Echolls Family Christmas 2006, Part II

[dead_hooker_2]

OK, so it wasn't exactly a Christmas out of the movies. But it went surprisingly well, given that most Christmases for the Echolls siblings have been one step removed from hellish.

And now Mary and Logan have gone home, and Chad's Grangran is snoring away in the guest room, and Trina is sort of absently tidying the living room, moving things from place to place, slightly restless, but not unhappily so.

Chad catches her arm as she goes past him, and pulls her down onto the couch beside him.

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[dead_hooker_2]

Trina almost laughs, though not with a great deal of humor. She's certainly aware of it.

"'So, baby don't connect the dots, hey, change your mind, We'll just call it détente'?" she says, finishing the chorus.

[dead_hooker_2]

A faint smile.


"Hey, there's a reason that album went platinum."

[dead_hooker_2]

"Yeah, but, Sweetie, I don't think it was the lyrics," she says, with a bit of a smile.

[dead_hooker_2]

"They were heartfelt."






It's not exactly a subtle hint.

[dead_hooker_2]

Chad is not exactly subtle.

Neither, for that matter, is Trina.

"Yeah? So then I guess the question is, what do we want?"

[dead_hooker_2]

Chad looks at her.


"I thought you were pretty happy," he says; which isn't, exactly, an answer.

[dead_hooker_2]

"I was. Or I am. Or . . . what do you want, Chad?"

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"I'm happy," Chad says. A little helplessly.

He's not a complicated guy, is Chad.

"But it sounds like -

"It sounds like you're resenting me for reasons I didn't know were there.

"Are you?"

[dead_hooker_2]

"No," she says. "God no. It's just, there's a lot I can't really tell you, and I don't know that that's ever going to change. It's just always going to be there. And it's not anything you did. Or do. It just is."

[dead_hooker_2]

"I'm . . . beginning to get that."

[dead_hooker_2]

"I really, really hate Christmas."

[dead_hooker_2]

Chad doesn't say anything.

But he does reach over to take his hand in hers, and squeeze it.

[dead_hooker_2]

"Do you think we could possibly not do this?" she asks, quietly. "Or have I pretty ruined things?"

[dead_hooker_2]

"- we don't," Chad says, "have to do anything you don't want to."

And smiles. A small smile, but there.

[dead_hooker_2]

"Détente," she says, with a small smile of her own.