The Christmas Shoes (Christmas Hope)

by VanLiere, Donna

  Jack and Evelyn recalled sweet memories for another hour. They talked about Maggie on her wedding day, and of Nathan’s and Rachel’s births. Jack told Maggie over and over again how beautiful she was, and how she had completed his life, and at 2:43 A.M., as he uttered once more how much he loved her, she took one final breath and died. There was no more pain. No more suffering. No more labored breaths.

  Evelyn stood motionless beside the bed, her hand trembling over her mouth.

  “Oh God, no,” she moaned, burying her head into Maggie’s shoulder. “I’m not ready for her to go.” Jack crumpled beside the bed, still holding Maggie’s hand, his heaving shoulders shaking the bed with each broken sob.

  “Oh, my sweet angel,” Evelyn wailed, kissing Maggie’s face and hands. “My sweet, sweet angel.”

  Jack pulled Maggie into his arms and rocked her back and forth, the bright colored scarf slipping from her head. “I thought I was ready to let you go, Maggie, but I’m not,” he sobbed into her neck. “I’m just not.”

  It was shortly after 3 A.M. when Jack awakened Nathan and explained that Mommy had stepped into heaven. Nathan ran, frightened, into the living room, where he saw his mother lying peacefully. His grandmother was holding and stroking his mother’s hand. Evelyn’s face was red and wet with tears. Nathan stood by his mother’s bed and tenderly touched her hand. It didn’t reach out for him, or draw him close to her, but lay motionless on the bed. Nathan felt his father’s hand on his shoulder as he looked into his mother’s face. She looked as if she was sleeping.

  “Is she already in heaven?” he asked softly, closely watching for his mother’s chest to rise and fall in breath.

  “She is, darlin’,” his grandmother said, smiling, tears falling from her chin. “She’s already there.”

  Before the men from the funeral-home arrived, they each said good-bye, kissing Maggie’s face and her hands, stroking her arms, and caressing her cheek. “I love you, Mama,” Nathan sobbed, falling into his father. It was more than his eight-year-old mind could comprehend, that he would never see his mother again.

  There would be those in town who would say it was cruel for Jack to wake Nathan the night his mother died, but one day Nathan would be thankful for the time he had had with his father and grandmother as they each, in their own special way, said good-bye to her. He saw the peace on his mother’s face and knew that what she had told him was true. That even at that very moment she was in heaven.

  Although they were expecting it, the soft knock on the door startled them all. Jack moved to the entryway, feeling as if he were moving in slow motion. He opened the door. Two men spoke softly to Jack as he motioned them in. Evelyn pulled Nathan to her as they watched the men work in silence, gently placing Maggie’s sheeted body on a collapsible stretcher. Jack kept a hand on his wife as the men wheeled her out into the cold and into the back of the hearse. Nathan stood beside the empty bed as his grandmother fell broken into the chair beside it, pulling him down on her lap, wrapping her arms tightly around him, sobbing. Beyond the window, snow gracefully fell to earth. Nathan’s father stayed outside in the cold and watched the hearse back out onto the street and drive away.

  The phone rang at eleven o’clock on Christmas morning. Doris had been busily chatting away with her son and daughter-in-law, everyone making their way through the great pile of gifts on the floor under the tree. Doris hurried into the kitchen and picked up the receiver. Her face fell as she listened to the voice on the other end of the line. She didn’t know the person calling, an aunt, she thought she heard her say, or maybe it was a neighbor—she couldn’t recall. The only thing she heard was that Maggie Andrews had died peacefully at home last night. Jack and her mother were by her side.

  By one o’clock that afternoon, Nathan’s home swelled with friends, relatives, and neighbors, and the countertops overflowed with food—turkey, gravy, dressing, green beans, peas, corn, and every potato imaginable: mashed potatoes, scalloped potatoes, cheesy potatoes, sweet potatoes, sweet potato casserole.

  Nathan pulled a Santa cookie from a Tupperware container his grandmother kept them in and sat quietly on the floor in the corner. His father and grandmother emerged from the bedroom carrying everything his mother would be buried in, the favorite dress she often wore to church and weddings, along with the beautiful wrap his grandmother had given her, and the sparkly shoes Nathan had purchased. He observed quietly as the grown-ups consoled his father and grandmother, clasping Jack on the back or squeezing his arm and whispering in his ear. He recognized the men his father worked with in the crowd, and the people from church. Rachel toddled through the forest of long legs, swinging Pooh bear in her hand as she crawled onto her father’s lap. A small group of women shook their heads somberly and patted his grandmother’s arm.

  Nathan recognized some neighbors. He wasn’t sure who a lot of the adults were, maybe people from Ferguson’s, where his mother used to work. Many of them slipped quietly in, leaving food or gifts on the kitchen table and then slipped back out without saying a word. The faces would blur, but Nathan would always remember their quiet acts of generosity. One elderly woman wearing a Christmas Is Love sweatshirt washed every dish, scrubbed every pan, emptied the garbage, and straightened and tidied the kitchen unnoticed. Drying her hands, she moved stealthily to the living room, where, when Nathan craned his neck, he could see her gathering cups, saucers, and plates, and taking them to the kitchen, where she promptly washed them, dried them, and put them away. She tackled the refrigerator next, dumping moldy dishes, wiping down shelves and making room for the many casserole and Corning Ware dishes of food that were sitting on the countertops and the table. When the food was in order and her work was done, she slid on her coat and left.

  Another couple appeared in the front door, said a few words to Jack and Evelyn, and quietly bundled Rachel up, gathering Pooh, her new pink baby doll, and some clothes, and shuffled out the door as Jack planted a kiss on one of his daughter’s plump, red cheeks. Nathan was glad that no one was whisking him away. Although his mother was not here, he knew, even then, that these moments were part of her and something he needed to share in.

  He looked toward the front door when he heard the familiar voice of his teacher, Mrs. Patterson, saying hello in the entryway. He hadn’t expected to see her until after Christmas break. When he saw her gentle face, his throat tightened. They hadn’t said much to each other all those days she’d driven him home from school, but he’d come to look forward to the time they’d spent together in the car. A kind-looking man Nathan had never seen before was with her. Nathan watched as the couple spoke with his father and grandmother, Mrs. Patterson’s arm around his grandmother’s shoulders. Nathan sprung to his feet and walked toward his teacher.

  “Hello, Nathan,” Doris said warmly. She looked to Nathan as though she may have been crying.

  “Hi, Mrs. Patterson,” he said quietly, waving the Santa cookie in his hand.

  “Nathan, this is Mr. Patterson,” she said, holding her husband’s hand.

  “Very nice to meet you, Nathan,” the man with the gentle face said.

  Nathan was glad that his teacher and her nice husband came to visit today.

  Doris guided Nathan to the kitchen table and sat down. He carefully placed his Santa cookie on the table in front of him.

  “Nathan,” Doris began. “I forgot all about the roll of film this picture was on. I found it when I was tidying my desk drawers for Christmas break. I thought you might like to have this.” She pulled out a framed photo of Maggie and Nathan taken the first week of school, when they’d helped decorate the classroom bulletin board. Before the picture was snapped, Maggie held up two yellow pipe cleaners behind Nathan’s head, laughing gleefully when the flash went off.

  From an envelope, Doris pulled out two other pictures. In one, Maggie was sitting at a tiny table in the school hallway, holding up a flash card to a student intently studying it. As the school photographer had walked toward them, Maggie turned and grinned. In th
e second picture, she had leaned over the table, pressing her face, cheek to cheek, into the student’s, as if they were crammed into a photo booth at the mall, her arm extended over her head, a broad smile running the width of her face.

  “Those two were taken last year,” Doris said, smiling.

  Nathan stared at the photos, shuffling through the three of them like a deck of cards, the framed one to the top, then the top to the bottom, carefully examining and reexamining each one. His mom looked different in the pictures…and then he realized why. They had been taken before she got sick, when she was still the mom who could jump in the leaves with him and dance around the house to the music on the radio and come to help out at his school. That’s how he would always remember her, just as she was in the pictures.

  They sat together quietly for several minutes before Doris stood and turned to leave.

  “Thank you, Mrs. Patterson,” Nathan said softly, fumbling the pictures in his hands.

  Doris turned to him, wishing she had something to say, but she didn’t know what that was. She and her husband were saying good-bye to Jack and Evelyn when Doris noticed the shiny, beaded shoes lying among a small pile of clothing near the front door. She turned toward Nathan, who smiled shyly.

  “I wanted her to feel special and beautiful,” was all he said. Doris’s eyes were wet with tears.

  “Oh, darling, she did. I’m certain she did.” She let go of her husband’s hand and bent down and hugged Nathan tightly to her before closing the door behind her.

  Nathan walked to the storm door and watched his teacher as she and her husband got into their car. He heard hushed fragments of a conversation in the hallway. He couldn’t hear exactly what was being said, but heard enough to know that his mother wouldn’t want him to listen. So he tuned out the voices, gazed at his mother’s laughing face in the photo, and squinted into the sky, looking for her in the clouds.

  The sun was rising in the sky, shimmering along the snowbanks and shining down on trees bending under the weight of the snow, when the phone rang. I had already completed a rousing game of hide-and-seek with Hannah and Lily when Kate called me from downstairs.

  “It’s Dalton,” she said, handing me the receiver.

  Dalton and Heddy were standing on the front porch waiting for Kate and me as I maneuvered the Mercedes into the driveway. I threw open the car door and stumbled past them into the house. I spun around the living room, frantically searching for Mother, bursting through the kitchen door, only to find it empty. I ran back into the living room, where I was met by the wet, grave faces of Dalton, Heddy, and Kate.

  “Don’t tell me, Dalton,” I begged, falling in stunned silence to the sofa, my voice breaking. “Don’t tell me she’s not here.” Kate sat beside me, wrapping her arms around me, leaning her head on my shoulder.

  “She’d invited us over for breakfast,” Dalton said soberly. “When she didn’t answer the door, we let ourselves in with our own key and found her in her chair by the tree. The ambulance got here right away but….” He stopped. This was heartbreaking for Dalton. He loved my mother very much. He stepped toward me and handed me a letter. “This was in her hand.” I stuffed the paper into my pocket.

  Nathan stood at the front door, watching as the hospital bed was wheeled out of the living room and loaded into the back of a medical-supplies truck parked in the driveway. He’d felt nervous and scared as the men loaded it, his heart beating faster and faster as the truck door slammed shut with a clang. As the truck backed out of the drive, his body filled with emotion. He shut the door against the cold winter air, pressing his nose against its wood, and wept softly.

  He took a deep breath. He thought about all of the times he’d sat in school wondering where his mother or father was at that exact moment. What kind of car was Dad working on? What was Mom doing? Was she playing with Rachel? Maybe she was in the kitchen baking cookies for when he got home from school. Perhaps she was wheeling Rachel around in a shopping cart, buying groceries at Ferguson’s. He often pictured what his mother was doing throughout the day, but now he’d no longer wonder. He knew exactly where she was and what she was doing. She was running and jumping and playing, just like she used to do with him before she ever had to get into that hospital bed. And in some peaceful, inexplicable way, that vision wrapped him in hope as he stood by the window and cried.

  The coroner’s office called later that evening. My mother had died of a brain aneurysm. The voice on the line explained that my mother had gone very quickly and felt no pain. I’d called Hugh and made a number of other calls to relatives and friends before kissing Hannah and Lily goodnight, holding them tightly in my arms.

  Kate and I sat together in the living room, lit only by the tiny white lights of the Christmas tree.

  “I was thinking we should bury her in the periwinkle jacket,” I said, staring into the lights. “And the new blouse and pin.” My voice faltered as I cleared my throat and continued softly. “She would definitely want the pin, because it has the stones of all her grandchildren in it.”

  I laughed, wiping the tears from my face.

  “She’d never let me hear the end of it if I didn’t bury her with the pin that represented all her grandbabies.”

  Kate rested her head on the back of the sofa, wiping the tears with both hands from her face.

  “I’m going to ask Dalton to say something at the funeral,” I said. “I can’t imagine anyone else doing it.”

  “I can’t either,” Kate reassured.

  I glanced at my watch.

  “Hugh’s flight is at ten. They’ll all get in at five-thirty tomorrow morning. We can plan the rest of the service with the pastor when he gets here.” I leaned forward on the sofa and buried my face in my hands, rubbing tired, bloodshot eyes with the heels of my palms.

  Kate scooted over, grabbed my hand, and set it on her lap, holding onto it as she fell asleep. I gently draped a throw over Kate and sat quietly in the stillness, staring at the Christmas tree, the way my mother had always loved to do. I recalled the day Hannah and Lily had decorated the tree, small hands digging anxiously through the boxes of decorations, each child clamoring to find the next prettiest bulb to hang on its branches. The tree was more than just a decoration to Mom. It was a daily reminder of the time she’d spent with her children and grandchildren. I wiped another tear from my face.

  “What a lousy time of year to lose your mother,” I said, rubbing my temples.

  When my head started to bob, and I felt myself nodding off in the early-morning hours, I stood to retrieve a blanket from the hall closet for myself. I straightened Kate’s legs on the sofa and started to empty my pants pockets when I felt the letter Dalton had given me earlier in the day. Amid all of the commotion, I had forgotten all about it.

  I turned the letter toward the lights of the tree and began to read.

  “Dear Robert,” it began. “I know the hard part is just beginning, but one day you’ll understand that it is worth it…. All of it.”

  I wept as I read the rest of the unfinished letter.

  Eight

  Death’s power is limited—

  It cannot eradicate memories

  Or slay love

  It cannot destroy even a threadbare faith

  Or permanently hobble the smallest hope in God

  It cannot permeate the soul

  And it cannot cripple the spirit

  It merely separates us for a while

  That is the only power death can claim

  —No more

  —Donna VanLiere

  It was late when the phone rang. Kate and I both leaped for it at once. Kate got there first. I watched her face as the expression changed from tense concern to utter happiness.

  “It’s a boy!” she shrieked. I’m a grandfather—we’re grandparents, I thought, my heart brimming. “She wants to speak with you,” Kate said, handing me the receiver.

  “Hello, sweetie,” I said, “Congratulations. How’s my little girl?”

&n
bsp; “I’m fine, Daddy. I’m perfect,” Hannah replied. Her voice sounded strong, full.

  “Well, how’s our grandson?” I could hardly contain my joy.

  “He’s gorgeous, Daddy, but he’s got Uncle Hugh’s feet,” she exclaimed.

  “Oh my, bunions already?” I joked.

  “No, but he is pigeon-toed…. Somehow they’re pretty adorable on him, though,” she laughed.

  “Well, does the little fellow have a name?” I asked. There was a brief pause on the other end of the line.

  “His name is Evan Robert,” she said softly. “After you, Daddy.”

  Evan Robert had arrived! He weighed six pounds eleven ounces and was twenty-one inches long. He’s a beautiful pink baby with soft tufts of hair on each side of his head, causing him to look very much like a little old man with a terribly receding hairline. Hannah and her husband, Steven, live four hours away in a small town where she teaches the fifth grade and he works as a state trooper. Hannah is most definitely her mother’s daughter, from her shiny black hair to her melodious laugh and compassionate heart. It makes me smile to see the mirror image of the Kate I first met so many years ago. Lily is finishing her last year of college and since interning at my firm this past summer, has been threatening to pursue a career in law. She loves to goad her father. She says I could use a little competition. I’d started my own firm a number of years back, and we’d won a couple of fairly high-profile class-action suits. Lily is as blond as her sister is dark and a true beauty, a fact that she seems to be entirely oblivious to—even if, to my chagrin, the boys on campus are not. Now, Hannah was bringing the baby home for his first Christmas.