Page 42 of Wicked Ends

“There was this one year we were staying in this absolute dump of a motel somewhere. But on Christmas Eve, I woke up, and she’d covered the windows and walls with paper snowflakes. Must have stayed up all night cutting them out.” Her voice softens with the memory. “She’d found a tiny pine tree, justa sapling she dug up, and put it in a coffee can. Decorated it with paper rings and one of her necklaces wrapped around for garland.”

The way Rose recalls this memory is so clear I can almost see it, and I feel admiration and respect for Rose’s mother, Sarah. A sad motel room transformed by a mother’s determination to create magic for her child at a time of year when others were surrounded by festivities and indulgences.

“We sat on the bed eating gas station donuts and drinking hot chocolates, pretending it was snowing.” Rose blinks rapidly, firelight catching on dampness in her eyes. “I didn’t care that we didn’t have our own place. It felt like home because she always made it home. No matter where we were. She was my home.”

“You must miss her.”

“Every day.” She looks at me then, her expression is unguarded and vulnerable. “This is my first Christmas without her. I didn’t think it would hit me this hard.”

I wish I had platitudes to offer, words to ease her pain. But I’ve lived too long to believe in the comfort of empty phrases. Instead, I simply say, “Tell me more about her.”

And she does. Stories pour from her about driving in the summer, singing songs with the windows down, impromptu dance parties in shop aisles, her mother’s unfailing ability to find beauty in squalor. With each memory, Rose grows more animated, grief turning into something more precious.

I listen. This is the gift I can give her, my complete attention, my willingness to bear witness to her loss without trying to diminish it.

Eventually, her stories taper off, and she looks almost embarrassed. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to dump all that on you.”

“No apology necessary.”

“It’s just that everyone else will be going home soon, to their perfect families and their perfect holidays, and I’ll be here. Alone.”

“Not alone. I’ll be here. Soren as well. Even your ghost, intermittently.”

She chuckles. “A vampire, an incubus, and a ghost. What a holiday card that would make. Could be worse,” she concedes. “At least the company’s good-looking.”

I arch an eyebrow at her, and she laughs.

“What? You know you’re hot. All of you. It’s like a prerequisite for being supernatural, right?”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“You should.” She stretches in the chair, the moment of vulnerability passed. “So what do vampires do for Yule, anyway? Besides brooding attractively by fireplaces?”

“I don’t brood. I contemplate.”

“Sure.”

I find myself smiling despite my best efforts not to. This is what Rose Smith does to me. She breaks through centuries of carefully cultivated reserve with her humor and her fragile humanity.

“In truth, I haven’t properly celebrated in a very long time,” I admit. “The occasion loses its luster after a few hundred years.”

“Well, that’s depressing.”

“Merely practical.”

She studies me, head tilted slightly. “Maybe this year could be different.”

“How so?”

“I don’t know. We could do something. Nothing fancy. Just acknowledge it. Together. All of us.”

My reaction to her question creates a surge of something unfamiliar spreading through my chest. “Perhaps,” I say, noncommittal.

But she sees through it, as she always does. “That’s not a no.”

“It’s not a yes, either.”

“It’s a maybe, which from you is practically enthusiastic agreement.” She grins, victorious.