Their rough collie intercepted Nick on his way to his daughter, her long fur bouncing as she ran, then she gave a single bark, so he used both hands to scratch her head before making his way to Holly. He hugged his daughter from the side, careful not to mess with the bag of frosting in her hands. “What are you two up to?”
“Well,” Holly said in her best cooking channel voice, “we decided that cookie cutters are very common, so it was up to us to use our creativity and decorate the cookies more uniquely.”
It always made him chuckle when his daughter used that voice. Maybe because the words always sounded like they came from someone older than six, even if the tone didn’t.
“So instead of an ordinary bulb for the circle ones, we added a marshmallow to the top of this one—doesn’t he look like a melting snowman? And we decorated this one like a wreath. And see this one? We think it was supposed to be a sweater, but we turned it upside down and made it a kid throwing their arms up on Christmas morning because they’re so excited.”
“I love them all. Nice work, Hollybear!”
His daughter’s hair was light brown, like his wife’s, but it had his curls. He kept his hair fairly short, but he sometimes wondered if his would be as curly as his daughter’s if it was as long as hers.
Linda slid an odd-shaped cookie—a bell, maybe?—across the counter to Holly. “Sweetie, why don’t you make a surprise decoration on this one for your dad? Grandpa and I just need to talk with him for a minute. Anything goes. Make it as creative as you’d like. Just keep lassie-dog from stealing any.”
“Grandma, her name is Rosy!”
Nick glanced between his in-laws. Why did he suddenly feel like he was in trouble? Nick kissed the top of Holly’s head. “I’ll be right back.”
He followed Linda into their front room, where both Ben and Linda took a seat in the armchairs. He suddenly didn’t feel like sitting, so he just leaned against the display table in front of the window, arms folded, facing them.
Ben and Linda both looked at each other, then Ben said, “We might as well just say it. We think you should start dating again.”
Nick sat up straighter, putting his hands on the table at his sides. “What?” Of all the things that ran through his mind that they might want to talk to him about, that was the furthest thing away. “Why?”
Linda leaned forward a bit, too. “I don’t think that Clara knew she was going to die last fall, but she must’ve sensed it on some level because she mentioned a few things she wanted to have happen if she did pass away before us. One of them was you getting remarried.”
Nick knew that. Clara had mentioned it to him, too. He’d laughed it off at the time, saying that it wasn’t going to happen so she would just have to live forever. But Clara had said, “No, I’m serious—Holly needs a mother, even if it can’t be me, and youneed a wife.” It had been too hard to think about, so he’d just put it out of his mind.
“Your daughter needs a mom,” Linda said, echoing his thoughts of his conversation with Clara so close that it was eerie. “As time goes on, she’ll need one more and more, not less.”
“Are you saying that you don’t think I’m doing a good enough job trying to be both parents to her?”
“That’s not it at all, son,” Ben said. “You’re doing everything you can. That’s helping. The dog is helping. We are helping.”
“But there’s not a whole lot that can replace a mom in a little girl’s life,” Linda finished.
He knew that. He did. But he loved Clara, and he couldn’t imagine loving someone else like that again. “I don’t think I’m ready.”
“I know,” Ben said. “It’s hard to imagine that you’ll ever be ready until you meet the one who will be your next love. You might think you can never love again, and then you’ll meet your Linda.” He reached across the space between the two armchairs and squeezed his wife’s hand.
Nick had almost forgotten that Ben had been married before. He’d known that Ben’s first wife had died in a car wreck after they’d been married only a couple of years. Before they’d had any kids. He just hadn’t thought about it in a long time. But Ben was right—Nick wasn’t sure he could ever love again. It just felt… weird to even try to imagine it.
“For about a year when Clara was about Holly’s age,” Linda said, “Ben worked overseas and only came home once a month for that full year. Now, I know it’s not the same experience as having a spouse pass away, but I did often feel like I was single parenting.” She paused for a long moment, then said, “and I know how lonely it got.”
Her words hit him in the chest pretty hard. He felt busy all the time trying to balance work and home life. He always felt likehe wasn’t doing enough as Holly’s only parent and as the only adult taking care of all the things they and their home needed. But as busy as he was, there still seemed to be plenty of time for him to feel those pangs of loneliness very acutely.
“You’ve got a fresh start here,” Linda said. “You’re no longer living in the home you shared with Clara, so—”
Nick shook his head. “No. Now I’m living in the home she lived in as a junior and senior in high school and with the parents who raised her.”
“That’s just temporary,” Linda said. “You know, I can set you up with someone if you’d like.”
“I am not having mydeceased wife’s momset me up on a date.”
“Ican set you up with someone,” Ben said. “A couple of guys I work with have daughters—”
“Why are you two even okay with the thought of me dating again? You should be freaking out that one day I might ‘replace’ your daughter.”
Ben shook his head. “No one can ever replace Clara.”
