Read Grace Grows for Free Online Page B

I said crisply, gathering up our empty plates, sweeping crumbs off the desk. I stood up, and found myself just about standing between his knees.
    “Well,” I said.
    He was not getting the message that we were leaving. He sprawled in a casual slouch in his chair, looking up at me from under auburn lashes.
    He patted his thigh. “Sit here.”
    “No.”
    “C’mon, Gracie.” He grazed a finger down my forearm. “I promise you’ll like it.”
    I kicked his chair.
    He got up.
    Coming down in the elevator he asked, “Are you mad at me?”
    “Why would I be?” I said cheerfully.
    He walked me to the subway at Fiftieth and Broadway.
    “ ’Bye,” I said. “If I don’t see you, Merry Christmas.”
    “I thought you were coming Monday night.”
    “Well, probably not, it turns out. Lots of shopping still to do.”
    “But you have to be there! I’ve been working on your Christmas gift.”
    “You have?”
    He smiled.
    “Ty, what is it?”
    “Come and find out.”
    arson becomes a subconscious possibility
     
    It was my last day at work for more than a week. The next day was Christmas Eve, and Steven and I were going to New Jersey.
    No one actually did any work. Edward had already gone to Houston, and the office was boring without him. We had cookies and eggnog in the break room and opened our Secret Santa gifts.
    I was Secret Santa to a slightly gruff older woman in Production, named Carol. We hadn’t worked together much, and all I knew about her was that her husband had recently died and she liked making crafts. Someone told me she had cats. So I spent way more than the twenty-dollar Secret Santa limit and gave her a needlepoint kit I got at the Met gift shop, based on The Favorite Cat lithograph by Currier.
    She unwrapped it, smiled tremulously, and covered her face with her hands.
    I put an arm around her shoulders. A couple of others gathered around us.
    “It’s just so hard ,” Carol said.
    None of us knew what to say. I hoped just listening was helpful, somehow. Someone gave her a tissue. I patted her shoulder.
    “Sorry,” she said, wiping her eyes. “It’s this fucking time of year.”
    Turned out Bill was my Secret Santa. He gave me a tin of Danish butter cookies and a Chia Pet in the shape of a cow. Obviously he did his Christmas shopping at Walgreens. I pondered the placid, bovine expression on my Chia and said thank you.
    Before I left work Peg called to check in with me about going to Tyler’s gig. I said that I would meet her there, but first I had to go with Steven to his office party.
    When we hung up, I grabbed my personalized Spender-Davis notepad and jotted down a sampling of my favorite songs. It was a mix of old oldies, like Earth, Wind & Fire’s “That’s the Way of the World,” and semi-oldies from high school days, like Blind Melon’s “Change.” I also special-mentioned Kate Bush’s seminal album The Kick Inside , an incredible late-seventies record a friend turned me on to in college.
    Steven’s company had rented a midtown nightclub for their party, complete with lavish buffet and open bar. A jazz band. We sat with two of his fellow attorneys, Nico and Ron, and Ron’s wife, Jody.
    Nico was going through a breakup that sounded a lot like what had happened to Steven: He met his wife in law school, was married a few years, and then she fell in love with a guy she worked with in private practice. Nico was doing a pretty good job of functioning socially, but he had this base facial expression of haunted vulnerability, overlaid with quick flashes of anger and cynicism. He laughed too quickly and loudly. When he spilled his drink, Steven cleaned it up and Ron went to the bar to get him a cup of coffee.
    “Poor guy,” Jody whispered to me.
    “Hey, man,” I heard Steven say quietly while he was blotting Nico’s shirt. “It gets better. Remember how I was when Katie left me? I thought my life was over. I could barely get out of bed, except to drink.”
    “I know, man,” Nico