A joyous Birth to all of you! I am certainly filled with joy on this day of days, not least because I am celebrating it on Earth for the first time. I think I have said in the past that Guardians are sometimes withheld from the celebrations in heaven, so that they can watch over what happens with the humans while their angels are gone. Who would have guessed when I wrote that, that within a year I would be one of those Guardians?
Ruhamah has the placement of our troops, and he has organized the ranks of the Guardians into three divisions, each of which will take a four-day shift to cover the season. I am in the first shift, which I believe was intentional, so that I would not be separated from Freya again so soon after rejoining her. Yes, I will be missing the beginning of the songs, but I cannot regret it much.
Our division is further divided into two shifts, day and night, and divided again to alternate patrol and time spent with charges. I have just come from patrolling this afternoon, so I had the privilege of spending Christmas morning with Freya, who after all is still my only charge.
This dawn brings forth a feeling in the human heart which is not quite like anything I have seen before. No matter how one feels about the holiday, whether it has been a source of excitement or stress, one wakes up knowing that this day is different. It is the first conscious thought in many minds all across the world: it’s today. A day that has been eagerly awaited, a day in which the air tastes different. A day that has so much meaning for so many.
Freya felt it when she woke this morning, and I was there to greet her. She smiled even before she opened her eyes, and she breathed in deep, thinking back to earlier years when she would tumble out of bed well before dawn and run to peek into her stocking. Sitting up, she looked around at the room where she was sleeping, which was her own room growing up. It’s changed a great deal since then—the bed is gone, replaced by a pull-out sofa, and the closet is full of boxes and photo albums rather than the fullness of a woman’s wardrobe. But the walls are still the deep blue that she painted them in her teenage years, and the window still looks out on the same little postage-stamp lawn that she saw all her life, currently coated in snow.
Freya had breakfast with her mother—cinnamon rolls—and they raided their stockings, but they didn’t open the presents until after they’d gone out to make a snowman. Pink-cheeked and breathless from the snowball fight they both knew would happen (it surprised me, though), they made hot chocolate and drank it while they opened the presents. Both of them kept a list of who gave them what, and each had given the other a stack of stationery for thank-you notes.
There wasn’t much conversation between them. Today is not a day that needed it. One little exchange warmed my heart, though.
“You seem to be doing a little better,” Esther said, setting her half-drunk cup down on the carpet. “You’ve been down lately.”
Freya tilted her head to one side. “Yeah, I guess I have. But I am better now.”
“Know why?” Esther asked.
“Why I was down, or why I’m better?”
“Both, if you know.”
Freya set down a half-opened box and took up her mug in both hands. She was seeking warmth, and I went to stand behind her and provide it. “I don’t know, it just all seemed like a lot all of a sudden,” she said after a moment’s thought. “The drama with the boys, and Kara and George getting wrapped up in each other—though they’ve been great, really, making sure they don’t leave me out too much—and work is still exactly the same as ever…” She paused for another long moment, and then she said slowly, “And I don’t know. I just had this weird feeling that something had changed. Like…like there was an emptiness where there hadn’t been one before.”
My heart wrenched. I knew that she had missed me, but I didn’t realize that she knew it, too.
Freya looked across at her mother and smiled. “But it’s gone now. Whatever I lost, if I lost something, I have it back now.”
“Well, I’m glad,” Esther said. She leaned forward and set her hand on Freya’s cheek. “You know I want you to have everything, right?”
“Ma,” Freya complained, but she didn’t pull away, and Esther smacked her lightly and they both laughed.
I leaned down over both of them and spread my wings. “I want you both to have everything,” I told them. “Everything good and sweet and peaceful and warm. I want to give it to you if I can.”
I may not be able to do that, at least not as easily as a Cupid might. But I can certainly keep her safe so that she can find it for herself. And if anyone can, it’s Freya.