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Maria
“I have to get home. There’s no way I can miss Nochebuena, the biggest and best night of the year in our family.” Literally translated, Nochebuena means good night, and it’s how the Cuban community celebrates Christmas Eve. Abuela pulls out all the stops to put on a feast of such epic proportions, we can’t move for days afterward. We look forward to it all year, and missing not only the party itself, but the day-long prep with my grandmothers, mother, aunts, sister and cousins is inconceivable to me.
Austin has had the patience of a saint as we grapple with weather delays on the way home from ten days in Hawaii, where we attended the wedding of one of his Miami Marlins teammates while enjoying the vacation of a lifetime.
Our honeymoon is going to have to work awfully hard to top this trip, which was perfect until we landed at LAX and learned we probably can’t get to Miami today due to a massive storm in the middle of the country. Tomorrow, which is Christmas Eve, is looking iffy, too.
He reaches for my hand and draws me down into the seat next to him. “Weather delays mean rough air, and you don’t like rough air any more than I do. I know it sucks to be stranded, especially at Christmas, but I’d rather spend the holiday in this airport than fly through that crap.”
He’s right. I know he is, especially since I totally freaked out on the flight to Hawaii when we flew through thirty minutes of pretty intense turbulence over the Pacific. I had visions of crashing into the ocean that had me on the verge of hyperventilating for the full half hour that the plane bounced through the sky.
I sag into the chair, feeling defeated.
“At least we have each other, right?” he asks with the cute grin that turns my insides to mush every time it’s directed my way, which is often.
My gorgeous man is even more so than usual after ten days of sunshine turned his skin a dark tan and made his blond hair even lighter. He’s unfairly beautiful, and I notice women looking at him everywhere we go. However, he never looks at anyone but me, which is one of many ways that loving him makes me a very lucky girl.
“What about poor Everly?” I ask of his three-year-old daughter, home with his parents and counting the days until Daddy and Rie get back from Hawaii. “We can’t miss Christmas with her.” I want to wail at the thought of missing our first Christmas as a family.
“Even if we can’t get there, she’ll still have a wonderful day thanks to everything we did to prepare before we left, and we’ll make it up to her with a trip to Disney or something when we get home.” He puts his arm around me and draws my head onto his shoulder. “What is it that Nona always says? We can plan everything except the weather.”
“That’s Abuela’s saying.”
“I knew it was one of them, the sources of more valuable wisdom than anyone I’ve ever met. They’d tell you the same thing I am—sit tight with your wonderful fiancé and stay safe for Christmas. What else can we do?”
“Nothing, I guess.” I can’t believe this is happening. I’ve been counting down to the first Nochebuena with Austin, Everly and Austin’s parents as part of my family. I couldn’t wait for them to experience the magnificence that is Christmas Eve with the Giordinos.
“I wanted to be there for Dee tomorrow, too. Wyatt is having his annual cardiac checkup, and she’s losing it.” My sister’s fiancé is a seventeen-year heart transplant survivor. With the average life expectancy after transplant right around eleven years, the annual checkups are a source of tremendous stress to everyone who loves Dr. Wyatt Blake, especially my sister, who is enduring it for the first time after falling for him this year.
“Why’s he having that done on Christmas Eve?”
“I guess it’s the one day no one wants to schedule surgery, so it’s a lighter day for him.”
Wyatt has parlayed his personal experiences into a successful career as a cardiothoracic surgeon.
Austin runs his fingers through my hair, which he knows soothes me when I’m wound up about something. “Can I ask a weird question?”
“Sure.”
“Why does your family celebrate Nochebuena? You guys aren’t even Cuban.”
That’s true. I’m not, but my cousin Carmen is, and her Cuban grandmother belongs to all of us, regardless of whether we’re related by blood. That’s how it works in our family. Christmas Eve has always belonged to Abuela, and it always will. I lift my head off Austin’s shoulder to look him in the eye. “Baby, on Nochebuena, we’re all Cuban.”
Dee
I tell myself to calm the hell down, but myself isn’t listening. Wyatt is fine and has told me repeatedly there’s no reason to worry about a routine cardiac checkup. Try telling that to my blood pressure, which must be sky-high as I’ve counted down to Christmas Eve and the only thing that truly matters to me on a day that’s usually full of family, food and fun. I’m the one who’s going to end up with a life-threatening cardiac condition unless I can find a way to chill.
Easier said than done.
I need him to be okay.
That is all I need to be okay myself, and it’s all I want for Christmas.
I’m so brittle with anxiety that I fear one wrong look from someone will break me, which is why I’m going with Wyatt to the hospital rather than helping with Nochebuena preparations tomorrow.
I’ve never once, in my entire life, missed that time with the women in my family, but I’ve also never had to deal with the possibility of losing the man I love to the heart condition that’s been at the center of his life since he was eight and diagnosed with cardiomyopathy.
Wyatt tried to save me from days like tomorrow by attempting to talk me out of loving him. He failed miserably at that, thank goodness. Every other day I’ve spent with him has been pure bliss. Today—and tomorrow—are the only days on which his situation has invaded our happily ever after. I tell myself I can get through two days of hell to have the rest of the time with him, but I have to be honest. The worry is more debilitating than I expected it to be when I decided to fight for the life I want with him.
I’m so upset, I feel sick, which I’m going to have to hide from him when he comes to bed after a shower. I hear the water turn off and steel myself to be my usual chipper self when I’m with the man of my dreams. And everything about our life together is a dream come true.
Except for this one thing—the specter of his uncertain health that hangs over days like today when we’re forced to confront his reality. The rest of the time we do a pretty good job of pretending like we have nothing to worry about.