rattle at him and nodded. My father stared at her grimly.
“Good plan,” I said. I reached under the tree for his gift and handed it up to him. “While we’re being honest about gifts, here’s yours. It’s a hat,” I said. “I knit it.”
He put his coffee mug on the carpet. “Thanks,” he said, with no sarcasm at all. He unwrapped the hat and immediately stretched it over his head. The ball was definitely lopsided. He looked silly, but if he knew it, he didn’t let on.
“Feels warm,” he said. “I like it.”
Elise nodded, eyebrows raised. “I think I like you more in that hat.”
“Thanks.” He looked at me. “So. How’s the engineer?”
Now it was my turn to be annoyed. My father knew Tim’s name by now. Tim had spent Thanksgiving break with us, staying with me at Elise’s house and gamely eating Thanksgiving dinner with my father and then my mother so no one would have hurt feelings. My father took us out for Indian food. My mother had ordered pizza. They had both liked Tim very much, which did not surprise me. What did surprise me was that each of them had later asked if the other one had liked him as well.
“He’s good,” I said. “He’s with his family. He just called, actually. He sends greetings from Illinois.”
My father nodded, impatient. That wasn’t what he wanted to know. “Is he getting offers?”
“Not yet.” I focused on picking pieces of tinsel out of the carpet. Tim would start getting offers soon. He was going to a job fair in February, where he would interview with recruiters from all over the country. He would need to make a decision, and whatever he decided wouldn’t have much to do with me. It couldn’t. I didn’t even know where I was headed for grad school. I still wouldn’t know in February. “It’s only for two years,” Tim had said, though we both knew it might be longer. “And they have these things called airplanes.” Still, we both knew the odds, and the potential Clydes and Clydettes in our future, or futures.
Elise looked up when the front door opened, a cool breeze rustling the ornaments and tinsel on the tree. Charlie appeared in the doorway, wearing a light jacket and running pants, his blond hair covered by the hat I’d knit him, his cheekbones glistening with sweat.
“How lucky am I?” he asked, still breathing hard. “Out of the office for two whole days, and the weather is downright balmy.” He pointed back at the door. “It’s already at least fifty degrees out there.” He stopped walking and pointed both hands at his head. “Or maybe I just felt warm in my new amazing hat.”
I liked Charlie. I always forgot that he was a lawyer, too. He was energetic and loud, but not combative like Elise and my father. He’d told me that when he was young, it had really never occurred to him that he would be anything other than a professional skateboarder. After his father died, he put himself through college waiting tables at a restaurant that specialized in children’s birthday parties. He still knew the words, and the accompanying hand gestures, to the restaurant’s theme song, and when he was a little tipsy, you could get him to sing them in English and also in Spanish.
“Good for you!” my father said. “Out for a run on Christmas morning!” He liked Charlie, too.
Charlie put his hands on his slim hips and peered over Elise’s shoulder. “How’s the show runner?” he asked.
“Fussy. He’s been fussy all morning.” She reached back to touch Charlie’s cheek, and pulled her hand back quickly. “Yuck,” she said, laughing a little. “Don’t get sweat on the baby.”
“I’ll take a shower.” He kissed her ear and stood. “And then I was going to run out for a bit. We’re having brunch at eleven, right? And then we’re going to your mother’s? What time do I need to be back here?”
She turned around, looking up. I couldn’t see her face. But he raised both his hands.
“On Christmas morning? Where do you have to go?”
“Why do I have to say?”
My father and I both stared at the twinkling tree, feigning sudden deafness. Two nights ago, after coming home from the Christmas party at Charlie’s firm, he and Elise had gotten into an actual fight, loud enough for me to hear in the guest room. She said she wasn’t going to his stupid parties anymore if everyone was going to treat