“I know, Auntie.” She grabbed Diana’s hand. “Let’s go.”
Donavan opened his car door and stepped out. He leaned against his car as Amarri and Diana came down the walk way. When Diana looked up and caught sight of him, she almost stumbled on the slick snowy path. “So, my mom let you move into her house, huh?”
“Mr. Donavan!” Amarri exclaimed, excitedly.
Donavan walked around his car and came to stand in front of them. “Hey, Amarri. Did you have fun playing games last night?”
Bouncing around she said, “I did. I won the game.”
Laughing, Donavan said, “I’m sure that Ikee was a good sport about it.”
“He was,” Diana acknowledged. Then she gave Donavan a cold stare down. “Why are you parked outside of my house?”
“This isn’t your house. My mother owns it.”
“But I’m renting it from her. So, that makes it mine. Now, please leave.” Diana pointed toward his car, providing directions for his exit out of her life.
“Well, I guess your Christmas cheer has evaporated.” Donavan didn’t know why he was standing there allowing himself to be irritated, but he couldn’t help himself.
“After what you said to me last night, did you think I should just welcome you into my home with open arms?” Diana shook her head. “Look Donavan, I don’t want to fight with you. But I don’t want you coming around here bothering me either. Okay?”
Donavan couldn’t walk away. He put his hands in his pocket as the crisp wind blew against him. “Why are you renting this house, in this neighborhood? You’ve got a good job, why don’t you go rent somewhere a little safer for your niece?”
“Why are you bothering me, Donavan?”
“I just want to know. When my mother and I lived here, the neighborhood was bad and I fell in with the wrong crowd. I just don’t want something like that to happen to your niece.”
Diana nodded. “Thank you for your concern. But I don’t plan to stay here forever. The low amount I pay in rent is allowing me to save so that I can eventually buy us a home in a better neighborhood.”
He wanted to shut down his curiosity, but it was eating him alive. “I thought you told me that you were going back to college to finish your degree. How come you never went back?”
Diana grabbed hold of Amarri’s hand and shrugged her shoulders. “I just couldn’t make it work.” Her eyes drifted toward her car. “Look Donavan, we really have to go. I promised Amarri that we would pick up presents today.”
Donavan stepped back to move out of her way. “Don’t let me keep you. I already did my Christmas shopping.”
“That’s nice for you. We like to shop late to get the best deals,” Diana said as she and Amarri walked past Donavan and got into her Ford Taurus.
Donavan didn’t know what possessed him to stand in the cold watching Diana and Amarri walk away from him. But he was stuck there, despising himself, because at that moment, he knew that he was longing for something that was no good for him.
5
What kind of fool was she? How did that song go? It takes a fool to learn that love don’t love nobody. Well this particular fool was walking through Wal-Mart with just an hour left in the Christmas shopping season, five more people on her gift giving list and she still couldn’t stop thinking about Donavan. He looked totally gorgeous standing in front of her house earlier today. When he smiled at Amarri, she got a glimpse of those deep dimples dipping down into that heavenly chocolate coated skin of his.
She’d lived in that house for three years and had often imagined what she would say if Donavan ever showed up at her doorstep. But since he hadn’t bothered to apologize for the rude way he spoke to her last night, Diana had no words for him. And the thing that most galled her was that she didn’t understand why he drove all the way over to her house, and then pretended like he didn’t know that she lived there.
She wanted to stay mad at him, but her thoughts kept drifting backward on her. Diana still remembered the first day she laid eyes on Donavan Walker. She’d interviewed for the secretarial position after she’d dropped out of college because she couldn’t come up with the tuition. She’d also gotten a case and the prosecutor had promised to drop the charges if she got a job. He’d even given her the information about the opening at Pastor Walker’s church.
As she was leaving the church feeling unsure about her interview and being distracted with thoughts of how she would pay her rent the next month, she ran right into Donavan. He’d been carrying a cup of coffee, which splashed all over his cream colored button down shirt.
“I’m so sorry,” Diana had said.
Wiping at his shirt, he said, “Don’t worry about it, everyone makes mistakes.”
“Yeah, but I should have been paying attention. Look at how I’ve messed up your shirt.”
“No big deal.”
She instantly liked his easy going manner, but when he lifted his head and smiled at her. She was treated to a slice of heaven that she almost most wanted to bow down and give thanks for. The chocolate drop standing before her was absolutely gorgeous. His deep dimpled smile mesmerized her. It called out to her.
Diana couldn’t explain her feelings and didn’t truly know if there was anything spiritual about them at all. But from the moment she laid eyes on Donavan Walker she’d felt as if he was her gift from God.
Once she’d been hired at the church, the prosecutor who promised to drop her case began making other demands of her. Truth was, she would have made her feelings for Donavan known on her own, because she fell for the man the moment he smiled at her. But blackmail made her move a lot faster and of course, it also made her lose the one man she longed to have. Trying to shut her mind to the past, she grabbed a Ninja Turtle action figure for Ikee and threw it in the cart.
“Auntie Diana, look,” Amarri pointed at the rack of scarfs. “My mom loves scarfs.”
Diana didn’t know how to tell her niece that she couldn’t send a scarf to her mom while she was serving her year long prison sentence. Before she could think of anything to say, Amarri started pushing her toward the scarf rack.
“Can we get it? Can we get it?” She picked up a dark brown and tan scarf.
Her sister loved browns; the fact that Amarri knew that, brought a smile to Diana’s face. If she had been fortunate enough to have gotten married and had a child, she would have wanted a daughter just like the one God apparently blessed her with. “It’s beautiful, Amarri. Let’s get it.”
After grabbing the scarf, Diana and Amarri ran around the store grabbing whatever sale items were left that matched their gift giving list. The store was crowded with people who probably had the same issue as Diana. They probably had just received their paycheck. Actually Diana had received her check on Friday, the twenty-first, but hadn’t had time to shop because she spent the weekend volunteering for the kids’ Christmas program at church and then helping Nina get ready for her Christmas party.
It was five minutes until closing, she was standing in line, preparing to pay for her purchases, when she glanced into the cart behind her and saw the La La Lucy doll. It just happened to be the only thing that Amarri asked for this year. It wasn’t in Diana’s basket and she knew that she couldn’t leave the store without it. “Excuse me,” she said to the woman behind her. “I forgot something. Can you let me out of the line?”
The woman and several other people behind her backed up to let Diana out of the line. She ran, while pushing the cart with Amarri holding on for her life.
“What’s the rush, Auntie?”
“I forgot something,” was all she said, but deep inside she was screaming at herself. What kind of mother forgets the only toy her child asks for? Her mind hadn’t been in the game, instead she had been daydreaming about Donavan. And now the store was about to close and she didn’t have a La La Lucy doll in her basket.
Her original plan had been to put a few presents in the cart. Then swing by the toy department, pick up Ikee’s gift and then distr
act Amarri while she tossed the La La Lucy in the bottom of her cart. But instead, Amarri had distracted her with the scarfs that had been on a rack in the outer lane next to the boy’s aisle.
“Attention all customers, the store will be closing in two minutes. Please make your final selections and head to the check-out.”
Diana made it to the toy section she swerved from aisle to aisle looking for the doll. When she didn’t see it in the aisle with the rest of the dolls, or better yet, the rest of the dolls that they had left, she stopped a store clerk and whispered, “Can you please tell me where the,” she put a hand on the side of her mouth so Amarri, wouldn’t see her mouth, “La La Lucy doll is.”
The sales clerk pointed. “What we have left is on the end cap over there.”
“The store will be closing in one minute,” the announcer said and then added, “I mean it. So, bring your FINAL selections to the checkout counter NOW!”
“Somebody wants to go home,” Diana mumbled as she turned the corner and found herself facing an end cap with one La La Lucy doll on it. She sighed in relief and then reached for the doll. When out of nowhere a crazed-looking woman dived over her cart and grabbed the doll.
Stunned by the woman’s actions, Diana couldn’t speak for a moment. She’d watched the news countless times and listened as reporters recounted tales of Wal-Mart shoppers fighting to the death over this or that item. But she’d never imagined that one day some rude woman would take the last La La Lucy down out of her grasp and make her want to brawl as well. “Hey, you saw me reaching for that doll.”
“I got it fair and square,” the woman said.
“Give it back.” Diana grabbed hold of the bottom of the box. This was not right. Amarri was already without her real mom for the holidays, and had to settle for a substitute who couldn’t even come to the store early enough to get the one thing the child asked for.
“Security,” the woman yelled.
“Are you really calling security on me? You’re the one trying to steal my niece’s doll.”
“I grabbed it first.”
The woman who obviously wanted to go home came back over the loud speaker. “If you’re not in line within the next thirty seconds, you will have to come back after Christmas to pick up your purchases.”
Diana didn’t want trouble. She didn’t want to fight with this woman and she didn’t want security to throw her out of the store before she purchased the other gifts, so she released the box and watched as the woman ran off with the prize in hand.
Diana wanted to scream. But she didn’t have time to panic. The store was about to close and she had to find a present for Amarri.
“There’s no more La La Lucy dolls, Auntie Diana? Why did that lady take my doll?”
At that moment, two things bothered Diana: one, that she hadn’t yet found a reliable baby sitter for Amarri. The child wouldn’t be surprised by her Christmas gift, because she had to shop with Amarri in tow. And two, that she absolutely refused to lie to her little girl. So, she lowered her head, sighed deeply as she admitted, “No more La La Lucy dolls at this store. But I promise I’ll get you one the day after Christmas.”
Diana couldn’t bear to see the disappointed look on Amarri’s face, so she peeked around the aisle and grabbed the first doll she saw. “You like Dora, don’t you?” The doll wasn’t actually a Dora the Explorer doll, but one made to look as much like the doll as possible.
“Yes ma’am,” came Amarri’s obedient response.
Diana could tell that the little girl’s heart wasn’t in her response, but what could she do. The store was about to close. So, threw it in the cart and went racing back toward the checkout counter. She had failed on her first big assignment as a parent and now Amarri had a do nothing, look-a-like doll for her Christmas present. Just great.
As she paid for her items and then slowly ambled toward her car feeling like a failure, it was Amarri, the child she had failed, who lifted her spirits.
“Don’t be sad, Auntie Diana, maybe the Christmas Angels will bring me a La La Lucy.”
Diana’s brow furrowed as she buckled Amarri into her car seat and then got behind the wheel to head home. “What do you know about Christmas Angels, honey?” She certainly had never heard of any angels being dispatched from heaven to give La La Lucy dolls to little girls.
“You know the story, Auntie Diana.” Amarri half rolled her eyes at the thought of her aunt needing to be told about the Christmas Angels. “Sister Brenda told us about the angels who came to see Jesus on the first Christmas, and how a star guided these three kings who brought the gifts.”
Sister Brenda handled the Wednesday night Bible classes and day care for the children. “Oh, so Sister Brenda told you about the birth of Jesus?”
“Yes, she said that the reason we celebrate Christmas is because Jesus Christ was born and the angels guided those kings so they would know where to bring their gifts for Jesus.”
Nina always read the story of the birth of Jesus out of the book of John every Christmas morning before anyone opened a gift. Diana had planned to make that a ritual at her house as well, so that Amarri didn’t grow up thinking that gifts were given because Santa Claus climbed down a chimney and left presents for all the nice children. But it seemed as though the church had already helped her out with that… Amarri hadn’t once suggested that Santa would bring her a doll. But she still didn’t understand why the child thought a Christmas angel would bring gifts to her. So, she said, “Amarri, you do realize that those angels came out that night because a wondrous thing had occurred… the savior of the world had been born. They didn’t come down from heaven with gifts on their mind… except of course, the most precious gift of all – Jesus Christ.”
“I don’t know about that, Auntie Diana.” Amarri put her index finger to her chin and tapped it a few times. “The angels don’t have to help those men bring presents to Jesus anymore, so I think they help other people all around the world bring the presents that little kids really want.”
“Like a Santa Claus?” Diana questioned, wondering if she needed to have the conversation after all. If she did, that conversation would wait until next year, because no way was she not providing Amarri with the only present she asked for and then telling her there was no fat man breaking in chimneys.
Amarri laughed, “Not Santa. Like a grandma, a mom or even a friend.”
Ah, the faith of a child. Where, oh where, had she lost her child-like faith?
***
By eight o’clock, Amarri and Diana had wrapped the few presents they were giving away this year. They put the canisters of Christmas cookies they made earlier in the day in the car, along with the presents, and drove to a few friends and family members’ homes to spread some Christmas cheer… even though Diana had lost most of her cheer when she realized she would not be providing Amarri with the one gift that she’d asked for.
She stopped by her mom’s house and as they all exchanged gifts, Diana silently prayed that her mom had picked up a La La Lucy doll for Amarri, but as they each opened their presents, Diana realized that her mother had been sensible and purchased socks, tee-shirts and underwear for Amarri. She appreciated the thought, because the sock monster had stolen so many of Amarri’s socks that the child had worn a mis-match pair to daycare the other day.
When Diana’s mother opened her present and saw the night gown, she gave Diana a look that said, “Is-this-all-your-mother-is-worth?”
Diana shrugged and said, “It’s like you’ve always told us, money is low and bills are high.”
“Yeah, but you only have one mama, so next time, don’t let Christmas sneak up on you. It does occur the same time each year.”
Yes, Diana was aware that Christmas was on December 25th, but she hadn’t had any extra money on any day of the year. All of her extra money, what little she had after taxes, tithes, rent and utilities had been going to pay back her debt. She had student loans, a car note, old credit cards that she had charged to the limit without
a plan for repaying the debt. In the last few years, Diana had been concentrating on making her name good with her creditors rather than wearing the latest fashion and getting her hair and nails done every week.
And now, she had Amarri to think about, so everyone was just going to have to be grateful for the meager presents she could afford. Besides, Christmas wasn’t about big gifts, it was about taking time to appreciate family and to remember our Savior’s birth. “These days, Christmas means so much more to me than just getting and giving gifts, but don’t worry. I love you, Mom, so when I’ve paid off my debts and am financially able, I’m going to bless your socks off.”
Her mother patted her on the shoulder. “I know you’re struggling, baby. I wish I could help you more than I do. But you are a good daughter, Diana, and I’ve got a feeling that God is going to bless your socks off.”
Diana and Amarri made two more stops and as Amarri noted that the Christmas angel hadn’t directed any of her family members to get her a La La Lucy, the smile began to wane.
Diana was crushed by the thought that she was responsible for crushing Amarri’s faith in Christmas angels. So, by the time they reached their last destination, the joy of Christmas had been beaten out of both Diana and the child.
6
“Merry Christmas,” Isaac said as he opened his front door and welcomed Diana and Amarri into the house.
“Merry Christmas to you too, Pastor Walker.” Diana handed him the box of Christmas cookies and said, “We’re just passing out the Christmas cookies that Amarri and I made earlier today.”
“And I believe Nina has something for you and Amarri. So go on in the family room where everyone else is.
She and Amarri entered the family room. Amarri was holding onto Little Isaac’s gift. The moment she saw him, she took off running and hollering, “Ikee, Ikee, I got something for you.”
“Hey you two,” Nina said as she bent in front of the tree and pulled out two presents. She handed one to Ikee and told him to give it to Amarri. Nina handed the other present to Diana.”
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