Page 79 of The Christmas Tree Farm

Kira peered at the handwriting scribbled on the sides of the boxes.

‘Books, cassette tapes, clothes,’ Kira read. ‘Oh, this one says “holiday”. That might be promising.’ She opened the box and looked in. ‘Hmm…’ She pulled out a rather creepy, elfish-looking Santa doll.

‘Yikes,’ he said.

‘The box is full of them.’

Bennett crossed the attic to look for himself. ‘Wow.’

‘An entire collection of terrifying Santas,’ Kira said, rifling through the box. She pulled out another and held it up.

‘I feel like it can see into my soul,’ he said, as the doll stared at him.

Kira stifled a laugh.

‘Why are old dolls so terrifying?’ she asked as she put scary Santa back and closed the box.

‘Because it’s way too easy to picture their heads turning independently to look at you.’

‘True.’ Was that a trace of amusement he heard? He would run with that.

Bennett moved the Santa box so they could get to the one beneath it, also marked ‘holiday’. ‘I’m almost scared to look. Might be filled with deranged elves or something.’

‘Baby,’ Kira said, but the teasing tone was back in her voice as she nudged him out of the way. ‘Jackpot.’

The box was filled with carefully wrapped ornaments.

Kira undid the yellowed newspaper around one and revealed a white ball with a delicate design in silver glitter snaking around it. She breathed a little sigh of awe and Bennett’s heart stumbled in his chest.

‘They’re beautiful,’ she said.

She took out another and another, passing them to him as she unwrapped them until his arms were filled with shimmering white and silver and gold ornaments and the smile was back on Kira’s face.

And he didn’t care that they were in a freezing cold attic or that the dust was tickling his nose or that he was pretty sure he’d heard the rumble of snow plows on the road. He would have stood there forever cradling the fragile decorations, wishing Kira would trust him to hold more than that.

Even though he didn’t really deserve to.

Even though he was leaving.

She smiled at the bounty in his arms, unaware of the direction of his thoughts. ‘Well, I was half hoping we’d find a box marked “treasure” but this is pretty good too.’

‘And I’m glad we didn’t find any skeletons.’

‘We didn’t open all the boxes,’ she said, taking the ornaments back one by one and placing them carefully in the box to bring downstairs.

‘Don’t even joke about that.’

She laughed and it sounded like hope.

‘I didn’t realize you were such a scaredy cat, Ben.’

Ben.Ben like she knew him. Ben like they were more than just two people passing by each other in the randomness of life.

‘Scaredy cat? No, I just would rather not find body parts in musty old attics.’

‘Where would you rather find body parts?’

‘Ideally, still attached to the person they belong to.’