The Maid of Honor and the Two Groomsmen No One Seated Beside Her novel · Chapter 23 of 24

Chapter 23: Christmas Eve

We drove to Cookeville on Christmas Eve in my green CR-V.

Colt's legs filled the back seat, and Jesse held a ham from Franklin in a cooler on his lap.

"Say it again," I said at the exit. "Who knows what."

"Your mother knows," Jesse said. "Your father knows because your mother made him sit down."

"And?"

"And your father took it better than your mother did," Jesse said.

"My mother took it fine."

"She asked if we'd both be eating," Colt said.

"That's a question about casseroles."

"Is it?"

My parents' house sat on top of a hill outside town.

It was a brick ranch with a manger in the yard and an extension cord running to every window.

My mother opened the door before I could knock.

She was in her red cardigan, with flour up to both elbows, and she looked at me.

Then at the two of them standing behind me on the mat holding the ham.

"Well," she said. "Come in, then. You're letting the heat out."

That was all.

She kissed me on the cheek and took the ham, and she hugged Jesse, who had gone pink, and patted Colt on the arm.

There were stockings on the mantel in the living room.

There had always been three, hung in a row, and for six Christmases the third had said his name.

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