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This year had been the hardest one so far, with Jace asking a lot more questions about his mom and his grandparents, and the answers…well, they weren’t something Clark thought his seven-year-old needed to hear.
“My daughter may not appreciate me volunteering her,” Victoria continued, “but I really can’t do everything, no matter how bad I want to.”
Clark chuckled. “Sometimes you gotta delegate.”
“Yes, and to be quite honest, I like to enjoy the festival, not deal with the details that go along with it.”
Butch broke free of Jace’s affections to greet Clark, leaning his whole body against him.
“Hey, big guy,” Clark whispered, patting the dog’s side before responding to Victoria. “I’m looking forward to checking out the festival as an adult. We didn’t really attend it when I was a kid. I was going to go with the other farm employees as a teen, but I think I got sick the day of.”
“Hopefully you’ll stay healthy this time. It is such a great event that helps out so many people and programs. You and Jace will enjoy it. Maybe they’ll have a superhero tree.”
Jace bounded into the kitchen and wrapped his arms around Victoria’s thighs. “You think?”
Instead of getting irritated or shooing him away, she chuckled, brushing his sandy hair back off his forehead. “Maybe that new gamer shop will do one.”
“That would be cool. Can my dad have a cookie?”
“Of course he can. Do you want another one too?”
Jace nodded.
A lump clogged Clark’s throat. Victoria treated Jace like a grandson and they’d only been there a few months. Clark’s parents cared enough to send Jace a birthday card and that was it. He’d made the effort, hoping their initial disapproval of Clark’s life decisions would fade as they spent time with their grandchild, but that hadn’t happened. He’d blown up at them a few days into the last trip after his father berated Jace for spilling his juice on the floor. Clark packed up their stuff and booked a hotel, dipping into his savings so they could spend one day at the Magic Kingdom. Clark sent a Christmas card once a year with a recent picture of Jace inside, but nothing more. It took him too many years to realize they would never be the kind of parents he wanted, and it was useless to be angry with them for it. They weren’t going to change.
The only family member he cared for besides Jace was his brother Sam. Sam was eight years older than Clark and had practically raised him until he’d moved to Oregon a few weeks after he’d graduated high school. Sam put his artistic talents to use as a tattoo artist and the first time he’d come home for a visit on a motorcycle with full tattoo sleeves and a tongue ring, Clark thought their parents were going to have a stroke.
Appearances were everything and they’d had no problem telling Sam to get lost. Clark remembered chasing his brother out the door, begging Sam to take Clark with him, but his mother screeched at him to get inside. Sam hugged him hard, told him he’d call, and headed out of town the way he came. The next seven years passed at a snail’s pace, with secret visits from Sam and his year at the Winters farm bringing brief stints of happiness in the solitude. Clark only had a few acquaintances, but they never spent time together outside of school. His shelves of books were his only escape and he consumed nearly six books a week. It worked out well for his parents and for him. They’d never been involved, unless either boy did something that could make them look bad. Sam and Clark didn’t exist unless they needed to parade them around as a perfect little family.
The day Clark left for college, he’d packed up his Subaru with everything he treasured and didn’t look back. Didn’t visit. Called for major holidays, but they were usually too busy for more than a brief exchange.
Watching the loving way Victoria and Chris Winters were with Jace brought the futile anger to the surface all over again at the people who raised him. He hadn’t expected Chris and Victoria Winters to treat them like family when Clark took the foreman position at the Winters Christmas Tree Farm. Victoria had even offered to pick up Jace from school and watch him so he didn’t have to hang at the after-school program. Clark didn’t want her to think he was taking advantage of her, but she’d insisted. Now Jace didn’t think twice about bursting into the main house, treating it like a second home.
Victoria picked up the head of the cow cookie jar and reached in to grab Jace a cookie, leaving the body of the black-and-white cow wearing a red-and-blue-striped scarf decapitated.
“That poor cow loses his head anytime someone has a sweet tooth,” Clark joked.
“Oh!” Victoria squatted down, laughter bubbling out. “I never thought about how morbid it looked! My mother got it for me years ago during my cow phase and I rotate it in when the weather turns cold and put the cow in the bathing suit away. Now that I think about it, that one does the same thing. You want one?”
Clark chuckled. “No, thank you.”
She replaced the top of the cookie jar with a sigh. “I wish you would. Otherwise, I find myself eating too many of them!”
“But Dad, I want you to try one,” Jace protested.
“Would you like a container of cookies for your place so your dad can try them later?” Victoria asked.
Jace nodded his head enthusiastically and Clark gave in. “Thanks, that would be great.”
Victoria pulled out a clear container and filled it nearly to the brim with chocolate chip cookies before snapping the red lid in place and handing it to him. “This will get you home so you can put them in your cookie jar.”
“We don’t have a cookie jar. We always buy the prepackaged cookies because we don’t make fresh ones.”
“Well, you’re going to need one if Jace becomes the master baker he’s aspiring to be,” Victoria said with a wink.
Butch, who had been politely sitting next to Jace, watching him take bite after bite of his cookie, finally whined and lifted one massive paw into the air, his long, droopy ears swaying with the motion.
“You can’t have these kinds of cookies, Butch.” Victoria pointed to a jar in the corner in the shape of a hound wearing a Santa hat. “Jace, will you get Butch a cookie?”
