He limped toward the back door as she came through. Bennett and Harper were already decorating the tree, which had been placed in its stand in the corner across the room from the fireplace. Ross had helped with that and with carrying in the boxes of ornaments, then stood back. Little John had resumed his place on the couch, staring out into the park.
“Whew, it’s bad out there now,” Nest declared as he came up to her. She stamped her boots on the entry rug and brushed the snow from her coat. “You can hardly see in front of your nose. How’s everyone here?”
“Fine.” He shifted to let her walk past and followed her down the hall. “They’re decorating the tree.”
She glanced over her shoulder in surprise. “Little John, too?”
“Well, no.” He gave a little shrug. “Me either, actually.”
“What’s your excuse?”
“I guess I don’t have one.”
She gave him a look. “That’s what I thought. Try to remember, John, it’s Christmas. Come on.”
She led him back into the living room and put him to work with the others. She brought Little John off the couch and spent time trying to show him how to hang ornaments. He stared at her blankly, watched Harper for a few minutes, hung one ornament, and went back to the couch. Nest seemed unperturbed. She strung tinsel and lights for a time, then went over to sit with him. Kneeling at his side, she began speaking softly to him. Ross couldn’t quite catch what she was saying, but it was something about the park and the things that lived in it. He heard her mention Pick and the feeders. He heard her speak of tatterdemalions, sylvans, and the magic they managed. She took her time, not rushing things, just carrying on a conversation as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
When the tree was decorated, she brought out cookies and hot chocolate, and they sat around the tree talking about Santa Claus and reindeer. Harper asked questions, and Nest supplied answers. Bennett listened and looked off into space, as if marking time. Outside, it was growing dark, the twilight fading away, the snowstorm disappearing into a blackness punctured only by the diffuse glow of streetlamps and porch lights, flurries chasing each other like moths about a flame. Cars edged down the roadway, slow and cautious metal beasts in search of their lairs. In the fireplace, the crackling of the burning logs was a steady reassurance.
It was nearing five when the phone rang. Nest walked to the kitchen to answer it, spoke for a few minutes, then summoned John. “It’s Josie,” she said. She arched one eyebrow questioningly and handed him the receiver.
He looked at her for a moment, then placed the receiver against his ear, staring out the kitchen window into the streetlit blackness.
“Hello.”
“I don’t mean to bother you, John,” Josie said quickly, “but I didn’t like the way we left things yesterday. It felt awkward. It’s been a long time, and seeing you like that really threw me. I can’t even remember what I said. Except that I asked you to dinner tonight, and I guess, thinking it over, I was a little pushy.”
“I didn’t think so,” he said.
He heard her soft sigh in the receiver. “I don’t know. It didn’t feel that way. You seemed a little put off by it.”
“No.” He shifted his weight to lean against the counter. “I appreciated the invitation. I just didn’t know what to say. I have some concerns about Little John, that’s all.”
“You could bring him. He would be welcome.” She paused. “I guess that’s another invitation, isn’t it? I’m standing in my kitchen, making this dinner, and I end up thinking about you. So I call to tell you I’m sorry for being pushy yesterday, then I get pushy all over again. Pathetic, huh?”
He still remembered her kitchen from fifteen years earlier, when she had dressed the wounds he had suffered during his fight with the steel-mill workers in Sinnissippi Park. He could picture her there now, the way she would look, how she would be standing, what she would be looking at as she spoke to him.