Wishing for Someday Soon (22 page)

“Let’s go, Katelyn,” Kevin said, standing by the atrium doors that kept the cold temperatures from flowing in every time someone opened the door.

“I have to go,” I said, stating the obvious.

“Right,” Max said, finally releasing my hand.

My hand felt irrationally lost without his.
Like I was missing a limb
, I couldn’t help thinking as I slowly walked toward Kevin.

Old Man Wither helped us carry the groceries through the frigid temperatures into our trailer that felt only slightly warmer.

“Might bit chilly in here. Don’t you think?” he asked, rubbing his hands together.

“A little,” I said, trying to sound blasé. “The heat's been acting up since the storm started. I’m sure the landlord will send someone out to fix it," I said, not wanting to admit that Lucinda had neglected to pay the rent.

“Hmmm, who knows when he’ll be able to get a repairman out here with it being the holidays and such,” Mr. Wither said. “I’m going to run over to the station and grab some tools so I can take a look at it.”

“No really, you don’t have to do that. We wouldn’t want to trouble you more than we already have,” I said, shooting an uneasy glance down the hall at Lucinda’s closed door.

“It’s no trouble, and I won’t be in your hair since the unit’s outside,” he said, looking at me meaningfully.

“Are you sure?” I asked quietly.

“Positive, my dear,” he said, heading out the door.

I was halfway through making dinner when the air that had been pumping through the floorboard vents began to warm up instantly, taking the chill of the interior of the trailer.

“Yay, Katelyn, we have heat,” Kevin said, sitting on the vent in the living room.

“Well, don’t block it, dork,” I said, laughing at him.

I expected to hear Old Man Wither’s pickup rumble to life as it pulled out, but the sound never came. It wasn’t until I was washing our silverware with a jug of water that I kept by the sink that I heard a soft knock on the trailer door.

Drying my hands on the back of my jeans, I walked to the front door and pulled it open.

“Mr. Wither, I thought you left an hour ago,” I said, surprised to see him.

“Nah, there were a few other things I wanted to take care of. Why don’t you go turn on the kitchen faucet and see if anything comes out.”

Excitedly, I rushed to the kitchen sink, not daring to believe. When I twisted the knob, I giggled in delight as water poured from the faucet. My giggles turned to happy tears as I realized that Kevin and I would no longer have to trek across the street at all hours of the night to go potty.

Mr. Wither joined me in the kitchen. “Very good,” he said, twisting the knob to high to check the water pressure. “Now, just keep this one running at a trickle when the temperatures dip too low and that should keep the pipes from freezing again,” he added.

“Thank you so much,” I said, throwing my arms around him.

“No problem, my dear,” he said, patting my back uncomfortably. “Don’t go being strangers now that it’s fixed, though,” he told Kevin and me sternly as he headed for the front door.

“We won’t,” I reassured him, walking him to his truck. “Thank you so much for all your help today. You’ve single-handedly saved Christmas for us now that my stepdad is away…” I added, letting my voice trail off for the last part.

“Did he go away on business?”

“Not really,” I said, skirting away from the truth.

“Will he be home by tomorrow?”

“Um no, I don’t think so,” I said, avoiding his eyes.

“Well, you two take care, and have yourself a nice night.”

“You too, Mr. Wither, and thanks again for everything,” I said, shutting the door behind me quickly so none of our new blissful heat could escape.

“Alright, bud, I’m going to go scour out the tub, and then you can take a nice hot shower,” I said, grinning at Kevin happily.

“Woohoo, no more freezing our butts off to go potty,” Kevin crowed, following me to the bathroom. He perched on the closed toilet seat chattering away as I cleaned out the tub.

I smiled at his glee. It didn’t take much to make us happy. All we needed were the basic human necessities: food, shelter, water and heat, and we were good to go.

It took a lot of elbow grease to finally remove the rancid ring that had formed along the inside of the tub. I used the Comet liberally, making sure the tub sparkled before I would allow Kevin to use it.

Chapter 13

Kevin and I both went to bed cleaner than we had been in days and when I woke the next morning, I saw that Lucinda had also enjoyed our windfall by the towels she had left scattered around the bathroom. Her depression over Jim’s incarceration hadn’t lifted, but I was relieved she was at least making an attempt to keep herself clean. I gathered her used towels and as many of our dirty clothes that would fit into one load of laundry.

I made Kevin go with me to the laundry room at the far end of the trailer park so he could get some fresh air. He followed behind carrying the jug of laundry soap and purposefully slid across the light dusting of snow that had fallen the night before while we were sleeping.

“Do you think Lucinda will let us open our presents tonight?” Kevin asked after a few minutes.

“I don’t know,” I said, shifting the weight of the duffle bag filled with our dirty clothes to my other shoulder. “I’m not sure she'll be joining us for Christmas. I’ll tell you what though, if she doesn’t come out of her room by nine o’clock tonight, I’ll let you open one.”

 
“Really?” he asked, skidding to a stop in front of me.

“Yeah really, but let’s hurry to the laundromat so I can stop freezing my butt-kiss off.”

He giggled at my choice of word.

“Besides, I want to get this laundry done so we can make Old Man Wither those brownies we bought last night.”

“Yum, brownies. Can we have one toooooooo?” he pleaded.

“I think that can be arranged if you’re a good helper.”

 
“I will be. I promise,” Kevin said, proving his point by holding the door of the small laundromat open for me.

Several hours later, Kevin held up to his promise as he helped me finish the laundry and prepare the brownies. By four in the afternoon, the trailer was spick-and-span and smelled heavenly from the double batch of brownies we had made up. I had felt massive guilt the day before, buying something as extravagant as brownies, but Kevin’s enthusiasm made it totally worth it.

We bundled up in our winter clothes and trudged back through the snow with the plate of brownies we had set aside for Old Man Wither.

The gas station was closed up for the rest of the evening and the following day so we headed around the building to Mr. Wither's cabin. Kevin knocked on the door and said

“Merry Christmas” when a surprised Wither saw us standing on his doorstep.

“We made you brownies,” I said, handing over the plate. “I know it’s not much, but we just wanted to say thank you.”

 
“Are you kidding me? This is the best gift I’ve gotten in years,” he said, taking an appreciative whiff through the plastic wrap that covered them. “Come in, come in. I got a few things for you guys too. I was going to bring them over later, but now you’ve saved me the trip.”

“Presents?” Kevin asked reverently.

“Yeah, presents,” Mr. Wither said, leading us in through the front door. “Those ones are yours,” he said to Kevin, pointing to a small stack at the far end of the coffee table.

Kevin squealed with glee when he saw his stack. “Can I open them?” he asked me pleadingly.

“Of course,” I said, feeling an odd tickle in the back of my throat.

Needing no further encouragement, Kevin tore through his packages with shrieks of pure joy when he discovered a Nintendo DSI and several games to go with it.

“Um, Mr. Wither, that is way too generous of you,” I said, mentally adding up the cost of Kevin’s presents in my head.

“Oh shush, I haven’t had this much fun shopping for presents in years. Me and my Marge would head to the shelter in Bozeman every Christmas and hand out gifts there. I haven’t been much in the mood to keep up the tradition since her passing until now. So don’t deprive an old man, okay?” he said with a twinkle in his eyes, making it obvious he was well aware of his nickname.

“Katelyn, look, it’s a Marvel Hero game,” Kevin said, stroking the package lovingly. Mr. Wither and I burst out laughing at the fawning look on his face.

“I guess you can tell he’s pleased,” I said, still giggling.

“Why don’t you open yours,” Mr. Wither said, handing me a present and a card. “Open the present first, though,” he added, smiling at me.

“Okay,” I said, suddenly uncomfortable. I couldn’t recall the last time I had gotten a present, much less from someone who barely knew me.

Sensing my unease, Old Man Wither sank into his oversized recliner on the other side of the room, giving me the space I sought. I opened the present gently, taking care not to tear the paper since I planned on keeping it with a few items I had managed to slide past Lucinda over the years. The paper slowly gave away, revealing a rectangular-shaped box. My heart raced as I read the word “Kindle” across the carton. I had seen electronic book readers advertised on the TV but knew there was no way I would ever be able to get one.

“No way,” I whispered, holding the item with trembling hands.

“You don’t like it?” Old Man Wither asked worriedly. “Kevin told me you like to read.”

“I love it, but there’s no way I can accept it. It’s way too expensive.”

“Nah, the salesclerk said they’ve come way down in price since they were first released.”

“It’s the best thing I’ve ever gotten,” I said truthfully, thinking about all the books I had abandoned over the years and the possibility of never having to do that again. My eyes filled with unshed tears of happiness at the thought. Embarrassed at my sudden wet eyes, I pulled up the flap of the envelope and extracted a funny Christmas card with a dancing reindeer on the cover. Opening it up, I discovered a fifty-dollar gift card to Amazon taped to the inside.

Before I could protest that it was too much, he held up his hand. “Now, the salesclerk also said there’s a slew of books you can get for free, but I also wanted you to have a little money to get the books you want. No arguments, okay? You wouldn't want to deprive me of my first happy holiday in a long time, would you?”

“No,” I said, still uncomfortable with the expense.

“Trust me, my dear, I bet my Marge is smiling down on us with approval,” he said with sudden wet eyes.

“Well then, in that case, thank you so much. You’ll never know how much this means to me,” I said, hugging the carton close to my chest.

“How about a brownie?” Kevin asked in his typical exuberance.

“Sounds good to me,” Mr. Wither said with a laugh, pulling the plastic wrap off the ceramic plate.

Kevin and I spent several hours with Old Man Wither as Kevin taught him the finer art of playing a handheld game system. While they took turns playing Marvel Heroes, I sat by the wall while my Kindle charged surfing through the automated manual. By the time Mr. Wither volunteered to take us home, I had found a mess of books I wanted to read. I was thrilled to see that tons of them were priced as low as ninety-nine cents.

Lucinda was still in her room when we returned home at nine, so I allowed Kevin to pick a present he wanted to open after we had sorted through them all. I wasn’t surprised that Lucinda and Jim’s own piles were twice as large as Kevin's and mine, but I was pleased that Kevin had almost a dozen for him alone.

“Your pile is pretty small,” he said, looking at me worriedly.

“Hey, don’t worry about it, pal. I got the best gift ever tonight thanks to you. If you wouldn’t have told Old Man Wither I like to read, I would've never gotten this,” I said, holding up my treasured Kindle. "So, which one are you going to open?”

“I think this one,” he said, holding up a heavy, large rectangular box that had puzzled us for weeks.

“Okay,” I said, secretly pleased the mystery of the package would be solved.

Kevin tore through the wrapping and opened the large carton beneath the paper. I swore under my breath when I saw him extract a baseball bat. Damn her! Lucinda was so intent on keeping Kevin from his love of action figures and superheroes that she would stoop so low to buy him something he had absolutely no use for.