Small Steps

by Peg Kehret

  Miss Ballard rolled her eyes, knowing full well that at age thirteen, I knew all about Santa Claus.

  Finally I added the last-ditch, tried-and-true argument of kids everywhere: “All the other kids are going home for Christmas.”

  She gave me a look that said, No, they aren’t, but she agreed to think about it.

  While I waited for her decision, I learned that the hospital was going to have a Christmas pageant, with patients playing all of the roles. I was thrilled when Miss Ballard asked me to play the part of Mary, the mother of Jesus.

  “You’re tall for your age,” she said, “and Mary was young.”

  Before I could get too big-headed about my important role, she added, “And we need someone who can make it from the back of the room to the manger without any help.”

  “Who is going to be Joseph?” Renée asked.

  His name was Kenny, and none of us knew him. He was in the men’s ward, and we never ventured there.

  “Kenny is being discharged the day after our pageant,” Miss Ballard said. “He is almost fully recovered and is strong as an ox. He can even walk by himself.”

  The hospital’s youngest patient, a four-month-old boy, would play the part of Jesus. Patients who did not have roles were enlisted to make programs, angel wings, and halos.

  During the next few days, my sessions with Miss Ballard were full of conversation about the pageant. The plan was for an adult patient to read the Christmas story from the Bible while the characters silently enacted their parts, forming a tableau at the front of the O.T. room.

  “I’d like to have some music, too,” Miss Ballard said.

  “Not accordion music,” I said.

  “I understand there are some good singing voices in Room 202.”

  I wondered how she knew that, since our singing always took place at night, after she had gone home.

  “Maybe all of you could sing a song,” she continued.

  “Why don’t you ask Alice to sing a solo?” I suggested. “She doesn’t have a part in the pageant yet.”

  “Is she good enough?” Miss Ballard asked. “The whole hospital will be there, plus many visitors.”

  No performer ever had a more enthusiastic agent than Alice had that day as I described her clear, bell-like voice.

  That afternoon, Miss Ballard asked Alice to sing a solo in the Christmas pageant.

  “Me?” Alice said. “How do you know I can even carry a tune?”

  “I’ve heard reports from someone I trust.”

  “One of the nurses? Did a nurse tell you I can sing?”

  “Could be.”

  Alice assumed that a nurse had talked to Miss Ballard, and I never let on that it was me. What did it matter who recommended her? The important thing was for her to be part of the pageant.

  “What do you want me to sing?”

  “One of the familiar Christmas carols would be nice.”

  “Sing ‘Silent Night,’ ” Renée said. “I get chills every time you sing ‘Silent Night.’ ”

  “Yes,” agreed Dorothy. “You should sing ‘Silent Night.’ ”

  Alice looked over at me. “What do you think?” she asked. “You’re the one who’s had music lessons.”

  “ ‘Silent Night’ would be perfect.”

  We had one rehearsal. All I had to do was walk from the back of the O.T. room to the front, with Kenny beside me, and sit on a chair.

  “Start walking toward the manger when you hear the word taxed,” Miss Ballard said. “That’s your cue.”

  Kenny and I nodded.

  When all the actors were in place, Miss Ballard said, “Now everyone will stand perfectly still while Alice sings ‘Silent Night.’ When she’s finished, the pageant is over.” Since no one had any lines to memorize, we only needed to go through it once, and Alice wasn’t asked to sing for the rehearsal.

  On the evening of the pageant, dinner was served early. It might have been skipped entirely in our room, since we were far too excited to care about food.

  We all warned Alice not to drink her milk. We didn’t want phlegm in her throat, spoiling her voice. Dorothy, who was going to be an angel, fretted until the nurse in charge of angels showed up to help her into her wings.

  When it was time to leave, Alice panicked. “I can’t do it,” she said. “Not in front of all those people. What if my voice cracks? What if I forget the words?”

  “You won’t forget the words to ‘Silent Night,’ ” Dorothy said. “You’ve sung it to us a hundred times this week.”

  “When it’s time to sing,” I told her, “close your eyes and pretend you’re in bed, singing only to us.”

  “What if I go blank? What if nothing comes out of my mouth?”

  “That would be an historic first,” Renée said.

  “I’m scared,” Alice whispered. “I’m afraid I’ll goof up.”

  “If you start to have trouble,” I said, “I’ll join in and sing with you. Nobody will know it wasn’t planned.”

  “Promise?”

  “Promise. But you won’t goof up. You have the best singing voice I’ve ever heard.”

  The O.T. room was the largest room in the hospital. That night it was crowded with patients, visiting family members, and staff.

  A spotlight shone on a crude crèche at one end of the room. Hospital beds, with the heads elevated, ringed the perimeter of the room like bent dominoes. Next were U-shaped rows of wheelchairs, with adults in back and kids in front.

  My costume was an ankle-length hospital gown belted with a piece of rope. A long piece of deep blue fabric, worn on my head and draped over one shoulder, made me feel slightly more holy.

  Miss Ballard rearranged the material three times before it suited her. “You look exactly the way Mary should look,” she declared.

  “Except for my feet,” I said. “Mary didn’t wear saddle shoes.”

  “You need the support of sturdy shoes. I don’t want Mary falling on her face before she gets to the manger.”

  “I should be barefoot. Couldn’t I go barefoot just for that short way?”

  “No,” Miss Ballard said, and I knew by the way she said it that I would be wasting my breath to ask again.

  I waited with the other actors just outside the O.T. room door. I hardly recognized Kenny, who wore a long brown bathrobe, a fake beard, and a scarf pulled tight across his forehead and hanging down the back of his neck. I noticed that he was barefoot.

  “I thought you’d have a pillow under your dress,” Kenny said. “You’re supposed to be pregnant.”

  That had not occurred to me. I asked Willie for a pillow.

  “No pillow,” she said. “It could throw you off balance.”

  Miss Ballard rushed out and said, “There’s a problem. So many people came that they didn’t keep the aisle as wide as they were supposed to. There isn’t room for Mary and Joseph to go down side by side, as planned.” She looked at Kenny. “Joseph,” she said, “you’ll have to follow behind Mary.”

  Opinions erupted like popping corn from the rest of the cast.

  “Mary and Joseph need to be together.”

  “We should have decorated a wheelchair to look like a donkey, and Kenny could have pushed her.”

  “Maybe somebody else should be Mary. Can’t anyone around here walk alone?”

  Nervous that I was going to be replaced at the last second, I said, “If Kenny helps me, I can make it without my sticks.”

  The babble of voices ceased, and everyone looked at Miss Ballard.

  “Without your sticks, you and Kenny would fit in the aisle at the same time,” she said. “If Kenny had his arm around your waist to support you, I think you could do it.”

  Twice during my physical therapy sessions, I had walked short distances holding onto a metal bar attached to the wall while Miss Ballard stood on my other side with her arm around me for support.

  “Do you think you can keep her upright?” Miss Ba
llard asked Kenny. “Can you catch her if she stumbles?”

  “Yes,” said Kenny, “as long as we use my good arm.”

  There was no time to practice. The lights in the O.T. room dimmed, and the reader began. “And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed.”

  Taxed! I thrust my walking sticks at Miss Ballard. Kenny’s arm went firmly around my waist, holding and lifting me so my feet barely touched the floor.

  “Are you sure you can make it?” Miss Ballard whispered.

  I nodded. I wasn’t sure at all, but it was too late to change plans. Every eye in the hospital was watching us.

  16: Christmas

  “Right foot first,” Joseph said softly.

  The reader continued. As the familiar words rang out, Joseph and Mary slowly made their way to the manger. My legs were far too weak to support my weight without my sticks, but Kenny’s strong grip never loosened, and he practically carried me the whole way. Even so, I was glad I had my shoes on.

  Our progress was slower than the reader’s voice, so when we were only halfway to the front, he quit reading and waited for us to catch up with the story.

  When we got to the crèche, Kenny helped me sit down on the chair on one side of the manger, and he sat on the other side.

  The reader continued. “And she gave birth to her first-born son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger.” A nurse from the pediatrics ward stepped forward and placed the baby in the manger.

  The other characters entered on cue. Dorothy looked suitably angelic with gauze wings trailing behind her wheelchair and a halo on her head. The wise men entered last, two in wheelchairs and one in braces, carrying gifts that looked suspiciously like the decorated jewelry boxes we had made in O.T. the week before.

  We had been directed to hold still while Alice sang her solo. Every character except one followed instructions. Jesus kicked his feet and waved his fists at us.

  Alice’s voice rang out confidently from the back of the room. “Silent night, holy night. All is calm, all is bright …” Her rendition was flawless: clear, true notes strung together in a necklace of sound, a gift for everyone in the room to wear.

  The last “Sleep in heavenly peace,” echoed for several seconds in the silence as visitors, staff, and patients wiped tears from their cheeks. Then thunderous applause broke out. Everyone talked at once, exclaiming how perfect the pageant had been.

  Miss Ballard rushed forward with my walking sticks, afraid she had let me do too much.

  “Kenny did all the work for me,” I said, which was

  true.

  The parents of the baby scooped him from the manger and beamed while others admired him.

  But the real star that night was Alice, and she shone brilliantly. Except for her four roommates and whichever nurses had listened outside our door, no one had known until then what a lovely voice she had. She was congratulated and complimented, over and over. People asked if she took voice lessons. She blossomed under all the attention, smiling graciously and talking with anyone who approached her.

  Refreshments were served, and our appetites immediately returned. We drank cranberry punch and stuffed ourselves with Christmas cookies, fruitcake, and candy canes.

  When the party ended, the five of us went back to our room and celebrated by ourselves. Long after the lights were out, we continued to talk. And sing. And eat.

  The next day, Miss Ballard told me I could go home for a Christmas visit.

  “You don’t sound very happy about it,” I said.

  “I would prefer to keep you at the Sheltering Arms, where I can control your activities,” she admitted. “You’ve made excellent progress, and you could undo it all by getting too tired or by trying to do something you aren’t ready for and damaging a muscle.” She shrugged. “But I don’t have the heart to say no to your parents.”

  “I’ll be careful,” I promised. “I’m much stronger than I was on the first visit.”

  After days of practice with Miss Ballard, I could walk up a step or two. With luck, I’d be able to make it in the front door of my house on my own.

  “Art will be home for the holidays,” I told Miss Ballard. “He and Dad plan to make a chair out of their hands and carry me up and down the stairs so I can use the big bathroom and sleep in my own bed.”

  Miss Ballard clapped her hands over her ears and said she didn’t want to know about it until after I was safely back at the Sheltering Arms.

  I was not the only patient in 202 to receive a Christmas pass. Dorothy and Renée were going home, too. Shirley’s parents and her two younger sisters were coming to spend Christmas Day with her; I was glad that she and Alice would have company.

  Two days before we were scheduled to leave, Dorothy got pneumonia, and her visit home was canceled. She had trouble breathing, which scared all of us. We knew that if she got worse she would be moved to University Hospital and put back in an iron lung.

  When my parents came to get me, my joy was marred by concern that when I returned, Dorothy might be gone. All of my roommates now seemed like sisters, and I desperately wanted Dorothy to get well. And I wanted her to stay at the Sheltering Arms with me.

  This time, my visit went smoothly. I was able to keep my balance in the car, and I managed the front steps on my own. Grandpa had tears in his eyes as he held the door open and watched me walk in with my sticks, but I knew they were tears of happiness.

  My only real diffculty was B.J., who was so glad to see me that he kept wagging around my ankles. We all worried that I would trip over him or that he would knock one of my sticks out of my hand. Dad wanted to shut B.J. in the basement.

  “If B.J. has to go to the basement,” I said, “I’m going with him.”

  B.J. was allowed to stay near me, but I spent a lot of time sitting down just so my dog wouldn’t get in trouble.

  Because I was stronger and able to move more easily, I didn’t get so tired on this second visit. I wore my new plaid satin dress and sat in my usual place on the sofa for our Christmas Eve gift exchange. I gave Grandpa, Art, Mother, and Dad fancy Christmas cards I had made in O.T. I felt like one of the family again.

  When it was time to go to bed, Mother carried my walking sticks up the stairs. Art and Dad made the “chair” out of their hands, I sat down and held on to their necks, and up we went. It worked fine, but I was glad Miss Ballard wasn’t there to watch.

  At the top of the stairs, Mother gave me my sticks and I walked eagerly into my own bedroom. Or was it my own bedroom? I stood in the doorway, totally stunned.

  “Surprise!” Mother said.

  “Merry Christmas!” Dad said.

  They had completely redecorated my room. The walls and furniture had been painted, and a new white bedspread covered my bed. Ruffled curtains now framed the windows, and a new lamp shone from the bedside table.

  I could barely hide my disappointment. I had thought a hundred times about my comfortable room with itsworn bedspread and familiar furniture. I had longed to see it all again, and now that room was gone forever. Even the closet was clean.

  “Wow,” I said, trying to act thrilled. The redone bedroom seemed less like my own than Room 202 did, and I fell asleep wondering how Dorothy was.

  In the morning, I decided I liked my new room, and that evening I left reluctantly for the Sheltering Arms. It had been good to be home again, and I had gotten around fairly well. Still, I knew I had a ways to go before I was well enough to come home for good. For one thing, Dad and Art would not be there all the time to carry me up and down the stairs.

  I braced myself for bad news as I entered Room 202. Much to my relief, Dorothy was sitting up in bed, looking well.

  “Look!” she said, the minute I arrived. She held her arm toward me. “My great-aunt in Montana sent me a watch!” Dorothy’s parents were extremely poor, and she said she had never dreamed she would have a watch o
f her own. “She sent me a new dress, too,” Dorothy said. “As soon as I’m well enough to get up, I’ll wear it.”

  That night, the five of us talked long after lights out. Renée told what she had done at home. Shirley told about the visit from her parents and sisters.

  “My mom came,” Dorothy said, “and my brother who is on leave from the army.” Even Alice had some exciting news: an uncle had come on Christmas Day to visit her.

  After all of December’s festivities, January seemed as dull as last month’s newspapers. The days were short, and so were our tempers. Shirley caught a cold and had to stay in bed. Dorothy was over the pneumonia, but her braces didn’t fit properly. They were returned and a new pair ordered. Even with new O.T. projects and another edition of the Clutch, the hospital newsletter, we were bored and restless.

  Despite blizzards and icy roads, Mother and Dad came every Sunday. On one trip, Mother told me she had visited the little kids’ ward.

  “They don’t have enough toys for those children,” she said. “Little ones can’t read to entertain themselves, the way you can.”

  I sensed that she was leading up to something, and I was right.

  “I was thinking,” she went on, “that you have outgrown many of your toys, and maybe you would like to donate them to the Sheltering Arms.”

  “Like what?” I asked.

  “Your table and chairs, for one thing. You’re much too big to fit in the chairs anymore, and they’re just taking up space at home.”

  I agreed to donate my table and chairs.

  “And your dolls. You haven’t played with dolls for years, and there aren’t enough dolls for all the children in that ward.”

  “Not my Raggedys,” I said. “And not Marilyn or the Story Book Dolls. But you can give the rest away.”

  Mother nodded. “What about all your books? The little children would enjoy looking at the pictures.”

  I hesitated. I couldn’t use the table and chairs even if I wanted to, and I didn’t mind giving away the dolls as long as I got to keep my favorites. But my books? I felt sorry for the little kids, too, but there were limits to my generosity.