One Imperfect Christmas Read Online Free PDF Page B

jaw clenched. “You spend every waking minute either at the print shop or working on your laptop at the dining room table. I go to bed alone; I get up alone. I take care of Lissa alone. It's not fair to me, and it's definitely not fair to our daughter.”
     
    Her hands balled into fists. Her eyes burned. She could hardly get a full breath. “You don't understand—”
     
    “That's the problem. I don't understand.” Daniel gripped the back of a chair. His head wagged like a pendulum. “You've stopped visiting your mother at the nursing home. You won't go with me to counseling. I don't know what else to do.”
     
    He turned away, his next words barely audible even as they exploded on Natalie's eardrums. “This is Saturday. Next Thursday is the last day of school. I want you moved out before Lissa and I get home.”
     

     
    “Daniel and I are separating.” Natalie rested her forehead on clasped hands and stared at a scratch on her parents' kitchen table—an old scratch, long and wavy and deeper on one end. She probably gouged it with a pencil while doing her homework a thousand years ago.
     
    Silence filled the farmhouse kitchen. A warm gust of air billowed the gingham curtains at the open window beside her. She raised her eyes to meet her father's. “Aren't you going to say something?”
     
    The sadness in his gaze said it all. “It's a mistake, Rosy-girl. And you know it.”
     
    “We're only separating—nothing permanent.” At least she hoped Daniel would eventually take her back. “We're fighting too much. We need some space. I've already put a deposit on an apartment.”
     
    “What about Lissa?”
     
    Natalie rubbed her temple. “She's staying with Daniel for now. This is going to be hard enough on her without making her move out of the house.”
     
    Dad rose and strode to the sink. He wet a dishcloth and wiped at imaginary spots on the counter. His shoulders knotted beneath his chambray work shirt. He stopped, leaned over the sink, and pressed his eyes shut. “If your mother knew her illness split up your family, she'd be crushed.”
     
    A river of pain flooded her. She swallowed a sob before it could escape. Mom had always done so much for her—selling paintings to help pay for Natalie's art supplies and classes, her riding gear and horse show entry fees, and then …
     
    “ Natalie, didn't you hear the weather forecast? I won't leave you alone on the farm with a bunch of nervous animals.”
     
    On top of all her other sacrifices over the years, Mom had risked everything important to her in that one act of selflessness. Yet Natalie kept making one wrong choice after another.
     
    Now things had gone too far, and she could see no way back. As a tear slipped silently down her cheek, she studied her wedding ring before sliding it off her finger and tucking it into her pocket.
     

     
    “No problem, Jeff. The Carla's Confections ad will be ready for printing first thing Monday.” Natalie snapped her cell phone shut and turned onto Willowbrook Lane. This was her weekend to spend with Lissa, and she promised herself not to spend the whole day working. Maybe by afternoon they'd have time—
     
    Her heart thudded to the pit of her stomach. She'd barely gotten used to seeing the gaudy for-sale sign in the front yard, its red and yellow logo a jarring contrast to the colonial-blue siding and white trim gracing the home she and Daniel had shared for the past three years. They'd dreamed about it together, pored over building plans together, and scrimped and saved together until they had enough for a down payment.
     
    Now someone had slapped a big, bold SOLD sign across the Realtor's emblem. It was over, the dream dying along with her marriage.
     
    After Natalie moved out, it didn't take long to realize they'd have to let the house go. Their combined incomes barely covered the mortgage payment, and now Natalie had apartment rent to pay. The real estate agent assured them that with families wanting