Love at Last (5 page)

     Noah crooked his finger toward the blond little girl and leaned close as if to tell her  a secret. “Mrs. Claus doesn’t know how to hug. Can you show her how?”

     The child grimaced and shook her head no.

     “I’m sorry I pulled away,” Kristen said. “I’d love to learn how to hug.”

     The girl bit her lip and appeared unsure.

     “Please?” Kristen coaxed.

     “It’s safe,” Santa Noah told the girl. “She just hugged me in the hallway.”

     The girl smiled and Kristen couldn’t help notice the child gave ‘Santa’ her complete trust. And with that trust, came a look of peace. The blond reached out her arms once more and this time Kristen didn’t pull away. She even placed her own arms around the sick child, a bit awkward at first, but then as she thought about her own childhood, with more empathy.

     Why didn’t her family ever hug each other like this?

     Kristen and Noah visited several more rooms and ended up in the cafeteria where they were greeted by some of the healthier patients and staff. Everyone seemed so happy to see them. It must have been contagious because Kristen found her own mood lifting to match theirs.

     Noah nudged her arm. “You did good, Mrs. Claus, once you got started.”

     Kristen almost laughed and Noah pointed to her face.

     “Is that a smile? If I didn’t know better, I’d say you enjoyed yourself today.”

     Kristen removed the wire-rimmed glasses and put them into the pocket of her red and white striped apron. “It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be.”

     “Hugging the kids, or hugging me?”

     This time she
did
laugh. “The kids, of course. Hugging you was horrible.”

     “So I guess you wouldn’t want me to do it again?”

     “No.”

     Noah looked into her eyes and gasped. “But you’re unsure.”

     “I am not,” Kristen retorted, careful to keep her voice firm.

     “Well, if I’m as horrible as you say, then I guess another hug wouldn’t change anything, would it?”

     Before Kristen could protest, Noah pulled her close. At first she tensed, unable to stop the ingrained impulse to protect herself, to shield herself from vulnerability. But then a peculiar sense of warmth, a sense of
peace
, enveloped her. And for one moment she let go, relaxed, and closed her eyes.

     “Would it?” he repeated. “Make a difference?”

     “No,” she said, and smiled. “You’re still horrible.”

     The following morning, Noah Goodwell strolled down the office corridor handing out his ever-cheerful round of  greetings. Kristen shook her head at his behavior, but today she did it with a lighter heart.

     Noah poked his head into her office. “Ready to visit the school for disabled children, Mrs. Claus?”

     “I’m not Mrs. Claus until I put on that ridiculous white wig,” Kristen said. She looked at her watch. “Until two o’clock I’m still Kristen.”

     “I look forward to your divine transformation, Kristen,” Noah teased. He held up two fingers. “I’ll see you then.”

     Kristen returned to the ideas she had typed into her desktop computer. If she couldn’t come up with a better slogan for the Children’s Center, the account would no doubt go to Noah. She didn’t know why Mr. Vanderbilt didn’t give the account to Noah in the first place. Noah was good with kids. He cared about them. He would have come up with a slogan to fit the Children’s Center’s mission statement on the first try.

     She drummed her fingers on her desk. What kind of slogan would a guy like Noah come up with? Something spontaneous. Something playful.
Fun
.

     The fact the administrator of the Children’s Center didn’t think her slogan contained any of these elements didn’t sit well. She couldn’t help think it was a reflection of
her
.

     Of course she wasn’t spontaneous. Spontaneous people were reckless, silly individuals who usually ended up in a heap of trouble. She and her brother were raised to be dignified, by very proper, well-educated, dignified parents.

     Still, Barry Winters comments niggled at her, hurt, like he’d thrown a mocking barb. Did people think she was uptight, straight-laced, and boring? Since when did she care?

     The school for the disabled and mentally impaired welcomed Mr. and Mrs. Claus with open-hearted cheers.

     Noah pulled out a string and two-inch metal ring from the pocket of his Santa suit. “If I drop this ring down the string and it slides to the ground, the person before me doesn’t believe in Christmas. But if the ring hangs on the string like a necklace? What does that mean?”

     The children shouted. “You believe!”

     “Do you believe in Christmas?” Noah asked them.

     “Yes!”

     Noah dropped the ring and it swung back and forth on the string. “You
do
believe in Christmas!”

     “How about Mrs. Claus?” one boy asked with a slight slur.

     Noah dropped the ring down the string a second time and this time it fell to the floor. “Oh no! Mrs. Claus doesn’t believe in Christmas.”

     The kids gasped, their eyes wide.

     Noah glanced at Kristen and she shot him a look of resentment. “Kids, how can we turn Mrs. Claus into a believer?”

     “Give her a candy cane!” a red head in a wheelchair shouted.

     “Give her a stocking with her name on it?” asked another. 

     “How ‘bout we give her a present,” a young boy suggested. He walked over to Kristen and handed her a very distorted wreath sculpted from bread. The kind kids make from flour, water, and salt, and bake in the oven until rock hard.

     Noah tensed, as he awaited Kristen’s reaction.
Don’t blow it. Please don’t hurt these children’s feelings.

     Kristen looked at the gift, said thank you, and with a big smile, she lifted the bread dough wreath to her mouth.

     “You don’t eat it,” the boy shouted, pulling her arm down. “You wear it!”

     “It’s a pin,” Noah told her, and laughed at the confused expression on her face.

     The whole auditorium of kids laughed too.

     Kristen turned the wreath over, discovered the safety pin glued to the back, and blushed a furious crimson bright enough to match her Mrs. Claus dress.

     “You could have warned me,” she hissed under her breath, as she drew near him. “But no, you let me make a fool out of myself. And you laughed.”

     “Of course I laughed,” he countered. “It was funny.”

     “You think everything is funny, don’t you? I bet you haven’t ever had a bad day in your life. Every day is just a big, fun-filled party for you, isn’t it? A colorful, gift-wrapped present!”

     Noah smiled and waved to the crowd, glad that Kristen at least had the decency to keep her voice below the children’s hearing.     

     “For your information, I
have
had a bad day. Several of them. Days when I didn’t know why I survived the car accident and my younger brother didn’t. Days when I questioned if his death was my fault instead of the driver who took us out.”

     Kristen’s mouth popped open and she cast him a look laced with surprise and guilt. She waved to the children lining up to come sit on their laps, then turned back to him once again.

     “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m really sorry.”

     Noah leaned close to her ear. “When I lay there in the hospital bed, wondering if I would live or die, there was only one thing in this world that mattered. My brother. My family. Relationships, Kristen. Nothing else matters. Life
is
a big, colorful present, just waiting to be unwrapped... and enjoyed... with those around you.”

     A young girl wiggled her way on to Kristen’s lap. “Do you believe in Christmas now, Mrs. Claus?”

     “I think I’m starting to,” Kristen said, her voice soft, and gave the girl a slight squeeze.

     Noah took a deep breath and wondered what had got into him. Instead of helping Kristen find happiness, he’d vented his own frustrations and made them both feel bad. Couldn’t they spend one day together that didn’t turn sour?

     Kristen focused on the children, each one happy to see her. Each one anxious to share their Christmas list in hopes of receiving their heart’s desires. If only everyone could be so full of joy. If only everyone could be so cheerful and nice... as
Noah.

     She’d been wrong about him. Noah’s sweetness wasn’t fake. It was very, very real. His emotions were real, not hidden behind social masks or nuances. He was a real sweet Santa. Maybe she could try to be a real... sweet... Mrs. Claus.

     “I like your pin,” one pig-tailed girl told her, “and I like you. You’re my best friend.”

     “Your best friend?” Kristen laughed. “But you didn’t know me until today.”

     “I know you now,” the child replied.

     Kristen shared a look with Noah, who had overheard, and her heart turned over. Why did he suddenly look so different? Ashley was right. Noah was a very handsome man, with or without the white Santa beard.

     When the school day was over, Kristen and Noah returned to the parking lot where they’d left his Jeep Cherokee.

     “I want to apologize for earlier today,” Noah said, “when I-”

     “No,” Kristen said, cutting him off. “I’m the one who needs to apologize. “I haven’t exactly been on board for this whole Santa and Mrs. Claus idea. I didn’t even think I liked you, but...” She touched his arm. “I know you now.”

     Noah cocked his head to the side and gave her a wide grin.  “Does that mean we’re best friends?”

     Kristen smiled back, her heart beating faster. Now that she liked him, was it possible he could like her too?

     On the third day of scheduled events, Kristen came to work with several slogans for the Children’s Center circling in her head. 
Kids connecting for fun, friendship, and adventure. Good food, fun, and friendship. Kids committed to peace, joy, and fun-filled opportunities.

     Five minutes after she sat down at her desk, Noah walked in and placed a steaming cup of dark liquid on her desk.

     Kristen sat up straighter. “Coffee?”

     Noah shook his head. “Hot cocoa.”

     “Thank you, but I think my brain needs caffeine.”

     “I thought chocolate would be better for my new BFF. Chocolate contains phenylethylamine which stimulates the brain and gives one the same feeling as being in love.”

     “Are you implying I’m the office Grinch?”

     Noah grinned. “Nah. I always thought of you as the office Scrooge - but a very attractive Scrooge.”

     “I am a Scrooge,” Kristen admitted. “I’m sorry if I haven’t been much fun.”

     “Do you want to have fun?”

     The sparkle in his eyes and the mischievous smile on his lips pulled the truth right out from under her, leaving her knocked down and breathless.

     “Yes,” she said, “I do.”

     “Then let’s make a pact. Our goal is to have fun no matter what happens today.”

     “Okay,” Kristen agreed, but doubts whispered in the back of her mind.
If only it were that easy.

     After lunch, Kristen took extra care to put on the red Mrs. Claus dress with the red and white pin-striped apron. She tucked her long dark hair up into the white granny hat and adjusted the wire-rimmed glasses midway down her nose.

    Leaning toward the bathroom mirror, she smiled at her reflection and wondered if she and Noah could get their picture taken together. Then she could show her brother on Christmas, because he wouldn’t believe her when she told him what she did  this week.

    The third event she and Noah were to attend was held at the Children’s Center - the same center for which she was trying to come up with an appropriate advertising slogan.

     “Some of the kids come here after school because both of their parents work and can’t pick them up until later,” Noah told her. “And some of the kids come to escape family trauma at home. What they need most is love and attention, someone to talk to and believe in them.”

     Kristen took a stocking filled with candy canes from the back of his car. “Just like we need kids to believe in us?”

     “I believe in you,” Noah said, his gaze steady as he looked into her eyes.

     Kristen hesitated. If Noah didn’t look so serious, she’d think he meant he believed in her as Mrs. Claus. But the intensity of his expression made her think he meant something more - like he believed in her as herself - Kristen.

     When they arrived at the outdoor play area two of the Children’s Center coordinator’s were busy helping kids dress in wise men, shepherd, angel, and animal costumes. Three other coordinators were trying to corral the rest of the boys and girls into a group in front of a painted cardboard Nativity set.

     “Look who’s here to watch our Christmas play,” one of the coordinators announced. “It’s Santa Claus and Mrs. Claus!”

     The kids broke away from their assigned positions and ran toward them with cries of delight.

    All except one brown-haired girl about nine years old who Kristen spotted sitting on the concrete, with her head part-way down, alone in the corner.

     “Who’s that?” Kristen asked one of the women in charge. “Why isn’t that young girl in a costume?”   

     “Callista Weisburg,” the coordinator said with a frown. “We call her Callie.”

     “I call her
‘iceberg,’”
a boy beside them sneered.

     “Tommy, that’s not nice,” the coordinator reprimanded.

     “But it’s true,” Tommy said. “Callie Weisburg, sits on her iceberg, watching everyone else play. Not even a spider would sit down beside her, because she keeps to herself all day!”

     Kristen stiffened at the revised nursery-rhyme insult and narrowed her eyes on the boy. “If you keep saying that, you’ll end up with coal in your stocking this Christmas.”

     The coordinator gasped but Kristen didn’t care. She marched straight toward the young girl and sat down beside her.

     “Hi Callie, I’m Kristen. Lately, people call me Mrs. Claus.”

     Callie lifted her gaze. “Hi.”

     “Don’t you want to be in the play?” Kristen asked.

     “No,” Callie said, and glanced at the other children. “It’s better if I’m not.”

     “How is it better?”

     “The other kids don’t think I’m good at anything but homework. The less I’m with them, the less they can mock me and call me names.”

     “I know,” Kristen said, and remembered the way she herself had hid away from the other kids at school for the same reason. “It hurts when the other kids think you are different or not good enough to be with them. They gang up on you and make you feel alone. So you keep to yourself and choose to be alone before they can make the choice for you.”

     “Have
you
ever been alone?” Callie asked, shifting her position and looking straight at her.

     “I’m alone all the time,” Kristen admitted, “and I discovered something this week.”

     “What?” asked the girl.

     “I don’t like it.”

     Callie was quiet several seconds and then said, “What do we do about it?”

     Kristen nodded toward Noah who kept glancing their way. “Do you see that jolly old elf with the white beard and the red suit? No matter what people say about him, he goes out of his way to help people. Even when they don’t deserve it, he greets people, gives gifts, and tries to be a friend. What do you think would happen if we did that?”