Chapter 7

Martin woke to the sound of a mini-refrigerator rattling to life. He opened his eyes and gasped. The darkness had given way to the soft purple glow of dawn reflected in a thousand gauzy mirrors.

He rolled over to see if Anthony was awake, and promptly got a faceful of black fur. Betty had maneuvered between them again. She lifted her head to look at him, then gave a soft tail wag against his shin that read as sorry-not-sorry .

Martin reached over her to shake Anthony’s shoulder. “Gonnae wake up. You’ll want to see this.”

Anthony muttered something inaudible, then fumbled for his glasses and put them on. “Whoa,” he said after one look out the window. He swung his legs over the side of the bed, his toes striking the wall. “Ow. Let’s go outside.”

Betty scrambled to her feet at the sound of the word.

They put on coats and shoes and walked outside with the tiniest of steps. Anthony used a towel as a sling around Betty’s abdomen to keep her from skidding out while she found a place to wee.

The forest was encased in ice-coated snow, preserved in periwinkle light. Even their snow angels from the previous night were frozen in place.

The only sounds came from their own eight shifting, crunching feet. He and Anthony heel-stomped with each step, cracking the ice enough to make divots of semi-stability.

“What a beautiful mess,” Anthony said. “I feel bad for anyone who’s gotta be on the road this morning.”

Martin breathed into his gloved hands to warm them. “You’re not one of those people, right?”

“Not yet, but as soon as it’s safe I need to get this girl home and fed.” Anthony lifted his chin, his breath coming out in a steaming gust. “Feels like it’s just below freezing now. Once the sun’s up, this’ll start to melt, and by midday it’ll be like it never happened.”

Like it never happened.

Betty shook herself, then flailed as her paws lost purchase on the ice. She didn’t fall, though, thanks to Anthony’s sling.

“Let’s put her inside and make some coffee,” Anthony said after she finished weeing. “Should be just enough time before sunrise.”

And so they did, which meant that by the time they returned to the terrace, the southern sky had turned a tropical orange and pink. Every surface, every branch and tree trunk, glistened in technicolor, like the world’s gayest disco.

In the distance, beneath the center of horizon-scattered sunlight, the Shenandoah flowed on, intrepidly liquid, its sheer volume making it immune to such a fleeting freeze as this one.

Then with no fanfare, the sun rose, peeking between the hills that dove to form the river. The world sparkled and sparked, so brightly Martin wanted to shade his eyes. But he couldn’t, because Anthony had just taken his hand, and he wouldn’t let go of that—or his coffee cup—for anything. So he just squinted into the mirrorball dazzle, his skin buzzing with gratitude at this transitory beauty.

“I feel like a traitor to my country,” Martin said in a near whisper, “but this is the most gorgeous thing I’ve ever seen.”

“Yep,” was Anthony’s only reply before he tugged Martin close and kissed him.

A bird called from the treetops, in a song unfamiliar to his European ears. Another answered. Still he and Anthony kissed.

Then, behind Martin, maybe halfway down the hillside, came an eerie tinkling noise. He jolted and looked in the direction of the sound. “What was that?”

Anthony put a finger to his mouth, looking up and around.

The noise came again, like a crystal champagne glass shattering in the next room.

“Another icicle bites the dust,” Anthony said. “Could be there’s a breeze over there we can’t feel, or could be the start of the thaw. Kind of a spooky sound when it hits the ice on the ground, though, huh?”

Not just spooky but threatening, this clinking herald of their approaching separation.

Like it never happened.

Perhaps this year’s calamity wasn’t something bad happening. Perhaps it was something very, very good, something that Martin—as the Curse would ensure—could never hold onto.

When Anthony drove Betty home at ten a.m., most of the ice and snow had melted off the roads. But water still dripped from overhanging trees, and along the shady stretches it could easily freeze into black ice. So he went slowly, though not as hilariously, adorably slowly as Martin had driven the night before.

As the road to Pockaway receded behind them, Betty let out a half whine, half grumble. Anthony looked at her in his rearview mirror. She was sitting upright with her chin propped on the back of the seat, gazing out the rear window.

“I know, girl.” He sighed. “I want to turn around and go be with him too.”

It wasn’t that Anthony dreaded Christmas with his family. Quite the opposite. After the balls-to-the-wall performance of Christmas Eve and the Seven Fishes, Christmas Day at the Bellos’ was strictly enforced chill time. His sister Katrina, his brother-in-law, and his niece would come over at noon dressed in PJs, the same attire as Anthony and his parents. They’d open gifts, watch basketball and Christmas Vacation , and generally laze around like house cats. No one shaved or put on makeup. Dinner would be a frozen lasagna made the week prior, with leftover seafood and bagged salad on the side.

It would be ideal, except for the missing piece.

At the first stop sign, he tapped his phone screen.

“Call Vanessa.”

She picked up after one and a half rings. “Yo, Tony!” she shouted in an over-the-top Sopranos accent. “Merry fuckin’ Christmas.”

“Merry fucking Christmas. Did I wake you up?”

“Dude, it’s nine o’clock and we got a dog,” she said in her normal voice. “In what universe would I ever still be asleep?”

“You coulda gone back to bed.”

“We’re still wrapping presents for when Harry’s daughter comes over. How did Mom and Dad do all this for three kids without going batshit?”

“Probably with a truckload of Kahlua and peppermint schnapps.” He passed the now-bare telephone pole where Pumpkin Spice’s flyer had hung. “Did Katrina call you yet?”

“No.”

He pumped his fist. “Yes! I win!”

“She texted me last night, though. Something about a new guy of yours? He’s Scandinavian?”

“Scottish. He’s the guest at Pockaway.”

“Serious forbidden fruit, little bro. So will you see him again after he goes home?”

“Yeah, I’ll just get in one of them pneumatic tubes that goes straight from here to the UK. Like they got at the bank drive-through?”

“Airplanes exist, Anthony.”

“That’s…” He rubbed his face. “I can’t think about the future while I’m driving. We had a storm last night, so I gotta watch out for black ice. That’s the most dangerous kind.”

“Sounds racist.”

He laughed. “Damn, Vanessa, I wish you were here.”

“That makes one of us.”

“Maybe next year?”

“Nah. But maybe next year you’ll be with that guy in Switzerland or Swaziland.”

“Scotland.”

“Sure.”

They blathered for the next fifteen minutes, until he turned onto his parents’ road. “I’m almost home, so I gotta go. Give my love to everyone there.”

“Same,” she said. “Only, not everyone.”

He sighed. This wouldn’t be the year they were a complete family again. But where there was life, there was hope. “I love you, you chickenshit.”

“Love you, too. Don’t be a dumbass.”

And with that wise counsel, she hung up.

Anthony drove on, steering around a large puddle. It was probably liquid, but why risk it being ice? On today of all days, it paid to be cautious.

Okay, so the Christmas Curse was in his head. He wanted desperately for nothing bad to happen today. If Martin could believe he’d broken the Curse by letting Anthony and Betty stay over, he’d be freed from this thirty-year-old monkey on his back. Then Martin could move on, find a fellow wonderful Scottish guy to share his life with. They could make each other happy 365 days a year.

A surge of jealousy made him scowl so hard his face nearly cramped. But why? He had no claim on Martin or vice versa. They were just…spending time together, like Martin had said the other night outside the cafe. It didn’t need to mean more than that. If anything, this time-out-of-time experience was more meaningful for its briefness.

He couldn’t—wouldn’t—ruin it by wishing it would last.

After Anthony and Betty left, Martin tidied up, then settled onto the couch to watch whatever sport was played on Christmas in this country. He found a basketball game, Milwaukee versus New York, which had just begun the second half. Though he’d planned to remain neutral, he found himself supporting the Bucks because of their enthusiastic antlered mascot.

No sooner had he made this choice than the Bucks proceeded to miss seventeen straight three-point attempts.

Martin changed the station. Live television was clearly out.

He channel-surfed until he found a program that wasn’t live sports or news. Here was a Christmas film he’d never seen. That was safe.

During the ad break he made another cup of coffee without burning the house down. Ya dancer!

Though he was watching the film from the midpoint, it was easy to work out what was happening. Two rivals/potential lovers were competing in a small-town gingerbread-house contest, in which everything that could go wrong, did go wrong. Ovens broke, dough went splat, and a dog ate the entire population of gingerbread people in an unparalleled massacre.

Martin could relate.

A dozen times he considered reaching out to Anthony to see if he made it home safely, or if he was having a good Christmas, or just to…reach out. But his phone stayed safely off.

As the Christmas film ended with a long-delayed first kiss, he picked up the remote control to search for another diversion.

Over the closing credits came an announcer’s voice. “When a cynical real-estate developer wants to pave over a farm-animal sanctuary to make way for a shopping mall, a local veterinarian and her precocious daughter show him that true Christmas riches can be gained only by helping others.”

Martin set down the remote control and pulled the blanket up to his chin. It smelled like damp Betty, which made him smile.