Page 104 of Run, Run Rudolph
Sparkles shook her head.
I gasped. “Dead?”
“Banished.”
“What does that mean?”
“Mrs. C. made her leave. But she can come back any time you make a wish. And Estelle can banish Mrs. Claus if she goes after a client while she’s granting wishes.” Her voice went so small, I could barely hear her when she added, “But that would cause a really big banishment fight.”
“Oh, boy.”
I’d once wondered what it might be like to have two men fight over me, as it had sounded a bit thrilling to be wanted that badly. This kind of battle though? With Mrs. Claus wanting to punish me, and Estelle wanting to save me? It was spine-chilling.
Still, I wasn’t conceited enough to think they were merely fighting over me. I knew there were a lot of periphery issues in play—ones I didn’t want to think about right now.
I turned back to Haden, unsure of what we should do. Run and hide? Try to help with the sleigh? Wade into the argument and play peacekeeper?
“Let’s see if we can get these goggles to fit the reindeer,” Haden said, as though reading my mind. He drew me behind the broken sleigh, crouching down so we’d be out of sight of the fighting couple. Then we began unboxing the goggles, trying to sort out how we’d fit them on the reindeer, while Sparkles went back to her impossible repair job on the sleigh.
We caught snippets of the argument going on near the stalls. “I was only nineteen.” And “You’re always like this.”
It didn’t sound as if they were arguing about tonight’s mess, and it made me feel helpless. Bringing Mrs. Claus had only made things worse.
Their fighting also reminded me of my parents, before they split temporarily, and of Kade, during our final days as a couple. Only we’d been screaming things such as “You’ve changed” and “You haven’t.”
Either way, in my experience, fights like this had a good chance of being deal-breakers. And that didn’t say much for the state of Christmas.
Haden and I had fallen asleep against the sleigh, unable to successfully lure one of the reindeer past the fighting couple, and over to us for a night-vision goggle fitting.
Now, something was wiggling my foot, disturbing my sleep. I grunted, pulling my foot closer as I snuggled further into Haden’s wonderful embrace and wide chest. He was prefect for snuggling, and as comforting as my Oma’s rice pudding Christmas dessert.
“Tamara!” hissed a voice.
“More sleep,” I muttered. The rhythmic thud of Haden’s heart under my ear made me feel as though everything was, and always would be, okay.
Someone hauled on my foot and I shifted upright, grumpy and dazed. Estelle was crouched beside us behind the sleigh, her short red hair tucked behind her ears.
“Shh. Sorry,” I whispered to Haden, settling him again with a pat on his chest. I extracted myself from his arms with difficulty, because he kept drawing me back in. There was nowhere else I’d rather be, but apparently I had to talk to my fairy godmother about the stupid magical world and its growing issues.
“What?” I asked, crawling over to the other end of the sleigh. The barn was quiet, still warm. When I poked my head up over the sleigh’s side, I could see the Christmas tree winking, but was unable to spy anyone other than a few reindeer resting in the straw.
I took a better look at Estelle. “What happened to your hair?” It was singed, her face red like a Canadian who’d gone out on the first sunny day of June without sunscreen, and gotten smacked about by the unfamiliar ball of fire in the sky called the sun. “And your skin?”
“Banishment.”
I felt my jaw drop, and I think even my shadow took a gulp of horror and surprise at the physical impact of what had happened to her when she’d been shuttled back to her own world against her will.
“We need to get you out of here,” Estelle whispered. She handed me a slip of paper. “This is the wish you need to make for everything to return to normal.”
My hands shook as I read the simple, carefully worded wish.
“Both the head fairy and I looked at it from every angle, and wrote this out. It’ll undo tonight, and should get you out of any trouble with Mrs. Claus.”
“And Christmas?”
“This wish would take you out of this timeline.”
“But will that save Christmas?”
