It snowedall day Christmas Day.
No one in Christmas Mountain minded, least of all me.
Everything in town sparkled, including my parents, who had somehow found their way back to being boisterously in love with one another. And including me. In the week since I’d proposed to Nick –and he’d accepted– I’d begun to grow into the idea of my new life.
The boutique was coming together. Several suppliers had complained about taking inventory back, but they’d complained less when I’d offered to take a credit and review other items they had for sale. Nick and I had found several pieces of vintage furniture at Secondhand Christmas Thrift, some of which I’d had to purchase and a few pieces they’d kindly agreed to let me use in exchange for putting a price tag on them. I’d decided The Nutcracker Boutique had to stock dance apparel and shoes, which had led me to order a box of dance-themed Christmas ornaments. This was Christmas Mountain, after all. We sold the holiday year-round.
I was helping Nick with his plans for Bowlful of Jelly, as well as our apartment upstairs. We were planning a spring wedding. Nothing elaborate. But we wanted to use the next year to build the foundation of our lives moving forward.
Holly was extending her stay in Denver, helping Noelle with her baby and supporting Eve and Isaac as they spent long days with the twins in N.I.C.U. But overall, things were looking good. Most of Nick’s family planned to return to Christmas Mountain around the first of the year when the twins were released from the hospital. In the meantime, I’d agreed to take over Eve’s classes and help her program in the new year.
Dance was still going to be a big part of my life.
And so it was that on Christmas Day Eve I stood in the wings of the community center surrounded by adorable little ballerinas, including some holding cardboard swords and waiting for their cue to take the stage.
“I’m so excited.” Ivy hopped up and down next to me, sending her rat tail swinging into her rat troops. “When is it our turn?”
“Soon,” I told her.
The last act left the stage on the other side to polite applause as the emcee approached the microphone to introduce the toddler girls. “And now, the first of four ballet dances from Tiny Elves Dance Studio, choreographed by Eve Harper and directed this evening by Allie Jameson.”
I ushered the tiny ballerinas out to the stage, trying to stay hidden in the wings.
“Yay, Allie!” That was Nick’s voice.
I peeked around the curtain, finding him in the packed crowd.
He sat up front next to my parents, holding a sign that read:Rudolph loves Prancer!
Nick was such a dork.
And since I loved him, I wouldn’t have it any other way.
A Second Chance Christmas
ANOTHER BOOK BY MELINDA CURTIS IN THE CHRISTMAS MOUNTAIN SERIES
Author Note: Lexi is a bit snarkier than Allie, but so plucky that I hope you love her, too!
Excerpt
As a kidfrom the wrong side of the Tennessee tracks transplanted to Montana, I had a dream about how my life would go. And it went something like this:
Get a really cool job that pays a lot of money, wear designer clothes, fall in love with a really handsome, wealthy man, have a wedding Barbie would envy, and live without ever having to eat another slice of Spam. Ever.
At twenty-six, none of that had happened.
Oh, I had a kind-of cool job as a political strategist, which mostly involved writing speeches for political candidates and incumbents for one of the most successful agencies in Washington, D.C. But I was an underpaid cubicle slave, a speech writer who had six degrees of separation between me and whatever candidate my company was hired to help elect.
I was ready for more–more pay, more responsibility, more of a social life. And I could use a little less Spam (the meat, not the virus-laden email).
Sadly, living in Washington, D.C., this basement dweller was still on a Spam budget, shopping at Goodwill (which had killer deals on used designer duds–the only way to buy), and working long hours with guys even my mother wouldn’t date (and she had a low bar). I was all for getting behind a candidate and transforming the world one vote at a time, but something had to change. I needed bigger and better opportunities. I was tired of waiting. It seemed as if I’d been waiting all my life.
My mama had always told me to be patient.
“Wait for the right guy, Lexi,”Mama used to say while watching Jeopardy and waiting for the right guy to find her. Last time I called, she was still waiting.
My mentor at Columbia University in New York City had always told me to be patient.