Page 10 of A Spell for Midwinter’s Heart
The path to the main stage went past Santa’s carousel, and Rowan slowed to watch it complete a full turn.
It was small, but the workmanship was as impressive as any, carved and painted to brilliant detail, festooned with gilt and lit up with bulbous lights.
Like most things at the festival, it’d been made by the people of Elk Ridge.
Her grandfather had felled the wood they’d carved the animals from, and he’d carved Rudolph, who flew at the front of Santa’s team with a giddy teenage girl on his back.
There was only room for eleven riders, one on each reindeer and two with Santa in the sleigh, but it still enchanted Rowan’s adult eyes.
Held aloft by candy cane pillars, the reindeer descended and ascended in a rippling formation against a black velvet backdrop fixed with tinkling spots, which created the illusion of a journey through a starry night.
Instead of the usual old man with a beard, a furry Sasquatch dressed in Santa’s reds sat in the driver’s seat. Santa-squatch had been delighting visitors young and old for as long as she could remember, and in all those years, she’d never figured out who was in the costume.
Or whether it even was a costume. She squinted his way, allowing herself to spend a moment wondering, before moving on.
The carolers had assembled on the stage in an assortment of tartan period costumes. The feminine singers had their hands stuffed in heavy white fur muffs, while the masculine all wore tall stovepipe hats.
As Rowan claimed a spot toward the center of the audience, a woman’s high-pitched laugh caught her attention. That was when she noticed a familiar face in the crowd.
Standing only a few feet away was Gavin with the laughing woman at his side, the two of them standing so close that their bodies brushed with the sway of her amusement.
The woman was tall and slender, wearing a solid white parka with a silver faux-fur collar and matching hat that slouched to frame her pale blond hair, which split to fall in strands over her high, defined cheekbones.
Her makeup was impeccable, her hair was smooth as butter, and her pants were pressed free of wrinkles.
This woman was, in short, everything Rowan had been searching for at the airport, and her stomach soured as she was left aware of the small mat forming in the underside of her curls, the worn cuffs of her sweater, the pooch in her stomach.
Gavin’s companion reached out and adjusted his coat, sliding her hand down his chest when she was done. The intimacy of the gesture only intensified Rowan’s unwelcome feelings. She made to slip away to another part of the crowd, but before she could, Gavin caught sight of her.
“Rowan. Hello.” He sidestepped from his companion, leaving the woman’s hand hanging in midair.
“Ah…hi, Gavin,” said Rowan, coming to a halt. “And, um…”
The other woman looked Rowan’s way, eyes sliding up and down in appraisal as she lowered her hand to cross it over her front.
“Hayleigh,” she said, flashing white teeth. “Nice to meet you, Ronan.”
“Rowan,” corrected Gavin. “Rowan Midwinter.”
“Midwinter? As in the Midwinters?” Hayleigh’s voice took on a note of amusement, her smile sliding back to land on Gavin with a hint of mischief.
Had they been talking about her family? Had they been laughing at her family?
“Rowan’s mother runs the festival,” said Gavin.
“Are you two here for the show?” asked Rowan, doing her best to keep her tone neutral.
“I was dropping this guy off,” said Hayleigh, settling her hand on Gavin’s forearm. “We had a couple of drinks and unwound together after some meetings.” Rowan’s brain latched onto the idea that they had “unwound together,” offering unhelpful suggestions about what that might mean.
“Do you work for Mr. McCreery?”
“ For him?” Hayleigh laughed, exposing those perfectly straight and eerily white teeth again. “No, I’m with the Goshen Group. You might have heard our company has taken an interest in the future of Elk Ridge, this festival in particular.”
Every inch of Rowan’s body ran cold. “Yeah, I heard.”
“I was showing Hayleigh how invested the community is in all the festival’s traditions,” said Gavin. “I’ve been trying to convince her to stay for the Solstice parade.”
“Isn’t he just the sweetest?” said Hayleigh, touching the chest of his jacket again.
“Always looking out for the little guy. Why, he has spent the whole day trying to convince me of every little special interest being catered to here.” She locked eyes with Rowan.
“Even when it’s clear they’re not only costing much more than they bring in but leading to the exclusion of a much larger audience. ”
Rowan blinked. “Are you trying to argue that by being more inclusive, the festival is somehow excluding people?”
Hayleigh’s laugh was high and airy. “I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that most people are tired of getting treated like they committed a crime if they say ‘Merry Christmas.’?”
“I promise you,” said Gavin with a patient smile, “no one who says ‘Merry Christmas’ is going to get anything but well-wishes in return.”
“Those special interests you mentioned,” said Rowan, “represent the sincerely held beliefs and cultural traditions of people who live here. Are you saying we should just ignore that?”
“I’m saying that most Americans are interested in a good, old-fashioned American Christmas.
And they don’t want to be vilified for remembering the reason for the season.
” Hayleigh leaned toward Rowan. “You can pretend it isn’t true, but look around you.
It seems like this festival’s woke is, well, making it go a wee bit broke, and taking this beautiful town with it.
Many, most, people in this community agree with me on this.
Shouldn’t they have a say too? If something’s best for most people, isn’t it a bit selfish to ignore that for your own sake? ”
Rowan opened her mouth to reply, but her heart seized. Was there a chance Hayleigh was right? Was this what most people wanted?
The Wassailers hummed their first notes. “Well, that’s my cue,” said Hayleigh. She turned back to Gavin, smoothing his coat one more time. “See you bright and early tomorrow.”
Gavin nodded with a small smile. “Good night.”
Hayleigh glanced Rowan’s way one more time. “Nice to meet you, Ronan—”
“Rowan,” she said, unable to hold back her irritation.
Hayleigh didn’t correct herself, only finished with a bright “Merry Christmas!”
And then she was gone, leaving them to await the start of the music in silence. Gavin stood with his hands in his pockets and his eyes fixed on the stage, while Rowan rocked back and forth on her heels.
A chill wound its way into her bones, and her teeth chattered as her body gave a shudder. Gavin glanced to the side with an arch of one dark eyebrow and seemed to prepare to say something, but at that exact moment, the leader of the singers stepped forward.
In a jolly faux-British accent, he called, “Welcome, welcome! We are so pleased you have joined us for this evening of merriment!”
After a brief introduction, the Wassailers launched into their first song, a rousing rendition of “Here We Come a-Wassailing.”
Unable to help herself, Rowan sang under her breath along with them. After a few stanzas, a confident baritone joined in. She looked up and found Gavin singing, all chesty vibrato and sincerity. He noticed her gaze and smiled briefly.
As they finished up, the lead singer announced, “I noticed a few of you shyly joining in our last song.”
He looked straight at Gavin and Rowan, and they exchanged a conspiratorial glance.
It reminded her of times they’d been caught goofing off during group work at school—or rather the times she had been, usually because he’d shown up to class with a particularly deep frown, and she’d taken the challenge to flip it to a smile.
“There’s no need to hold back, my friends!” said the Wassailers’ leader with a wink. “So put an arm around that beautiful lady and sing as loud as you please!”
Rowan seized up with a sudden anxiousness, coalescing around the thought of—what? That he might actually put his arm around her? The thought was beyond ridiculous.
Her breath hitched and her pulse picked up as her nerves hummed into motion.
She peeked at Gavin’s face, checking to see if he shared her distress, but his expression remained frustratingly unreadable.
He shifted from one foot to the other and then his arm shifted, and it almost seemed as if he might reach out.
But he didn’t. Only rolled his shoulders in a stretch.
The tension broke as the choir launched straight into “Deck the Halls” and the voices of the crowd surged around them to follow along.
It took several songs for her heart to slow all the way back down.