Page 171 of Reckless Hearts

Seven Years Later

Of all the different looks I’ve seen my husband pull off over the years—tuxedos on the red carpet, a spacesuit for the movieUnexplored, an Elizabethan doublet and hose for his Shakespeare-inspired dramaThe Bard’s Secret—this might be my favorite.

Besides when he’s naked, of course.

“That hat really suits you,” I say.

Marcus gives me a look that lets me know if it weren’t for the little ears currently present, he’d be saying something decidedly unflattering right now.

Instead, he adjusts the Santa hat on his head and reaches for the next present in his sack.

“And this one is for Marley.” He gives the present to our niece, who is sitting in the lap of Saskia’s husband Joe. Marley is only two, so she looks up at Marcus with an adorable mix of confusion and excitement, unsure whether to focus on the gift or the man in the red suit.

“Papa, you forgot to say ho, ho, ho,” George says seriously. We can always count on George to correct any of our transgressions.

“You’re right. Ho, ho, ho. Merry Christmas, Marley.” Marcus inserts so much joviality into his voice for a second that it’s easy to believe he’s actually a rotund, rosy-cheeked man who just stepped out of a North Pole toy shop rather than a thirty-eight-year-old New Zealander currently sweating up a storm in a synthetic Santa suit.

Summer Christmas and Santa suits are definitely not a match made in heaven.

But I guess it’s not surprising Marcus can pull off a great Santa. He is the winner of an Academy Award, after all.

It’s such a beautiful morning that we decided to open Christmas presents on my parents’ back deck. The Pohutukawa’s crimson canopy showers the deck with delicate petals, like nature wanted to provide its own confetti to mark our Christmas celebrations.

Our daughter Mia is snuggled next to my mother, showing her the stuffed penguin she received in her Santa stocking this morning.

“Nana, you hold him,” Mia orders, attempting to arrange the penguin and my mother’s arms to her exact specifications. My mother complies, letting Mia position and reposition the stuffed animal until it meets some mysterious criteria only a five-year-old understands.

My parents are extremely doting grandparents to our twins, stepping up to help when Marcus is away on location. He tries to only film overseas once a year so he’s not away from the kids for too long. When he’s home, he does a few local acting projects but mainly focuses on doing all the day-to-day stuff with the kids so I can continue to chase tenure.

It hasn’t always been easy.

Initially, there was the relentless prying into our relationship. I guess it’s understandable that after Marcus’s speech at the Academy Awards, there was lots of attention focused on whether he got his happy ever after. For a while, photographers stalked our every move. Having my face plastered across the news and social media was a new experience and not one I ever want to repeat.

Although, it was quite amusing to see the reaction from my university colleagues and my Rainbow Rascals teammates. I guess I wasn’t the most obvious candidate for “movie star’s boyfriend.”

The only silver lining was fairy terns received far more attention than ever before, especially after a photo of Marcus hand-feeding a chick went viral.

Luckily, the interest in our lives has faded over time. Living in the backwater of New Zealand, where people tend to be more laid-back about celebrities in their midst, has definitely made it easier.

Marcus is still in therapy. He still has days when he struggles, when the ghosts of his past are loud in his head, when he worries about whether he can be enough for me, George, and Mia.

Marcus hands Mia her next present, then crouches beside her to help her unwrap it. When she reveals the child-sized lab coat withDr. Miaembroidered on the pocket, her face lights up.

“Now I can be just like Daddy!” she says as she immediately tries to put it on.

“Here, let me help,” Marcus says, holding the coat while she slips her arms in.

He straightens when he finishes, grinning down at her. “Daddy saves endangered birds. What are you going to save?”

“Everything!” Mia declares with the absolute certainty only a five-year-old can muster. “Birds and tigers and whales and…”She continues listing animals while Marcus and my mother exchange smiles.

Seeing Marcus now, it’s strange to remember how terrified he was about being a parent. When Saskia was pregnant with the twins, he would wake up in the night with nightmares, his subconscious playing out every parental fear in vivid detail.

I was so worried he’d only pushed for us to have kids together because he knew it was what I wanted and that becoming a father would derail his recovery.

But his therapist worked hard to help Marcus confront his deepest fears about parenthood, unpack the complex emotions tied to his own childhood, and develop coping strategies for the inevitable challenges of raising children.

And from the moment Marcus was handed George as a newborn, and I saw the look on his face as he gazed down at him, I knew we would be okay.