Climb | ✔

Chapter 11 | Thanks

On this particular Thanksgiving Day, Winter was relieved to be thankful for at least one thing: the promise of eating some of her Aunt's famous tres leches cake. Passed down from her Abuelita, Rose's tres leches cake promised the wonderfully moist and decadent flavors that have haunted Winter for the past five years. Finally, her half-decade craving would be sated.

Unfortunately, there were a number of other things that Winter was not thankful for: number one being the sad albeit predictable absence of her father. Another would be the joint dinner plans she and Rose were currently attending.

The Hayes' house was a cottage-style home with yellow sliding and lacquered wood fences. Bushels of roses and other flowers were withering in the flower beds along the wide, wrap-around porch. The door was a handsome ochre shade with a bronze knocker that Rose used with relish.

"Doesn't it just feel classy?" she gushed, pointing a giddy finger at the bronze contraption.

Winter nodded cheekily, her dark brows raised in sarcastic agreeance. Then, Barbara Hayes opened the door and charmed her guests in.

"Oh, let me take that off your hands!" she exclaimed in an accent equal to her husband, Pete's. She took Rose's baking tray off her hands and enthused about the cake. "Murdoch, you take Winter's." She motioned her head towards Winter's.

Murdoch maneuvered around his grandmother in the tight entrance hall and took the dish of elotes from Winter. He smiled awkwardly and nodded in place of a normal greeting, and Winter returned the gesture just as awkwardly.

She felt strangely invasive in their home as Pete conducted them through the house. Portraits and knickknacks of all sorts ornamented their path to the dining room, snippets of the Hayes' family's life that she had no part of; happy and sad memories all melding into a large display of kinship and familial love.

It all felt terribly foreign to her.

The dinner itself was a wonderful affair, and even the strangeness of having Murdoch of all people with her on this auspicious day didn't take away from that. The Hayes and Moores gorged on the finest of Grandma Hayes' cooking. It was no near wonder why she ran a successful and community-loved catering service.

"I got to say, Rose, old friend. Nothing holds a candle to your tres leches cake. Babs tried all she might but couldn't manage it," Pete said, cheeks rosy from wine and smiling all evening long.

"Not even with your recipe," Barbara, or Babs, piped.

Rose laughed gaily and redirected the compliment to Babs' pie. Babs' pies were top-sellers, after all.

When the time to clear the table came around, Winter offered her help to Babs, and Rose insisted that she take it. The two made for the kitchen, plates in hand, and Winter got straight to scraping the turkey bones and leftovers off into the trash bin while Babs prepped for washing.

"It was so nice to have you around this year, Winter. It's nice to have someone Murdoch's age," said Babs as Winter handed a dirty plate to her.

"Oh, well, the pleasure's all mine," replied Winter. She and Murdoch hadn't spoken a single word to one another the whole night. "The food was amazing."

Babs hummed humorously, her green eyes wrinkling tenderly from the scrunch of her coy smile. "Years of practice should warrant a decent meal once in a blue moon. It helps having guests, too. I must say, though, we really had an abundance this year. It's been just the four of-- Pete, Murdoch, Rose, and me--since..."

She paused in her ministrations as her gaze wandered to a decorative shelf mantled alongside the cupboards. Photos and knickknacks adorned it. Her eyes only struck a portrait of her late son before they began to water. "Well, since Bennie passed."