It only feels like a few seconds go by. But eventually, a voice overhead announces, "Two more minutes until the closing of the workshop. All guests should vacate the premises. Two more minutes."
When we finally pull away, Krista's eyes are once again brimming with tears. "I'm sorry. And I hope I see you next Christmas when the workshop comes back. I understand if I don't. But I hope I do."
All I can do is wait.
Without warning, my life flashes before my eyes.
My teenage years when I learned not to acknowledge the ghosts….
Holding Satomi’s body in my arms….
Lying to my therapists at the sanitorium…
Watching my mother die right in front of me…
Dragging Koyamo out of the Tokyo residence after Satomi tried to use her to confront my father. And then, breaking things off with her for reasons she didn’t understand.
Meeting Kristal…
She dazzles me across a small table.
She kisses me even when I tell her she’s not allowed.
She can never stay still when I’m on top of her.
And she’s better than any other woman I’ve ever met.
She makes me a better person.
She makes everything in my life better.
The highlight reel fades away as Kristal’s words from earlier echo in my mind.
Santa only makes deals that are in your best interest. Like, he doesn’t agree to anything that won’t ultimately benefit you.
What if the answer to my problem comes down to doing what would best benefit Kristal. Not me. Not figuring out how to keep her. But figuring out how to make her life better.
I am my father’s son. I've never been brave. Not when it comes to relationships.
But after a lifetime of doing what would serve my best interests, or protecting myself above all others, I swallow and tell Kristal the truth she deserves to hear. The truth I’ve been keeping inside during our ten days together. Possibly from the first moment we met.
"I love you,” I tell her. “I truly love you."
She inhales sharply, then turns her face away. As if I've hit her, not professed my true love.
I take her by the chin and gently force her to meet my eyes. "Do you love me?"
More tears spill onto her cheeks, and her voice sounds broken as she answers, "This is not the time to start a deep conversation. We have less than two minutes. You have to leave."
But I don't move. I don't let her look away. I only ask again, "Dorie, do you love me? Do you love me like I love you?"
Kristal looks at me for a long helpless second. Then her face crumples, and she nods. "Yes, I love you. I love you so much. And I'm glad Jae-Hyun got his closure, even if he turned out to be a morally questionable and seriously problematic ghost. But this is breaking my heart."
Mine too.
My only option is to wait.
353 days.
But I'm a Nakamura.
We pivot. We adapt. We fight.
And Krista was right. This is True Love.
Letting go of Kristal's chin, I pull out my phone and start typing out a text.
"One minute until we return to the North Pole!" an elf calls out over the speaker.
"What are you doing?" Kristal asks, "You have to get out of here…"
She trails off when I turn the phone around to show her what I've written. A message addressed to Hugh, Norio, and Go.
"Have decided to take a year-long sabbatical to be with the love of my life. I won't be back or reachable until Christmas Day. Hugh Edgeworth will explain everything."
She reads it. Then she looks up at me, her eyes shining and bright. "Do you mean it? Do you really mean it?"
I answer her question by pulling her into my arms.
I kiss her as the final warning alarms blare overhead. And I kiss her some more as the elves start counting down.
"10…9….8…7….6…"
By the time they make it to "One!" I'm fairly certain she knows that this time our arrangement won't be for one night…
Or ten days…
Or even twelve days…
Twelve months.
I'll be with Kristal for twelve months. Twelve Months of Kristal.
Then after that….
A lifetime.
And on that promise, we both fade along with the workshop from this plane of existence.
48
River Deep Mountain High
HAYATO
Christmas 2020
“10… 9… 8… 7… 6…!”
I startle when Kristal and all the other elves gathered on the workshop's main floor suddenly start counting down. Only a few minutes have passed since we waved Santa off in his huge sleigh filled with presents.
Marian, the human woman Santa married two years ago, sidles up to say, “Scared the bejeezus out of me too the first time they did that. You’d think as much as they love workshop-wide announcements, they’d make one before starting the big countdown.”
“… One!!!” The elves finish the countdown with a huge cheer.
“What exactly are they counting down to?” I ask, shouting to be heard over all the noise.
This isn’t the first time Marian has had to explain some strange elf ritual to me.
She’s the only other human in the workshop, and, like me, she can also see ghosts. Her talent is a lot more temporally disconnected than mine though. Ghosts from the past, present, and future commune with her in both the North Pole and the real world—or as the elves refer to it, the third dimension.
But other than that, I was surprised to find that I had more in common with the little old African-American woman from Virginia than any of the ever cheerful and extraordinarily industrious elves.
Marian likes to fuss over me. She makes me lunch every day. And she turned the library into a personal office for me when Santa started giving me odd higher-level administrative jobs so that I would have something to do all day. Santa said he had a to-do list even longer than the naughty one before I came, so he was glad for the help. But I suspect Marian told him I was bored.
In any case, the work is pretty interesting. As it turns out, Hollywood is perfectly aware that Santa exists. My first few months in the North Pole were spent reading scripts and either granting or denying clearance to use Santa’s image and name in various projects. My next few months were spent sending magical cease-and-desist notices to productions and marketing firms who tried to use Santa’s image anyway without the proper clearance.
Twelve months passed and I still didn’t make it all the way down the to-do list. But Marian went out of her way to make me comfortable while I worked. And she even served as my assistant.
When I told her she didn’t have to do so much for me, she answered that she never had the time or wherewithal to be a good mother to either of her daughters. “So I have to pack all the mothering I didn’t do into my one year with you.”
I continue to tell her many times throughout the year that her mothering wasn’t necessary. After all, I grew up with servants. Even my own mother didn’t attend to me the way she insisted on doing ever since we met for the first time on January 7th. Though she greeted me like a long lost son even then.
“Your ghost came to visit me before you passed on to his next life,” she let me know after saying a short hello. “You live to be 106, but you said your time with me in the North Pole was still a fond memory. And even after dementia set in, you remembered your promise to come visit me before you moved on. I’ll tell you, I’ve been looking forward to your twelve months of Kristal for quite a while now. We’re going to be best friends. Apparently, it’s going to be my last year at the North Pole too.”