A Christmas with the Lawsons after CUBS WIN!!

A Christmas with the Lawsons

Mara

"Are you serious?"

"What?"

"How many of those do you have?"

Mitch jerked his head toward the t-shirt I was wearing.

A tee that had a white flag with a big blue "W" on it, red fireworks exploding around it with the Chicago Cubs' "C" under it.

One could say I went a little bit nuts this season (and last, and pretty much every season) buying Cubs tees.

But definitely this season.

I looked back to my husband and answered, "Seven thousand, two hundred and twenty-two."

He grinned at me and asked, "Did we get another closet I don't know about?"

"Don't be smart," I retorted.

"You married me because I'm smart."

I absolutely did not.

I married him because he was beyond perfect. He loved me. He loved my niece and nephew, Bud and Billie. He took care of all of us like he was born to do just that. And because he was outrageously hot.

Mitch came to me and put his hands to my hips.

Bending his head to me, he kept up the interrogation (not a surprise, he was a cop). "We all gonna get Cubs gear for Christmas?"

My eyes slid to the side because that was a yes and no answer.

The no part was that they weren't only going to get Cubs gear for Christmas.

The yes part was that they were all definitely going to get a bunch of Cubs gear for Christmas.

It wasn't just because Mitch was a cop that he read my face astutely, prompting him to remark, "You do know, outside you, this is a Colorado Rockies family. Not to mention, Bud's living and breathing the dream to play for the Rockies one day."

I knew this. I survived this knowledge every day.

My nephew, who lived with Mitch and I, was loved by Mitch and I like we'd made him ourselves and loved Mitch and I like crazy, was a really good baseball player. That's what he wanted to be when he grew up. And all he could talk about was playing for the Rockies.

I could handle this, just barely, due to the fact we lived in Denver.

I was still hoping to sway him toward my Cubbies.

"You're not gonna give up tryin' to make him love the Cubs," Mitch noted.

I narrowed my eyes on him.

Really?

Sometimes having a husband who was a cop, who was smart, who knew me through and through and who didn't know when to keep his mouth shut was annoying.

Luckily, he was hot, so even through narrowed eyes, I could still see him and that made my being annoyed not that annoyed.

I decided to change the subject and asked, "Are we going to the Christmas party Tyra's throwing at the Compound?"

Mitch blew out a sigh and looked over my head, muttering, "How I got to the point my social life includes hangin' with a bunch of vigilante bikers at their Compound, I will never know."

"Yes you do," I retorted. "You were there, helping to save Tyra's life when that lunatic kidnapped her. It's not like bikers aren't loyal, Mitch. You did that for Tyra and Tack, you're forever part of the Chaos posse."