The low strains of an upright bass reverberated from the library. Philip looked in as he passed. Large swaths of gift wrap lay on the floor, discarded, as Adeline drew her bow across the strings. In addition to the upright double bass she played, two others stood by the wall. Gannon looked as if he would drift off on the couch as he listened, but absorbed in playing, Adeline didn’t seem to mind.
Philip wouldn’t argue with a nap himself, but Nila and Nason had graduated from them and were raring to go. With Dad and Joan asleep, entertaining his kids fell to him. He found them watching John suit up his dogs for a walk.
“Dogs wear boots?” Nila once again gripped her locket, rubbing her thumb over the surface, though her attention was riveted on Trigger.
“Salt hurts their feet.”
“But that’s snow outside.”
“It’s on the road.” John caught another of the gray dog’s paws and slipped a boot on it. Finished, he let the dog go.
The kids sounded peals of laughter as Trigger high-stepped, uncomfortable with the gear. Even John smiled as he prepped Camo.
“You two get your boots and coats on too,” Philip said. “We’ll see if we can make a fort.”
Cheering, the kids disappeared into the closet where they’d hung the coats and stashed their boots. John and his dogs made it out the door before the kids finished suiting up. When they stepped outside, the drummer was already out of sight.
The clouds were dissipating, and in the sun, the snow would pack best, so Philip steered his kids toward the patch of light in the center of the looped drive.
He’d expected them to get bored and cold, but their attention spans surprised him. They barely noticed when John brought the dogs back and left again in one of the trucks, headed off to see a property.
Long after that, the kids were still happy when Dad came out and sat on the porch steps. Philip had helped create and push six large disks of snow into place, forming three-foot-tall walls. Nason busily packed snow into the spaces between the disks, while Nila worked to clear a doorway. Both of them remained so absorbed in their work, they didn’t complain when he left to sit next to his dad.
The evergreen garland tied to the railings added extra pine scent to the forest air. “I didn’t think they’d be so well rested after a night in the van,” Philip said.
“One of the many benefits of youth. But you’ll want to start bedtime routines right after dinner. They’ll head downhill fast.”
Right. Bedtime routines were his responsibility, no one else’s. He pulled off his gloves to rub his numb hands together. “Joan asked me what I’m going to do the next time we go on tour.”
“Ah.” Dad’s shoulders rose and fell with a long breath. “We’re getting older, Philip, and so are they. One year here, one year there …” Dad lifted his hands and turned a steady gaze on him. “It’s a lot for them. They need the stability of a life in one place, and we’re thrilled to be grandparents, but we can’t be parents again. We’re past that stage of life.”
Philip put his gloves back on and interlaced his fingers. “What if I passed it, too, when Clare died? What if I never … had it?”
Nason threw a snowball over the wall, and Nila squealed and ran. By the time she circled back, she carried three of her own snowballs to launch inside the fort.
“You’re not just worried about travel,” Dad said.
Philip rubbed his hand over his mouth. “It was supposed to be that I would provide for Clare, and she would make sure they had a nice home and the care they needed. The school supplies, the clothes, the haircuts … The little barrettes.”
Dad chuckled. “Those are one hundred percent Joan.”
“They were supposed to be one hundred percent Clare.”
Nason wailed inside the fort. One of the snowballs Nila lobbed over must’ve hit its target. Philip trudged through the snow and lifted his son over the fort wall. He checked him over, calmed him down, and brought the children in.
He and his dad found a hot chocolate mix with tiny marshmallows.
“You sure you don’t want one?” Dad stirred cocoa into a third mug.
“I’m good.” Philip passed cups to the kids.
They set the children up at the dining table with the hot chocolate and some activity books, and his dad motioned him to accompany him to the living room. Someone suggested they hold a Christmas Eve service this evening, but for now, everyone still seemed to be off doing their own thing.
Dad slurped from his mug before setting it on the coffee table. He glanced at the tree that dominated the recessed area by the bay windows, but the decorations and cocoa wouldn’t keep him distracted long. Philip felt like a guilty man awaiting a judge’s sentence.
“I can’t imagine what it’d be like to spend a year off touring the world and come back and crash land into family life. But you’ve done this before, and you’ll figure it out again. You’re the very best thing for your kids, and they’re the best thing for you.”
He’d thought that about Clare, but God must not’ve agreed. “I love them. I just don’t know how to be everything for them. It feels impossible.”
Dad nodded. “What’s even more unlikely than you finding a way is Clare coming back.”
Heat washed over him. Dad really thought that needed to be said?
“You’ve patched together one temporary solution after another since she died, son.” Dad winced, as if the words hurt to say. “It’s time to accept that this is how life is and enact a permanent solution. Joan and I can’t be that. It’s not fair to anyone. The good news is, you don’t have to be everything to them. You just have to be their father.”
“And their mother, if Clare’s not coming back.” Which she wasn’t. Why had he said “if”? Maybe Dad was right. He’d never come to terms with that, with the need to find a permanent solution.
“You’re a single parent,” Dad said, “and that’s a big responsibility, but unless God provides someone to step in where Clare left off, your kids have a dad, not a mom. It’s less than ideal, but it’s also doable, especially if you’re making wise choices, the kinds that keep the kids’ best interests at heart.” He gave a loaded glance.
A blade of meaning pierced Philip’s chest. Trying to cope after Clare’s death, he’d made some poor choices. Relied on things he shouldn’t have. More temporary solutions. But joining Awestruck meant signing a morality agreement, so now he had one more reason not to go back to old habits. He wanted to provide for his kids, and Awestruck was key to that. He wouldn’t gamble with his kids or his job.
He just wished no one knew how he’d failed, wished Dad would quit alluding to it. Wished those old habits didn’t occur to him when he wondered how to cope after the tour.
His father laid a hand on his shoulder. “You don’t have to be everything. Just Dad. You can do that.”
Philip nodded. Just Dad.
Because Clare was gone.
When John started the drive up to the Lakeshore area, he’d planned to send word to his family that he’d broken up with Nicole. He didn’t want to deal with their surprise and questions in person. But sending the message would make the end official, so he’d let navigating the snowy roads distract him.
He’d seen a few plows since leaving the cabin, and most roads had been at least partially cleared, but at a few junctions, he’d been grateful for the SUV’s capabilities. He owned a four-wheel-drive sedan, but living in this remote area might require him to get something lifted.
Or a snowmobile? In this area, residents relied heavily on them.
He slowed for what GPS said would be the last turn before the driveway. The little road tunneled through the snowy woods.
The countryside place was restful. Peaceful.
Even if he had no one to someday share it with.
He sighed.
A black-and-red for-sale sign hung on a rusted old gate that flanked an even narrower drive. Looked like someone had scraped most of the snow from the driveway with a pickup plow, leaving a flat, packed layer behind. He followed the drive and soon came to a wider cleared area.
Ahead stood the house, but not the traditional front view. Instead, the garage made up the face of the building, and from the looks of the trees, no road circled past the front door. The owners must always come and go through the garage doors or the small utility door to the side of them. From the online pictures, however, he knew there was a nice exterior door somewhere.
He pulled up next to the late-model sedan parked by one of the garage doors. Nicole would hate this place. Not showy enough for her, but he liked that the house didn’t lead with its most charming features.
Easier to trust that way.
Besides, he was glad he had never fully opened up to Nicole. Had been a little hard to get to know.
Kind of like this house was to first-time visitors.
He rubbed his face. If he was identifying with a building, the events of the last day were getting to him.
Even so, he’d known from the very start that Awestruck couldn’t complete him or be his life’s sole purpose. Hence the pains he took to keep his role as Awestruck’s drummer separate from his core identity. The bracelets he put on and took off served as a small reminder of a larger, vital truth.
And then Nicole had gone and used him—who he was away from the crowd—to capitalize on what he could offer as Awestruck’s drummer.
If Nicole, famous herself, had set her sights on his bank accounts, who was above suspicion? Because of her, he’d wonder about motives every time he met someone—unless that someone somehow didn’t know about Awestruck.
He stretched both hands up and settled them behind his headrest.
His time with Nicole had needed to end.
And he couldn’t put off telling his family forever.
He typed out the message. Nicole and I have gone our separate ways. She won’t be with me tomorrow.
Hank, his stepdad, would probably take that at face value, but his mom and sisters would reply with questions he didn’t want to deal with. He silenced his phone as he got out of the car.
A shoveled path led around the side of the home. By following that, he found the real estate agent taking one last swipe of snow off the stoop of the main entrance.
Inside, he stowed his shoes on the utility mat, and the old hardwood creaked a welcome beneath his feet. The baseboards and door trim gleamed, though the finish had texture that came only with age. The place was dim and worn, but tidy, as the pictures online had led him to expect.
He and the real estate agent talked about adding windows, skylights, and a deck, about keeping a staircase the previous owner had handcrafted, preserving most of the old woodwork, and updating the kitchen.
By the time he left, he wanted the place, but he stopped himself from signing any paperwork. If he wasn’t in the right mindset to read texts from his family, he had no business buying a house.
“That’s not a bass.” Nila scrunched her nose.
Once Adeline unwrapped the basses from Gannon after lunch, they’d talked. Then, his need to sleep and her desire to try the instruments dovetailed nicely. She’d spent most of the afternoon playing while he drifted in and out, sometimes sleeping, sometimes talking about the instruments or a piece she’d played.
About twenty minutes ago, he’d excused himself to take a shower before dinner. Adeline had been about to pack up the bass and go help with the meal when Nila appeared in the doorway.
“It is a bass.” Holding the neck, Adeline stepped aside so Nila could get a good look. “But it’s called an upright double bass. Your dad plays a different kind—an electric bass.”
“Oh.” Nila chewed her lip. “Do you know any songs?”
“Do you want me to play you one?” She could probably piece together “Jesus Loves Me” from memory.
Nila knelt and petted Bruce’s graying head, her lips pressed together in thought. “Can you play ‘Amazing Grace’?”
Wow. Philip’s daughter had sophisticated taste for a kid. Adeline played the hymn often enough at church, but her part didn’t include the melody, which Nila would most likely expect to hear. She used her phone to pull up the notes and drew her bow across the strings.
A few beats in, Nila’s sweet voice rose to accompany the low sound of the instrument.
The little girl knew every word of the first verse and most of the others.
When they finished, Adeline clapped for her. “How do you know that song?”
Bruce had returned to his napping, but Nila continued to focus on him as she stroked his thick fur. “My mom used to sing it to me.”
The poor, sweet child.
Adeline missed Gannon when he traveled, but Nila’s mom wasn’t coming home. She longed to wrap her in a hug, but she might do best to work with the connection they’d found in music.
She set her bow aside. “Would you like to play too? I can hold the strings, so all you have to do is pluck the note. We’ll do it together.”
Nila straightened away from the dog. “We can play Mom’s song?”
“It would be an honor.”
They spent the next ten minutes learning to play the first line together. They’d completed a pretty good run when a quiet sound drew her attention to the door. Philip stood in the entry, eyes on his daughter. Adeline hadn’t gotten to know him very well over the last year, but that looked like pain in his expression.
The section complete, Nila gave her a gap-toothed smile. “I did it!”
“You did. Great job.” Adeline lent enthusiasm to her voice and gave the girl a high five because she didn’t deserve to have her excitement squashed, even if Adeline never should’ve agreed to work on a song with her that might resurrect painful memories for Philip. “Looks like your dad missed you. You’d better go with him now.”
As Nila turned toward her father, Adeline watched him force a smile. He too congratulated the girl on a job well done.
“Can we sing that tonight?” Nila asked. “Like we used to?”
“Of course.” Philip smoothed his hand over her curls as she cheered at his response and slipped past him into the hall. Before stepping away himself, he lifted his focus to Adeline, his smile growing less and less convincing, what with the wound in his eyes. “Thank you.”
“No. I’m sorry. She said her mom used to sing it. I didn’t mean to dredge anything up.”
Philip nodded, chest expanding with a deep breath. “It’s good. I don’t think she really remembers her mom, but she knows that song.” He shoved his fingers into his pockets. “It’s brought a lot of comfort to her over the years. I want her to have that.”
The set of his shoulders, the turn of his lips, the way he wouldn’t hold eye contact more than a second all said he was hurting, and now it was Philip Adeline wanted to hug. That wasn’t her place, but she would send Gannon after him later, even if it meant less time for her to spend with him.
That, after all, was an important part of Christmas. Sacrifice in the name of love.