Ten years had passed since that Christmas morning that had changed my life forever. Ten years of quiet routines, whispered goodnights, Lego towers, and bedtime stories.
Ten years of making sure Liam knew love, consistency, and security, despite the enormous absence of the woman who had promised to share that life with me.
Katie had died in the hospital, her hand slipping from mine as she whispered encouragement to the nurse, her last breaths intermingling with the first cries of our son.
I had held Liam against my chest, trembling and numb, as the weight of a lifetime of promises settled upon me. I was alone now, responsible for this tiny human being who carried the legacy of both of us, yet had barely met his mother.
For a decade, it had just been the two of us. I never remarried. I never even considered it seriously. Liam was enough. He was my world, my heartbeat outside of myself, the living memory of a love that had been taken too early.
The week before Christmas always felt heavier than the rest of the year. It wasn’t in a peaceful way. The days seemed slower, the air thicker, almost reluctant to carry time forward.
We moved in routines: mornings filled with cereal, school lunches packed, LEGO blocks scattered across the kitchen floor, and evenings with soft lights and quiet stories. The rhythm of our life was predictable, comforting, and yet filled with an invisible absence.
That morning, Liam sat at the kitchen table, the same chair Katie used to lean against when she made her cinnamon tea. Her photo rested on the mantel in a blue frame, her smile frozen mid-laugh, as if someone had whispered the perfect joke.
I didn’t need to look at it to see her. She lived in Liam, in the way he furrowed his brow when he was concentrating, the tilt of his head when imagining something fantastic, the way he carefully organized his LEGO pieces into perfect patterns.
“Dad,” he asked without looking up from his creations, “do you think Santa gets tired of peanut butter cookies?”
Tired? Of cookies?” I set my mug down and leaned against the counter. “I don’t think that’s possible, son.”
“But we make the same ones every year,” he said. “What if he wants variety?”
“We make them, and then you eat half the dough before it ever hits the tray.”
