Christmas at Home

by Carolyn Brown

  “My favorite food in the whole world is dumplins. We only talk Momma into making them on Easter and Thanksgiving. She’s as stingy with her dumplins as you are with your recipe for snow ice cream,” he said.

  “Then dumplins it is. And honey, my recipe is so complicated that you’d never get it right.”

  “You’d better not leave it behind when you move or I’ll find it!” He stretched the kinks from his neck and back when he stood up. Then he crossed the room and wrapped his arms around her from behind. “I like that picture best of all three.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Riley, and there isn’t a written copy of my recipe. The only one in existence is in my head and it will die with me,” she said.

  “That would be Creed, ma’am. My friends call me Creed.”

  “Do you go around hugging and kissing all your friends?”

  “Only the pretty ones who paint gorgeous pictures and make luscious snow ice cream. See you after a while.” He kissed her on the neck, just below her ear.

  It was a full five minutes after he left before she could steady her hands enough to touch the canvas with a paintbrush. Yes, sir! Just like the moth to the flame and Creed was one scorching hot blaze.

  She’d barely gotten started when Creed burst in the back door. “You’ve got to come and see this, Sage. It’ll be gone by morning. Do you have a camera in the house? My phone is dead or I’d use it.”

  She laid her palette and brushes down. “What is it?”

  “Your next big thing.” He grinned.

  She didn’t have the heart to tell him that Grand had taken her to see the next big thing dozens of times, but she could never get them to come out right on canvas. If the PGs didn’t slap her with inspiration, she might as well not even try to paint it.

  “I’ll get the camera.”

  She disappeared into the bedroom and came out with a digital camera and hoped the batteries in it were still good. She seldom used it. If she saw a picture, it was embedded in her mind permanently and refused to leave until she finished the job.

  He held her coat while she slipped her arms into it. She stomped her feet down into her boots and followed him outside. He grabbed her hand to hurry her along the plowed path leading to the tractor sitting on the south side of the barn.

  Sage didn’t see a thing that was so wonderful, but warmth ran from his hand up her arm and into her body. Maybe the next big thing was that she would fall in love with the man.

  Hell, no! She caught herself before she said it out loud. Sage Presley never made rash decisions. She weighed everything carefully, sometimes even wrote the pros and cons on paper, before she made up her mind. She’d known Creed less than a week, for God’s sake!

  When she had her first sexual relationship as a sophomore in college, she’d gone into it thoughtfully and with lots of care. That was seven years earlier, so there was no way she was entering into something with Creed Riley after such a short time.

  He stopped and pointed. “Look.”

  She stared, slack-jawed.

  Sure enough. There was the next big thing and it had been delivered through him. That was a first, for sure. The PGs had never worked that way before.

  “What do you think?” he asked.

  “I think you should paint. You have an eye for it.” She dropped his hand and brought the camera up and pressed the button. She moved a foot to the left and took another picture, two feet and another one. Not that she would need the pictures, but the vision through the lens was like framing it after she’d painted it.

  “Aww, shucks.” He kicked a big pile of snow. “I can’t even color without getting outside the lines. Just ask Rachel.”

  She lowered the camera. “Rachel?”

  “Yep, she’s the expert.”

  “Oh?”

  “She’s my friend’s daughter. She’s in preschool and she tells us all that we’ve got to stay in the lines or we can’t color in her books,” Creed said. “So you think you can use that in your new collection?”

  “Oh, yeah!”

  Sage stepped back and branded the moment into her brain. It was a scraggly old scrub oak tree with a big bunch of mistletoe near the top. The sun had melted the snow from the top branches and the water had dripped slowly through the mistletoe, making icicles all through the thick green leaves. Icicles as thin as hair even hung on the tiny white berries.

  Sage stared until her head hurt. True, the berries and the mistletoe were beautiful, but the thing that made her know that this was an inspiration were the shadows in the branches. They formed a manger with a shepherd’s hook leaning against it. No people. Nothing like a complete nativity scene or a baby kicking and wiggling in the manger. Just the wooden box of straw with the mistletoe hanging inside the hook’s crook. One part of the mistletoe lay in shadows. The other parts’ icicles glistened with the sun rays sneaking in from the edges of the dark clouds.

  “It’s wonderful,” she whispered.

  “I thought you’d like it. I just wish that pair of cardinals would have come back so you’d have had some more color.”

  “I see color. There’s green in the mistletoe leaves and red in the berries and the clouds are throwing beautiful shadows.”

  “What clouds?” He looked up. “Oh, I didn’t see those.”

  Sage smiled. He was the messenger, but the best had been saved especially for her. She shoved the camera into her pocket and kissed him on the cheek.

  His arms went around her and he pulled her so close that the sunlight couldn’t sneak between them. “I really do like you, Sage Presley.”

  Her heart came to a screeching, skidding stop. “Like” meant commitment and that was a big black cloud without a silver lining.

  “Now back to the house,” he said. “You’ve got one to finish and one to start. The phone is already working and the electricity will soon be on, which will open up cell phones and laptops. Your uninterrupted days are about to come to a halt.”

  “Creed, I…” she stammered.

  He laid a hand over her lips. “No explanations necessary.”

  “Really?”

  “Really. I think you know your way back inside. I’ll be there in an hour to grab a Reuben dog and then I’m going to come back outside until dark. I’ve been cooped up so long if I go back inside I’m going to get so grumpy that you’ll throw me out the front door and lock it.”

  * * *

  He watched her jog back toward the house, camera in hand and hair flowing in the wind. She hadn’t said that she was sorry but she didn’t like him, that his kisses were just something to ease her boredom.

  That was progress.

  Creed had broken lots of horses in his time. Some of them required a lot of care and attention before he put the saddle on their back and his foot in the stirrup. He knew how to be patient even if it wasn’t one of his virtues.

  “I’m not comparing her to a damn horse,” he mumbled before the voice in his head had time to smart off to him.

  * * *

  Ada was on her way back to the house from the mailbox when her cell phone rang. She dug it out of her coat pocket and answered it on the third ring.

  “Grand!” Sage said. “I miss you horrible. Do you realize this is the longest we’ve been away from each other since I moved home from college? No, it’s the longest ever because when I was in college I came home every single weekend.”

  “Slow down, kiddo! Tell me about the cowboy. Where is he?”

  “Out making pathways for the cows so they will have dirt under their feet instead of snow. I’m glad I never learned to knit or he’d want me to make little socks for them,” she said.

  “So he cares for his cattle, does he?”

  “He’s a cowboy from the heart out, Grand.”

  “Okay. Now tell me about you. You got any painting done with all the snow?”

 
; Sage went into a long detailed description of her mistletoe pictures and what Marquee said about them. She even told her grandmother about the latest one that Creed had found for her. “He’s got an eye for seeing the unusual for sure. But he didn’t see the shadows,” she said and caught her breath before going into more detail about the newest picture.

  “Heard from Lawton?” Ada changed the subject.

  Sage launched into April’s tale of woe and ended up with the fact that Lawton was still planning the Christmas party on the third Saturday in December. Since they’d missed the annual Hanging of the Green because of the storm, they were having it the next day after the Christmas party.

  “I always enjoyed that ceremony. It moves the soul,” Ada said.

  “Come home and go with me. We’ve gone to the Hanging of the Green my whole life. I can’t believe you are going to miss it.”

  “I wasn’t kiddin’ when I said that Essie needs me, Sage. She actually crawled up on the house to nail down shingles.”

  “Shit!”

  “You said it! Her boys want to put her in a nursing home.”

  “Never! I won’t have it, Grand. Neither of you are ever going to a nursing home. Aunt Essie can come here.”

  “She’d wilt in the Texas heat at her age. Speaking of the weather, don’t forget to put flowers on the graves. Red poinsettias for the holidays.”

  Ada heard the catch in Sage’s voice. “By myself?”

  “Take the cowboy with you.”

  “It’s not his momma and daddy and grandpa.”

  “But he’ll own the cemetery when I sell to him.”

  There was a long pause.

  “Sage, are you still there?”

  “You are really going to do this, aren’t you?”

  “I think I am,” Ada said.

  “I’m going to cry and pitch a hissy and pout and whine,” Sage said.

  “That sounds like a crock of shit! I didn’t raise you to be a sissy. If I sell that ranch you aren’t going to shed a single tear. You’re going to stand on the porch with a straight backbone and wave at me. Do you hear me, Elizabeth Sage Presley?”

  “You second-named me. You haven’t done that in years.”

  “Yes, I did. This is serious, and you’re acting like a crybaby, so you deserve it. Change happens and you need to realize it don’t kill none of us.”

  “But I damn sure don’t have to like it.”

  “Nobody said that you had to like it, but you won’t carry on like a lovesick coyote.”

  “You are a tough old broad,” Sage said.

  “And don’t you forget it for a minute.”

  “Can I grow up and be just like you?”

  Ada laughed. “I hope you do. Did you make snow ice cream?”

  “Yes, I did, and Creed says it’s the best he ever ate and wanted to know my recipe. I tricked him. Put the can of milk in a bowl and whipped it with a whisk like I had all kinds of ingredients in there.”

  Ada laughed even harder. “Did you tell him the truth?”

  “I did not!”

  “You know that once he eats snow ice cream from that recipe, he will never leave.”

  “Well, shit! I didn’t think of that.”

  “Too late now. Tell me about the cat and dog.”

  “Creed says Noel is going to have puppies any day. It’s a madhouse around here. When you left, you took all the sanity with you.”

  “Old place needs some life in it,” Ada said. “No, I didn’t say Sage was going to be a wife.”

  “What!” Sage yelled.

  “I’m back in the house and Essie thought she heard something about a wife.”

  “Tell her I said hell no!”

  “Be careful, darlin’. Sometimes that hell no business sneaks up and bites you on the ass. Essie’s got her hand out. I guess you’re going to have to talk to her for a spell before you get to hang up.”

  Essie’s voice came over the line loud and clear. She didn’t sound like she was feeble and needed anybody’s help. “Hello, Sage.”

  “What’s this about you crawling up on the roof? Don’t make me come out there, Aunt Essie.”

  “Shingles were coming loose. Somebody had to fix them and if I thought you’d move out here, I’d crawl back up there again. You don’t be worryin’ none about me, child. You’ve got enough to worry about with a strange man right in the house with you. I don’t know what Ada was thinkin’ about, leavin’ you there with him. He’s been a gentleman, hasn’t he?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Ada wrestled the phone from her sister. “Give me that.”

  “Grand, what are you two doing? Fighting like little girls?” Sage asked.

  “You damn right we are. Don’t you be buyin’ her brand of bullshit! I knew exactly what I was doing when that cowboy walked up on my porch. I saw a vision of the future. My Indian senses get sharper with age. Don’t you dare laugh at me. You got the vision too. You just call it your PGs and paint what you see. I know in my heart he’s the right cowboy to take on the Rockin’ C.”

  “I’m starving. Let’s make Reuben dogs,” Creed’s deep drawl came through the phone line. “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t see that you were talking to someone.”

  “Reuben dogs? He eats sauerkraut on hot dogs. He’s definitely a keeper,” Ada told Sage.

  “It’s Grand,” Sage said.

  “Hi, Miz Ada. The sun is out and we’re diggin’ out. Didn’t lose a single cow and we gained some inside livestock,” he raised his voice.

  “Go take care of your cowboy,” Ada said.

  “You and Aunt Essie both are losin’ your minds.”

  “Call me tomorrow when you have time, and don’t pay no mind to Essie. I wouldn’t leave you with a serial killer.”

  Chapter 8

  “That one is too big,” Creed said.

  Sage walked around the enormous cedar tree and imagined it with lights and tinsel. “But it’s shaped just right.”

  “Look up, Sage.”

  She threw her head back expecting to see something fantastic like shadows creating a phenomenal idea for a painting or maybe a ball of mistletoe the size of a church punch bowl. But there was nothing but a promising Christmas tree.

  “Now look at me and compare the tree to my height. Remember the ceiling is eight feet,” he said.

  “Well, dammit!”

  “They look a lot smaller in the pasture than they really are. That thing would take up more than half of our living room.”

  “You sound like Grand,” she said.

  “Does that mean you’ve always wanted a tree that wouldn’t go through the kitchen door?”

  “I love Christmas. It’s my favorite holiday and we’ve got tons of ornaments. When I was a little girl, I was afraid if we didn’t get them all on the tree that the ones left behind would get their feelings hurt. It’s crazy but…”

  His big hand closed around hers, dwarfing it in size. She liked that. She’d been the tallest kid in the kindergarten class and kept that title until ninth grade when the boys started catching up. By then she’d heard all the jokes about height—How’s the weather up there? Can you see the ground? Do we all look like toys?—and had developed a complex about it.

  He led her through the crusty-topped snow to another tree. “How about this one?”

  She studied it carefully. “It’s four feet taller than you, which means at least three feet would have to come out of the top to make room for the angel, and it would look like a blob.”

  They went another fifty yards across the pasture with the rock formation that Sage had painted so many times getting closer and closer. Finally, she stopped and stared at the rock. Answers were there. They always had been. She just had to stare at it long enough and they would surface.

  “You see something to paint or are w
e still looking for a tree?” Creed asked.

  She hadn’t realized that she’d stopped or that she’d been gazing at the rock so long. Creed hadn’t pressured her to go on and find a tree. He didn’t tell her that it was cold and they were walking through snow that came almost to the tops of their boots. He hadn’t even shifted from one leg to the other and sighed deeply. It was those things that he didn’t do that she appreciated as much as all the things he had done that whole week.

  “The first time Grand brought me to this spot I was about five years old. Grand and I were going to put flowers on the graves. I hated that. It made it so final that I didn’t have a father or a mother like other kids.

  “I saw Grandpa’s profile in the eroded edges of the top rock. Even though he was dead and gone before I was born, I recognized him from the picture that Grand kept on the dresser in her bedroom. The sky was cloudless with only the silhouette of a single bird high up in the sky on the opposite side of Grandpa. There he was with his heavy eyebrows, wide nose with just a slight bump on the top, moustache, lower lip, and chin that dropped into a saggy neckline. And I told her that I was going to paint that rock someday.”

  “How long was it before you actually painted it?”

  “More than sixteen years. I went home that day when I was five and drew it on a piece of paper and gave it to Grand. She still has it somewhere.”

  “It’s quite a formation,” he said.

  It rose up out of the floor of the canyon like a huge ocher-colored sandcastle with a sloped side at the back where a cautious climber could make his way to the ledge. The top flattened out with a small mesa, barely big enough for a man or a dog to sit on. At the back of the floor it looked as if someone had haphazardly set a chimney stack down.

  She had sold a dozen or more paintings of the rock, changing the subtle cuts and erosions to suit whatever theme she put into the picture. Her highest-selling piece had been a profile of an Indian chief cut into the top layer. And then she’d painted the chief sitting on the ledge looking out over his world, meditating about the changes that were coming to his people.

  Now snow hid in the deep shadows. The sun had melted most of the white cap from the top, but icicles hung from the edges like those hanging from the roof of the back porch at the house and bunkhouse.