"She would've liked the scissors threat," Dez said, nodding at Wren. "She believed in decisive women."
"She raised one decisive man who pretends otherwise," Wren said.
Gus wiped his glasses. "For the record, if you two get disgustingly happy, I'm still inserting myself into holidays forever. Contractual. Pine-needle clause."
"Signed," Dez said.
"Initialed," Wren added.
They hung the last ornaments from the KEEP box—careful, ceremonial. Dez told them about the revolving stand in Queens, about perfume-counter complexity, about the tabletop fir and the medicine bottles and the way grief had made him allergic to small trees as if size itself could reverse time. Wren cried quietly and did not hide it. Gus put a hand on Dez's shoulder and left it there until the moment passed from sharp to bearable.
Midnight arrived. Somewhere in the building, someone shouted a tipsy carol. The three of them stood at the window and watched snow erase the alley’s sharp lines. Wren slipped under Dez's arm. Gus hummed off-key on purpose. For a stretch of minutes measured only by blinking lights, nothing needed solving.
---