Mom continued. “Did you and Arthur have any more adventures?” Off my puzzled look, she continued. “You know, like with the sleigh ride? That sounded so fun.”

I scoffed. “We nearly died.” An exaggeration.

“Oh.” She deflated a little. “The way you told it, it sounded like you’d had fun.”

“There were some good parts about it,” I admitted begrudgingly.

She brightened. “Yeah? Like what?”

Holding Arthur’s hand unexpectedly. Seeing him in that red nose and cracking up. Realizing I liked him in all his idiosyncrasies. Were they because he was British or absurdly wealthy and thereby out of touch with normal behavior, or because he was simply Arthur and that was who he was?

I told her none of those things. Rather, “We got reindeer cheese,” was what I said. “It’s in the refrigerator.” I pointed over my shoulder, back in the direction of the kitchen.

“Reindeer cheese?”

“Uh-huh.” I nodded. “It’s smoked.”

“Oh.” She appeared to be figuring out what to do with that information. “Is it any good?”

“I haven’t tried it.”

“Well.” She tapped her nails against the side of the mug and I noticed she was still wearing her white gold wedding ring with the tiny diamonds. “Maybe Grandma Jo will put it out for the Christmas Eve party.”

“Maybe.” I bit my lip. The lights of the lobby Christmas tree danced off her face and for a second she seemed young, like my age. “Are you going to be here for that?” I asked her.

Her brow furrowed slightly. “Sure. I go every year.”

“But this . . . isn’t like every year,” I pointed out. “Is it?”

A silence followed.

She dropped her eyes. “No. It isn’t.”

More silence. Until I couldn’t take it. “I wasn’t sure you were coming back,” I burst out.

She sighed. “Of course I was, honey.” Her tone was placating, which irked me. “Christmas is my home.”

“But you were gone for months.”

“Five weeks.”

“It feels longer.”

“You just found out.”

A minor detail.

“And about that,” I said. “Why didn’t you say something? We had calls every week and you never mentioned anything was going on with you and Dad.”

She shrugged helplessly. “You were at school. And we . . . we were working it out.”

“From Missouri?”

“I came back.”

“After five weeks.”

“Actually, I tried to come back sooner, but your dad thought it would be good for me to stay gone a while longer.”

That surprised me. The impression I’d had was that she was the one who chose to be gone the entire time. Before I could ask “why,” though, she rubbed her hand over her forehead, seeming tired again, regardless of her attempt at freshening up.