reese suggested, Marissa had decided she wanted it in the parlour. That meant they would have to move some furniture too to make room.

"This is a big tree." Reese said, stating the obvious with a wry smile, as they struggled together to cut the netting from the tree.

Marissa looked sheepish.

"I know. I'm sorry. I guessed I panicked. I just want to make this a great Christmas for the kids."

"Do you have a big enough Christmas tree stand?" Maggie asked looking at the stump.

"Yeah." said Marissa. "The Chandler's always have big trees and I've got one of their old stands. It needed a new screw but it works fine now."

…

They planned to put the tree in the corner by the fireplace. Getting the large tree upright was the first challenge, especially as the kids wanted to help with that part. To an outsider it would have seemed very funny to watch. Marissa lying under the tree, buried under the pine branches with only her legs showing. She was trying to line up the trunk, shouting out instruction to Reese and Maggie who could barely hold the tree upright while the enthusiastic kids got in the way by holding branches but not really taking any weight.

"It's in!" Marissa shouted finally.

"Oh thank god!" gasped Reese, spitting out pine needle. "Can we let go?"

"Just let me tighten the screws." Marissa called. "Almost… almost…" She made a grunt of effort. "…There, it's done!"

With a sigh of relief everyone let go and stood back to admire their handiwork. As they did the tree slowly made a drunken lean to the left and then stopped.

"That's not stable." said Marissa unhappily.

"Could we just tie it to a picture hook or something?" Maggie suggested. "That will help hold it upright and help take the weight."

"And if we can push it more into the corner and make it lean in, that would help too."

It took much muttering, scratches from itchy branches and a couple of close calls before they wrestled the giant tree safely into the corner and tied it off between a metal light fitting and the curtain rail.

"Can we decorate it now?" Miranda asked excitedly.

Reese, Maggie and Marissa as one collapsed into the couch.

"Give us five minutes to catch our breath." Marissa gasped.

"And maybe grab a drink." added Reese.

"We'll get you some juice." said AJ, smiling at Miranda. The two older kids rushed off to the kitchen to be helpful. Gabby followed a little later after she had put the Christmas fairy she had brought up from the basement, carefully onto the coffee table.

"I was thinking of something a little stronger." Reese muttered to herself.

…

The kids returned with glasses of juice and the tin that held Christmas cookies.

"Can we decorate now?" Miranda asked again after a moment.

"We can decorate now." Marissa said as she drained her glass and hauled herself off of the couch. "Now which box has the lights in?"

Reese hauled herself up too.

"I'll go get the ladder." she said. They weren't going to get the fairy on the top without it.

…

They had two sets of lights to choose from, red and white berry lights and a bright string of red, yellow, blue and green flashing lights. One set was Marissa's, the other Bianca's. In the end they put both sets on, starting as they meant to go on. The Montgomery-Tasker-Chandler Christmas tree was going to be the gaudiest and most colourful Christmas tree in town. Once Bianca's red and gold beads and Marissa's purple and green tinsel had been added the kids were let loose with the baubles.

…

AJ had his special wooden decorations that had been brought for him by Nana Krystal, one every year. He had put a few low down, but now he was handing them to Reese, directing where he wanted them hung higher up the tree.

"I'm surprised you kids have been so patient about Christmas." she said as she hung AJ's wooden reindeer on the nearest branch.

"We didn't want to make mom sad." he said. "We knew Santa wouldn't forget us even if we didn't have a tree."

"Well I think that is very sweet of you."

"And if we didn't have our special Christmas stocking we would just put socks at the end of the bed," AJ explained happily, "Gabby wanted to cheat and put a pair of pantyhose on her bed, but we said that would be greedy."

Reese laughed at the kids' cuteness.

"You're smart kids." she said and AJ looked very pleased with the compliment.

…

Marissa was helping Miranda untangle another string of beads they hand found in the bottom of the box. Marissa then noticed Gabby clumsily pulling out a box that was very dear to her. She lunged to stop the lid from falling off and all the contents falling out.

"Careful sweetie." she said, taking the box gently from the little girl's hand. "This is very precious."

She opened the lid reverently to reveal nine colourful glass baubles.

"These belonged to my mom and dad." she said. "They had been my dad's moms before that. They were always the last decorations to go on the Christmas tree."

Miranda and Gabby oo'd and ah'd together over the antique decorations.

"With mommy we always put the fairy on last." said Miranda. "It was her nana's fairy. So is precious too."

"We can put them both on last." said Gabby magnanimously.

"We can try." said Marissa with a laugh.

…

While the tree was being decorated Maggie was rummaging through dresser drawers looking for a pair of scissors to cut ribbon for bows.

"There aren't any here." she called looking back the others by the tree.

"Try out in the hall table." Marissa called back distractedly not looking up from the knot in the beads she had returned to help Miranda with.

Maggie made her way out to the entrance hall and was reaching for the drawer when suddenly Marissa hurried out after her,

"Wait." she exclaimed. "Don't open that, there are scissors in the den!"

Maggie was already pulling open the drawer and looked down to see what Marissa was hiding. The drawer was full of mail. It mostly looked like cards.

Maggie pulled the drawer out fully.

"What is this?" she asked.

Marissa looked guilty about being caught out.

"I just didn't want to open any more 'I'm so sorry for your loss' cards from people I barely know."

"Okay," said Maggie, in an understanding tone. "But there are a lot of cards in here. Most of them are probably Christmas cards."

"I just didn't want to take the risk." said Marissa with a sad smile, a little self-conscious now about her unconventional behaviour.

Maggie pulled the cards from the drawer.

"Are there any more?" she asked.

Marissa waved her hand at the whole circular table. Maggie checked all four drawers. They all contained varying amounts of cards.

The scissors forgotten Maggie gathered all the mail together.

"You can't just leave them hidden away." she said.

Marissa didn't look too enthusiastic about the thought of opening them though.

"'Tell you what." said Maggie. "If you can't face it, why don't I open them? If they are condolence cards I'll put them to one side and you just need to look at the Christmas cards."

"That would be very thoughtful." said Marissa, eyeing the pile of mail with trepidation. "Thank you."

In the end Gabby joined Maggie on the couch to help open the letters; she had run out of branches she could reach on the tree and besides she liked opening envelopes.

There were a few condolence cards in the pile which Maggie put to one side, the rest of the Christmas cards she began to put around the room.

"What is this?" Gabby asked, holding up what she found in her latest envelope. It wasn't a Christmas card. It looked like an invitation.

"Marissa," Maggie called, "Did you know that Miranda Centre is holding a Ball in Bianca's honour?"

"Muriel mentioned it." Marissa said not drawing her attention away from the tree; they were almost ready for the tree topper.

"I have the invitation here." said Maggie. "It's tomorrow night, Christmas Eve."

"It's okay, I'm not going to go." Marissa said. "I'm not sure I can face it."

"But you have to go!" exclaimed Miranda.

"Yeah, you have to go to the Ball!" exclaimed Gabby.

Marissa found herself in the spotlight stare of two excited children.

Marissa looked for support from Reese or Maggie. Reese just raised her eyebrow.

"It would be a shame not to go." said Maggie.

Finally Marissa turned to her son, but he wasn't going to back her up either.

"If it's a Ball you can wear Binks' favourite dress." he said.

It felt like they were ganging up on her.

"I'll think about it." she said, eventually. "So shall we get the fairy in her special place?" she added, as a way to change the subject.

It worked.

…

With much solemn ceremony Marissa's nine baubles were hung on the branches and finally the fairy was placed on the top of the tree.

They stood back and admired the tree covered in cheerfully clashing colours and differently flashing lights. Gabby was delighted with the finished results.

"It's the most beautiful Christmas tree in the whole wide world!" she exclaimed proudly.

"It's certainly the most colourful." said Marissa giving her a squoosh.

"I like it!" said AJ.

"Me too." said Miranda.

"Well it you certainly know its Christmas now." said Reese, delighted to see everyone so happy after the sombreness of the last few weeks. She turned and gave Maggie a hug. "Thank you for the suggestion."

…