Glastonbury, 25 December 1988

[noteful]

It's not quite three in the morning, and Meg Ford is staring at the ceiling in her sister's study/storage/catch all/guest room.

She could blame the insomnia on the fact that her sense of time is thrown off by a seven-hour flight and a five-hour time change and a church service that got them back to Kim's house past midnight, and that would be legitimate, really. But the simple fact of the matter is that for most of her life, she hasn't slept well at Christmas. There's too much to stay awake and think about.

When Meg had been not-quite-four, she woke Kim up at four in the morning to tell her that Santa Claus had been there. (Meg had evidence to present. She had checked, and the stockings that had been flat and empty when she'd gone to bed were definitely fat and full now.) And a fourteen-year old Kim, rather than telling her little sister to go back to bed, had obligingly gone downstairs to see, too, and then made them both cocoa so they could sit by the tree and guess what was in the boxes.

By the time Meg was the one who was fourteen, it was one of those deeply ingrained, if wholly unofficial, traditions that spring up around holidays.

And in the last three years, it's become one of the many holiday traditions that has undeniably, though again unofficially, fallen by the wayside for the Fords. When Kim met them at the airport, it was the first time the four of them had been in the same room in nearly four years. That's a lot to ask traditions to withstand.

Meg's actually glad they're not trying to do this at her parents' house, with all those old habits and patterns and expectations lying in wait to trip them up. The Ghost of Christmas Past was cruel, in a lot of ways. It's much more a year to focus on the whole Come in! And know me better thing.

It would not be accurate to say it's been a perfectly easy, like-nothing-ever-happened visit. There have been awkward moments, certainly. But they've been a strangely easy sort of awkward, the sort that's diffused with wry smiles and phrases like I'm sorry, after you.

All in all, it's been a quiet couple days. They've been for walks in twos and threes and all together, and played card games, and filled Kim's nook of a kitchen with baked goods. Kim took them into town, to show their father the clinic where she works, and to shop, and to play tourist. They've had dinners at Kim's house, and lunches in the restaurant nearest the inn their parents are staying in because Kim's home is not really designed for three houseguests.

They're all having to relearn how to do this, to be a family, and sometimes it's very hard and sometimes it's as easy as breathing.

It's a mix, this Christmas, of new and old, of the tried and true and the new and the risky, compromises and oh but we have to's, the traditions that have survived and the innovations that will replace them.

And when the clock on the desk reads 3:04, Meg decides she's spent more than enough time staring at the ceiling. She pulls a sweater on over her pajamas, and steps into her loafers, and goes down the hall to the living area to see which of those lists joint sororal Christmas insomnia belongs on.

Comments

[noteful]

Meg shrugs.

"It's Christmas Eve."

Meg looks down at her watch, though she knows the time.

"Actually, I guess, technically it's Christmas.

"But not at home, yet.

"What an odd thought."

[bannion_sight]

"Time zones are tricky that way."

She taps the wooden spoon against the edge of the saucepan, then glances down into it.

"I think this is almost done."

[noteful]

"Is there anything I can do to help?"

[bannion_sight]

"You can get a couple of mugs down from that cupboard over there?" Kim nods to an overcounter cabinet beside the refrigerator.

[noteful]

One of the nice things about having a sister not much taller than you is that she doesn't put all the useful stuff on the high shelves.

Meg sets two mugs next to the stove and steps out of the way.

[bannion_sight]

Kim ladles cocoa into the mugs, alternating back and forth between the two.

"Do you want whipped cream?"

She gives Meg a quick grin.

[noteful]

"It's Christmas Eve," Meg says again.

[bannion_sight]

She laughs.

"In the fridge. Top shelf."

That same shelf also holds a small canister of chocolate shavings, sitting right beside the whipped cream.

[noteful]

Meg pulls both out of the refrigerator, though she is surprised to find the chocolate shavings.

"Have you gone all gourmet, since you got to England?"

Because English food is not exactly known for inspiring that sort of thing.

[bannion_sight]

"What-- oh, no, that's not why--"

Kim shakes her head, looking rueful.

"-- that's because of Mrs. Williams. She was doing her marketing at the same time I was, and was insistent."

[noteful]

"And do you get insisted into things often, while marketing?"

[bannion_sight]

"Remind me to introduce you to Mrs. Williams," Kim says, very dryly. "She's very convincing."

[noteful]

"Is she why you have four jars of marmelade?"

Meg opens the jar of chocolate shavings and sprinkles them across the whipped cream that is now on top of the cocoa.

[bannion_sight]

"No, that's Jennie Stiles," Kim tells her. "She brings one by the clinic every time she finishes a new batch."

A beat. "I think they know each other, though."

[noteful]

"So, basically, you've been adopted?

"Do you even like marmalade?"

[bannion_sight]

"Something like that, I guess."

"And honestly? Not that much," she admits. "It's one thing to have it every once in a while, but not every day."

[noteful]

"Then you probably never have to worry about running out."

Kim is well-supplied, if it is an occasional thing to have with toast.

"So you like living over here, insistant marketers and marmalade excesses aside?"

[bannion_sight]

"I do."

She turns the flame down under the saucepan and picks up her mug, gesturing with it in the direction of the living room.

"It's not Canada, but it's still --"

Home, she starts to say, and then doesn't.

"-- comfortable. I like it here very much," Kim concludes.

[noteful]

Meg follows her sister into the living room.

"That's good.

"It's pretty here, from what I've seen."

[bannion_sight]

"You should see it in spring and summer," Kim tells her, curling up at one end of the little sofa. She tucks her feet under her and leans back against the arm of the sofa, the mug of cocoa cradled in one hand.

"It's pretty then, too."

[noteful]

"I think I'd like that," Meg says, taking the other end of the sofa.

[bannion_sight]

"Well, you're welcome any time you want to come."

She takes a sip of her cocoa, then nods at the tree.

"I think it turned out well, don't you?"

[noteful]

Meg looks at the tree in its corner, somewhat precariously balanced and assisted not a little by the fact that it's (stealthily) tied to nails in the wall and ceiling to keep it in place.

"Yes.

"It's a very festive engineering marvel," says Meg.

[bannion_sight]

Kim laughs.

"It shows, huh?"

[noteful]

"It does, yes."