A Wedding in December Read online

  “You’re mad, and upset and—” Katie placed her palm on Rosie’s cheek “—and you’re cold. Freezing. Where have you been?”

  “To talk to Dan. On a snowmobile.”

  “A snowmobile?” Katie removed her own scarf and wrapped it around her sister’s neck. “Who can have a conversation on a snowmobile?”

  “Not us.” She tugged off her boots. “But I’m starting to think we can’t have a conversation anywhere.”

  “This is all my fault.”

  “It’s not your fault.” Rosie flopped facedown on the sofa. “It’s my fault for not having confidence in my own decision making. I’m sorry I yelled at you.”

  “I deserved every decibel. And I feel terrible. What can I do?”

  “Nothing.” Rosie’s voice was muffled by the sofa cushions. “I tried talking to him but he’s made up his mind.”

  “Well, that’s ridiculous.” Katie stroked her back gently.

  It made her remember being little, being poorly, when she’d snuggle on her sister’s lap and listen to her read a story.

  “If I ask you to grab my inhaler from my bag, are you going to freak out?”

  “Your—of course—” Katie scrambled to her feet and dug her hand into the back pocket of her jeans. “Here. Sit up. Breathe. Good technique, remember? Why didn’t you have this with you? Never mind, use it, that’s all that matters. I’m not freaking out, I promise.”

  “You carry an inhaler in your pocket?” Rosie sat up and took it from her. “Since when have you suffered from asthma?”

  “I don’t, but you do so I like to be prepared. Stop talking. I can’t believe you went out in the freezing cold like that. But I’m not going to worry and be overprotective. You’re an adult.”

  “I had a scarf but it was colder than I thought.” And she hadn’t been thinking about her breathing, she’d been thinking about Dan.

  She closed her eyes and used the inhaler twice.

  Katie took it from her and knelt down in front of her. “Sit for a minute, don’t try to talk. I’ll do the talking. I’m really sorry for everything. I haven’t been in a good place the last few weeks.”

  “Stop.” Her chest felt so tight. She should have used her inhaler sooner. “Everything you said was true. I do change my mind about things. I’m like a grasshopper, leaping from one thing to the next. And Dan is right. I should have been able to talk to him. But sometimes he plows right over me, and he doesn’t even know he’s doing it.”

  “And when he calms down, you can tell him that.” Katie stroked her hair. “A conversation requires two things, someone to talk and someone to listen. Maybe he’s upset that you didn’t talk, but you’re upset that he didn’t listen. Fifty, fifty, Rosie. No, don’t talk. If your breathing doesn’t improve in a few minutes, we’re going to the hospital. You should be so mad with me.”

  “I’m not mad.”

  “Stop talking. I’ve been a bad sister. I’ve been overprotective, I know that, but from the moment you were born I wanted to make sure nothing hurt you. I fell in love with your funny little face the moment I saw you.”

  “I don’t have a funny face.”

  “Check out your baby photos.” She took Rosie’s hand. “I’m going to stop being overprotective. I can’t promise to get it right overnight, but I can promise to work on it. Moving forward if you ever want to talk to me as a friend, I’ll be here, but no more advice from me. Turns out I’m not great at it anyway. Apart from the inhaler thing. I’m totally great at that, so still no talking.”

  “You’re a great sister. And a great doctor.”

  “I am not either.”

  Rosie pressed her hand to her chest. She felt a flutter of fear. There was nothing, nothing, more frightening than not being able to breathe. “This is—there’s a good hospital here, right?”

  “You’re not going to need a hospital.” Her sister was calm. Rock solid. “I’m here, and you’re fine.”

  “Distract me.”

  “Distract you? Okay—well, you wanted me to open up to you, so this is me opening up. I always wanted to be a doctor, you know that. Right through school. Right through medical school, I thought I was doing the only thing I could do. This was me. It was a vocation.” Katie had her eyes fixed on Rosie’s chest, watching the rise and fall. “Until it wasn’t. I don’t even know what happened. Slowly, without me even noticing, my love for the job started to drain away. Nothing dramatic. A drop at a time. A slow hemorrhage of enthusiasm. I didn’t even notice. I told myself I was tired. Stressed. So what? Show me a doctor who isn’t tired and stressed. I didn’t give it a second thought.” She paused. “How’s your chest? Are you doing okay?”

  Rosie nodded. She couldn’t remember ever hearing Katie talk to her like this before. She waved a hand to urge her to carry on.

  “Two months ago, there was an incident at work. It was—upsetting. Usually we try to detach, it’s a requirement of the job, but none of us did so well that night. I don’t need to give you the details—”

  “Give me the details.” If her sister had dealt with it firsthand, the least she could do was hear about it secondhand. She needed to understand. And she didn’t want to think about her breathing.

  Katie hesitated and then started talking and every word she spoke increased Rosie’s respect for her sister. How did you handle something like that and not be affected? Did Katie really think it was possible to stay detached?

  “He attacked you.”

  “It was understandable.”

  “And frightening.”

  Katie rubbed her fingers over her forehead. “Yes, and frightening.”

  “Did you get support?”

  “Not until last week, when I finally saw a doctor. Who signed me off sick. Yes,” she said, and gave a wry smile, “I’m actually on sick leave. I’m officially sick, which would be a useful explanation for the way I’ve been behaving. And now you’re going to ask me why I didn’t tell you before. I’m not sure why, except that you’re proud that I’m a doctor. I thought you might think less of me.”

  “I’m your sister. I love you. How could I think less of you?” Rosie leaned forward and wrapped her arms around her sister.

  “Oh—that’s nice. Does this mean I’m forgiven? Don’t give me sympathy. I’m better if I just—”

  “It’s okay, Katie. It’s okay to feel shitty after something like that.”

  “I’m fine, really, I don’t—”

  “It’s okay.” Rosie hugged tighter and felt her sister sag against her.

  “I’m not okay. I’m not okay.” Finally Katie cracked. Tears flowed out of her, and she cried, great jerking, broken sobs that tore through Rosie like a knife. Her sister had never, ever, cried on her before. Her own cheeks were wet and she realized she was crying, too. She didn’t know what to say—what could she possibly say?—so she simply held her sister and murmured meaningless words of comfort.

  Eventually the crying stopped and Katie slumped against her. “And now I have a headache. And I didn’t even drink to get it.”

  Rosie gave a choked laugh. “We could fix that.”

  Katie sniffed and pulled away. “Bet you preferred me in my role as smother mother.”

  Smother mother.

  Despite everything, Rosie laughed. “Not true. I feel as if I finally know you a little. And it explains a lot about how you’ve been the last few weeks.”

  Katie blew her nose and flopped down next to Rosie on the sofa. “I have some big decisions to make. And I have no idea what to do. Here’s the learning point from this sorry tale. You think there’s some magic decision fairy that makes every choice a clear one, but there isn’t. We’re all muddling our way through, doing the best we can. We make decisions based on many factors, and sometimes that can lead to one hell of a mess. My life is an example.” She looked at Rosie. “Yours might be, too, but that’
s my fault. I have managed to screw up your life as well as mine.”

  It was something of a shock to discover that her sure, confident sister was wrestling with doubts, too. A shock and a comfort.

  “You’re an amazing doctor.”

  “I don’t know. I try to be—but that doesn’t mean I don’t wish I’d chosen another profession.”

  “You really feel that way?”

  “I think I do. And it’s taken me a while to admit it, because the thought makes me panic. I’ve devoted my whole adult life to this. It’s hard to walk away from that without wondering if it was all a waste.”

  “Whatever you do in the future, the past is never a waste.” Rosie leaned her head against her sister’s shoulder.

  “Jordan said something similar.”

  “You discussed it with Jordan?”

  “He’s a good listener. And it helped that he wasn’t emotionally invested. Sometimes when a decision feels huge, you want someone to tell you you’re doing the right thing.”

  “I know. One of the things I love about Dan is that he’s so confident about everything. And his confidence rubbed off on me a little. He’s not scared of life. Being with him made me braver. He doesn’t talk himself out of doing things that are difficult. He looks at the obstacle and either goes over it or around it. He makes me think about the things I can do, not the things I can’t.”

  Katie pulled her closer. “Tell me what else you love about him.”

  “I don’t know. It’s a thousand small things, isn’t it? Like the way he makes me tea because he knows I love it even though he never drinks it himself, and the way he watches romantic movies because that’s what I want to do.”

  “He watches romantic movies? Does he pull a face?”

  “No face.”

  “He looks at his phone during the sloppy parts?”

  “Never.”

  “Wow, that’s—definitely love. And he does better than I do, by the way. If Vicky chooses a romantic movie I moan all the way through it. What else?”

  “He’s so calm and patient. The first time I met him, in the gym that day, I had an asthma attack.” She felt her sister tense.

  “You never told me that.”

  “Because I knew you’d overreact. I was using the treadmill and—” she waved a hand “—it doesn’t matter. But Dan noticed, and he was by my side in an instant and then came with me to the hospital and handled all of it because I hadn’t been in the US long. And he was calm. So calm. You already saw that when you were subjecting him to interrogation.” She felt her sister wince.

  “You’re right, he could have punched me and he didn’t.”

  “He would never do that. He would think that if there was something you needed to say, then you should say it.” She sighed. “And I didn’t.”

  “And that was my fault. I’m sorry I made you doubt yourself. And for what it’s worth, I don’t think those doubts came from you. I put them there. I created this problem and I need to fix it.”

  “It’s my problem. I could have shut you down. I could have told Dan how I was feeling.” Rosie didn’t want to think about that. “You discussed this with Jordan, too?”

  “We were snowbound for the best part of fifteen hours. Talking about the weather got old after twenty minutes.”

  She was dismissing it, but to Rosie it seemed momentous that she’d talked to Jordan.

  “What else did the two of you talk about?”

  “A lot of things. Including my overdeveloped protective instincts.”

  “He’s seriously hot.”

  “Rosie White, you’re about to be married.”

  “Doesn’t seem that way, but even if I was it doesn’t stop me noticing when a man is hot. Just stops me doing something about it. Jordan is smoking hot.”

  “He is.” Something in the way her sister said it made Rosie wonder.

  “Did you have trouble staying warm when you were snowbound in that cabin?”

  “No. I was toasty. There was a perfectly good fire.”

  “So no body warmth, then.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “Katie!” Rosie sat up and stared at her sister. “Did you—?”

  “Yes, we did. Several times in fact. Probably would have been more but he ran out of condoms. There. That’s my first ever kiss and tell. I’d carve his name in my bedpost, except my bed doesn’t have a post.”

  Rosie hadn’t thought she was capable of being cheered up, but for some reason this cheered her up. “How long is it since you’ve been involved with a man?”

  “Who said anything about being involved? I’m not involved. We spent a pleasurable physical night together, that’s all.”

  “Apart from the fact you told him things about yourself you’ve never told anyone else.”

  “That too.”

  “And he knows your real name.”

  “Now you’re freaking me out. Fortunately for me, as you pointed out, he kept me there so that you and Dan would have time alone, so I don’t think either of us need to worry that this is going to be a lasting relationship.”

  “And you’re not mad with him for that?”

  “The only person I’m mad with right now is myself. I am going to call the airline, then a taxi. And I will take advantage of the long flight to rethink my life.” Katie heaved herself to her feet. “But first I need coffee, and now that your breathing seems to have settled down you need a hot shower to warm up.”

  “Please don’t leave. If we leave, then we’ll leave together. I still need to talk to Catherine. Promise me you won’t leave?”

  Katie stilled. “I thought you’d had enough of me.”

  Rosie stood up, too, and wrapped her arms around her sister. “I’ve had enough of you protecting me, but I haven’t had enough of you.”

  “Okay, well—” Katie hugged her back. “I won’t leave until you do. That’s a promise.”

  “What about Mum and Dad? Are they splitting up? I’m confused.”

  “You and me both. They were definitely thinking of it, but once I calmed down I realized they couldn’t possibly have known we were all going to show up this morning, so the whole bed thing couldn’t possibly have been for effect.”

  “Can we not talk about the bed thing?”

  “Good plan.” Katie gave her a final hug and walked to the kitchen.

  “Do you think it was my fault they were having problems?”

  “Why would it be your fault?”

  “My asthma put strain on the whole family.”

  “It wasn’t your fault.” Katie handed her a mug. “Relationships are complicated.”

  “You don’t need to tell me that.” Rosie took a sip of coffee. She felt exhausted. Drained of energy. And on the verge of tears. Knowing that crying in front of her sister would make Katie feel worse, she put her coffee down. “You’re right. I need to take that shower. What are you going to do?”

  “I have a couple of errands. First I have to apologize to Mum and Dad, for flinging accusations and invading their privacy. After that,” she said, shrugging, “I don’t know. Maybe you’re right. Maybe we should fly home. Whatever we do, it’s been interesting.”

  Rosie managed a smile. “You can’t beat a White family Christmas.”

  Katie

  Katie pulled on her outdoor gear and paused by the door.

  She could hear the shower running, and she knew her sister was crying under that shower.

  She clenched her hands, fighting the impulse to break down the bathroom door and hug her.

  But what good was comfort?

  Rosie didn’t need comfort. She needed the man she loved. And seeing as Katie was entirely responsible for what had happened, she was the one who should fix things. And that was in no way interfering. How could fixing a wrong be classed as interfering?
/>   It was the natural order of things.

  She’d messed up. And it was no good playing the what if game and wondering if she might have reacted differently had Rosie not called in the middle of a difficult shift, if Sally hadn’t been on her mind, if her head hadn’t been full of her own problems, or if the words perfect and whirlwind hadn’t triggered her protective instincts. That was in the past. All she could do was deal with now.

  She closed the door behind her and walked toward Snowfall Lodge. It was freezing. Surely Dan wouldn’t still be out on the snowmobile? If he was, then she was sunk.

  The walk to the lodge gave her time to think, and by the time she stepped into the elegant foyer, she knew exactly what she wanted to say.

  Taking advantage of the fact that the reception staff were deep in conversation with guests, she ducked into the private stairwell and took the stairs up to the apartment.

  She didn’t intend to give Dan warning of her arrival, and when she tapped on the door and he opened it she saw immediately that had been the right decision.

  “I know you want to close the door in my face and I don’t blame you,” she said. “Give me ten minutes. That’s all I ask.”

  “Rosie sent you.”

  “Rosie would kill me if she knew I was here now.”

  “But you’re willing to take that risk.”

  “Yes, I am, because all of this is my fault.”

  He opened the door and she stepped inside.

  She could see from his body language that he was in agony. She took that as a good sign.

  “So here’s the thing.” She paced to the window and stared across the now familiar beauty of the mountains. “I came here to stop your wedding.”

  “Well, at least you’re honest.”

  She turned. “It seemed too quick to me. A wild, crazy impulse. There were some things going on in my life—I won’t bore you with details, but taken together with what I already knew about Rosie, I felt I knew her mind better than she did. I was scared for her.” She thrust her hands into her pockets. She’d eaten so much humble pie in one day she felt bloated. “I’ve always seen her as vulnerable. All those times when she was little and I held her when she couldn’t breathe—well, that’s an image that’s hard to shake off.” She saw that his expression had changed.