Wrapped Up in Christmas Joy - Janice Lynn Page 0,79
in such a way that Sophie wanted to wrap her arms around him and hug away every bad thing that had ever happened to him.
Sophie and Cole finished putting together a large artificial blue spruce in the assisted living center’s dining hall. Sophie stepped back to inspect their work.
“Hmm, that branch needs to be fluffed up a little.”
Eyeing the tree to figure out which branch she referred to, Cole then reshaped the branch while Sophie pulled decorations from a box. She plugged in a string of colorful lights to make sure they all lit up. Each light twinkled with a burst of color that filled Cole with a bit of nostalgia.
“Yay. They all work.”
His lips twitched at her happy little dance moves.
“Laugh if you want to, but the lights are my favorite part,” she asserted as she handed one end of the strand to him.
“Why’s that?” he asked, surprised by the feelings swamping him.
He acted as if Christmas had never been a big deal, but memories of Christmases with his parents pre-divorce, decorating their tree, flashed through his head for the first time in years. Maybe the young family he’d seen that morning in the church had triggered thoughts of himself as the child he’d once been, a part of a loving family.
“Because it’s the first layer of magic,” Sophie informed as if he should have known the answer all along.
“First layer, huh?” He couldn’t resist smiling at how she swayed her arms out, stretching the lights out across her pretty red dress and down the long sleeve covering her arm. “How many layers of magic does a Christmas tree usually have?”
Not nearly as many magical layers as Sophie Grace Davis. She overflowed with goodness.
“Let’s see,” She pretended to be considering her answer very seriously as she twirled, slowly winding a bit of the light string around her waist and making him think yet again that she was his own personal Christmas tree. “There’s the lights, then the ornaments, and then the most magical layer of all—the star.”
“I see.”
Eyes twinkling brighter than any star in the sky, she laughed and stretched out her arms, lights and all. “What do you see? That I look like a beautiful Christmas tree?”
Had Sophie read his mind? Sometimes, it felt as if she could. Perhaps because she’d read his journal and knew the inner ticking of his thoughts. Or perhaps it was something more he felt zinging between them.
Cole studied the vision she made with the lights wound loosely around her a few times. She was beautiful.
His heart sped up as he wondered whether the lights truly were magical. He couldn’t deny that something was happening inside him at being near her, at looking at her, at getting wrapped up in Sophie’s joy.
Magic. That was as good a word as any for what happened when he looked at her. She made him feel things he’d have thought impossible. That had to be magic.
“You think I’m being silly,” she laughed as she twirled herself free of the strands twisted around her. “I know I’m a kid at heart when it comes to Christmas—and a lot of other times of the year, too, actually. But you have to admit, this is fun.”
“You have a strange idea of what embodies fun,” he countered, just for argument’s sake. In truth, he knew she was right. He was enjoying her company and was glad that they were doing something good in the process of their “fun.”
The assisted living crew had been excited when they’d arrived to decorate, and the looks of appreciation on the faces of the elderly residents they’d come in contact with thus far had made him feel ashamed he’d ever even considered not coming to help.
He glanced at the boxes he’d carried to the room. The contents were now spread out on a table. He and Sophie were the only ones here in the dining room, but there had been a large group that had come out to the facility. While this tree was going up here, others had been paired off to go to various resident rooms to decorate mini trees.
Which was fine by Cole, as he felt more comfortable being away from the group.
Although being alone with Sophie held an edge as well.
Truth was, he’d been on edge from the moment she’d held his hand at the beginning of the church service. Those few seconds had rattled him, though not necessarily in a bad way. It was more that he was excited to be