With delicate fingers, they picked apart the tangled knots of nickel. Clark paid special attention not to bend them out of shape. Frivolous as he thought the exercise was for a classroom—when he was a boy, he threatened to file suit because Christmas activities robbed him of the teaching time his family paid for—someone still spent their time and effort on this chain of stars. He didn’t want to ruin them. As they worked, Kate talked, stupefying him more and more with every word out of her mouth.

“Miss Monzalno, the second-grade teacher, she teaches her kids how to make advent calendars. And Miss White takes her kids to Dallas every year to serve at a soup kitchen right before they get out for Christmas. I don’t know if she still does it, but when I was there, Miss Elias took all of us to plant our own trees.”

“You know so much about this town,” he said, causing her to balk. A swift tug of her wrist sent the paperclip strand flying out of his hands.

She deflected. “It’s mine. It’s special to me.”

“Not even Michael knew so much as you do.”

“Miller’s Point is my family.”

“I don’t know that much about my family.”

He didn’t mean it as an accusation. But she took it as one.

“You’re not the only one with a tragic backstory, Clark.”

“You…?” She faced the world with the blinding optimism of someone who’d never been hurt before. He’d assumed she had a brimming family with many siblings. Every time he so much as imagined her home life, he pictured a Norman Rockwell painting, a white picket fenced house with a table of smiling cousins and grandparents.

She made herself busy with the ornaments, taking them out one at a time and arranging them on the tree’s branches. They sparkled ironically as a shadow took hold of Kate.

“My mom wasn’t ever really in the picture and my dad was…not a good father.” Those words hung in the air for a moment before she amended herself. What came next was a confession, one he wondered if she’d ever shared with another person so explicitly. “He was an alcoholic. I started volunteering with The Christmas Company when my teacher—Miss Sanders—wanted to help get me out of the house. I liked it so much, I never wanted to go back

home. The town became more of my family than my family ever was. Not exactly tragic. It’s really a happy ending, if you think about it.”

Each word was worse than a kick in the teeth. It took Clark a long, solemn moment before he recovered enough to speak again.

“Only you could see it that way.”

“See it what way?”