The Christmas Hope (12 page)
Read The Christmas Hope Online
Authors: Donna VanLiere
“Diet Coke,” I said, catching the waitress before she left. “I can already feel the holiday pounds.”
Roy leaned on the table and looked at me. “You look terrible, Patti.”
I threw my arms in the air. “Please, don’t hold anything back. Tell me how I really look.”
Roy laughed and made room for the pitcher of Sprite. “Did she like the tree?”
“She loved it.” I swirled the napkin in bigger circles in front of me.
Roy cleared his throat. “Are you happy that Mark will be home for Christmas?”
I looked up at him and wadded the napkin into a ball. “I don’t know,” I whispered.
Roy looked at me and nodded. “Did I ever tell you about Margaret’s wind chimes?”
I shook my head.
“Well, I never knew that Margaret loved wind chimes but one year we went to visit my mother and on our way home we stopped at a restaurant that had a great big wraparound porch on it with all these wind chimes hanging from it. She kept me out on that porch for thirty minutes trying to find the perfect wind chimes for our back porch. She found a set that had bright colored birds on it and when we got home she wanted to hang them right away. So I hung them for her but I wasn’t thinking and didn’t realize that our breakfast nook windows are right by the back porch and every morning I’d hear those tinkling chimes, and they drove me crazy. Margaret loved the sound. She’d open the windows wide and just listen as they went pling, pling—pling, pling, but they drove me nuts. I couldn’t read the paper with all that plinging. When she was out of the house one day I moved them to the front porch but when she got home and noticed what I’d done she moved them back. That went on for ages. I’d move them to the front and she’d move them to the back and open the windows so she could hear them. Back and forth they went until she got sick.” His voice was quiet. “I didn’t move them anymore after that. I left the windows open and let that sound filter through the house. When she couldn’t get up anymore I put another set outside our bedroom window and when I’d lay down next to her at night I could hear them going pling, pling—pling, pling, and I’d fall to sleep. I could fall asleep to a noise that at one time drove me crazy.” He took a drink of soda and cleared his throat. “I don’t know why I told you that, Patti, except to say don’t let this happen. If you and Mark get a divorce it’ll be like another death in your family.” He paused for a moment. “If I’m stepping over my boundaries you let me know, Patti, but I’ve known you for a long time and I knew Sean, too. And I know there’s no way he’d ever want to see you and Mark split up or for you to check out the way you have. You’ve been part of the living dead long enough. I know what that society looks like because I was part of it for a long time after Margaret died. But at some point you have to make a decision to join life again.”
I held my empty glass in my hands and rolled it back and forth. It was time that Roy knew the truth. “His bags are packed.” I could sense Roy looking at me. “I don’t know when he’s leaving but he’s ready. I know he won’t leave till after Christmas. Not now that Emily is with us. We’re both too polite to create any sort of scene with someone in the house.” I paused. “We don’t even cause scenes when it’s just the two of us in the house.”
“Stop him, Patti.”
I wouldn’t look at him. “I can’t.” I shifted in my chair, reaching for my purse. I wanted to end this conversation. “We just keep drifting and neither one of us knows how to … I don’t know.”
“Yes, you do,” he said. “We always know what to do but sometimes that means an awful lot of work and opting out is easier. There’s a divorced woman walking around this town with my last name who’s a result of my taking the easy way out.”
“That’s not true, Roy,” I said. “I ran into Ella the other day and she told me she dropped your name a long time ago.” Roy rolled his eyes and I laughed out loud.
Emily fell asleep on the way home. It was only eight o’clock but the day had been so long for both of us. I helped her up the stairs and into her pajamas. She slipped into bed and Girl curled up by her feet. “Can you read to me?” she asked, rubbing her eyes. It was the first time she’d wanted me to read before she fell asleep.
“Aren’t you too tired for a story?” She shook her head. I opened the top drawer of the dresser and found some of the special books I had been saving since Sean’s childhood for my grandchildren. Neither Mark nor I had thrown them out after Sean’s death. I picked up
Love You Forever
. I had read it so often to Sean that at one time I had it memorized. The pages were worn, some had food stains and were torn, but Emily didn’t notice.
Love You Forever
. I had read it so often to Sean that at one time I had it memorized. The pages were worn, some had food stains and were torn, but Emily didn’t notice.
I read how a mother had a baby boy and rocked him in her arms. Then I got to the part where the mother sings about loving her son forever. I had made up a tune for the song years ago when Sean was a child. Emily glanced up at me; she recognized the story. I read how the little boy turned nine years old and then into a teenager and then into a grown man with children of his own and after each stage of life I would sing again. At the end the mother is aged and she calls her son to tell him she is sick. Emily was quiet as she looked at the picture on the page. When the son came through the door the old woman tried to sing but she was unable to finish the song because she was too ill. I felt tears coming but kept reading. I choked on the words as the son picked the mother up and rocked her back and forth, singing the song she had always sung to him. I tried to sing but I couldn’t. I couldn’t even speak.
Emily sang out the tune I had been singing throughout the book. Tears trailed down my nose and I wiped my face. “It’s okay, Patricia,” she said, patting my shoulder. “The boy said he’d always love his mommy.”
I nodded.
“It’s not sad. It’s happy.”
I hugged her to me and cried over the loss of Sean and of losing her in a couple of days. It was the first time I’d cried in years.
“Thank you for helping me finish the book,” I said, wiping my face.
“Maybe you shouldn’t read it anymore,” she said. I hugged her tight. She held on to my arm and I knew she wanted me to stay with her. I lay down and pulled the blankets up and laid them across her chest. I reached and turned off the light. She moved her hand around in the darkness looking for mine; she wanted to hold it. She pulled it onto her chest and took a deep breath. She was content. I needed to get up so I could let Girl out. I needed to check the messages on the answering machine, I needed to check my e-mail, but felt myself drifting. I was too tired to move.
At one o’clock in the morning Nathan Andrews awoke with a start. “It’s her,” he said, louder than he realized.
“What’s wrong?” Meghan asked, lifting her head to see him in the moonlight.
“I just thought of something,” he said, getting out of bed.
“What are you doing?” Meghan asked, leaning up on one arm.
“Nothing. Go back to sleep.” He pulled on a pair of sweatpants and a sweatshirt and tiptoed toward the door.
Meghan turned on the light and shielded her face. “Where in the world are you going?”
“I need to open that gift.”
“What gift?”
“The gift I found during my ER rotation.”
“You need to open it
now?
”
now?
”
“Yes.”
“Where is it?”
“It’s in my coat pocket.”
Meghan sat on the edge of the bed. “Why are you getting it now?”
“I really need to see what’s in that box.”
Meghan put her feet on the floor and pushed herself off from the bed.
“What are you doing?” Nathan said.
“I’m going with you.”
He tried to help her back into bed. “No. It’s too late. Go back to sleep.”
“Like I can sleep now! I want to see what’s in the box, too.”
“You’re going to turn our son into a night owl.”
“Trust me, this baby’s already a night owl. It’s been kicking me all night.”
“A football player in the making,” Nathan said, turning the light on in the hallway.
Meghan rolled her eyes. It was too early in the morning to argue. She followed Nathan to the front hallway, where he opened the closet door and pulled the gift out of his coat pocket. They walked into the living room and sat down.
“Are you ever going to tell me what you’re thinking?” Meghan asked.
“Do you remember how I told you that med students will never forget the first time they have to tell someone that a loved one has died?”
She nodded. “What’s that got to do with the gift?”
“Four years ago, on Christmas Eve, paramedics brought in a young guy who had fallen asleep at the wheel. His car went right up under a tractor-trailer. I was part of the team that tried to save him. I saw this gift on the floor and I assumed it had to have been in his pocket so I picked it up and set it aside but there wasn’t an opportunity to ask him about it. He wasn’t making it and we knew it. We tried to save him but we couldn’t, and before I knew it, there was his mother asking about him, wanting to see him, but he was gone. The attending physicians were busy and she was in the hall asking about her son. I was terrified. I couldn’t look at her and tell her that her eighteen-year-old son was dead so I tried to find the attendings, but they had their hands full with two shooting victims so there I was trying to stay out of sight, but the mother was wandering the halls looking for somebody who could tell her something.” He shook his head. “I hated that night.”
“So this gift was with that boy who died?”
“I don’t know. I remember seeing it the next day on the admittance desk and I put it in my locker so I’d be sure to track down who it belonged to. It didn’t take long for it to get buried, pushed to the back of my locker, and I forgot all about it.”
“How’d you remember the boy’s name?”
“I don’t remember. I can remember that night but I can’t remember his name or his mother’s face.” When he went to med school Nathan had assumed that he would remember the faces of tragedy he dealt with but over time names and faces always blurred. He felt guilty until several doctors told him they found that to be their experience as well. Nathan thought of it as God’s grace that he couldn’t remember every detail like faces or names but could always recall the emotions he felt. “I think I ran into his mother this week,” he said.
“Did you recognize her?”
Nathan tore the green wrapping from the gift. “No. But I only saw her for a few minutes that night in the ER and I was so nervous that I can’t remember anything about her.” He threw the wrapping paper on the floor, opened a black velvet box and pulled out an antique pocket watch that was nestled in the middle of a tarnished gold holder. Nathan took out the watch and hung it onto the hook at the top of the holder.
“It’s beautiful,” Meghan said. Nathan turned the watch over and read the engraving: “
Mom, Always … S.
”
Mom, Always … S.
”
At the bottom of the box was a gift card. He looked to the bottom of it but again, the signature was simply S. Nathan picked up the phone and dialed.
“Who are you calling?” Meghan said.
“The ER at County. I’m hoping an old friend will be on duty tonight. If not, somebody else could help.” He asked for Dr. Lee and smiled when he was put on hold. “He’s there,” he said, moving the phone from his mouth. The phone clicked on the other end.
“Twice in one week,” Rory said. “What’s going on?”
“Do you feel like hunting down that needle in the haystack we talked about?”
“Did you think of a name?”
“The last name’s Addison. Check files for Christmas Eve four years ago. If you can tell me a first name that’d be great, but better than that, I’m hoping his personal effects were logged in that night.”
“When do you need it?”
“As soon as your Christmas spirit allows you to move on it.” Nathan heard shouting in the background. It was another busy night in the ER.
“I’ll do what I can,” Rory said, hanging up the phone. It was a long shot but fortunately, both Meghan and Nathan believed in them.
These are the hardest times, especially when those who are younger than you take their leave, and there are times when I forget and permit myself to think that I am in the midst of death. But this is not so. It is life that surrounds me. Life. Life that is meant to be lived, its riches to be extracted. No, the Lord’s promise is not for those who give up, but for those who forge ahead …
—Leonora Wood
I
heard something in the kitchen at 6:30. I tried to move but my neck was stiff. Girl jumped to the floor and wagged her tail, pacing back and forth between the bed and the door. I managed to sit up and rolled my neck around. Emily was still sound asleep. I looked down at myself. I’d never slept in my clothes so much in my life! I was a mess. I opened the door and Girl bolted down the stairs. Mark was in the kitchen lining the island with shopping bags. He looked at me and his face said it all. He didn’t know if I was coming or going. “Is she sleeping?” he asked, whispering.
heard something in the kitchen at 6:30. I tried to move but my neck was stiff. Girl jumped to the floor and wagged her tail, pacing back and forth between the bed and the door. I managed to sit up and rolled my neck around. Emily was still sound asleep. I looked down at myself. I’d never slept in my clothes so much in my life! I was a mess. I opened the door and Girl bolted down the stairs. Mark was in the kitchen lining the island with shopping bags. He looked at me and his face said it all. He didn’t know if I was coming or going. “Is she sleeping?” he asked, whispering.
I told him she was. He pulled something out of a department store bag and held it up. “Do you think she’ll like this? She kept talking about queens and kings and I just thought she might. I don’t know.” It was a princess dress like the one in the catalog. It even came with a tiara and a pair of pink sequined plastic shoes. I couldn’t believe he’d bought it. He hadn’t seen the picture.
“She’ll go crazy over it,” I said. He started rummaging through other bags and pulled out a baby doll with two different sets of clothes and a stroller, an Easy Bake oven, a puzzle, and Magic Markers and paints. His face was beaming.
“What do you think?”
I was amazed. “When did you do all this?”
“On my way in to work last night. Will she like it?”
I couldn’t find the right words. “What little girl wouldn’t?” He scooped all the gifts into his arms and began to rummage through our hall closet. I knew what he was looking for. I picked up the roll of wrapping paper Roy had left for me and handed it to him. “Roy left this for us.”
Mark took his project into the den and closed the door. “Don’t let her come in here,” he said, opening the door a crack. Mark was excited about Christmas. I felt a rush of energy jolt through me. It was Christmas Eve! I had to get busy. I headed for the stairs when the phone rang.
“Hello, Mom,” I said, knowing it was her.
“I bought a turkey days ago,” she said. “What else can we do to help?”
“How long have you been waiting to call?”
“All night long, thank you for asking. Now are you going to tell me anything or am I going to have to play twenty questions?”
I laughed. “Emily’s still sleeping and I haven’t showered in two days. How do you and Dad feel about coming over here and helping me get some things prepared?”
“What are you making?”
“I have no idea.”
I could hear her mumbling something to Dad. “I’ve got ingredients for fudge, pecan pie, and enough stuff to make a small batch of English toffee. I’ve also got sweet potatoes, broccoli, veggies for a green salad, corn, yeast for rolls, and potatoes. How’s that sound?”
“So basically you have everything for a Christmas meal?”
“Basically.” We hung up and I ran for my Palm Pilot. I had to call Greta and Hal and invite them for Christmas before it was too late. The phone rang and rang and I groaned. Maybe they’d gone out of town to see their kids. A cracklyvoiced Hal answered.
“I’m sorry to bother you this early,” I said. “But we really want you to come over tomorrow for Christmas.”
“Hold on,” he yelled into the receiver.
“Why’d you answer the phone in the first place?” Greta said, taking it from him. “Sorry, he can’t hear anything without his hearing aids. Who’s calling?”
“It’s Patti,” I said, catching myself because I was still yelling into the phone. “We really want you to come over for Christmas to watch Emily open her gifts and to eat with us. Can you do it?”
“Oh, we’d love it. Thank you so much. I have some things for her and I found something that Tracy bought for her.” We talked over our plans and Greta asked again and again if she could bring anything but I declined. I just wanted them to enjoy the day with Emily. I hung up the phone and ran up the stairs for a shower. I jumped in and lathered my hair. I felt a small sensation fluttering in my heart. I couldn’t put my finger on what it was exactly but it felt like excitement. Despite the sadness and pain I wanted Emily to love Christmas so she would never dread it the way I did. I wanted to make this Christmas as special as I could for her … and for Mark and me. I turned the water off and stepped out of the shower when I realized I hadn’t sprayed down the walls or run the squeegee over the glass doors.
Tomorrow
, I thought, reaching for my towel. I dried my hair and put makeup on, taking extra time to do it well. I convinced myself that I didn’t want Emily’s memories to be those of spending Christmas with a hag, but deep down I knew I wanted to look pretty. For the first time in years I wanted to look as if I were alive.
Tomorrow
, I thought, reaching for my towel. I dried my hair and put makeup on, taking extra time to do it well. I convinced myself that I didn’t want Emily’s memories to be those of spending Christmas with a hag, but deep down I knew I wanted to look pretty. For the first time in years I wanted to look as if I were alive.
I ran down the stairs and saw Girl staring at the back door. “Did we forget you?” I said, rubbing her head. I opened the door and Girl ran toward the woods. I looked around the kitchen but didn’t know where to start.
“What can I do?”
I spun to see Mark standing in the doorway.
“The gifts are wrapped and hidden so I’m ready to help.” It felt just like the times when Sean was a little boy and we’d run around the house like crazy people getting last-minute things done.
“We need to put the leaves in the table.” We hadn’t made the table bigger in four years. I couldn’t even remember where the leaves were. “And I’d love to hang some garland in the dining room—maybe put some decorations on the mantle and find our red tablecloth and that great big centerpiece with the pinecones.” I was talking so fast I could barely keep up with what I was saying.
Mark held up his hand. “Let me go to the garage attic and look for all that stuff before you tell me anything else.” He disappeared into the garage and I started to pull out the china we’d received on our wedding day. We rarely used it; there wasn’t a scratch on it.
What a shame
, I thought. It was so beautiful and I kept it put away. I pulled out several pieces and began to wash them. I heard rustling at the door and looked up to see Mom and Dad fumbling with grocery bags. I ran to open the door and saw that the ground was covered with fresh snow.
A white Christmas
for Emily
, I thought.
What a shame
, I thought. It was so beautiful and I kept it put away. I pulled out several pieces and began to wash them. I heard rustling at the door and looked up to see Mom and Dad fumbling with grocery bags. I ran to open the door and saw that the ground was covered with fresh snow.
A white Christmas
for Emily
, I thought.
“Ho, ho, ho,” Mom said, coming through the door. She sat the bags down on the kitchen table and looked at the stack of dishes.
“There’s more in the cabinet,” I said. “Once we get these washed and out of the way we can start baking.”
“Is Emily asleep?” Dad asked. I nodded. He bent down and pulled out a set of books with beautiful illustrated covers. “We got her these.” He read off the titles:
Alice in Wonderland,Anne of Green Gables, Little House on the Prairie, The Complete Tales of Winnie the Pooh, Curious George,
and
The Chronicles of Narnia.
I wondered how much they had spent on such beautiful books but I knew it didn’t matter to them. At one time my mother had been in need and people gave her gifts she never imagined.
Alice in Wonderland,Anne of Green Gables, Little House on the Prairie, The Complete Tales of Winnie the Pooh, Curious George,
and
The Chronicles of Narnia.
I wondered how much they had spent on such beautiful books but I knew it didn’t matter to them. At one time my mother had been in need and people gave her gifts she never imagined.
“Is Mark home?” Dad asked. I pointed toward the garage and pictured Dad climbing up our rickety attic ladder to find Mark. Mom and I worked side by side washing the dishes and drying them.
“How did her mother die?” she asked.
“Car accident.”
She was quiet as she dried a large serving platter and set it on the counter. “Did you go to the funeral?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, God, help her,” she said to herself. Throughout our lives, if Mom heard of someone who had died or was sick with cancer or heart disease she would grow quiet and I always knew she was praying. She never said she was; she didn’t bow her head or close her eyes or get down on her knees and fold her hands; I just knew. If Walter Cronkite showed a family involved in a tragedy or someone who had lost their life in a foreign country on the evening news she would say, “Oh, God, help them.” When I was a child I wondered how many prayers had been muttered all over the country during those thirty-minute news broadcasts. “It was the prayers of strangers that helped us,” she said to Richard and me time and again after our father left.
With the last of the dishes washed and dried Mom got busy making a piecrust for the pecan pie and I grabbed a pot to make fudge. I reached for my recipe box; it had been so long that I’d forgotten how to do it. A huge thud sounded in the garage and I was certain Dad had fallen from the ladder and was lying on his back on the floor. “Don’t panic,” he said, yelling in through the door. “Just a box of garland.” Moments later he and Mark carried several boxes into the dining room. I never imagined I would see Mark and my dad pulling decorations from a box and discussing color scheme and placement. “That doesn’t look right next to that red glass globe,” Dad said. “Put that ivy-looking thing there.” I could hear Mark move things around. “Yeah, that looks better. Now move those candles to the back. No, take them off completely. They don’t look Christmassy. What’s this?”
“That’s a thing to hold Christmas cards,” Mark said. I heard a thud as Dad threw the “thing to hold Christmas cards” back in the box.
“Here we go. Put that up there on the mantle. What is that? A candelabra?”
“Yeah.”
“Put that in the middle and let’s stick some candles in there. You got any candles? Hey, Patti, you got any candles?”
“No, Dad, I don’t think so.”
He walked into the kitchen and picked up the pad of paper next to the phone. “We’ll need to write that down. If we go with that thing on the mantle then we’re going to need green candles. No, red.” He jotted something down on the paper and went back into the dining room.
“This garland is a crumpled, flat mess,” Mark said.
I saw Dad scribbling on the pad again. “Let’s get the real kind, the kind that smells,” he said. “And let’s get enough to wrap it around the banister going upstairs. Emily will like that.”
“Write down some sort of centerpiece, too,” Mark said. “This pinecone thing has seen better days. And put down one of those long things that run right down the center of the table.” Mom and I listened as they dug through more boxes and pulled out what they could, commenting on usability, age of the product in hand, where it was purchased, and how they used to have one of those when they were a kid.
“All right, we’ve got to go to the store,” Dad said. “Do you girls need anything?”
We shook our heads.
“I’m getting eggnog,” he said, jotting on the list again. “I don’t care if it’s bad for you, I’m getting it anyway.”
Mom didn’t argue. She’d go back to watching his cholesterol after Christmas. I could feel that small level of excitement building again. It was going to be a good Christmas this year. I thought I heard something upstairs.
“Patricia!” It was Emily. She was screaming. I ran past Mom and bolted up the stairs into the guest bedroom. Emily was lying still, the covers pulled up under her chin. I sat on the bed next to her.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
She nodded and held my hand. “Were you afraid when you woke up?”
She nodded. I helped her sit up and hugged her to me.
“It’s okay” She wrapped her arms around me and I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt so needed. “Do you know what today is?”
She shook her head.
“It’s Christmas Eve. So do you know what tomorrow is?”
“Christmas,” she whispered.
“That’s right. And we’re downstairs right now making all sorts of pies and candy, and I’ve invited Greta and Hal to come spend the day with us tomorrow.”
She nodded but was quiet. “Do they have Christmas in heaven?”
“Every day is Christmas in heaven,” I said.
“I want my mom to be here for Christmas.” I pulled her close and rested my chin on top of her head.
“I know,” I said. I kissed her forehead and squeezed her hand. For the rest of her life she would miss her mother, but the holidays would always be especially heartbreaking.
She looked around the room. “Where’s Girl?” That was all she wanted to talk about her mother for now.
I jumped with a start. “Oh, I forgot her outside. She’s probably got icicles hanging from her whiskers!”
Emily ran from the room and down the stairs. She had to save Girl. She threw open the back door and there was Girl, wagging her tail as if she didn’t know it was thirty degrees. Emily grabbed her collar and pulled her inside, wrapping her arms around Girl’s neck to help warm her.
“She needs hot chocolate,” Emily said.
I handed her a bowl of dog food. “Let’s start with this and see how she is after that.” Emily picked up a handful of dog food and opened her palm for Girl. Emily wiped the crumbs from her hand onto her pajamas and followed me into the kitchen.
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