The Moment Keeper (8 page)

Olivia puts the box into the hole and scoops the dirt on top of it. She pats the ground. “Now we need a grave marker. Can I use one of the extra landscaping stones Daddy has in the garage?”

“Sure,” Elizabeth says. “I’ll get the stone and you get a marker.”

Elizabeth returns with a flat stone and places it on top of the fresh grave. “You can do the rest.”

Olivia takes the lid off of her black permanent marker and writes on the stone: Oscar the fish.

There was room left on my mom’s marker for Matt’s name. I think Grandma had planned it like that. Smart move on her part because it saved money. Didn’t have to squirrel away money for another ten years.

“How many spots are there here?” I asked Grandma when we went to the cemetery to see the tombstone after Matt’s name had been added.

“Your grandpa bought a lot for six. So there’s plenty of room here for me when I go.”

“That better not be for a really long time,” I said.

“I don’t plan on it, Sarah. But life has a way of dealing us stuff we don’t plan on.”

“But who would take care of me?”

I really didn’t want to know the answer to that and I don’t think Grandma really wanted to answer the question. Truth was I’d end up in foster care like my mom. We had no family, no relatives, no one who would take me in. If something happened to Grandma, I might as well die myself.

Chapter 14

Olivia sits Indian style on the living-room floor in front of the eight-foot Fraser fir decorated with white lilies and crystal spheres. Cousins, some older and others younger, surround her. They laugh, unable to sit still. One male cousin rubs his hands and another bites her fingernails.

Tom whistles to quiet the crowded room. “I want to thank everyone for celebrating Christmas with us once again. Liz, Libby and I always look forward to what’s become a holiday tradition.”

Tom looks at Elizabeth. “How long have we been doing this now?”

“Since Libby’s first Christmas and she’s nine,” Elizabeth answers.

All eyes find Olivia and her face pops like a firework – green eyes sparkling, smile bursting, face as red as the roses her dad gave her mom that morning.

“That’s right. Since Libby’s first Christmas. We’ve welcomed a couple babies into the family since then and some of our loved ones are no longer with us and we should remember them tonight.”

Heads nod and whispers of “yes” fill the great room.

“Please, eat up and have fun.”

Sleigh bells ring. The kids stand and jump up and down. They know that Santa has arrived.

Santa, aka Uncle Ned, walks into the room carrying a huge red sack filled with gifts. He takes one gift out of the bag and calls the name on the tag. It’s for Olivia’s cousin, Samantha. Three-year-old Samantha skips to Santa and takes the gift.

“Ho! Ho! Ho!” Santa says. “Remember, don’t open your gift until everyone has one. I’ll go fast, I promise.”

Santa calls one name after another and the kids get their gifts and then sit down, legs crossed and the gift on the floor in front of them. Olivia’s fingers are crossed. I know that she’s hoping for a dog. She’s asked over and over for one, promising to take care of it all on her own.

Olivia looks around the room. Everyone has a gift but her. She wonders if Santa forgot her this year.

“Ho! Ho! Ho!” Santa says. “I have one gift that wouldn’t fit in my Santa sack.”

Tom hands him a big box with a red bow on top.

Santa reads the tag. “This one’s for Olivia.”

Santa sets the white box in front of Olivia.

“Why don’t we let Olivia open hers first?” Santa says.

The kids gather around Olivia. There’s a “yelp” from inside the box. Olivia tears off the bow, pushes back the flaps and reaches in.

“It’s a puppy! It’s a puppy! I got a puppy.”

She picks up the five-pound Cairn terrier with a pink collar accented with rhinestones. Her
dark eyes and black nose take up most of her puppy face. Her little ears fold down in perfect triangles.

Olivia lifts the puppy to her face and rubs her cheek against the puppy’s quivering body. “It’s OK, Daisy. You’re with me now.”

“Can I hold her?”

“I want to hold her.”

“I get her next.”

“Now, kids,” Santa says. “Let’s let Olivia hold her for a while. Then maybe later you can hold her.”

“Uh-oh!” Olivia says.

“What’s wrong?” Tom asks.

“I think Daisy just peed on me.”

Olivia holds out Daisy and there’s a big wet spot on the front of her green velvet dress. Everyone laughs.

“I’m sure it won’t be the last time she pees on you,” Tom says. “Come with me, Lib, and we’ll take her out while the others open their gifts.”

Tom and Olivia take Daisy out and the room erupts in total chaos – kids scream, paper flies every which way and all the adults can do is pray that nothing gets broken and nobody gets hurt.

I love Christmas at Olivia’s house. Each year on Christmas Eve, both sides of the family gather for the biggest party of the year. The house is wrapped in laughter and love.

Long banquet tables are filled with food. There’s steamed shrimp, pecan-crusted chicken tenders, caramelized onion brie en croute, bacon-wrapped sirloin gorgonzola skewers, artichoke and spinach filo tartlets, edamame dumplings and much more.

The desserts are just as amazing and include everything from red velvet cupcakes to eggnog cheesecake with gingersnap crust and pomegranate glaze. And cookies, lots of cookies, for the kids.

I imagine how everything would taste. Olivia especially likes the pecan-crusted chicken tenders and her favorite cookie is sand tarts. It’s just about the only item on the tables that hasn’t been prepared by a caterer. Grandma Cindy and Olivia always spend a day making sand tarts. Grandma Cindy takes Olivia shopping for special Christmas tins that Olivia puts cookies in to give to her teachers.

The night of the party, kids run from room to room, playing with the toys Santa has brought. The adults are always in good moods. They eat and drink and become kids again. Then the next day, Olivia always finds a mountain of gifts by the tree. While Santa stopped by in person the night before, he always surprises Olivia in the morning with even more things.

I have never seen so many gifts for one person in my life. And they are always wrapped in ballerina-themed paper. No other gifts in the house are wrapped in this paper, a sure sign, according to Tom, that Santa brought them.

Olivia always opens the cerise and pink crochet Christmas stocking Grandma Cindy made her last. It’s always filled with little surprises and usually, at the toe of the stocking, is something extra special, like a birthstone ring.

My Christmases were nothing like Olivia’s. Most of my gifts came from the dollar store and the others through the Salvation Army’s Angel Tree program. Each year, Grandma filled out a registration sheet with the items I needed. The charity wrote the items people submitted on paper angels and hung them on trees at area businesses. People would pick an angel off a tree and buy the items listed. There was one angel for each child.

I always got pajamas and underwear, things that Grandma didn’t feel right buying used at the Goodwill store. But there was usually something fun, like a toy, to go with it. And our church always gave us a box of food and a turkey so we always had a nice Christmas dinner.

When I got too old for the Angel Tree, Grandma said that I would get only three gifts. One for each of the wise men.

“I wish I could give you more,” Grandma said. “But I got too many bills.”

“Gram. Who cares about gifts anyway? You don’t have to buy me anything. I don’t buy you anything.”

“You’re my gift, Sarah,” Grandma said. “And I thank the good Lord for you every day.”

“But that’s not the same as getting something,” I said. “Like a new toaster. Only the one side works on the one we have and that’ll probably go soon. And I know how much you love your toast in the morning.”

“I’ll look at the Goodwill store the next time I stop. I’ll get me a toaster soon enough. If they don’t have one, I’ll tell Phyllis, the clerk who goes through the donations, to keep her eye out in case one comes in. She’ll put it back for me. She’s done that a time or two before when I needed something special.”

I never had any money to buy Grandma gifts so I made things to give her. When I was little, I dug a coffee can out of the trash and covered it with a piece of white construction paper that I had decorated with blue and red stars. Then I wrapped it using paper Grandma had saved from presents we had received. In our house, Grandma always recycled, from empty bread bags to plastic grocery bags. She found a use for everything.

“It’s a drum,” I told Grandma when she unwrapped it that Christmas.

“Just what I always wanted,” Grandma said. “A drum to play. And I love the red and blue stars.”

Grandma sat the drum on her dresser and every now and then she would parade around the house tapping on the plastic lid. She acted as if that drum was the best gift she had ever received. When she died, I put the drum in her casket, just in case she wanted to play it in Heaven.

Olivia comes in from outside with Daisy and the puppy snuggles in her arms. She takes Daisy to her room, away from the other kids. She doesn’t want to share Daisy just yet. She sits on her bed.

“You’re the best present ever,” Olivia tells Daisy. “I will always take care of you just like Mommy and Daddy take care of me.”

Elizabeth is listening outside Olivia’s room. She smiles and walks in.

“Ready to join everyone else?”

“Do I have to share Daisy?”

“Well, it would be nice to let the other kids hold her. Just for a little.”

Olivia’s shoulders drop and she sighs. “OK. If I have to.”

I begged Grandma for a puppy but the closest I ever got was a toy one that, with the help of a battery pack, walked, sat, flipped over and barked. We found it at a yard sale and the lady put batteries in it to show us it still worked.

“You know we can’t have any pets in the apartment,” Grandma said.

“Why do we have to live in a stupid apartment anyway?” I shot back.

“Because it’s what I can afford.”

“Well, I’m tired of being poor. Everyone else has a puppy but me.”

“Not everyone,” Grandma said.

“Almost everyone. Rachel does. And some kids at school got them for Christmas.”

“Sorry,” Grandma said. “Even if we could have one in the apartment, I’d never have the money to spend on keeping a dog. They cost money. Just like humans, they got to go to the doctor’s when they get sick and for checkups and shots. Plus, you got to buy them food. Just too much money.”

I marched to my bedroom and slammed my door. I was a brat and Grandma deserved better.

The kids gather around Olivia and Daisy, and Olivia gives each one a turn holding the puppy. Grandma Cindy is talking to Elizabeth. They are standing nearby so I can hear them.

“One of my Angel gifts didn’t have one toy listed,” Grandma Cindy says. “It was all essential stuff, like underwear and socks and mittens. But I just had to add a toy or two. Every kid should have at least one toy to open Christmas morning.”

“Olivia loved going shopping for her Angel gifts,” Elizabeth says. “Tom brought home two from work. One was a little boy, eight, and the other a little girl, six.”

I smiled. It was fun to watch Olivia pick out gifts for other children, and I couldn’t help remember that I had been on the receiving end of such generosity growing up. When I got older, Grandma insisted that we give back. So, we participated in the Salvation Army’s Red Kettle Christmas Campaign. Grandma would sit next to the tripod holding the red kettle and I would ring the bell, hoping people would make a donation. My cheeks always hurt from smiling so much. People always seemed more willing to give around Christmas, I thought. I
never understood why that feeling couldn’t last the whole year.

Chapter 15

Olivia sees Elizabeth and Tom pull into the driveway. They are returning from a parent-teacher conference with Olivia’s fourth-grade teacher, Mrs. Beshore.

It’s the first time I notice how Olivia’s left eye and thumb twitch when she’s nervous or stressed.

Olivia greets them at the door. “Did she say anything bad?”

She steps to the side so her parents can walk into the house.

“She said you’re an excellent student but there is one thing you need to work on,” Tom says.

Olivia follows her parents into the living room where Grandma Cindy is knitting Olivia another scarf. Olivia sits on the chair and her mom and dad sit on the sofa facing her.

Elizabeth starts. “You’re way ahead in reading and writing and where you’re supposed to be in math. But, you talk too much.”

Olivia knew she was going to get in trouble for her talking. Just that day, Mrs. Beshore made her spend her recess writing, “I will not talk in class.”

“But I have so much talking to do and there’s never enough time to do it.”

“Listen, Libby,” Tom says. “We’re glad that you’re outgoing and sociable and everyone’s friend. But when the teacher is teaching, you can’t be talking. It’s disrespectful and rude. And it needs to stop.”

Olivia looks down. “OK, I’ll try.”

Grandma Cindy looks up from her knitting needles. “Sounds like someone else I know.” Grandma Cindy smiles at Elizabeth. “Go on. Tell her about it.”

“Mom.”

“No Mom me. You were a talker, too, and just like Libby you had to learn how to zip up during class.”

Olivia looks at her mom. “So you liked talking, too?”

“Did she ever,” Grandma Cindy says. “She was always spending recesses inside or staying after school. Like mother, like daughter.”

“OK, yes, I did like to talk,” Elizabeth says. “But that doesn’t mean you’re off the hook. Like your dad said, you can’t talk when you’re not supposed to. Not only will it impede your learning, because if you’re talking you’re not listening, but that of others.”

“What’s impede mean?” Olivia asks.

“Hamper. Hinder. Hurt. Not only will it hurt your learning but it will hurt the other boys and girls because you talking gets in the way of their listening.”