Page 21 of The Christmas Book Flood

ELEVEN

On Friday, Gattathefur the Door Sniffer came, so they had to make sure the flat was tidy, no stinky socks left in the laundry to scare the big-nosed troll away.

Tatiana and Elea went to work at the normal hour, which felt so luxurious that Tatiana still got up early and spent the time writing, her fingers flying as the final chapters of the story clicked into place.

Anders’s brothers sent fresh fish again for dinner, and it took forever to get Elea to settle into bed after he left, so excited was she for the Christmas Party at Uncle Valdi’s the next day.

Tatiana got the lamb fat into her deep pot and set it to heating while Elea, with the help of a chair, pulled out the saved-up rations of flour and sugar.

They laughed as they mixed the dough for the leaf bread, rolled it out as thin as they could get it, and Elea took the lead using their new iron to cut decorative designs.

Leaves here, snowflakes there. Tatiana handled lowering the dough into the bubbling fat and lifting it again on a slotted spoon soon after, the scent of crisp fried dough filling the kitchen.

They baked their cookies and even had enough sugar left over to make a small batch of icing for decorating them.

Then they began looking at the clock. Anders had promised to come over at three, so they’d have enough time to decorate the tree and then for the girls to get ready.

The party began at six, but it would take at least twenty minutes to drive to Valdi’s house.

.. possibly more like thirty, depending on how much snow fell today.

“Did you decide what to get him?” Elea asked at two thirty, as they scraped the bits of flour and dough and sugar off the table. They’d been careful, so there wasn’t much waste to clean up.

Tatiana sighed and held the rubbish bin for Elea to scrape the bits into.

She’d taken her lunch hour yesterday to go shopping—Helga and Anders had insisted they’d watch Elea through lunch, when she’d said she hadn’t yet gotten anything for Valdi or his family.

She’d found earrings for Camilla, a beautiful scarf for Beta, even a lovely fountain pen for Valdi, since his had seen better days.

But nothing she saw in the sparsely stocked shops looked right for Anders. Nothing said, I know you and want to know you more . Nothing said, I want this to be the beginning of forever .

It had been all she could do to shake off the frustration and enjoy their evening together. But as she’d lain in bed last night, mind churning not only over the gift dilemma and the recent days, but also the ending to her novel, she realized Elea had been right all along.

“I decided to take your advice.”

Her niece grinned. “You’re writing him a story?” Elea clapped. “Yay! Is that what you were working on yesterday?”

Throat too tight suddenly for words, Tatiana nodded.

A knock on the door silenced any further questions, which suited her fine. It was early to be Anders... yet somehow she wasn’t surprised to open the door and find him there, a sheepish grin on his face and juniper boughs in his arms.

“I’m early, I know,” he said, coming in when she stepped aside for him. “But I didn’t know how far I’d have to drive to find these so I gave myself far too much time, as it turned out.”

She breathed in the fresh scent, eyes going wide. “I thought it was a lost cause!” They’d both looked at the usual vendors the last two days, but neither had found either juniper or heather. She’d resigned herself to a bare-limbed dowel-rod tree this year.

She ought to have known Anders wouldn’t accept that answer. “You’re my hero!”

He shook his head, but the grin didn’t leave his face. “Hardly an epic feat.”

“It is to me.” To prove it, she leaned up to kiss his cheek, as she’d taken to doing whenever she could find an excuse, just to see the way his eyes lit. And the way he’d glance at her lips.

One of these days, he’d kiss her. Or if he dragged his feet about it much longer, then she’d just take matters into her own hands. A thought that had her grinning as Elea dashed up to take some of the boughs from him.

Between the three of them, they soon had the fresh greenery fastened to the wooden rods.

“What’s your tree like at home?” Anders asked Elea as he carried the boxes of ornaments from where Tatiana had stashed them beside the sofa to the end table that now held the fragrant tree.

“Big!” Elea stretched her arms upward, but she couldn’t get high enough. “As tall as you, at least. My pabbi made it for Mamma their first Christmas together, before I was born. It’s a lot like Aunt Tatta’s—all wooden rods painted green. Just bigger.”

Tatiana grinned. “He made this one for me that same year, actually. Same design, just scaled down. Growing up, we had one my father had made from old metal hangers.” Remembering the contraption that her mother had fondly dubbed “the metal monstrosity,” she had to laugh.

“It was horrible. Pabbi is good at many things, but making Christmas trees is not one of them. When Ari and Gunnar got married and my parents decided to give them the house and move to town, Mamma graciously offered to leave her the tree, and Ari graciously refused.” She sent a wink to her niece.

It had been a very laughter-filled argument as each woman tried to escape Pabbi’s dubious handiwork. That was when Gunnar had promised his bride a new tree.

He’d made one for his in-laws as well, and Mamma had given him a big kiss on the cheek in thanks while Pabbi pretended offense. There was no denying Gunnar’s creation was superior in every way.

Still, part of her missed that rickety old wire version that had a tendency to fall apart if you looked at it wrong. It had been hideous, but it had made for good memories.

This one, however, had candleholders built in, and they were sturdy enough that she never feared them falling over and catching anything on fire.

She pulled out the bundle of small white candles and handed them to Elea, who from her perch on the sofa had no trouble reaching even the higher branches.

She passed a box of small glass ornaments to Anders and kept for herself the red ribbon bows to tie onto the end of each branch.

“We used to use candy as our ornaments,” Anders said as he hung a shiny gold ball. “Which meant that when we took the tree down after Epiphany, we got to eat it. Our favorite day of the year.”

Elea grinned. “Maybe when the war’s over, we can do that. I love candy.”

All the more, probably, because she got it so rarely these days.

Sometimes it was strange to think that her niece had no memories of life in Iceland before the war.

She’d been only a toddler when the British forces arrived, soon followed by the Americans.

To her, this was normal—rationed food, American aircraft flying overhead every day, German U-boats interfering with their fishing.

She’d only know the richer Iceland that had come with the Americans. Which was good—Tatiana would be the first to say how glad she was that their economy had turned up so dramatically, given that it had allowed her to come to the city and chase her dream.

But she treasured all those memories of her own childhood. The ones built around finding ingenious ways to use every scrap, to create what they could never afford to buy. To read and tell stories because radios were too expensive, and small villages didn’t have things like movie houses.

Anders made a show of sniffing one of the candles. “Oh, good. Not made from tallow. It would have been dangerous to put these out for Kertasnikir to steal otherwise. At the very least, you’d find some teeth marks in them tomorrow morning.”

Elea made a face. “Who wants to eat candles ?”

“Not spoiled little girls who have plenty of food to eat instead. But for a troll? Yum.” Anders made as if to take a bite of one, which set Elea to giggling.

He’d be such a good father someday.

Tatiana’s pulse hammered at the thought.

Until a week ago, she would have wondered with more than a tinge of jealousy what lucky woman would eventually overcome his bashfulness and convince him to propose.

Now... it could be her. Maybe, if things went as she hoped they would, if he kept looking at her with his heart in his eyes.

.. maybe she’d be the one who got to hold his heart.

The one to walk through life by his side. Her children who could call him Pabbi.

She wanted it. She wanted it more than any present that could ever be put under a tree.

Even though it had only been a week since they started down this path, even though he’d yet to even kiss her, she knew.

He was the only man she’d ever met that she could imagine marrying. Spending the rest of her life with.

She’d been falling in love with him step by step, letter by letter this past year, after admiring him for years before that but deeming him unknowable.

Tying the last ribbon on the tree, Tatiana watched as Anders drew out her gold-painted star and gathered Elea in his arms so he could lift her to more easily reach the tip of the tree. Once she pushed it into place, they all clapped and cheered.

“Glethileg jol,” she said. It truly felt like Christmas now, with juniper scenting the air and the star gleaming from the top of her little tree, with the lingering aroma of leaf bread and cookies coming from the kitchen, with her flat adorned and laughter filling it.

“Merry Christmas,” Elea shouted in return.

Anders laughed and put her down, making a show of rubbing his ear. “I think all of Iceland heard you.”

“Good! I wish them all a merry Christmas.” She twirled around the center of the room and then grinned up at Tatiana. “Can I put my party dress on now? Can I? Can I?”

“All right.” It was still awfully early, but why not? And while her niece dashed off and Anders settled with a contented sigh on her sofa, she decided she might as well make use of the opportunity. “So, tomorrow.”