The Nine Lives of Christmas by Sheila Roberts Page B

and tears. An unknown choir was singing “God rest ye merry gentlemen, let nothing you dismay.”
    No dismay, she vowed. This wasn’t the end of the world. It was the beginning of a new chapter. Life has more in store for you than working at Pet Palace .
    Somehow, somewhere, she would find it.
    *   *   *
    Tom was obviously happy with his magic scratching box. It seemed as though every time Zach turned around the cat was at the thing, clawing up a storm. Better that than the couch.
    “Looks like our problems are solved, dude,” he said, scratching Tom behind his ears. “Now maybe I can stay out of Pet Palace for a while.”
    And that was a good thing. Really. He had other stuff to spend his money on, like new flooring and a shower unit for the downstairs bathroom. He didn’t need to be always running into Merilee.
    Or any other woman. Women complicated things and Zach didn’t need complications.
    Speaking of complications. “Have you talked to your chief yet about getting Christmas Eve off?” asked his mother.
    He knew he shouldn’t have answered his cell. “Mom, I really don’t think that’s going to happen.”
    Mom had cancelled the family togetherness card when she and Al, husband number two, had taken the Steps and moved to the East Coast to start a new life that hadn’t included Zach and David. That had been fine with Zach. He’d been thirteen at the time and what Al so lovingly termed a pain in the butt, so he’d been shunted off to live with Dad, who was slowly sliding into the bottle, while Mom and Al had skipped off to live the good life.
    At first she’d made the right sounds about missing Zach and wanting him to come out for the summer. (Like Al was anxious for that!) But their conversations were never good and soon the phone calls dried up, maybe scorched by the heat of teen boy anger. Or maybe because she just hadn’t given a damn. Either way, what did it matter? By the time Zach was sixteen they were down to a yearly check enclosed in a birthday card. He never cashed the checks. They always felt like bribes. She finally gave up on checks and switched to gift cards like that was, somehow, more personal. He’d tossed those, too.
    Mom and the gang had moved back to town in June and she was ready to be one big happy family again. Zach had no problem being a family with the Steps. Both girls had friended him on Facebook a couple of years back and now they were constantly messaging him, stopping by the station, or calling him on the phone … or siccing producers from The Bachelor on him. But Mom, he wasn’t ready for her or her plans for a cozy family Christmas.
    He could already see how that would play out. David would conveniently forget to call from Australia, and that would leave Mom all teary. Al would feel honor bound to comfort her and mutter that the kid was just like his dad. Not a compliment. When Mom was finished mourning the fact that her baby was so far away she would tell Zach how happy she was that they all were able to be together again. Of course, one of the Steps would be sure to have her laptop handy, primed to sign him up for eHarmony. He’d balk. Then his stepdad, the PC king, would teasingly suggest he was gay. Otherwise, why wouldn’t a man want to settle down with a wonderful woman like Zach’s mother? Aw, sweet. And a good way to assure Al got his for Christmas. Later, to top off the evening, Dad would call Zach on his cell, drunk and maudlin—his favorite way to celebrate the holidays.
    Yeah, Mom’s party would be as fun as a toothache, not to mention hypocritical since he and Al had never gotten along. It would also feel wrong to be with a family that shouldn’t have been his family. And they wouldn’t have been if Mom hadn’t dumped Dad.
    When he was little he didn’t get it, but as he grew older he had pieced things together pretty easily. Somehow, Dad hadn’t been enough so Mom had dumped him and splintered their family unit. Then she upgraded to Al and