A Gift to You

by Patricia Scanlan

  ‘Denise, that day has arrived! Deal with it,’ Magdalena teased. ‘Besides, it’s Christmas Eve, I’ve got chores to do.’

  ‘And I’ll have to leave in another ten minutes. I’ve to pick Finn up from the crèche,’ Sally remarked.

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake! You married women are all the same. You only think of yourselves. What about us poor singletons that need to be entertained and amused? No wonder Dolores turned out the way she did. She probably had friends like you . . .’ Denise complained. ‘Who’s going to pour me into a taxi? I’d like to know.’

  ‘Go up and wipe Dolores’s eye with George. He’ll look after you,’ Sally suggested wickedly.

  ‘Bioch, is there no end to your nastiness? Go home and leave me all alone.’ Denise stood up to let her friend out.

  ‘The best of luck, Denise.’ Magdalena laughed, as she hugged her, before wishing the rest of her work mates a Happy Christmas with promises to meet early in the New Year before the baby was born.

  It had been a relief to leave the noise and the stuffiness of the pub and breathe in the biting-cold blustery air. The pavements were so crowded with last-minute shoppers, she couldn’t face the trek to Tara Street to catch the Dart so, when unexpectedly, she saw a taxi with the yellow light on, she flagged it down impulsively and waddled towards it, puffing slightly as she hauled her bulk into the backseat. ‘Tara Street Dart Station,’ she said politely, feeling snugly cocooned in the soft leather seat listening to Bing Crosby croon White Christmas, while outside on the pavements, shoppers trudged to and fro, laden with carrier bags, and revellers congregated in little knots, forcing pedestrians onto the street to sidestep them. The taxi ride was a little Christmas gift for her, Magdalena decided, damping down her feelings of guilt, utterly relieved she didn’t have to face the walk along the windswept quays to the Dart.

  The commuter train, when she finally boarded, was jam-packed with shoppers and workers getting off early for Christmas and she’d had to stand, although one frail old lady had offered her a seat. Three men had been sitting in the seats opposite and beside her and not one of them had even looked in Magdalena’s direction. Equality didn’t mean goodbye to good manners, she thought crossly, as she graciously refused the elderly woman’s kind offer, hoping that a seat would become vacant at Connolly. She wasn’t that lucky and her hip was throbbing as the train lurched out of Connolly towards Clontarf.

  She wondered whether Michael would give up his seat to a pregnant woman. She must ask him, she mused, as the train swayed into Killester and a seat finally became vacant. The second-next stop was hers. Dusk was settling silently, softly onto the city, and the glow from lights on Christmas trees grew brighter, spilling out through windows onto suburban gardens; some long and narrow, others little square postage stamps, most neatly tended, a few higgledy-piggledy with strewn rubbish and household junk. As she sat staring into peoples’ homes for fleeting seconds while the train cruised towards the next station, and watched women in their kitchens preparing for seasonal feasts, Magdalena felt the unwelcome shroud of loneliness hovering again, ready to envelop her, should she allow it. Don’t think about it, she chided, as they passed a garden festooned with twinkling lights strung along the hedges and trees, and a massive Santa atop the chimney.

  ‘Oh, Mammy, look at that!’ a child in the opposite seat cried excitedly, nose pressed against the cold windowpane, agog! In a few years’ time, her own child would be old enough to share in the excitement of Christmas and an unexpected feeling of joy and anticipation suffused Magdalena, lifting her spirits.

  Her stop was less than ten minutes from home and as she walked down from the station towards the seafront, she inhaled the salt-laden air appreciatively. She loved living so close to the sea. That was one of the big plusses of living in Dublin. The sea and the countryside were so close to the city. Escape from noise and traffic was always possible. She turned into the small secluded cul-de-sac and felt another sudden surge of loneliness. The twilight was deepening and her neighbours’ windows shone with festive iridescence, while her own house was dark and unwelcoming. The first house she passed had lights twined about the undressed branches of a cherry tree, and she thought of home and how her father would have twinkling lights on the hedgerow that led to the farmhouse where she had grown up. Magdalena swallowed hard. She would not cry, she told herself fiercely. She was a very lucky young woman with so much in her life. She would focus on that.

  She walked up her garden path. Even though the car was parked out at the front, there was no one at home. Her husband also used the Dart to get to work. She’d got a text from him on the train to say he would be home around six. That had made her grumpy. It was Christmas Eve; she had left the work drinks party early, and he could make more of an effort sometimes, she thought crossly. She’d need to get the clothes in off the line so they wouldn’t get too damp, then she would turn on the Christmas tree lights and make herself a cup of tea before getting busy in the kitchen.

  A welcoming rush of warmth enveloped her when she let herself in; the central heating had a time switch, and the house was cosy after the chill evening air. But Michel had not set the alarm. He was so absent-minded sometimes. He’d probably forgotten to hang out the washing too. Magdalena sniffed. Was she imagining it, or was there a whiff of something cooking? They had decided to follow the Polish tradition of no cooking on Christmas Day and prepare the turkey dinner this evening. Had Michael come home at lunchtime and made the stuffing, and put the bird in to slow cook? She switched on the porch light and the hall lamps. She hated a dark house. The hall, decorated in mint-green and grey, led into a large kitchen-dining-room painted in cheery lemon, cream, and New England blue. She loved her bright, airy south-facing kitchen.

  Magdalena opened the kitchen door and dropped her bags of shopping on the floor. The aromas were mouthwatering. The light from the big oven showed a tinfoil-swaddled mound. What a good husband I have, she thought, turning on the main lights, feeling most guilty for her earlier crotchety thoughts about him.

  ‘Aww!’ she gave a little cry of delight when she walked further in and saw that Michael had gone to the trouble of setting the table Polish style, with a white tablecloth, and a sheaf of hay. He’d even got oplatek, a thin wafer made of flour and water that was a traditional part of the Wigilia feast.

  But why was the table set for so many? Magdalena frowned, perplexed, counting the place settings. Six. One was most likely the traditional vacant chair and place setting reserved for unexpected guests. That still left three other places for real guests.

  Had Michael invited some of their Polish friends to dinner to surprise her, so she wouldn’t feel too homesick? A rush of love for her thoughtful husband overwhelmed her and Magdalena burst into tears. She was blowing noisily into a tissue when she heard him call her name from the hall. ‘Oh, Michael! You are so good to me.’ She turned and flung her arms around him. ‘You’re so, so good to me,’ she hiccupped. ‘Who’s coming? Did you invite Gabriela and Wiktor, and Marta?’

  ‘How did you guess? I didn’t want you to be lonely.’ Her husband smiled down at her, his blue eyes glinting with love and amusement. ‘They’re hiding in the lounge. We wanted to surprise you. Come in and say hello.’

  ‘They’re here already? Oh, my goodness. I bought roast potatoes and vegetables in M&S. I’d better put them in the oven,’ Magdalena said, suddenly feeling flustered, shrugging out of her coat and laying it on a chair.

  ‘Stay calm, all taken care of,’ her husband said reassuringly. ‘Come and say hello first then we can organize ourselves.’ He dropped an arm around her shoulder and they walked through the dining room into the lounge where two women and a man stood beaming with delight.

  But it wasn’t Gabriela, Wiktor and Marta that greeted her. When her parents and sister launched themselves upon Magdalena with cries of joy, they were echoed by her own.

  ‘Oh, my God! Oh, my God! I don’t believe this!’ she exclaimed, then, when the hugging and kissing were over
, enquired ‘How? When?’

  ‘When Michael found out you were expecting a baby, he asked would we come to visit for Christmas, even though we will be coming over also when the baby is born. He paid for our tickets and said it was a gift for you. How could we refuse?’ Her mother wiped the tears from her eyes.

  ‘I didn’t have to spend a fortune,’ Michael explained, grinning, ‘because I booked them eight months ago and I got a good deal. I took today off work, picked them up from the airport and Zuzanna and Karolina have been busy in the kitchen since they arrived.’

  ‘And I blessed the garden and hung up the mistletoe,’ her father added, chuckling, ‘and made sure all the lights were out, and kept these women quiet when I spied you coming up the road.’

  ‘I just can’t believe it!’ Magdalena exclaimed, happier than she had ever been. What a joyful Christmas this was turning into.

  ‘Believe it! With all my love, Happy Christmas, Magdalena,’ Michael said, bending down to kiss his beloved wife, his hand resting tenderly on her bump as their child gave a vigorous kick that made them smile at each other with utter delight.

  Back Where I Belong

  It’s a very different Christmas this year, that’s for sure, and I’m absolutely thrilled with myself. I’m a Christmas Angel and I’m back on top of the Christmas tree! For the last few years, I’ve languished in a cardboard box under the stairs, while Madame Saundra (plain ordinary Sandra to you and me, check out the birth-cert.) went minimalist and spent a fortune on her ‘themed’ Christmas trees.

  I don’t mean to sound bitter and twisted, it’s not very angelic, I admit, but I’d been the angel on top of the Christmas tree in Sunnymede Cottage for fifty years and I loved it.

  I was always very happy when Lillian, Saundra’s grandmother, would take me out of the soft, creamy tissue paper she folded me in each year, and hand me to Matthew, her husband, who would place me very gently on top of the tree.

  I adored Matthew; he was the most gorgeous man, and I don’t mean just physically. He was a quiet, reserved, hardworking farmer, who was a great husband, father and neighbour. He was utterly kind. He’d keep an eye on the elderly widow across the field and would do bits and pieces around her house for her in the most unobtrusive way. ‘A little help is better than a lot of sympathy,’ was Matthew’s motto.

  Lillian adored him. He had a terrific sense of humour and their marriage was rock solid and, for the most part, full of joy and laughter. They didn’t have much money but they always had a warm house and good food on the table and what they had they shared with family and neighbours.

  I was the first Christmas decoration they bought the year they were married. I always remember it was the 8 December, the Holy Day when country people used to come to Dublin to do their Christmas shopping. I knew they were from the country by their accents. Soft, rolling vowels, compared to the more strident distinctive Dublin twang. I was sitting on a shelf, as proud as punch, in a tizzy of anticipation, hoping against hope that someone would pick me up and buy me and bring me home to do the job I was created to do. A Christmas Angel isn’t like a Guardian Angel. I didn’t have to ‘mind and guard and rule and guide’. My job was to radiate joy and goodwill and peace and serenity as much as I could, for the Christmas Season.

  I wondered what sort of a home I’d go to. Would there be children? Would they be careful with me? There was always the danger of getting broken. But if you went to a good home and were taken care of, you could last a long time. That was what I wanted. To last a long time with a family who would take care of me, a family I would get to know and love, a family I would be with for generations. It was the dream of every Christmas Angel.

  I’d been picked up and put down a few times. It was nerve-wracking. I’d liked the first lady who picked me up, an elderly woman with white hair, and a kind face. ‘Isn’t she a lovely little Angel?’ she said to her granddaughter. ‘If I had the money I’d buy her, but your mammy would give out to me for spending my money on gewgaws.’ I didn’t like the sound of the mammy.

  My friend, Angelica, was bought the day after we were placed side by side on our shelf. A thin, middle-aged woman with short hair and a pinched look about her, picked her up, gave her a cursory look and handed her to the shop assistant. ‘Good luck, Angelica,’ I said. We could communicate telepathically.

  ‘Thanks, Angelina.’ She gave me a little wave and I could sense her nervous excitement as the woman handed over the money – two and six – and the assistant placed it into the tube and it rattled along to the cashier. Things have changed a lot since those days – every so often I gad off to Dublin, once Christmas is over of course. I leave my little glass body and fly free. Anyway, it was just before closing time the following day and I was lonely for Angelica and wondering how she was getting on, when I heard a girl say, ‘Ah, Matthew, look! Isn’t she gorgeous? Let’s buy her for the tree.’ I looked up and saw a young woman in her mid-twenties, with long auburn hair and big hazel eyes, wearing a black coat with a wide belt, looking like a young Rita Hayworth. I still think the Forties and Fifties had the most stylish and elegant clothes. I love looking at the old black-and-white films they show in the afternoons around Christmas time, but I digress.

  ‘We’d better buy it quick, Lillian, if we want to get to Amien’s Street to catch the early train back,’ the young man said. He was a dish. Tall, broad-shouldered, with chestnut hair and blue eyes fringed by long black lashes a woman would die for. ‘I’ll buy it,’ he said, taking a ten-shilling note from his wallet. ‘A gift for you.’

  ‘Oh, Matthew, I’ll treasure her always,’ the girl said, tucking her arm into his, and I could see she was mad about him. I felt ecstatically happy as I was neatly wrapped and placed in a Clery’s bag and handed to my new owner. At last! I’d found my family and they had found me.

  The city was brimming with pre-Christmas excitement. Couples embraced under the big clock as we left the department store. Carol singers sang enthusiastically, the shop windows shone with festive glitz and the trees, festooned with lights, sparkled and twinkled like the diamonds in Weir’s window. The frosty chill turned breath white and reddened cheeks and noses as Lillian, Matthew and I, swinging in my bag, hurried along Talbot Street, weaving in and out of the crowds before running up the steps of the packed train station.

  I was bursting with excitement as they made their way through the carriages, laden with cheery bags from all the big stores, Clery’s, Arnotts, Boyers and Roches. They found two empty seats and moments later the whistle blew, the doors were slammed shut and we clickity-clacked our way out of Amien’s Street, crossed the Liffey, and headed south to my new home, a neat little cottage in a village called Riverside, not far from Brittas Bay.

  How proud and happy I was that Christmas Eve, two weeks later, when Matthew reached up and gently placed me on top of their Christmas tree as the fire blazed up the chimney and the aroma of pudding wafted around the cottage as it bubbled merrily on the stove. Outside, snow-flakes drifted down silently dressing the trees for Christmas morning, as my beloved owners kissed under the mistletoe and a slender red candle flickered and flamed in the window, and the house was filled with love and joy as they celebrated their first Christmas together in their own home.

  It brings a lump to my throat when I remember Lillian and Matthew. They were a couple whose love remained steadfast through thick and thin, and a couple who would have been horrified had they lived to see what had become of their lovely home, and the way their granddaughter, Sandra aka Saundra had turned out.

  A demanding young madam from the minute she was born to Rebecca, Matthew and Lillian’s only child, Sandra grew up to have notions about herself and became what Lillian would have described as ‘a right little consequence’.

  Rebecca left Riverside to study architecture in UCD where she met Hugh Sullivan, a part-time lecturer. They married, built up a successful architectural practice and, after two miscarriages, were ecstatic when their baby girl was born. She was a much loved ch
ild and wanted for nothing. As Sandra grew into her teens, visiting her grandparents in Riverside was not high on her list of priorities; she was far too interested in ‘chilling’ with her posh D4 friends. Spending Christmas in the country was ‘boring’ and ‘like totally uncool’, I heard her rant to Rebecca one Christmas day as they had a spat in the sitting room while Lillian and Matthew, now elderly and afflicted by the ailments of cruel ageing, served up the dinner in the kitchen.

  That was the last Christmas my beloveds were together. And it was my last Christmas on top of the tree. Matthew had a heart attack the following March as he lifted a bag of feed off the tractor, and Lillian, heartbroken, went to her husband, and our glorious Creator five months later.

  For the next few years, I languished in my box under the stairs. Every so often, Rebecca and Hugh would come to visit and heat the house and do a spot of painting but they never spent Christmas there. Sandra became ‘Saundra’ and married a hotshot financial whizz kid, Theo Carr, in Italy, in a wedding that cost an arm and a leg. It wouldn’t have been Lillian and Matthew’s cup of tea. It was all designer dresses, a wedding-gift list in BT’s and wedding planners. I could just imagine Lillian saying, ‘It was far from wedding planners and gift lists she was reared.’

  Then, one sunny spring day, I heard the sound of tyres crunching on gravel and minutes later Saundra’s D4 accent broke the silence, and a waft of Poison filled the air. I heard her say, ‘We could knock the wall between the kitchen and the dining room and make it open plan, and we could knock the wall down that faces south and have it totally glass . . .’ and my heart sank.