The Christmas Hope

by VanLiere, Donna

  “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.”

  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.

  SEVEN

  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.

  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.

  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 be
gan 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.

  “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.

  “Good morning, Emily,” Mom said. “And merry Christmas!”

  Emily sat at the island and watched Mom work. “Are we going to see the activity today?” Mom and I looked at her.

  “What activity?” I asked, washing my hands.

  “With all the animals and Mary and Joseph.”

  Mom threw her head back and laughed. “Oh! The living activity,” she said.

  “We’ll do whatever you want,” I said. I scrambled an egg and put a piece of toast on a plate for Emily. I poured her a glass of milk and set it in front of her. I was getting good at this.

  “Can we go to see Mia today and can I buy her a gift for Christmas?”

  “Yes, we can go see her.”

  “Can Mark go, too?” I knew Mom was waiting to hear my answer but she acted as if she were as busy as could be finishing the pie.

  “We can ask. I’m sure he’ll want to.”

  When Mark and Dad returned from shopping, a huge topiary entered the kitchen before Dad. “We’re going to set this on the floor next to the mantle,” he said. “What’d that lady call this thing, Mark?”

  “A topiary.”

  Dad shook his head. “It looks better than it sounds. See, it’s got real fruit mixed in with the artificial leaves.
That way you can use it every year.” He smiled and Mom laughed. For years we’d only heard him use construction and building terms. Today he was an article straight out of Better Homes and Gardens. Mark followed carrying large paper bags with handles. Emily drank the last of her milk and ran into the dining room to help. I searched for our camera in the hall closet and tried to snap a picture of Mom but the batteries were dead.

  It’s been four years, I thought, realizing the last time we’d used the camera. I popped new batteries into place, put in a roll of film, and stepped into the door of the dining room. I took a picture of Emily burrowing through the bags, of Mark and Dad hanging garland, of Dad giving me a thumbs-up while he strung some lights, of Mark helping Emily spread out the table runner, and of Mom licking her fingers and giving me a dirty look. We baked and cleaned and spruced up the house for our visitors and for the first time in years it felt normal; it felt real.

  Mom and Dad left and Mark carried games in from the garage. “I bought these today,” he said to Emily and me. He was holding Candy Land, and Chutes and Ladders. “Does anybody want to play?”

  Emily held up her hand. “I do. But can we see Mia first?” She walked over to him and looked up. “Can you go with us?”

  “I can’t be seen in public with someone wearing reindeer pajamas,” he said. Emily ran up the stairs into the bedroom, leaving Mark and me alone in the kitchen.

  “The dining room is gorgeous,” I said, breaking the silence. “Thanks for doing that.”

  He nodded. “Thanks for cooking.”

  “Mom did most of it. She’s a much better cook than I am.”

  “Guess it depends on who you’re asking,” he said. He smiled and I wanted to hug him but I couldn’t. He couldn’t either. Roy was wrong. We didn’t know what to do. There was something broken and neither of us knew how to fix it.