My True Love Gave to Me: Twelve Holiday Stories (17 page)

The air was cleaner. Emptier. As more space was created, Marigold became more aware of her breath, became aware that she
could
breathe. Her lungs felt hungry.

“What about the couch?” she asked. “It’s still in my bedroom.”

North mopped his forehead with his shirtsleeve. He was sweating. “It’s going in the living room so you can use it.”

The thought—that incredibly simple thought—felt peculiar.

“You guys need something to sit on beside your beds. Somewhere to relax when you come home from work.” He unbuttoned his red-plaid flannel shirt. “Something to sit on while you admire my tree.”

Holy mother of Earth. Marigold was thankful she was already flushed from exertion. She tried to remain focused, but the sight of North undressing was monumentally distracting. “You keep calling it
your
tree.”

He grinned. “I grew it, didn’t I?”

“I bought it, didn’t I?”

“And I’m very glad you did.” North tossed aside the flannel shirt. He was now wearing a black T-shirt … with an NPR logo on it.

Marigold was doubly tongue-tied.

She knew, on some level, that North must like her. Guys just didn’t
do
things like this if they
didn’t
like you. But this was the first out-loud acknowledgment that maybe he was here for something more than utilizing his superhuman organizational skills.

It was thrilling.

And then … there was the T-shirt. National Public Radio seemed like something a boy who liked
indoor
activities would be interested in. Maybe they had more in common than she thought they did, more than a mutual appreciation for verbal sparring.

But the fact that Marigold hadn’t immediately given him a smartass retort took North’s own smartassery down a notch. He looked unsure of himself, like maybe he’d misread the situation. Maybe she wasn’t interested in him.

Oh, Marigold was interested.

Marigold was
definitely
interested.

She gave him a cocky smile. “NPR, huh?”

Her expression made him straighten his shoulders, and Marigold couldn’t help but notice—really, really notice—the shape of his upper body. The fact that it
had
a shape. But as her question sunk in, he grew embarrassed. He turned around to shove a shoebox filled with nuts and bolts into one of the last remaining crevices.

“I got it during their last pledge drive,” he said, meaning the T-shirt.

“Mm-hm,” Marigold said.

“I like keeping up with the news. I like learning things.”

“My
mom
listens to NPR.”

His back was still turned. “So I should have asked this earlier, but are there any boxes of Christmas”—he shook his head—“
Yule
decorations that we should be looking for?”

He was changing the subject instead of playing along. Interesting. Until now, he hadn’t seemed like someone who could resist a comeback.

“Or are solstice trees bare?” he continued drily. “The way nature made them?”

There
was the North she knew. But … she didn’t know him, did she? Marigold was suddenly struck by how badly she
wanted
to know him.

She moved toward him. “We decorate ours.”

North turned around, not realizing how close she was standing behind him. He didn’t step backward, and his confidence didn’t waver. “So you’re saying there’s a box.”

His voice was so deep that it rattled through her. “Yeah. There are two.”

North smiled. “Care to describe these boxes?”

“One is for an old Fisher-Price castle. The other is for a Fisher-Price Tudor house.”

“I don’t think I’ve seen those yet.” His voice had gotten even deeper, somehow. Even—okay, she could admit it—
sexier.
Deep and sexy … about Fisher-Price boxes.

She turned away from him, smiling to herself. “Can I get you something to drink? Water? Coffee? Tea?”

He seemed amused by her amusement. Even if he didn’t understand it. “Yeah. Coffee, thanks.”

The kitchen was a wreck, but—unlike how the rest of the apartment had been—it contained more room to maneuver around in. As Marigold brewed the coffee, North grabbed a round patio table and two dining room chairs, and he made a cozy new dining area in one corner of the living room. Marigold usually ate standing up or at her desk. She couldn’t remember the last time she and her mother had eaten together.

North appeared behind her, pointing at her coffee-making device. “What’s that?”

“A French press.”

“Fancy.”

She shrugged. “My mom doesn’t believe in electric coffeemakers.”

“At least she believes in coffee.”

Marigold laughed as she removed two mugs (handmade, her mother also believed in supporting local artists) from the cabinet. “How do you take yours?”

“Black,” he said.

“Figures. A hearty lumberjack like yourself.”

North snorted.

Marigold grinned. “I take mine black, too.”

He leaned over the island in the kitchen, leaned his tall body toward hers. “And here I had you figured for an herbal-tea kind of girl.”

“Right.” Marigold rolled her eyes. She handed him his coffee. “Because of the restaurant.”

“Because of the
solstice.
And your
name.
And this
pottery.
” He held up the mug. “What’s the restaurant?”

She’d forgotten that she hadn’t told him. It seemed like he should already know. Marigold sat down at the patio table, and North sat across from her. “My mom owns a late-night vegan comfort-food restaurant downtown,” she said in one breath. “Yes, I know. It’s very Asheville.”

“Henrietta’s? Is your mom
Henrietta
?”

Marigold’s eyebrows shot up in surprise.

North shrugged. “There aren’t many late-night restaurants—and there aren’t
any
in Sugar Cove—so I’ve wound up there after a ton of movies and shows. Everyone knows your mom,” he added. “Or, at least, her reputation. Helping out the homeless and all. It’s pretty cool.”

Marigold had expected him to tease her. Instead, she felt a lump in her throat. It had been awhile since she’d heard anyone speak well of Henrietta. Her mother’s employees were as sick of the sadness and anger as Marigold was. But her mother had built her reputation on feeding everyone well, regardless of how much money they had in their pockets. Included on her menu was a simple beans-and-rice dish that customers paid for on a sliding scale. Those who paid
more
than the dish was worth, their money went toward those who had little or none. People were surprisingly good at paying it forward.

“Thank you.” Marigold could barely speak the words.

“Are you a vegan?”

“Not even a vegetarian. But,” she admitted, “I eat mainly vegan by default. I’m not allowed to have meat in the house, so I
used
to eat it in the school cafeteria.”

“School-lunch meat. That’s desperation.”

Marigold smiled. “You have no idea.”

“So … you aren’t a student anymore?”

“Not since I graduated high school. You?”

“Same,” North said. “How old are you?”

“Nineteen. You?”

“Same.”

They smiled at each other, shyly. Pleased. The moment grew bigger and bigger, until it was
too
big. North shifted in his seat. “I was a vegetarian for a few months. I had to go back to eating meat, because I needed that level of protein and energy for the farm work. But the moment I’m out of here, I’m gonna try it again.”

“You aren’t interested in the family business?”

“No way. You?”

Marigold shook her head. “The restaurant gene did
not
pass on to me. My grandparents also own a restaurant,” she explained. “Down in Atlanta.”

“That’s cool. My grandparents started our tree farm.”

“Family owned and operated since 1964,” she said, quoting their sign.

Something flashed inside North’s eyes. As if he were feeling the same thing she’d felt when he’d spoken highly of her mother. Pride, maybe relief. “That’s right,” he said.

“So why don’t you want to be a farmer, North Drummond?”

“Just not in me.” He sipped his coffee. “Like you and restaurant-ing, I suppose.”

But there was something in his tone that he couldn’t quite hide. Something that was more distressed than indifferent.

“So,” she asked again. “Why don’t you want to be a farmer, North Drummond?”

He smiled grimly. “It’s true that I’m not interested in it. But Nick—my older brother who was
supposed
to inherit the farm—it turned out that he didn’t want it, either. About two years ago, he left in the middle of the night. Packed up everything he owned and moved to Virginia to live with his girlfriend. Now they breed designer dogs. Puggles and Labradoodles.”

Marigold was struck by the excessive bitterness in his pronunciation of these words. “But … wasn’t he getting out, like you want to do?”

“My dad had just been diagnosed with Parkinson’s.”

“Shit. Oh,
shit.
I’m sorry.”

North stared at his coffee mug. “It’s getting harder for him to work, and my parents have been relying on me more and more. They want me to take over the farm, but my sister is the one who actually wants it. My parents are good people, but … they’re kind of old-fashioned. There was a big fight last summer. Now Noelle’s gone, too.”

Marigold wished she could reach through the table to hug him. She understood everything—the love, the shame, the needing to stay until things were okay again.

“I’ve been trying to convince her to come back—and trying to convince my parents to give
her
the farm—so that I can leave.”

“Why can’t you just leave anyway? Like your brother and sister did?”

“The farm barely turns a profit as it is. My parents would go broke without me.”

Marigold swallowed. She’d made the same decision. She had also put her future on hold. “I—I’m staying home to help out, too.”

North looked up. His hardness, his edge, dissolved. “Does this have something to do with your father?”

“It has everything to do with my father.”

“And the reason why you’ve been living like this?”

Now Marigold was the one staring at her coffee. “You know those stories about women who didn’t know that their husbands had secret, second families?”

“Yeah.”

Marigold shrugged.

There was a beat. “Are you serious? You can’t be serious.”

“In Charlotte. A wife and two daughters.”

North looked appropriately shocked.

“They weren’t happy to hear about our existence either,” Marigold said. “And now he’s living there. With them. Making amends. To them. Maybe starting a third and fourth secret family, I don’t know. We found out just before Christmas, last year.”

North shook his head. “I didn’t know things like that happened in real life.”

Marigold hadn’t known either.

“So why didn’t you get to keep your house?” he asked.

“Because my mom and I …
we
were the second family.”

North’s eyes widened with understanding.

“He married the other woman before he ever met my mom. We were his exotic, wild-child, hippie side project.” Marigold spat this like poison. “So now his wife, his legal wife, is taking all the money in lawsuits. He had to sell our house, and we had to move.”

“I’m sorry. I don’t even know what to say.”

She pushed away her mug. “We’re gonna find a new house this spring.”

“And … you’ll stay here in Asheville? Helping your mom?”

Marigold had almost forgotten why she’d approached North in the first place. Almost. She’d decided that even if he couldn’t do it—or, more likely, even if she never asked him to do it—having another person to talk to was enough.
Tonight
was enough.

“It’s hard, you know?” she said. “I love this town. I love its art deco architecture and its never-ending music festivals. Its overly friendly locals. But … there’s no future for me here. No career. When my mom’s settled, I’m moving to Atlanta.”

North frowned. “To work with your grandparents?”

“No.” But her smile returned, because he’d remembered. “Animation.”

She scooted forward with a new eagerness and told him about the studios that were only three-and-a-half hours away. How the market in Atlanta had been growing for years—how the major television networks were all creating shows down there. She told him about her YouTube channel, her success, her aspirations. Marigold told him everything. Everything except the crucial role that she’d wanted him to play in this.

North leaned in. “Do you want to go to college for that? For animation?”

“I want to work. I’m
ready
to work.” Marigold paused. “Do you want to go to college?”

“Yeah. I do…” But he trailed off, embarrassed.

Marigold leaned in. Mirroring him.

His words came out in a rush as he gestured at his T-shirt. “I know it’s a dying art and all that, but I want to study broadcasting. I want to work in radio.”

An alarm sounded, full blast, inside Marigold’s head.

“Someone once told me I had a good voice for radio,” he continued. “I’ve never been able to get it out of my head. And I
love
radio. And podcasts. I listen to
This American Life
and
WTF
and
Radiolab
all day long, obsessively, while I work.”

“You
do
have a good voice. You have an
amazing
voice.”

North looked taken aback by her level of enthusiasm, but it was too late to stop.

“I have a confession,” she said. And the rest of her story poured out, the one that revealed that this whole night had been about the sound of his voice.

North was frozen.

“—and I’ve clearly freaked you out, and I’m totally mortified, and now I’m going to stop talking,” she said.
And now I’m going to die.

There was a long and painful silence. And then North’s features slid back into their usual state of composure. “First of all,” he said, as smoothly and sardonically as anything he’d said yet, “I’m flattered that you came looking for
me
and not a tree. This shows excellent taste on your behalf.”